1) What is your name?

John Tynes

2) Please briefly describe your qualifications as an expert in apocalypse-themed fiction.

I've been working within this genre for some years now as a published author, editor, and the owner of a publishing house that has done work in the genre.

3) What do you foresee as the immediate marketing future of such fiction?

Genres thrive on novelty. A fresh approach, a new idea, or an old idea interpreted in the light of current events--these are what give a particular genre a future. In the case of apocalyptic fiction, we've seen novelties such as martian invasions, nuclear war, food crises, global pandemics, race wars, flesh-eating zombies, alien invasion, killer asteroids, and magical disasters all come and go. At present, the meme of man-made technological apocalypse--represented by the Y2K situation--is having its way with the mainstream media, but isn't spawning a healthy sub-genre of prose fiction (unless you count the prognostications of certain social commentators). I think any significant development in the immediate future of apocalyptic fiction is dependent on the emergence of some fresh novelty, and as such, it's impossible to predict.

4) What predictions would you make about the demand for apocalyptic fiction up to the year 2005?

While the success of new works is predicated on novelty, as I've mentioned, I do think it's safe to say that there will be interest in the reading public should such a novelty come along. Thoughts of apocalypse are a convenient short-hand for solving our personal problems; I don't have to deal with my embittered wife if the world is coming to an end, do I? We can just make some grand Spielbergian gesture, hugging before the fireball, without addressing our problems in a substantial fashion. Apocalypticism is as much escapist entertainment as pirate adventures or talking cat astronauts are.

5) What leads you to those conclusions?

The belief that humans are basically selfish, short-sighted creatures. What situation better rewards selfish short-sightedness than an apocalyptic milieu in which resources are scarce, survival is strictly of the fittest, and there is no real impetus to build communities because the world is coming to an end? Apocalypticism is a form of spiritual hedonism and narcissism in which an individual's struggle for survival is the only story still worth telling, but in a sense that murders any notion of heroism.

6) What trends do you see influencing the market demand?

People don't seem to be getting smarter or more selfless, so that's a plus. Clearly, a real-world apocalypse would put a damper on bookstore sales. Frankly, I think apocalypticism can exist as a viable genre under most any sustainable sociopolitical system or set of economic conditions. When times are good, apocalypticism reminds us that we're skirting a precipice. When times are bad, apocalypticism becomes prognostication.

Peter Lynch, the stock-market guru, tells an interesting story about the housing market. For years on end in the late 80s and early 90s, the financial press ran countless groupthink stories about how the housing market was heading into the toilet. It wasn't--the legitimate market indicators showed that no, people were buying lots of houses at affordable prices and there was no reason to think otherwise; real-estate companies were getting rich. *Unless* you were talking about fat-cat luxury houses costing $750,000+. At that level--the level at which the big national finance experts live--the housing market was not too good. They looked at their houses and their neighbor's houses, talked to their fat-cat colleagues, and determined from "common sense" that the housing market was screwed, when in fact it was booming and tremendously profitable.

Are you selfish and short-sighted? Apocalypse good!

7) What events would be most likely to create a demand for eschatological stories?

First off, I'd recommend against using the word "eschatological." People don't demand what they can't spell and don't know the meaning of. I've never seen "Eschatology" on a placard at Waldenbooks, but maybe I've been looking in the wrong parts of the store.

Seriously, though, it boils down to novelty. If some author comes up with an interesting or unusually well-executed take on apocalypticism, readers will respond.

That's sort of an unintentionally interesting statement, now that I think about it. It suggests that the shock of the new is required to attract interest in the end of the old.

8) Conversely, what events would exercise a chilling effect on this particular market?

As noted earlier, an actual apocalypse on Earth would wreak havoc on bookstores, as we'd be burning their contents for warmth.

A lack of novelty is likewise fatal. You don't read a lot of exploring-the-moon stories, do you? But turn the clock back thirty-plus years and you'll find a lot of them. If no one comes up with good apocalyptic ideas, the lack of novelty will shunt the readership into the abattoir of other genres or, god help them, literary fiction.