Thomas Wharton
As a child
I was born in Grande Prairie, Alberta, a northern oil and gas boom town. I spent part of my childhood in Jasper, in the Canadian Rockies. I had what I would call a pretty good childhood. My parents made sure we had lots of books. But I grew up feeling like there was no one else who loved books as much as I did – I always felt like something of an outsider.
As an adult
I have lived in Grand Prairie, Jasper, Peace River, Calgary and Edmonton. All places in Alberta. I started writing stories when I was quite young – 8 or 9 years old probably. I would read a book and be inspired to try writing something like that myself. I studied and worked for several years in biological sciences, until I realized I was not happy, and I was not doing enough with the creative impulses I’d always had – for writing, drawing, painting, etc. So I went back to school to study English and creative writing. I took writing courses from several Alberta writers of note, including Greg Hollingshead, Rudy Wiebe, and Aritha van Herk. Now I teach creative writing at the university where I used to be a student.
As an artist
Although I’m married and have 3 kids (how did that happen?), I’m generally a solitary soul. I feel most myself when I’m alone in my study reading, writing and daydreaming. Generally I work for a couple of hours in the morning – this is the “churning it out” stage. After that I take a break and then, if I have time later in the day, I’ll do some less intensive work like taking notes or editing the rough “churned out” material. With a full-time teaching job, my writing time has been curtailed and so I’ve have to adapt by parcelling out my writing time more efficiently. This is painful because I’m a very inefficient, disorganized person. Right now I’m working on Books 2 and 3 of the Perilous Realm trilogy, and I’m excited about some of the unexpected directions the books are taking me in. This is one of the main reasons I write: to be surprised. I write because I want to read a book that no one else has written yet.
Things you didn't know about Thomas Wharton
- Fave colour: green
- Fave musical group: The Beatles
- I love comic books and superheroes, especially Green Lantern, Batman and Thor.
- I am a Buddhist and a vegetarian.
- I love my kids, but I get annoyed when I’m working on my writing and they’re standing at my shoulder asking me questions, like right now.
- Fave food: tofu fries
- I love hiking in the mountains. I like wolves, coyotes, ravens, and bears (from a distance).
- I ride my bicycle to work. Even in winter.
- Sometimes I wear costumes and pretend to be the characters in my books. This helps me get into the characters’ heads. For my fantasy trilogy, I have a medieval tunic, a cloak and a sword. My kids think I’m a complete nerd. I guess they’re right.
- As a kid I wanted to be a cartoonist. I had a comic strip in the college newspaper called “The Disenchanted Forest”.