E722 - Andrey Medina - Screenwriter and Author - Sci-Fi storyteller who's fascinated by the questions that don't have easy answers

EPISODE 722 - Andrey Medina - Screenwriter and Author - Sci-Fi storyteller who's fascinated by the questions that don't have easy answers

In this episode, Dave sits down with author and screenwriter Andrey Medina to explore how imagination, movement, and instability as a child sparked a lifelong inner world that eventually led him to science fiction. Andrey explains that he was not so much “called” to authorship as he was found by science fiction itself, discovering in it a way to imagine alternatives to reality. Influences like Tolkien and Asimov did more than shape his taste; they fundamentally shaped how he thinks about worlds, systems, and psychohistory-level questions of how reality can be simulated and reimagined.

Andrey shares honest, practical advice for aspiring writers: finish something. Even a three to five page story matters, because reaching the end delivers pride and a deeper sense of catharsis as both writer and reader of your own work. He describes how completing a story can move you to tears or leave you breathless, and why that emotional climax is the best encouragement to keep going. From there, the second crucial step is to show your work to someone. Even if the reader does not fully connect, the simple fact that they speak your character’s name out loud proves that someone else now carries a piece of your imagination in their mind. He also talks about setting himself a week-long challenge during Covid to write a short story every day, emphasizing that even “crappy” stories hold fragments of gold worth revisiting later.

The conversation turns to craft and career. Andrey talks about mining small but powerful ideas from imperfect drafts, like a story of a boy who believes he is a robot and a father forced to deconstruct life into tiny, teachable truths. He discusses writing both for himself and for readers, consciously merging the stories he loves with clear commercial awareness, particularly in his young adult speculative dystopian thrillers. Drawing on his screenwriting background, he explains how thinking in scenes, locations, conflict, and emotional reaction shapes his novels, and how good dialogue functions as action rooted in motivation and emotional baggage.

Andrey introduces his series, beginning with The Conduit Trials, featuring Ren, a sixteen year old rebel in a totalitarian regime whose botched mission leads to a death sentence and a shocking offer to become a fighter pilot for the very system she opposes. He teases themes of moral ambiguity, propaganda, and critical thinking in a world where nothing is fully right or fully wrong, and shares how recent chaotic global events helped fuel the emotional “lava” behind the story. He wants readers to be fully immersed in Ren’s world while constantly asking themselves, “What would I do in her place?”

He also explains how listeners can currently read The Conduit Trials as a free ARC through BookSprout, join his mailing list via a link at the end of the book, and stay updated on future installments and launches.

Key takeaway: Finish something, no matter how small, and let it be seen. Completion gives you emotional proof that you are a storyteller, and every shared story, even an imperfect one, plants your imagined world in another person’s mind.

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