Franz Austin V. De Mesa is a fiction writer with an unnatural appetite for horror, fantasy, and dystopian sci-fi stories. A certified anime and gaming enthusiast, he writes to explore the dark parts of humanity and indulge in his fascinations with the macabre, alternate timelines, and other what-if scenarios lurking in our world. For his undergraduate thesis, he wrote a collection of interactive short stories, which was awarded Best Thesis in Creative Writing. He is currently undertaking an MA in Creative Writing at the University of Santo Tomas. His story, IN(DE)CISION, was published in Philippine Genre Stories in May, 2023. 

Welcome back to Philippine Genre Stories, Franz! What have you been up to since we last chatted?  

A lot has happened since June 2023. For one thing, I graduated from UST as batch valedictorian of my college; I made a whole speech—which, in classic Creative Writing style, was workshopped by my professors before being approved; no pressure at all—and got congratulated by strangers in odd, wizard-like robes and hats, surrounded by loud music, bright lights, and thousands of students, parents, family members, and the whole University staff.  It was a nightmare for an introvert, though I guess it was also a dream. If anything, it was surreal. 

My thesis adviser, the late Dr. Jenny Ortuoste, also went up with me on the big stage to accept the Best Thesis Award. That was the first and last time I saw her in the flesh. Most of our consultations were held during the pandemic, so it was only Discord and Zoom calls, sometimes even just conversations over email. She said very little, perhaps because she knew that I was the type of writer that worked well when left to their own devices. Most of the time, when I presented her with my new stories, she would just go “This is good! This is great! No further comments.” And in just those few words, I felt validated and seen. She was a beacon of care and support for so many Thomasians and fellow writers. I could not have done any of it without her.

After graduating, I took a break of about three months: played video games, watched Netflix, and traveled to Osaka with my parents and siblings. I started looking for a job, which was a whole nightmare of its own. I eventually found one, a night-shift research job in a BPO company in Makati, which only lasted for about seven months before I found my current job as a work-from-home content analyst. It’s true that corporate life really changes you. It was the first time that I truly felt like an adult; weekdays seemed to never end while weekends burned too quickly, and friendships were reduced to a meeting once every two months. 

I also stopped writing (or even reading for that matter) for nearly a year since I adjusted myself for work. I guess that’s why I enrolled in graduate school to get that creative streak going again.

Definitely a lot. And thank you for being very open with us.  Ma’am Jenny, may she rest in peace, had helped many people and is indeed missed. And we’re glad you’re weathering through that tough transition to life after college. And doubly glad you held on to writing. 

Looking back, what was your takeaway from publishing IN(DE)CISION?

I guess my biggest takeaway was knowing that every story will eventually find its home, so long as one keeps actively searching for it. As a niche, very wordy, and somewhat experimental writer, it can be difficult to find a magazine or anthology that matches my values, genre, and more importantly, my word count. Interactive fiction, especially, can become bloated when you present a lot of choices that can change the outcome of the story. I have more interactive stories that have yet to find a home because the shortest one is more than 11,000 words, so a future plan is to compile them into a collection. 

I suppose this is why I am thankful for rare platforms like PGS that cater to certain niches of literature, with a very accommodating word limit for writers like me. With that said, another takeaway is maybe taking a break from writing interactive stories for a while; they’re too long and they take too long.

We’ll keep watch for that near-future compilation and it was a privilege to be a part of that journey. And what made you answer the call for the PGS submission this time? 

I had a story that was in need of a home, and I knew that it would be welcome in PGS.

Happy to give your new story a home! How did you start exploring the genre/s to begin with anyways? Were there specific books and authors that got you started? 

I started exploring the genre of dystopian future fiction through films and video games. Games like The Last of Us and Horizon Zero Dawn showed me a future where humanity was forced to relocate and adapt to smaller spaces because of some natural force. 

Similarly, films like The Hunger Games and V For Vendetta show us a man-made kind of dystopia where people in power oppress the masses, and suppress any kind of thought, idea, or emotion that incites rebellion or goes against the ideology of those in power. 

I owe a lot to George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four in shaping the kind of dystopian, cynical view I have of the future. I also read more horrific, hopeless accounts of what awaits us, such as short stories I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison and Ray Bradbury’s There Will Come Soft Rains. 

If there’s anyone to blame for the kind of cruel and tragic fate that I impose on my characters, it is them.

(Laughter). And what about Filipino-authored works, which ones do we blame for what you impose on your characters? 

One can argue that government corruption, police violence, extrajudicial killings, and the 2022 presidential elections are “Filipino-authored” works that heavily influence my writing. 

But I suppose that my foundation as a historically and politically aware writer came first from my interest in the works of Gina Apostol. I read Gun Dealer’s Daughter and Insurrecto during my first year in college, and the way in which her protagonists deal with conflicting perceptions of self—the struggles of being middle-class, privileged, and educated like myself—amidst the backdrop of historical events and turbulent acts of violence and terrorism, was very relatable. The experimental nature of her works was also something I picked up. 

When I started working on my thesis, I was able to read the works of Filipino science fictionists like Gregorio Brilliantes’ The Apollo Centennial and Pocholo Goitia’s An Introduction to the Luminescent. Sources like the Best of Philippine Speculative Fiction 2005-2010 (UP Press), Demons of the New Year (UP Press), and Tales of Enchantment and Fantasy (Milfores) also proved quite useful in informing my writing. 

Other experimental works that influenced me include Dean Alfar’s The Lorenzo Project Questionnaire from the Likhaan Journal, Eliza Victoria’s When I die, I want you to have all of my stuff posted online as an interactive fiction piece in philome.la and Victor Fernando R. Ocampo’s Play This Story: The Book of Red Shadows, a limited-time interactive story in Singapore.

Quite textured, your influences. And what about the published stories in Philippine Genre Stories, which have you found the most interesting so far (and why)?

I must admit that I have not read a lot of stories from PGS, but from the few that I have read, one that stands out to me is The Ocean Above Her by Victor Fernando Ocampo. I have always been a big fan of Ocampo as a literary researcher since his online catalogue of speculative fiction stories proved instrumental to completing my undergraduate thesis. I also mainly follow him for his writings on interactive fiction, but reading this story has made me an instant fan of him as a traditional writer as well. 

I love the blending of science fiction with ancient Philippine Mythology, the playfulness of giving far-future robots the names of ancient gods, and learning about the whole culture that surrounds this world where the protagonist Tala resides. It is inventive yet also grounded in Philippine history, showing not only how technology can evolve, but also how language and beliefs can develop in the distant future.

Onto your story: what specifically inspired you to write EMPTY ORCHESTRA?

When I was thinking of story ideas for my undergraduate thesis, one of them came to me in a strange image: a dark, haunting room with only light coming from a videoke machine that somehow displayed your memories, based on the song you chose. For a while, I placed this idea in the vault while I worked on my other stories that were being workshopped at the time. 

During my last semester as an undergraduate student, I took a course titled Creative Writing and the Self under Dr. Chuckberry Pascual. The various conflicting ideas of identity that came from that course, combined with the bitterness I felt living in a country ruled by yet another Marcos, eventually led me to fleshing out that story idea into a dystopian future fiction piece.

When it comes to the form, suffice to say that my gimmick isn’t quite original. When I was in junior high school, I borrowed a friend’s copy of Playlist for the Dead by Michelle Falkoff; it was the lesser-known novel about suicide which had a gimmick at the time, the other being 13 Reasons Why. 

Similar to my story, Playlist For the Dead used song titles for chapter names to convey a certain mood, tone, and premonition of what the chapter would be about. The songs were also integral and were diegetic to the narrative. 

It was an enjoyable, sort of meta interaction that was very new to me at the time, to listen to the song first before reading the actual chapter. You could say that I stole this idea from Falkoff to use in my story, but I would like to think that I put my own spin at it by using more Gen-Z era songs and throwing in a few Pinoy indie songs.

So which came easy and hard in writing this story? 

The easier and more enjoyable aspect of writing this story was choosing which songs to place for each chapter. 

The harder aspect was in the actual writing, more specifically, how do you condense a whole person’s life journey and at the same time, establish a believable, realistic dystopian future society and the kind of culture that surrounds it—all into a few select memories? 

Most of the stories I wrote before had a traditional formula to them: focusing on a singular instance in a character’s life where they must make a moral, high-stakes choice that will significantly impact their identity and life thereafter, perhaps with a couple of flashbacks thrown in there. 

However, Empty Orchestra focuses on various significant memories in particular, as the central character looks back on the life she had led. It was certainly difficult to figure out what to include and what to exclude in each memory, how each memory adds to the greater narrative, and how to sequence these memories to achieve the most cathartic experience. On top of that, how to achieve the balance in worldbuilding descriptions and emotional tension. I hope that my attempt for this story was successful.

What was different or the same between writing the two stories?

I think the big difference between In(de)cision and Empty Orchestra is the form. The former is a surreal interactive story while the latter is a dystopian, traditionally-read story. And yet, at the same time, one can argue that both are interactive since Empty Orchestra also encourages and incentivizes you to search up each song and give it a listen yourself. Both stories also had their own challenges. 

For In(de)cision, it was difficult because it was very personal to me, and a certain kind of restraint and intention in language was necessary to write from a prepubescent boy’s perspective. On the other hand, for Empty Orchestra, I could not solely rely on my own perspective and experience since the main character is a woman hardened by the scars of war, and I have no experience of either being a woman or going to war. Both stories are definitely horrific in their own right; both say something about Philippine culture and history, but while one focuses on the contemplation and consequences of choice, the other focuses on the acceptance of already made choices. 

I encourage readers to give them both a read and form their own insights.

Is there a next project that you’re already working on? 

For my thesis in MA Creative Writing, I plan to write a collection of interconnected dark fantasy stories that take place within the same setting. In this world, a secret society of sorcerers can be found hidden under plain sight all over the Philippines, with established sorcery schools and their own form of government, as well as a unique culture, tradition, and history that is borne from staying hidden amidst normal, unaware humans. 

This collection will be the predecessor of a bigger project that I plan to develop, making it a sort of testing ground to explore the rules of the magic system and the various aspects of this shared world. So far, I have written two of these stories, and I hope that I will also find a home for them soon.

Another one to look out for from you! As a writer, and taking masters in creative writing at that, what new tips can you share with aspiring storytellers out there?

While I am in no way an authority on how a person should write, I suppose that these are tips that I, myself, found really useful and practice when writing:

Keep Consuming Stories. I am of the opinion that you don’t necessarily need to read in order to be a good writer, but what is necessary is to keep consuming stories—whether its films, TV series, video games, anime, K-dramas, news articles, Wikipedia, gossip from friends and family—stories come in all forms, shapes and sizes. I suppose the reason that I’m currently writing fantasy stories right now is because that’s what I’ve been consuming lately. Seriously, we have games like Metaphor Re:Fantazio, Persona 3 Reload, Black Myth Wukong, and Elden Ring, along with anime like Frieren, Solo Leveling, My Happy Marriage, Bleach, Black Clover, and Re:Zero trending right now. It is a great time to be a fantasy writer.

Write what you like. Seriously, if you don’t have an interest at all in the kind of story that you’re making, then what will drive you to finish it? A well-written story, no matter how mundane or fantastic its subject matter, will always be worth reading. Though, of course, it would also help to expand your tastes in literature and what you like, so you can expand what you can write.

Write what you don’t know. While incorporating one’s own experiences to the text is important, if your character is a doctor, a lawyer, a detective, or any kind of professional—your own experience will rarely matter that much. Fiction, and any kind of writing for that matter, is meant to explore the unknown and the yet to be discovered, or to defamiliarize and reinterpret what is already known. Do not be afraid to challenge yourself, or to create constraints and limitations to spark that creativity within you. When you write what you don’t know, it compels you to do research, to unearth new knowledge, and to look into the experiences of others apart from yourself. Sometimes, writers are afraid to write from the perspective of, say, a farmer or a laborer, or someone of a different gender—and certainly, there are some ethical concerns regarding this—but this can be remedied when you have good intentions and do your due diligence. You cannot just stick to your own experience all the time. Read up on your topic, do your research, and try your best attempt at awakening your creativity.

Anything else that you’d like your current and future readers to know about you?

Apart from writing fiction, I am also interested in writing critical essays, creative nonfiction, and sometimes even short animated films. I hope that I will soon find a home for those pieces as well. Lastly, I think that every person should play these games at least once in their life: Signalis, Persona 3 (Reload, FES, or Portable), and Outer Wilds.

Thank you again, Franz, and it’s really good to have you back in 2025!