There are certain books that I return to.  I can’t really help it.  There is something about the way they are crafted, the voice that speaks from the pages, or perhaps the world within that I can’t ever completely walk away from.  Like an old friend or an addicting lover, I am drawn to them over and over.  One of those is Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.  It is so potent, so penetrating.  The contrast of raw emotion against spiritual depravity, ladled thick with cutting social commentaries that expose the evils of all outcomes and trap a man between equally undesirable choices…  It defines the human societal experience and challenges conformity, and it is positively brilliant.

When I set out to write the story, I had several goals.  I wanted to create something that was beautiful to envision and engrossing to read, that felt adventurous and “escapist,” but that was also relevant and believable.  I wanted to create a perspective future that was founded in current reality, one that would paint a picture of tomorrow by layering the logically developed consequences of today’s social, political, and environmental issues with pure fiction.

Of course, there is no such thing as pure fiction.  All fiction is based in some kind of reality.  Even in high fantasy, characters experience emotion – something derived from the human experience.  Every leaf connects to a root.  An anchor for every ship.

So, for my first novel, I looked at history to find my fiction.  History and the future are so closely related, despite our present day tendency to ignore such information, thus it made sense to me that history would define this fictionalized future… or futures, as the case may be.  In the fall of one empire, we see the foreshadowing of ruins to come.  In the succumbing of a people, we realize our own dangerous shortcomings.

Predicting the future, however, is a tough business.  I mean, there is, after all, the freewill variable.  People always have a choice, and if history has taught us anything it is that people choose to survive.  This is where I justify the story’s cultural divide, the other place, the other outcome.  In designing this counter, I was able to present an opposing set of values and its contrasting effects.  Not to mention, it – by its very nature – afforded me the opportunity for unbridled creativity and grounds for a tremendous visual experience.

Writing on a common theme (in this case: “two worlds colliding”) comes with unique challenges.  Avoiding cliques, staying on an original storyline, and sidestepping the traps of predictability turn the marathon of novel-writing into an obstacle “ultra” – 50 miles of author hell.  But when a story is demanding to be told, what can you do?…

…You check your laces and get limber.  Aldous did it, and that man was high as a kite.

Whether or not I have succeeded in my endeavor, to write the next standout in the wide and ever-expanding genre of speculative fiction, remains to be seen.  (Querying would be a good first step to finding out.)  Nonetheless, the mission was in earnest, and the inspiration was solid.  If I’m worth my salt as a wordsmith, I should make out ok.  I hope, in any case, that you’ll explore and enjoy what lands here – on my blog.