The Elements (Book I) - A Writers Journey II

So I had somewhat of a solid story line. I know what I wanted to say and initially where I wanted the story to take place. Initially I played around the idea with the setting being another planet entirely and then I decided against it. I am of the opinion that sometimes, particularly in science fiction & fantasy, (let me say this carefully) we want to push for social change in our uutopias & dystopias and this is a good thing especially when written well & not too "preachy" but sometimes, the fictional world we create can be so vast, so far out ther, so removed from or foreign to the reality of this world and science & physics...etc people get so caught up in that hype, that they "miss the forest for the trees" - this is probably more of an issue with fantasy than science fictio because Octavia Butler said it best - "Fantasy is totally wide open; all you really have to do is follow the rules you've set. But if you're writing about science, you have to first learn what you're writing about."Science Fiction must have valid science period.  I didnt want to make the error of getting so worked up with filling my fictional world with weird beings and characters with over the top magic powers. I had to keep myself in check because imagination is powerful and must be tamed sometimes. In the end, I found a great balance (at least I think so!)
 I was going through my packed closet and there were many things in there still packed in boxes. (sidebar: if you move and after a time you still have boxes and boxes of things, they are things you obviously do not need) I pick up a large rolled up, laminated map of the world. I unrolled it and I tool a dry erase marker and started writing the names of the people in my book, where they could live on the map - the Iscindri (water people) were written in in  the oceans of the world. I would use the planet Earth! There was no need to create an entire fictional planet and ecosystems, new atmospheres, moons...etc This novel would take place on the Earth of long ago. I hung up this map (which I still have - I have no idea where it came from by the way & my long term memory is quite remarkable if I may say so myself) I stared at it, erased, wrote the names & locations out again.  I came up with names for the god-like beings who would forced the humas into this symbiotic slavery - the Iscindri (water), the Firii (fire), the terranu (earth) & the Windu (wind) -these were names I just made up, I mean obviously the Terranu comes from the Latin noun "terra"which means land/earth but the others were pretty much off the top of my head. Then I had the god like beings (it would be a few months before I would simply call them "the elements")  who would convince the "Photari" (the people of the island) to use thir knowledge of microbes to "ïnfect" the people with people with a bacteria to force them into the symbiosis. The Microbes would live inside the bodies of the people (still seperated into four groups based on the four body systems) and they would cause the physical pain or death of 1 member of each of the four groups of people. The pain or death would be directly proportional to the level of biochemicals released by the brain whenever the emotion of anger is felt. I had it all figured out, or so I thought. Then I began to think that this was way too technical than it should be for a story taking place millions of years ago before or while the dinosaurs were alive (I hadn't decided if I'd included dinosaurs or not) Who would have this technical knowledge in my world? And at some point the humans would have to learn that the pain and/or deaths were caused by someone or something and it would be to incredible to have them believe that "the gods"had done this to them. I mean I could have found a way to pull it off I think but why put myself through all of that? Then I said well the god-like beings and the Photari could be from another planet and of course be light years ahead of the humans of the earth as far as knowledge and technology. They would know that the people were too primitive to be told what was done to them technically so they could blame it on the gods of their indigenous religions/spirituality. It could work! But then I thought ok so these early people would need to be a bit primitive and kind of intellectually "way behind the times" witht hat said these people would need to have a race and I would want to represent them with the real people of the Earth - that presented a problem because inevitably, some modern day homo sapiens would be offended and I would seriously flirt with stereotypes of early indigenous people of the planet - even if I was wrong I didnt want the worry of this to bother me. As a heavy thinker I go through such a mental process when I write - maybe more than the average person, but thats me.  Either way, I made the decision to scratch that because it wasn't good enough and I was uncomfortable with it. Then I said, "forget it"- I can't write genre fiction let me go back to literary fiction. I put the story down - then there was work, school, the daily drama of life. A week became a month, a month became 6 months, 6 months became a year. If I am honest with myself back then I was somewhat of a lazy writer. I wished that thoughts would somehow telepathically leave my mind & hot the page. Then I'd get an editor to clean it up, an agent would take it & I'd sell a million copies & live happily ever after.  Those of you who are starving artists know exactly what I am talking about.    

Writing great fiction is work. Its easier said than done and yet not as difficult as some of us make it. Its not for everyone. Everyone wants to write the great American novel including myself & most who want to write will not. (if you're not American take out the American and fill in the space with where you are from) I picked up my mental pen again, opened the file on my computer labeled One Nation and brainstormed yet again. I kept the general themes and threw away what I had written so far - I hated it and needed to clean it up. I cannot count on both hands and feet the number of re-writes I did. Then I gave up and decided it was not for me so many times! Every other month or so I would pick the pen up again and add to what I had written - it was really a mess for a while. Then finally one day I picked up the map & I decided on a setting - everything would take place on Pangea - the supercontinent that existed before the contiinental divide but I couldnt call it Pangea (or didnt want to rather) but I said I'll start writing again and figure that out later.  After eight years of back and forth, sometimes writing, sometimes not I finally dis an outlind and basic story plot then did the proper research that one must do before writing a science fiction novel. I re--familiarized myself heavily with symbiosis, Pangea, the continental divide, plate tectonics...etc and then I sat down & did detailed character analysis, decided what indigenous cultures I wanted to base my fictional characters from & studied them heavily, learned some of the languages, looked for & received help when I needed it (I must say when speaking with universities in Ghana, Zimbabwe-especially Zimbabwe, South Africa and a professor here in the US from Senegal originally I received so much help & resources - Is it me or are Africans someof the friendliest peope in the world? : ) I spoke with people from the Indigenous American communities - particularly the Dakota/Lakota tribes (most non indigenous americans are familiar with the name Sioux Indians or Plains Indians) once again, I received so much advice and resources. Tehn I went through the naming process - I wanted names that had real meanings. (I'll talk more about that next week) I decided to call the god-like beings"the "Elements" and the two of the tribes would be the Kishnu and the Lungi (now those came from my brainstorming but I liked them so I kept them) I got a map of Pangea and wrote on it where everyone lived.

One thing I will say is as a writer when you really get going and you're on a roll you gotta stay focused and stay on it. Write as much as you can because you can refer back to it when you experience writers block. I finally decided (one of my most important decisions) to take out the idea that a microbe would symbiotically link the people and have one of the elements do this (I won't say which or how I don't wanna give the story away) but this decision pushed me closer to the fantasy genre than science fiction and I was ok with that. The best thing I love about my novels is the interactions between the humans and nature - the elements. After all, we are in a very real symbiosis with water, wind, fire & the wind - we need all four. I once was in a dicussion at work & we were discussing conservation & the ozone layer & the greenhouse effect. A co-worker said in response to something I said, "Ok Talitha, so when is all of that gonna take place like 30, 50 or 100 years from now? I won't even be alive then..."  I looked at him (he was older than me) I said, " How many lines of posterity do you have already?" He said that he was (unfortunately) already a great grandfather..I touched his shoulder and said, "yes, you will be alive then...you are alive then" We all in the human race, are alive then...

Journey of a Writer

Back in March 2003 I was sitting on a sofa  in my tiny yet cozy apartment in Marietta, Ga watching the television. The local news was on and although I generally don't watch the news (its so depressing sometimes), this time I paid close attention. The president (George W. Bush) along with Congress were sending troops into Iraq & thus, war had begun. I thought of all of the young soldiers who would go to Iraq to fight for our country, and also how many of them would not return, or would return never the same. Suddenly, an idea came into my head that I wanted to write about war. I had no idea how I would do it, but that was what I definitely wanted to write about. I had read many novels in which war occured and others where war was the major theme and I wanted to take the same topic and somehow treat it differently. Most if not all novels abour war  created empathy in the reader by exposing the bloodiness of battle and the carnage. This is very effective for most but I didnt want most of the human audience I wanted all (many have become desensitized to direct  violence through various mediums unfortunately), and so my quest began. At the time I was unemployed, clinically depressed and was busy writing a coming of age story about a young black woman battling depression. I had named it, The Autobiography of Jane Doe since I had taken many events from my own life and some of my actual journal entries and inserted them into this book. I came up with the Jane Doe portion of the title because although it was largely my own story, I was neither famous nor well-known in any way and therefore I was a "Jane Doe"or Everywoman. I became so obsessed with writing about war in some unique and different way that I soon put aside TAOJD and began brainstorming this new "war book" as I initially referred to it. I brainstormed for a couple of months and finally I knew where to begin my thinking process around the plot & philosophy of this "war book". My mind traveled back to the days of high school and college where I had studied ecology and organisms. I particularly reflected back on what I had learned about symbiotic relationships and even more specifically, the symbiotic relationships mutualism (the way two organisms biologically interact where each individual benefits) and parasitism (a type of symbiotic relationship between organisms of different species where one organism, the parasite, benefits at the expense of the other, the host). I went back and dusted off old text & reference books on my shelf) and reviewed the material and refreshed my knowledge of examples in nature of both symbiotic relationships. My fascination was renewed and I began to wonder if humans, physiologically linked to one another through major & vital body systems by another organism, would voluntarily be linked harmoniously -philosophically & socially in order to maintain biological life for the whole. Emotion is the complex psychophysiological experience of an individual's state of mind as interacting with biochemical (internal) and environmental (external) influences. Anger is one such emotion and is an emotion related to one's psychological interpretation of having been offended, wronged or denied and a tendency to undo that by retaliation. Humans, throughout our collective history have chosen violence and large-scale wars to resolve & retaliate these feelings of wrongdoing and conflicts. #1 What if an organism such as a bacteria or virus species when introduced (purposely in The Elements) into a human host could somehow link all of the humans physiologically. #2 What if said organism directly reproduced or relied on the very biochemicals released by the human brain during an emotion such as anger and caused the harm of or death of a number of individuals who are a part of the biological whole? #3 Would man, after realizing the physiolocial linkage as well as the cause and the implications (no violent emotions=physical life of the whole) acquiesce to the mutualistic relationship between all members of his species and live peacefully together despite differences? or would mankind be ruled by their violent emotions and therefore face extinction?  This was the essence of my brainstorming and I had no choice but to explore my own curiosity and quest to demonstrate that a peaceful existence is vital and possible for all of us. Writing fiction became my highest priority because the imagination allows us to experiment with ideas that could (or should rather) not be explored with real humans in real life . The latter idea is what scientists do in laboratories everyday - hypothesize, experiment, data, conclusions, applications. The writer of fiction, namely science fiction, can do the same things with his or her pen, answering the "what ifs" without bringing harm to living species. Unfortunately, human history is filled with examples of inhumane "human experiments" whose results were disastrous. Initially, I called my "war book" Una Gentis (latin for One Nation/People) since my fictional tribes would be physiologically linked and literally, One people. I came up with the idea that once exposed to the microorganism, four random groups (physiologically) would be formed, seperated by which body system their microorganism controlled when the individual became angry. There was the Cardiogas (the cardiovascular system), The Nervanu (the nervous system), The Resprii (the respiratory system) and the Immuni (the immune system) - while writing this I have to laugh at those early ideas which seem so silly but you have to begin somewhere with an idea. I thought of those soldiers on the news being deployed.  I thought of their mothers and children and siblings. They had wives and daughters to escort to dinner parties and dances, sons to play baseball with and they were going to a place with weapons and quite likely, their deaths. I imagined the faces of the mothers, fathers, children and neighbors of the communities they would invade. The amount of death and injury that would come to both sides saddened me and I vowed to finish my work, no matter how long it took and show humanity another possibility. Peace was that possibility and I wanted every last man, woman and child to stop and think that if peace can be maintained through coersion via biological linkage (physiological symbiosis) then mankind, being the highest and most intelligent of all living species, without a doubt had to have the ability and the will to live peacefullly, voluntarily. If we can be forced, we can volunteer. The Kishnu and Lungi in The Elements learn this very lesson as did I - their literary mother, and now I share this with the world.