Aug 11, 2016

I want to take a break from all the annoying fundraising and just talk about the book for a minute, specifically about the main character Lucy. I’m sure some people will be asking themselves why my main character is a black woman when I am neither of those things. To be honest, the choice at the time was almost arbitrary. When I started writing the first draft, I’d just read N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms and had become aware of the absolute dearth of black writers and characters in genre fiction. I thought at the time it would be a challenge as a writer to find Lucy’s voice.

Public expectations can be strange sometimes. I could have written a story about a sentient gelatinous slime monster and no one would have raised an eyebrow. But a female person of color is somehow more problematic and unbelievable, at least to a certain segment of the audience. It challenges the middle-aged white male hero expectation that has been around since the early days of pulp novels, a time before feminism when racism was the de facto norm in many places.

To be clear, this is a novel about a woman who is black, and not a black woman’s story. The latter is not something I could or should write, because it’s important that story be told from her perspective and experience. While I can imagine her struggle and empathize with her, I will never truly understand. Instead I’ve tried to write a more universally sympathetic character, someone who is human and relatable. Her outward appearance is thus only a secondary aspect of her character, but I hope that by making her a woman of color, it might in some small part help pave the way for greater diversity in the future.

Anyway, back to the novel. It’s hard to talk in anything but generalizations without spoiling the book, but maybe this will give you an idea where I’m coming from. Much of Lucy’s struggle is a search for inner strength. She begins as most of us do, a normal person muddling her way through life, a job, and relationships. As she is challenged from the outside by powerful and dangerous figures, she has to reevaluate her goals and decide what she wants from life. She finds it difficult to trust when so many have hidden agendas and nearly unlimited wealth to back them up, but she must make a choice between the various factions and soon. When the situation becomes literally life or death, she has to draw upon all her resources just to survive, but in the process she discovers what is truly important to her.

I hope to do more little insight pieces like this in the future. It’s far more interesting for both of us than just banging the “buy my book” drum over and over. Also, while I still have a few more excerpts to post, I don’t want to put the whole novel online so I need something else to write about. I may do a short story or two if I have time, maybe in this universe, maybe not. I’ll dive into the ideas folder and see what percolates to the surface. It’ll depend on how much time I have to spare and how many orders I can get. There’s still a long time until the funding period ends, but that’s enough for now. Until next time.

P.S. N.K. Jemisin did a Twitter rant on diversity shortly after I finished writing this. You can find the Storified version here.