Real Places, Fictional Places

Many of my stories are set, in part or whole, in Florida. This is not necessarily the ‘real’ Florida nor do they all visit the same fictional version of the state. Scenes in the Wilk novel ‘The Dictator’s Children,’ for example, do take place in the real Naples Florida. I attempted to keep the narrative and description historically accurate—the tale is set in 1948—but was willing to bend or invent as needed for the story.

It may be noted that the Women in the Sun novels, written under the pen name Sienna Santerre, are set in that same Naples but the details vary to fit a different fictional timeline. There are definite parallels between the two; indeed, I originally thought to tie the two series together but chose to go with a completely different vision of Naples. The decision to use the pen name brought a final division between the two.

My Shaper novels are set in a fictional Cully Beach Florida, a place that draws from a number of Atlantic coast towns but especially from Flagler Beach. It is not Flagler, however! It is Cully Beach and exists in its own fictional space. These novels are set in the same Florida as my novel ‘The Middle of Nowhere’ and a number of my short stories.

The Ruby of ‘Middle’ is somewhat loosely based on Steinhatchee Florida. Again, it is not Steinhatchee, nor are the neighboring towns the same, though they have resemblances. I ‘flipped’ a few of the locations there. The town of Genoa, from which some of my characters hail in this version of Florida, is pretty much a disguised Naples. But I also visit real places around the state in the stories—including White Springs to attend the Florida Folk Festival in the Cully Beach novel ‘Smoke.’

‘Asanas,’ the first (but I hope, not only) Tamarind novel, is set in yet another, different Florida. The town of Tamarind is completely fictional, though nearby Leawood is, in part, based on Englewood. But there is also something of Fort Myers Beach to it, and certainly other places I know. As with Ruby, I flipped some of the geography. Most of the places around it are real Florida locations; I invented nothing beyond the Tamarind area itself, aside from Karen’s ‘farm’ on an invented lake somewhere north of Sebring. There are a whole lot of lakes there! I will admit that Consonante Springs and its spa/hotel is loosely based on Bonita Springs, which is located quite a bit further south. And the Hot Dog Stand derives from a beach-side restaurant in faraway Keaton Beach.

I’ve done somewhat the same sorts of things in my novel set in southern Ohio, ‘These Remembered Hills.’ I’ve moved things about just a tad in the Hocking Hills region where the tale is set—not any towns or such, but the valley where the Fry farm is located. That is based on a very real place.

I am entirely likely to draw from a hodgepodge of remembered places and events when writing my stories, mixing them up and altering them to best fit. There is no need to stick strictly to the facts in a work of fiction, as long as the result is believable and consistent. Then the world we create is just as ‘real’ as that of our everyday lives.

Yet, if we name a real place and get some detail wrong, there will be those to pick at it. This is a pretty good argument in favor of changing the names. I’ve no doubt someone will see something in my versions of Naples that they think is not quite correct. I myself have found things in stories set there. Like getting the dry and rainy seasons reversed! If it doesn’t hurt the story, it’s no big deal, but major blunders can impact our willingness to believe.

Ultimately, any setting is fictional, no matter how closely it is modeled on reality. It comes from the author’s mind and it is for the author to make it seem real. Tamarind and Cully Beach must be places the reader can believe exist, places where they can live for a few hours. The same is true of ‘my’ Naples.

But the goal is not to make the reader see those places as I see them. It is to let them see as the characters see. That is the final step to making it real.

Novel-whatzit

I have never written a novelette. ‘So what?’ some might ask, or even, ‘What the heck is a novelette?’

A novelette is, in essence, a long short story. Any attempt to give an exact measurement of its length will be arbitrary but typically the form is considered to be over 7,500 words up to somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000. If one goes higher, it is likely to be a novella—that is, a short novel.

At this point, the longest short story I’ve ever written stands at 5,100 words. It is always possible I’ll turn out something longer one of these days. There isn’t as much of a market for the novelette as there is for work both longer and shorter, but it was a popular form at one time. Some of the great golden age speculative fiction came as novelettes, some of the best known stories of Howard and Lovecraft.

And the novelette has had its mainstream popularity. Some of Alice Monroe’s stories fit the category. Oh, there are undoubtedly loads I could list if I felt like researching!

Why do I define the novelette as a sort of short story? Because it typically has the same sort of focus on a single plot line. It comes from the same mindset; I much suspect that most who sat down and wrote a novelette were thinking ‘short story’ when they started. It grew to whatever length was needed to tell the story.

I will mention that one of my personal favorites is ‘The Man Who Would Be King’ by Rudyard Kipling, weighing in at a bit over 14,000 words—near the top limit. In honesty, it sometimes feels more like a novella, but the narrative is kept just sufficiently focused to justify the novelette name. It really is the sort of story that could have been inflated into a novel, had Kipling been so inclined. I am glad he wasn’t; I do not think it would have the same impact.

You, of course, are free to call it what you wish. So, you ask me now, ‘What is a novella?’ It is simply a short novel. How short is, again, arbitrary. It starts where the novelette lets off, down around 15 to 20,000 words and goes up to, traditionally, 35,000 or 40,000 words. I prefer the lower number, but some now set it higher, at 50,000.

Not so long ago 50,000 was regarded as a perfectly good length for a novel. And there is more than one bloated contemporary novel that might benefit from being cut back to something like that size.

Enough of my curmudgeonly opinions. I have written novellas (and I am not counting those novels that run between 40 and 50,000 words). The first section of my Donzalo’s Destiny is a self-standing novella of some 21,400 words. I added ten more sections to finish the epic, some more self-contained than others but each with its own unique arc.

A true stand alone novella is not something for which I have any plans. But then, plans do change and new ideas do come along.

I could name a bunch of famous novellas here. A few, anyway, such as ‘The Old Man and the Sea,’ ‘A Christmas Carol,’ or ‘Of Mice and Men.’ All fitted to the story that needed to be told and none the worse for being shorter than what some would consider a proper length for a novel.

Indeed, maybe the better for it.

Although I have a handful of published short stories, my focus tends to be on longer form fiction. My short stories, admittedly, have had a tendency to morph into chapters in novels. But I continue to dabble at them and could even turn out one of those in-between novelette/novella works one of these days. As always, the material will dictate the final form.

Spies

One point I am establishing in my ‘The Old Hand’ WIP novel is that there are two ‘enemy’ spy operations in Saigon with which my characters become involved, one Vietcong, with Russian assistance, and one Chinese. These two are working separately and, though they may cooperate on occasion, have their own agendas, often not knowing anything of each other’s operations.

To be sure, there was plenty more going on than just what I am including. None of that figures in the story, though it may be mentioned in passing. And there are the spooks on the American/Republic of Vietnam side, CIA and much more. I won’t be delving into them but do make note that my main protagonist, Wilk, has had a long history with American intelligence.

Or I should say he is one of two main protagonists. John Wilkins aka Jean Wilk has had the lead to himself in the previous two Wilk novels but here he shares equal billing with American reporter Mike Baines. I knew from the start I couldn’t tell the story just from one point of view. One main character would have been worn out trying to keep up with everything! I did consider including a third POV character for a brief while but soon realized two worked better. Mike was previously introduced in the novel ‘Wilk,’ where he interviews the elderly spy in the ‘flash forward’ scenes that frame the tale.

I’m chugging along after a fairly lengthy hiatus to attend to other chores. I’ll admit, I almost set the story aside to work on a different one, but it’s coming along now. That doesn’t mean I won’t do that yet, somewhere along the line. There is no schedule or deadline to concern me—and plenty of other ideas I can turn to. The only thing that is certain at the moment for this coming year is a new poetry collection, coming on April 21. That’s my birthday and I have resolved to release a collection on that date every year until I either run out of poems or kick the bucket. ‘Shallow Poet’ has already been put together, formatted and typeset, and is ready to go.

As for anything else, you’ll know when I do!

No News Is…

Since I got my Stephen Brooke website (stephenbrooke.com) established (but far from finished) and started up a personal blog (eggshellboats.com) where I hold forth on just about anything, I’ve not posted much here. This blog is essentially for news about my writing and there hasn’t been much!

I suppose I could write more about the world-building and that sort of thing. It probably belongs here as much as anywhere, though I do hope to have dedicated pages for that sort of thing somewhere. Maybe at the site, maybe at a separate location. Anyway, do know that I am writing, at least from time to time, working on the latest novel, producing the occasional poem, etc. Also, we (i.e me and Arachis Press) have completely updated all the books (those under my own name as well as those using pen names) with new typography.

Those books continue to be available in print ‘everywhere’ or directly from Arachis Press. The ebooks, however, are all now free downloads in EPUB and PDF formats from the AP site.

A Decade of Donzalo

This year, 2023, marks the tenth anniversary of the publication of my first fantasy novels, the four books that make up Donzalo’s Destiny. The first half (approximately) of the first book, ‘The Song of the Sword,’ was written as a more-or-less standalone novella and I followed that template for the rest of the continuing story though, admittedly, some of the sections stand on their own better than others.

This was not my first novel. I had previously turned out the mainstream Young Adult title, ‘The Middle of Nowhere.’ I still consider it a decent effort but I made more compromises than I preferred, and kept it rather conventional on the advice of publishing professionals. It was also the only book I wrote in longhand, before the advent of computers!

The Donzalo books are a bit self-consciously ‘literary.’ I’ve tamed that a tad in the work that has followed. There’s a fair amount of what is termed ‘free indirect style’ and shifts in tense as we go in and out of characters’ thoughts. I stand by all that and still use such devices, though perhaps with a little more circumspection now. I could say I got it out of my system; that may or may not be true, nor does it particularly matter.

Donzalo’s Destiny could be seen as one epic novel of over 200,000 words but I chose to publish in four shorter books. The tale revolves around young Donzalo Rosam, who remains a relatively static figure and certainly less interesting than some of the other characters. This is not to say he doesn’t grow, but he is a more down-to-earth sort, providing a stable center for the narrative. That narrative takes place in a world resembling, more than aught else, Central Europe of the Late Renaissance (the 16^th Century). The last thing I wanted to do was write another pseudo-medieval fantasy! So we have muskets and canons and wheel-lock pistols, and the incipient capitalism and nationalism of that era, the growth of centralized power and the weakening of the feudal system and economy.

Yes, I touch on these things in the story, though I don’t lecture on them. They add a certain reality. But the novels aren’t about that sort of thing. World building is only a means to an end, after all, and that end is to write a story that both entertains and makes one think. Think in the broad sense; I have no agendas to which I write, only questions that take my interest.

And I will point out that there is no ‘big bad’ villain, no world-threatening power. My primary antagonist (unless one counts the evil god who gives him the occasional assist) is a powerful but deluded—we might say mad—sorcerer who operates on a relatively small stage. I am far more interested in him as a character than as a danger (though he is certainly a danger to Donzalo).

The four Donzalo’s Destiny stories are, in order, ‘The Song of the Sword,’ ‘The Shadow of Asak,’ ‘The Sign of the Arrow,’ and ‘The Hand of the Sorcerer.’ All four are available in print from Arachis Press in newly typeset editions and distributed to most online booksellers (though it can sometimes take a while for the new print editions to show up everywhere). The ebooks are also at the Arachis Press site as free downloads in both EPUB and PDF formats.

I have written quite a few novels in the decade since they first appeared, some fantasy and some not. Among the most recent of these is ‘The Plain of Silver,’ the first book of Destiny’s Daughter, a sequel to the Donzalo epic. It too is out in a brand new edition.

Muscles

Once upon a time I wrote for fitness and bodybuilding magazines. This was mostly back in the Eighties through the early Thousands. I didn’t make a living from it—still had to have a day job (or a night job, much of the time)—but it did help ends meet. This was before I got my location recording business going, which sent me off in a different direction (getting onto the internet had a lot to do with all that).

I never, of course, got on with the Weider publications. They mostly used staff writers. Second tier magazines did buy my stuff, particularly the now-defunct MuscleMag International (which gave Weider a good run for its money for a while) and Natural Bodybuilding. I’m posting some cover shots for a few issues in which my work appeared. Note the woman draped over the muscle star on each; mustn’t let folks get a whiff of homosexuality!

Journalism of this sort was a good training ground. It gave me a foundation for when I turned to fiction. It can not be denied that my work still tends toward journalistic brevity and language (though also being a poet brings some other tools to the job). One stop along the way in my writing journey—I have some of the articles in my files and could probably work them up for some sort of publication. They definitely need revision—they might have been acceptable to the editors of those magazines but they seem amateurish to me now!

But there is little point in writing about that sort of thing now. Time has limits and other interests demand my attention. However, you may be sure that I still lift daily. Bodybuilding remains a central part of who I am.

What Were They Thinking?

I will never tell you what is going on in a character’s mind. Unless that character is the first person narrator and then, of course, they are likely to be a most unreliable source. They will tell what they think they are thinking, though their actual motives might be quite different. The same is largely true for a close third perspective.

As for what others might be thinking, we can only give the point-of-view character’s guess on it. Or the narrator’s feelings, if we go more or less omniscient. Trollope would do this; he would only suggest reasons for a character’s actions, when he chose (which he did from time to time) to break the fourth wall.

Aside from the point of view problems, I simply dislike attempting to psychoanalyze anyone. It tends to come off as simplistic and not truly believable. Moreover, such attempts at pop psychology are likely to become quickly dated. Better to let the reader figure things out!

MEF

MEF stands for Modern Epic Fantasy. Yes, I invented it. It also conveys my feelings about most of it. ‘Mef,’ I say, when perusing a book by Martin or Sanderson. If those ridiculous movie poster-style covers don’t keep me from opening it in the first place. I might say even worse things than ‘mef.’

But we won’t use those here. I don’t write MEFs. The closest approach would be the four books of Donzalo’s Destiny. Some might call them an epic, but they are not as expansive as most books with that label, nor is there the world-threatening evil one frequently finds in such novels. My fantasies are really every bit as character-driven as my mainstream work, and the magic and world-building is always secondary. Or tertiary, or some further remove.

Perhaps this is why I find myself writing more of that mainstream fiction these days. I don’t need fantasy to say what I want. This does not mean I do not enjoy it and its writing. And yes, the magic and world-building.

The truth is, despite all those novels I’ve churned out, I do consider myself first a poet. This does reflect in my prose; of this I am quite aware. I prefer the lean yet imaginative language of good poetry. I like metaphors and ambiguities. Unlike the typical plodding MEF!

People of Color in Exura (and my stories)

Quite a few of the characters in the stories that make up the Annals of Izan—both in the world of Exura and elsewhere in the infinite worlds—are ‘people of color.’ I’ll not speak now of gods and fay and such who might came in variety of hues, some not at all what we might consider normal. Rather, allow me to speak of the mortal humans of Exura, where most of the tales are set.

There are black people, or what most might call black. It should be noted at once that these are not of African descent (except in the sense we all are) but have Oceanic and Australoid ancestors. These passed from our world through the gate located somewhere in the vast South Pacific. Melanesians, Papuans, Aboriginal Australians—all found their way through in small numbers, as did other Oceanic folk. Needless to say, there was plenty of mixing. The folk I name the Baxac (or Bazu) are definitely a dark people. They are also a people who spread widely. The mercenary general Ildor, father of the sorcerer Radal—the primary antagonist of the Donzalo’s Destiny books—was of Baxac ancestry, his immediate origin being the isle of Lorj.

There was plenty of mixing there, too, although Ildor was notably dark. All the more notably when he settled among the Sharshites! His granddaughter, Fachalana, daughter of Radal and the main protagonist of the Destiny’s Daughter series, is but a quarter Lorjam and not much darker than many of those about her. There is even less contrast when she strays across the mountains to adventure among the olive-skinned Lamans.

Now dark people did pass through the gate on the other side of both worlds. That is the one located in the Ural Mountains in our world and early Paleolithic individuals would have been drawn in—the first ‘modern’ humans to pass into Exura (we won’t count earlier Neanderthals, etc. though they certainly would have passed too). Genetic evidence suggests these were a relatively dark population, quite possibly ancestral to the people scattered across northern Asia, as well as Native Americans. They remain ancestral as well to many of the scattered peoples of Exura, at least in part. I have hinted at pockets of dark aboriginal people here and there in the stories but haven’t had reason to explore the idea in any detail.

The wizards Im and Na, of the Wizardry books, are as thoroughly black as anyone in their world. Their ancestry is Australoid and Melanesian with very little else mixed in—save for the genes of the very long lived and very prolific wizard Hurasu who ruled over the isolated valley of their ancestors. He hailed from a completely other world so we can’t call him anything other than an Atlantean. Urtu, the protagonist of The Walls Between the Worlds, is a son of Hurasu, so he does look a bit different than the typical valley dweller. Still somewhat dark though and we would probably refer to him as a person of color these days.

Incidentally, in Melanesian fashion, many of the dwellers in that Valley of Visions where Hurasu ruled had the combination of black skin and blond hair. That is rare among the Baxac.

Of course, other ethnic groups found their way through one gate or another. Culture after culture rose about or passed through the Urals over the ages, Turkic and Iranian and Slavic, on back to the Mal’ta-Buret’ and Yamna peoples. I have hinted that the Mura people have some of that early Asian ancestry and portrayed them as appearing rather like Siberians or Native Americans. The (retired) pirate queen, Qala, of the Crocodile Chronicles is of Muram blood. She’s certainly not ‘white,’ like the Sharshites among whom she retires to her country estate. And her son Zedos has a quite black father—who just happens to be a god. I might talk about those some other time.

I did not go out of my way to be diverse with my characters (nor with those in my non-fantasy novels). It follows naturally from the world building. Some of the earliest of that world building involved Polynesians and shipwrecked sailors, and that grew into the seven (so far) books set among the Mora. The very concept of Exura and its gates guaranteed variety.

Xuthal

The desert-lost city of Hirstel, in which opens my novel ‘The Ways of Wizardry,’ undoubtedly owes a debt to the Xuthal of R.E. Howard’s Conan story, ‘Xuthal of the Dusk.’ As it has been at least forty years since I last read that story, it should not be surprising I had completely forgotten it. I have been reading through all Howard’s Conan tales—the originals, none of the pastiche of Carter or DeCamp—and had reached Xuthal.

So there are similarities and there are differences. I used Hirstel only as a starting point for the ‘Wizardry’ adventure, lingering for a few opening chapters. The dreaming citizens of both eventually come to unhappy ends; different ends, to be sure, yet there is a shared madness perhaps.

The concept was not completely novel with Howard, but I do suspect it was his story, buried somewhere in my subconscious, that gave birth to Hirstel. I have referenced the city in some other stories and may well do so again. We’ll have to see about that.