From Satire to Seriousness

Letting Each Story Be Itself

When I published my first book, Aug. 18, 2005: A Better Tomorrow, I knew I wanted to approach the story with a sense of humour rather than maintain a consistently serious tone. The unconventional title, I think, communicates that quite well. I often thought about Terry Pratchett, Monty Python, and other satirical works, considering what made them successful and why other works attempting something similar did not always work as well.

I thought beginning my writing career with a less serious story would give me room to explore those ideas. Of course, that did not mean I wanted to put any less care into the writing. But rather, I wanted the humour to work naturally, without distracting from the narrative itself.

I can assure you that the first draft looks drastically different from the book available today. During the writing process, I considered questions such as whether the narrator should be witty or whether the humour should emerge more naturally through the characters and their conversations.

Because my characters are United Nations representatives, I wanted readers to see beyond their professional responsibilities and serious personalities. That meant allowing the story to spend time on seemingly trivial things, whether they were playing games together or having heartfelt conversations about life and death. Their positions might set them apart from ordinary people in certain respects, but they still have their own fears, vulnerabilities, and sense of humour.

When I began working on my second book, Shifting Horizons, I found myself approaching the characters differently. The story required a group of friends who knew a great deal about radio waves, but I wondered whether making them all nerds would become rather dull. If everyone in a group is knowledgeable in roughly the same way, their conversations can begin to feel repetitive. Pretentiousness, on the other hand, can take many forms. One person might be a know-it-all, another might have a subtle sense of class and superiority, and someone might have an entirely different way of demonstrating their supposed intellectual standing.

I also had another consideration. The scientific theories underlying the story might eventually become old news, or at least be understood differently as new research emerged. Much of the research I used to familiarize myself with these ideas came from older books. I began to wonder whether my characters, if they were all well-read science enthusiasts, would be expected to have the latest scientific literature at their disposal and know precisely what they are talking about.

Making them pretentious offered me a certain freedom. A pretentious person can speak with complete confidence and still be wrong. That gave me some room to work with the scientific material without requiring every character to be an infallible authority on the subjects they discuss.

Letting the Story Unfold

Just before I begin writing, I have all sorts of questions about the characters, the worlds, the tone, and the direction of the story. I think about how certain decisions might work and whether they serve the narrative. But once I begin writing, something changes. It becomes less a matter of asking questions from the outside and more a matter of stepping into the world itself. I begin to see the characters going about their lives, having conversations, and responding to one another, and I let the story unfold from there.

That is not to say I stop making decisions or revising what I have written. Rather, I try not to force every moment into a predetermined shape. I want to leave room for things to develop naturally, including things I might not have anticipated when I first sat down to write.