Sneak Peek!!

As promised, here is a sneak peek at the prologue of my first novel, Unidentified. The actual story takes place about a thousand years after this, but this scene is important for context.

And so, without further ado:

Prologue

August 23, 2144

“Phina, what are you doing?”

I didn’t look up from my microscope. “What’s wrong, Alisya?”

“You took the job with the geneticists, didn’t you?”

I straightened, turning to face my sister. She was younger than me, prettier too, though we both knew that I was the smarter one. “And if I did?”

“We talked about this! You can’t help them!” She came farther into my pristine lab, her huge boots leaving dirty tracks on the tiles that had already had the finish scrubbed off.

“Alisya, this could help so many people!”

“And how will you save them if you help their dictator live forever?” She had suddenly gotten quiet, which, more than anything, made me listen to her.

“I can’t give up this chance,” I replied, knowing that she was right. “Alisya, this could change everything. The pay will set us up for the rest of our lives.”

“At the cost of how many others? How many will have to succumb to his rule?”

“I’m sorry, Alisya,” I replied, turning away again. “I can’t back out now. It’s too late.” Making a few notes in my notebook, I turned my chair around, pushing myself to the counter across the room. There, I looked into a new microscope, adjusting the focus.

“How far are you?”

“Done.” I said it like it wasn’t the statement that would change our country. “All I need to do is activate the conscience, which will only be possible when our current dictator is ready to die.”

“How will you make them all be the same?”

“Transfer memories. It’s not complicated science, Alisya. That’s been done since before we were even born.”

“What are you working on now?”

“Several things. This,” I gestured to the microscope I was currently using, “is the chip that will replace identity cards and currency. It will be implanted at birth and not removed until the subject dies, so it has to hold up. I’m having some trouble with durability. Do you have any ideas?” My sister was brilliant with micro circuitry.

“Does anyone else know how far you are?” Alisya ignored my question. She was obviously disturbed by the cloning initiative.

“Everyone on the project, Master Stogen included.”

“Phina, how could you? Have you even read Stogen’s platform? He intends to enslave Canada, to wage war on the world.”

“I’m sure he doesn’t say so in as many words.”

“Actually, he does,” Alisya didn’t even sound angry anymore, just disappointed. “Quite blatantly. On page four of his manifesto, and page six, and page ten.”

“So you really believe that he is bad for Canada?” I asked, already knowing what the answer would be.

“Yes. Stogen will destroy this country, and you are helping him do it.”

My hands shaking, I turned back to her. “Then you are a traitor. I’m sorry, Alisya.”

Moving quicker than I ever had before, I pressed the prototype stun baton to her neck. She yelped with pain, then collapsed.

“Perhaps they will find a use for you in the testing area,” I told her still form. “I am sorry. But there is no room for dissent in the new world.”

Pressing a button that would call the building security to my lab, I continued my work, unable to look at the woman who had been my sister. If I kept my head down, I knew that no one else would see my tears.

Write what you know - Or not?

Unsplash user Aaron Burden

My favorite stories to read are the ones I wrote myself. I’m not bragging, or being narcissistic (okay, maybe a little), but just being honest. I like the books that I write because they are exactly what I want. They contain all the elements of what I feel makes a good novel. However, there is a small bit of ‘advice’ that has been told to me many times, and actually threatened to derail my writing.

I don’t know who first came up with this advice, but taken at face value, like I took it, it can destroy a young author. You may have heard it, or at least seen it. It’s a relatively small tidbit of creative poison. Write what you know.

This is good advice too, if you add meaning to it. Researching things that you haven’t done before (and might not ever do) is a good way to gain knowledge of whatever-it-is, knowledge that will give your writing credibility. You can’t describe a car if you don’t have some idea of what it should look like.

Despite this, I really don’t think that this can be considered advice. I write in the future (I’ll be posting a sneak peek at Unidentified next week) and in a fantasy world that I created. There is no way I can do real, hard-core research on either of those topic, other than looking into the conventions of the genre I am writing in. That writing is me creating things as I go along, without really thinking too hard about whether or not I actually know what this aspect of this thing looks like.

It is important to have a solid background for your tales. Without at least an idea of where it takes place, you won’t be able to effectively describe setting, or time period. Your story could start to feel like it’s characters living in a featureless box.

But you don’t have to travel to England to get a feel for a castle to put in your fantasy story. You can, and I definitely intend to do that one day, but it isn’t a necessity. Make your castles what you want, however impossible that is.

Writers are creators, and shouldn’t be bound by the limits of what they themselves know. I’ve never been in a stable, or even seen one, but I don’t really need to. I can imagine that it would smell of horses, hay and possibly leather. That’s what I assume, but I don’t know. If anyone’s ever been in a medieval stable, they could probably spot me, but most people haven’t.

That’s my point. Most people won’t know anything about some obscure detail, or even a more significant one. This little fact gives you license to use your imagination! If you don’t know what the inside of a medieval house should look like, it isn’t likely that your readers will either. Just make it up! There is something marvelous called creative license that will explain it away.

As a final note, this isn’t really viable for a fiction story that is set in the present. When describing a culture that actually exists, do proper research. If your character is a mechanic, look into how a car engine works. You just don’t need to have a PhD on the subject. The main focus of this post is fantasy, sci-fi, steampunk, dystopian and other examples of genres that take us away from the present.