So what's this page about then?
I always wanted this project to be more than some guy trying to write a book. Whilst is true - I am some guy trying to write a book - I thought this website could offer a little more than my humble narrative. The website arrangement allows me to chronicle my writing odyssey and I thought this could be done via an FAQ.
Some of the questions below were penned by me in an attempt to anticipate the sort of questions I could be asked should anyone show a modicum of interest in this book. Other questions are ones that have been put to me by friends and family. I hope this page offers some insight into the paths I have stumbled down whilst trying to make an author of myself.
If anyone has any questions they would like answered here, a polite email is all that is needed.
Paul Stewart, Author of 'Caliban's End'
Hey, what's with all the hyperlinks?
I love the hyperlinks. They give a little bit of power to the reader. If the reader wants to read up more on a particular aspect, then he or she may do so. The narrative is deliberately fragmented to allow for this. In many of the chapters, I have inserted flashbacks. These flashbacks are crucial as they introduce new bits of information to keep the story engaging. The hyperlinks take this paradigm a step further by allowing the reader to uncover even more if they really want to pursue a certain strand.
However, I don't want the reader to ruin his or her enjoyment by reading too far in a particular direction. To this end, I have inserted SPOILER warnings throughout the ancillary pages.
The hyperlinks allow for a bit more colour in the narrative. Sometimes the links are quite playful. For example, In Chapter One, Trypp notices a vessel:
Trypp could see one such vessel glinting on the horizon and his gaze was so fixed on it, he failed to notice the argument that had broken out among the Helyans and Sessymirians.
If you click on the link embedded in the text, you will find out that this boat is actually Gerriod's boat The Crimson Dawn. It isn't essential to the plot but it help gives the story a unified feeling - or at least, that's the theory. In the same chapter, there is mention of Trypp's climbing instructor:
He had only seen the maneuver done once before and that was performed by Trypp's climbing master many, many years ago, but that was upon the training wall...
If you follow this link, it takes you to a page about Akampa Lodd, the Sapphrryan Ambassador. The reader doesn't formally meet the Ambassador until Chapter Sixteen. It is not necessary to know everything the hyperlinks reveal, but they do add another layer to the narrative that I quite enjoyed crafting.
If you find all the hyperlinks annoying, it is my hope that one day this book will end up in ink. I'll make sure that all the links are gone by then. It's worth noting that when I first put the text online, I had a hyperlink every few words! Fortunately, sanity prevailed in the form of my wife who recommended that I use the links only when introducing new characters, places etc. and all subsequent references are left unlinked. I think it was good advice.
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How do you keep track of all the threads in the book?
To be honest, I'm not sure I have kept track of all the narrative threads. There are just so many things to remember! What has help has been the non-linear way in which the book has been written. I had a fairly clear idea of how I wanted the book to conclude and I decided upon quite a few elements in the final battle long before I had finshed the first chapter. In many ways, I wrote backwards, and this ensures that at least a few of the threads at the end are tied up.
As I introduced each new character or scenario, I then went to chapters further down the line and wove aspects of the newly introduced components into those parts of the narrative. I hope doing this provides cohesion. There are quite a few relationships in the book that help tie the plot together. Rather than writing the book chapter by chapter, I found it easiest to follow a particular thread jumping ahead to relevant chapters if that is what the narrative required.
By the novel's conclusion, I think I have knotted together all the loose ends reasonably well. I'm a Virgoan - I like order.
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Are you thinking of writing a sequel to the saga of Caliban's End?
I would love to write another series of books set in this world, but sequel would be the wrong word to describe it. This tale doesn't demand a sequel per se, but the Myr is a big world and I already have some interesting ideas regarding how to revisit these lands in a fresh and unexpected ways.
So you are doing a sequel! What it about?
It's not a sequel! What I'm planning places quite a few things on the periphery of this story and shoves them into the light (including certain things that don't like being shoved into the light). The scope of the story is a bit broader. I don't think it would be unreasonable to expect a little bit from the days when the great aerolith slammed into Lake Erras, unleashing the Ghul, the Ghaddar and the Cabal upon the world.
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How long did it take you to write this story?
A long time! The story was in its embrionic stage in the early nineties but I didn't really flesh it out until about 1998. Then at the turn of the century, I put the story away so I could focus on a more important creation - the first of my three children. Over the past six years, I have written the book in fits and starts. Usually when I write, I write in slabs, then concern myself with something else, then return to the book refreshed.
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Do you find it difficult to write?
Yes and no. I never find it difficult to start typing nor have I ever had anything I could call writer's block. I actually enjoy writing and often I find that my disgracefully slow typing cannot keep up with my manic mind. But there are times when a piece of writing simply doesn't work. If that happens I just bury it in my subcoscious and focus upon something else. I usually return to the problematic parts months later and either instantly find a way to make it work, or bin the passage/idea and move on. What I find most difficult about writing is knowing when to leave a chapter alone. I tinker and sometimes I wonder whether I work some passages to much. That said, I must admit that I prefer the crazy rush of ideas part of my writing to the polishing of final drafts.
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Can you comment in more detail upon the drafting process?
I'd be happy to. I write in an extremely fragmented way. My life demands it. I grab a spare hour here and there and write until I am interrupted. I have written with a child on my knee and I often write with distractions around me (such as bad television or squabbling offspring). I once heard an interview with the great Robert Cormier who described how he wrote his books in his living room with his family carrying out their lives around him. This gave me the preparedness to accept that I would never be able to write in a cloistered environment, and so I dropped this reason for procrastination from a long list many years ago.
Once I had drawn out the plot arcs in Caliban's End I found it quite easy to concentrate on individual ideas, knowing that the broader narrative was more or less fixed. I have had ideas that have caused me to change some of the story arcs in places, but nothing that has caused any real problems. Working out the skeleton plot has afforded me the luxury of writing in a piecemeal fashion. It also has allowed me to focus only on what's happenning in front of me, and not how it fits into the wider story. However, the narrative has become increasingly intricate over the past two years, and I have found that when I have spent a protracted period of time away from the book, I haven't been able to write without rereading certain parts of the book. Fortunately, whilst I am capable of forgetting extremely important things like birthdays and dinner engagements, I am able to recall most details of the book, especially where I have been going with the countless narrative threads.
Writing in a non-linear fashion has enabled me to write according to my mood. On days, I have felt bouyant and expressive, I have written parts of the narrative involving the characters such as Mulupo, Sir Edgar and various Ghul such as Gormgut and Droola. On days when a darker mood have taken me, I have tended to write Caliban's activities. When feeling pensive and introspective, I have explored the thoughts of Remiel or Trypp. And on days when all I have felt like doing is complain, I have focussed upon either Lara or Sela (especially Sela). I also write according to what is going on around me. Whenever I have been inspired by a gripping action piece I have either seen or read, I have absorbed myself in the telling of the heroic exploits of characters such as Trojanu, Sumi, Pylos or Jehenna. Basically, I have written the book in a fairly whimsical way, writing when interest or mood has provoked me into action.
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Do you think your chaotic approach to writing shows in your narrative?
I'll let others be the judged of that. The narrative is diverse and my piecemeal approach has probably contributed to this, but I always wanted an eclectic, reasonably unpredictable narrative. I wanted moments of pathos to be followed by comic situations or something similarly at odds with whatever preceded it. I think one positive thing to come out of the unstructured drafting process that has characterised the writing of this book is that the style of the book has not been compromised by the time it has taken to write it. Let me explain. Had I written this book in a linear fashion, the first part of the book would reflect my writing style of years ago, and the end of the book would be fairly fresh stylistically. As it is, the entire book is an amalgam of all my writing phases and the things I have learned along the way have helped shape the first chapter just as much as they have moulded the last.
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Can you remember a specific moment when the idea for the story first popped into your head?
Absolutely. I can remember it quite clearly. My wife and I were on a plane bound for the cheesy funpark delights of Queensland. We had just finished lunch - I'm am one of those strange creatures who actually enjoys airplane food - and I was doodling on some scraps of paper to fill in the time. I drew a cross between a snail and a horse. I called it - rather unimaginatively - a snorse and my first Myrran lifeform was born. I kept this picture and it is up on the site. Over the following months, I just kept adding to this menagerie, until I realised i had to find a place for them. And then the real story started unfolding.
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Is any of the narrative autobiographical?
Despite the fact I am a twin and story concerns itself with the conflict between the Grayson twins, I'd have to say that there is very little that could be considered autobiographical in the book. I haven't based the characters on anyone I know, at least not consciously. Although there are some very human aspects to the book, the fantastical genre in which the book resides enables me to avoid anything vaguely autobiographical.
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Would you mind commenting upon the literary devices you have employed in the book?
Well, this is going to be a long answer, not because I've been particularly successful in this area, but because I've certainly tried to augment the narrative through use of such devices. To make the answer easier to follow, I'll break it down in sections.
Foreshadowing - a favourite of mine. I always get excited when I see aspects of foreshadowing in the books I read.
Juxtaposition - I'm also a big fan of this. I think it's a result of being a great lover of movies where the technique is employed frequently. I like to follow a scene of event with something totally different, ideally the exact opposite. For example, it's no coincidence that the chapter where our heroes are crossing the burning sands of the Marid is followed by Sumi and Lara's trek across the icy wasteland of the Slith. I try to also incorporate juxtaposition with dialogue, following what a character has said with something that plays out in a diamaterically opposed fashion. Not only do I like the drama that results from juxtaposition, I like the way it moves a narrative along. Also, tremendous pathos can be delivered via juxtaposition.
(More to come...)
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What's with all the names? Did you make them up?
In most cases, no. I like to play with language and names are no exception.This doesn't mean the significance of many names will be apparent to the reader. Some of the names have highly specific names.For example, early in the book Trypp (think Odysseus) is climbing the Skyfall.He comes across an impossible overhang called Maru Lem which translates roughly to 'the problem'. Now the name Maru Lem is a combination of two of my favourite impossible situations. The Kobayashi Maru was featured in the opening scene of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. It is basically a test scenario for Starfleet cadets whereby they are placed in a no-win scenario to test their mettle. The other part of the name comes from the acronym LEM which stands for Lunar Excursion Module. In 1970, the LEM played an crucial role getting the three astronauts of the Apollo 13 mission back home despite impossible odds. It seemed appropriate considering the impossible nature of Trypp's climb up the Skyfall and later on, the Myrra's efforts to defeat Caliban.
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The title of the first book is What Lies Beneath. What is the significance of this title?
Each book in the trilogy comes from a line of dialogue in the story. In the case of What Lies Beneath, it comes from two separate chapters where the phrase is used by a character.
SPOILER ALERT
The first one is when Gerriod finds his father in the Endless. Gerriod questions his father about the location of the entrances into the Endless:
‘Dad, the other breaches – do you know where they are?’
‘They are all over the Myr. I know there is one deep in the forests of Morae, another in the desert near Sulis and one hidden amongst the reefs in the Sea of Telamon. I think Caliban mentioned a breach near the top of the Skyfall. Every few weeks another is opened up.’
The second use of the phrase occurs in Chapter 13. Lokasenna Hagen, the foreman of the mine known as Strom Mir is being informed of the discovery of something curious at the bottom of the mine:
‘It seems we have unearthed a stone floor of sorts. Someone has been here before! The floor sounds hollow and –’
‘You stopped the dig?’ she said excitedly.
‘Yes. I thought you would want to be present when we broke through.’
‘You did well Mr Helstrom. Let us see what lies beneath.’
END OF SPOILER
The title works on three layers, or at least, that was my intention.
You use some outdated units of measurement in the book. Why not go metric?
I really wanted to avoid overly specific measurements as I find them restrictive. By using a term such as league instead of mile or kilometre, I can make the distances less important which hopefully places greater focus upon the journey itself and not the mathematics of it. The Skyfall for example is 3 leagues from crest to base. I just wanted the waterfall to be incredibly high. Now if you sit down and calculate it, 1 league is said to be 3 miles, and that would make the Skyfall over 9 miles high which would put it at almost twice the height of Mt Everest which is just over 5 miles high (8,848 metres) which seems a bit high even for a fantasy novel. However, if one employs a Roman unit of measurement, a league is actually 2.2 kilometres which would put the Skyfall at 6.6 kilometres, about three quarters the height of Everest, which seems about right to me.
It's not only the relative ambiguity of these units of measurement I enjoy - it's also the sound. For example, 'yards' seems a lot more in keeping with the feel of the book. I think terms like metres and centimetres would jar.
Occasionally, I admit I am highly specific in my use of measurements but this is just for playful reasons. For example the prison ships 'The Hulks' are described as being 294 yards long and 52 yards high, powered by nine-cylinder, medium-speed engines which turn two five-bladed propellers. In open sea, they are capable of speeds up to 32 knots. Each Hulk provides for a complement of 1,756 prisoners. These dimensions are also the dimensions of the QE2. Why are the dimensions the same? Just for fun - they're both really big boats! If only one person spots the similarity, I'm happy. The novel has quite a lot of this playfulness, especially with names. See if you can spot some of these as you read the story.
Where did all the pictures comes from?
The vast majority of pictures came from Morguefile http://www.morguefile.com/ which is a site that allows people to use their photographs for creative purposes. In most cases, attribution is not required but a courtesy email informing the photographer about the usage is appreciated. I endeavoured to contact numerous photographers as a courtesy but very few ever acknowledged my correspondence, and a number came back from email accounts that were no longer active. Whilst contacting the photographer is encouraged under Morguefile's terms, it is not required. Many other pictures were either taken by myself or by friends. I have tried to avoid using Creative Commons photographs as I wanted to avoided supplying attribution under each photograph - I felt this would detract from the wiki's suspension of disbelief. Most of the pictures were manipulated in Corel Photo Paint, although I have used other image programs such as GIMP, Fireworks and Photoshop.
