Creating the Universe, One Word at a Time
Big Brother. Dweomer. Mockingjay. The Golden Snitch. Ringwraiths.
Great A’Tuin. The
shining. You know all, or at least some of these made-up
words and phrases. Heck, if you’re anything like me, you’ve extensively pondered
the joys of taking second breakfast with a hobbit, maybe after imbibing some butterbeer
with Harry and Hermione.
I read fantasy, sci-fi, and horror. There’s just something
so intriguing about consuming a story that not only includes the usual drama of
everyday living but words and ideas that exist uniquely in the universe the
author has created. These fictitious concepts and words fascinate me. Why did
the author construct this style of government? What magic system did she or he
dismiss before deciding on that one? What do the syllables of these words
represent? How much symbolism and ideology can be packed into a single word or
phrase?
I write romantic fantasy and sci-fi. At least part of the great
joy of penning my stories comes from stretching the known. As a writer of the
paranormal, I create new, maybe extranatural (who says they’re “super”?)
situations and vernacular. I love the challenge of coming up with new ways of
organizing the words and the world.
I set my latest novel, The
Tithe, which is due to be released on August 20 (hooray!), a century or
more into the future. Humanity has been reduced to a devout, few hundred
thousand souls, all of whom live in the desert towns of what we now know as San
Bernardino County in Southern California. As such, I tried to balance two
conflicting goals: spicing my characters’ lives with words, phrases, and
concepts specific to their small, highly regimented, and deeply religious
desert lives while also making their values and speech intelligible to my
readers.
My main character, Joshua (named after the trees that dot the Mojave’s
landscape), is an orphan whom the imrabi raised in one of Barstow’s rab’ris.
She attends services, reads the Bitoran, and prays daily to Elovah. To
translate, Josh lives among the town’s holy women and reads devotedly their
town’s holy book. In creating this new religion, along with its verbiage,
ideologies, and rituals, I chose to model it on our modern incarnations of the Abrahamic religions:
Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. For example, The Tithe’s god’s name is Elovah, which I devised by combining the
various names of the Abrahamic gods: Yahweh, Adonai, Elohim, Jehovah, Allah. Well, and
I made Her a woman.
About halfway through The
Tithe, Josh officiates two weddings. I researched Jewish, Christian, and
Muslim weddings, snagged traditions from each, rendered them a bit more gender
egalitarian, and created an interesting and odd amalgamation that includes rings,
chalices, and veils for both would-be
spouses.
Do I expect “imrabi” and “Bitoran” to become pop cultural
buzzwords? Well, maybe not. But that doesn’t stop me from delighting in this
new world, with its unique curse words (“Jimson!”), religious dogma (remaining
illiterate and attending twice daily services), and arid analogies (“his voice
as dry and impersonal as the desert wind”). All this, in its alienness and its
familiarity, its highlighting of some modern conventions and dismissal of
others, reflects not only my creative processes but also a deeply personal commentary
on the political and cultural state of the world.
It’s no wonder I’m so in love with fantasy and sci-fi. In
combining the familiar with the fantastic, we paranormal authors create worlds
that reflect, explore, and defy the foibles and possibilities of modern life.
I agree -- wholeheartedly!
ReplyDeleteI figured you would, LJ, since you did the same in your fantasy series. <3
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