While I don’t write full-time, nor do I make
enough money with my writing to live off of it...neither do all of the
professional writers above...someone pays for and publishes ten percent of what
I write. When I started this blog, that was NOT true, so I may have reached a
point where my own advice is reasonably good. We shall see! Hemingway’s quote
to the left will now remain unchanged as I work to increase my writing output
and sales! As always, your comments are welcome!
I stumbled across an advertisement in the discussion columns of the
online writer’s group I joined a decade ago.
They were looking for people to write stories for an original “shared
world” anthology. This was in the days before crowd funding and it was the
project of a small, independent publisher.
The ad directed me to a website where they had posted a “bible” of the
world, giving specifics of the conditions that bounded it. Specifically, the
world was one in which the Christian Church never arose, Egypt and Greece never
collapsed. Oh – and instead of vacuum, space is filled with variably breathable
“aether”. Sort of like air, but not. It extends far, far into the area we call space
in our world, but there, it is accessible with balloons and human-powered
flight. Instead of ocean-going vessels, humanity invented “aether-going”
vessels.
The idea intrigued me to no end – and it kicked the foundations of my personal
beliefs in the teeth: “While the writer is free to explore the subject, we don’t
see how a Christian cult could arise. The traditional religions of Greece and
Egypt will be dominant. The worship of Zeus may have emerged as monotheism
(there are Real World Fact hints that some did worship him in this way).
Jehovah is only worshipped by whatever tribes of Israel might exist (and since
this derived out of Babylonian polytheism, it is possible that some semblance
of ancient Hebrew religion got started, but rather unlikely that it spawned
ther est of the Abrahamic faiths as it did in the real world).”
For me, that was a challenge! I am a Christian and believe that my
faith is more than just ancient cultures borrowing the myths of other cultures
and cobbling together a religion to use to influence others and create wealth
for a privileged few. I believe God can work in ANY way – and that he did.
So I set out to prove it – by working out God’s plan in this shared world.
In this real world, Egypt was at its height when God released the
Children of Israel. The traditional Ten Tribes returned to the Promised land.
But legends and tales have persisted for centuries that there were ANOTHER Ten Tribes that went in the opposite direction of what would become Israel. One of those tribes, was the Tribe of Dan which headed deeper into the African continent and became the Ethiopian Church. In the world of Aether, I make the legends a fact. From that
Ethiopian church, springs my main character, Berhanu Lexy. He is a victim of
polio and he is a scientist – a poor scientist as he has no sponsor in Athens
or Alexandria; but a scientist nonetheless.
Experience with bubonic plague in the Olmec Empire of what we would
call South America leads him to the germ theory of disease – in our timeline,
it was discovered by a long string of Europeans. In Berhanu’s world, germ
theory has been well-established – but he has a theory that epitheatosos
– invisible inflamers – are responsible for other diseases...
In Berhanu’s timeline, Jesus was both of the Tribe of Dan and came to
save the world anyway. Berhanu is a Christian minority both in a polytheistic
world of Egyptian and Greek gods and goddesses and an atheistic world of
medicine. In the story, I manage to hint at the life of a man who is devoted not
only to medicine, but to serving the Christ. I forgot to mention that there’s a
bit of unrequited love in the story, too. And a preparation for a launch into
the aether, but for me, that wasn’t the important part. I just wanted to get
into the anthology.
When they took the story, I was thrilled. I didn’t “make” any money on
it, but it was quite a bit of fun, and I’ve thought of extending the story
(which is what I’d planned on doing anyway) and sending a story to ANALOG. But
we’ll have to wait and see!
AETHER AGE: Helios is still available in its various formats, Kindle’s the cheapest at $1.99. Get it here if
you’d like: http://www.amazon.com/Aether-Age-Helios-Theresa-Crater-ebook/dp/B005EZHFRC/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=1-1&qid=1427024593.
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