Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Anatomy of an Idea: Ten Cities Down

Ten Cities Down initially started as a writing exercise. I took a handful of randomly generated names that intrigued me and wrote short scene snippets. Other names chosen include Kallistrate, Vasilka and Jory. Timur's included the core concept, the idea of a multi-tiered city and an escape from the afterlife. This piece sat for some time before I decided to write a story from it ...

I knew I needed another character to complicate the journey, and particularly a pretext to divert him back downwards. I decided to use his daughter, and things were never the same. Civine ... well, she took over, running my story and my narrator ragged.

I've always been fascinated by the wisdom and resilience of children ... while still, of course, showing the impatience and inexperience of their age. This is a story which is very muted at heart, with a repressed emotional tone. Were it left up to Timur, it might be cold. Civine provided (I hope) my balance.

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