I think one of the reasons I love writing the Sons of Rome series so much is because it's the most mature and sophisticated of my projects so far. A little more subtle, a little more real-world relevant - odd, considering it's fantasy. But.
Looking back, the Walker Series was a feel-good story about basically good people. The Russell Series was action-adventure centered around gray-area characters. And the Dartmoor Series asks readers to care about and identify with flat-out criminals without any kind of larger look at morality or good vs. bad dynamic.
But with the Sons of Rome, there's a chance to take a more complex look at the characters - and the world in general. One of the big, overarching themes that will carry through the series is: What is a monster? Is it something that isn't human? Or can humans be monsters?
The goal, for me as a writer, was to balance a diverse cast who are all basically "good" at heart, at least fairly pure of motive, but who appear monstrous when seen from others' perspectives. The result is, hopefully, a tangled web that will take some time, and lots of books, to slice through.
White Wolf, specifically, felt like a big scary risk - but a calculated one. I'd been writing bikers for several years, bikers who were drug dealers, murderers, and unquestionably amoral individuals...but amoral individuals who were accepted within the genre. Nikita and his boys, though, were Chekists. And whether they were only playing at Chekists, biding their time until they could pursue their true purpose, or real ones, the point was: there is no way to sugarcoat the Soviet secret police. It was the riskiest thing I'd ever done - now, on the other side of it, I'm glad I chose to take that risk. Why? Because if White Wolf was a horror story, then the most horrifying aspect wasn't the magic, or the wolves, or the vamps, but the true life horror that was daily life for the Russian people living in the Soviet Union. And for all the people - Finns, Poles, and Ukrainians - who lived at the mercy of the Red Army. The real monsters in the novel were Hitler, Stalin, and their toadies - the men who slaughtered millions.
Asking readers to care about Nik and his boys was scary - but in a good way. I feel like the only way for me to grow as a writer is to push those boundaries.
Going forward, I can't wait to introduce more characters, and explore the existing ones deeper, asking that monster question over and over. What is a monster? Can a monster be redeemed? Is a monster evil? And, maybe most of all, why do different people have different ideas of monsters?
Hi Lauren,
ReplyDeleteIt was indeed a struggle to care about a group of characters who were Chekists, even pretend ones. And as a Ukrainian, I don't see Whites as the good guys either. The Russian Empire and the White army may not have been quite as evil and monstrous as the Bolsheviks, but they were still oppressors and ruthless occupants to all the nations under their rule.
And that was also an incredible difficult period in history. That system with all its unimaginable terrors, torture and murder, the sick but incredibly powerful propaganda, and the war itself messed with people's heads and souls, too, and not just their lives.
You've done a great job with the White Wolf and its characters. They are complicated and controversial, but very real and human. There's nothing simple, black and white, clear-cut there. And I love that.
I also admire your willingness to take on such a difficult task and to conduct so much historic and cultural research for your books. Thank you :) They are amazing.
There was something which confused me, though. I'm not a native speaker of Russian, but I'm pretty sure that there's no such word as "bodark". Russian for "werewolf" is "oboroten" as far as I know. Could you clear it up for me? Thanks.
Hi, thanks so much for your comment! You make an excellent point about the empire and the Bolsheviks. My dad likes to say that the people living under both tsarist and communist rule "just traded one set of oppressors for another." Russian history is some of the bloodiest, darkest, and admittedly most fascinating; I felt it a very fitting backdrop for what was, at its core, a horror story. I'm thrilled to hear that you were able to connect with and care for the characters! That's what every author dreams of. This whole series - due to its spanning of history - will continue to highlight dark times and controversial movements, and my strategy, same as with this book, is to focus on individuals rather than parties or governments. In WW, Nikita in particular, had a lot to learn about other people's causes.
Delete"Bodark" is, according to the resources I consulted, a word that's no longer in use, but an old mythological term from way back in Russian folklore. A bodark was a human who chose, for whatever reason, to become a werewolf - or skinwalker, more accurately - and underwent a ceremony that changed them. I don't know that it's still ever used in Russia, if it ever was widely, but it was too cool a legend not to make use of!
Thank you so much for your thoughtful response to the book. I really appreciate it :)
I agree with you absolutely that the time period, actually the entire first half of the 20st century (in this part of the world at least), is the perfect setting for a horror story. There was just so much unimaginable evil there impossible to comprehend with a rational mind. A few years back I read an amazing book (Basavryuk XX - Devil XX) by a Ukrainian author Dmitro Bilyi. He uses horror and monsters (mainly werewolves, by the way!) as an origin and nature of evil of the Bolsheviks, the Cheka especially, describing mainly the war of 1917-1921 here in Ukraine, but going back centuries to other wars and battles with the Poles and the Muscovites, and implying that all the coming famines, wars and holocousts of the 20st century originate in that "Temple of Horrors" as well. I was blown away by that book, and fell in love with the idea of combining horror and dark historical reality. So I am super fascinated by and excited about your series! And very grateful you keep true to the real history, while using real historical events and figures to create your own interpretation. :)
DeleteThanks for explaining that!
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