Welcome to TRB Lounge. Today, I’d like to welcome the author of The Guitar Decoder Ring—Asher Black, for an author interview with The Reading Bud.

About The Author

Asher Black is an author, karateka, musician, digital ecologist® and maintainer of tobacco pipes of various personalities in Brooklyn, NY. He writes about everything, is a host of multiple podcasts, and (for his day job) connects enterprise sales teams with their audience through sales enablement campaigns and brand story. He boats, dances, and plays with cryptography and linguistics, while reading history and hard-boiled detective novels.

Asher Black is an enforcer for the creativity mafia, plying his art through storytelling (even in non-fiction), collecting oil paintings, improvising and composing for the guitar with the romance of a practitioner in love with the fretboard, and pushing through to zen-like execution of the martial arts. He is a hitman with words, broadcasting from the home studio a continual critique of one-sided thinking, and is known for his raucous sense of humor.

You can find author Black here:
Goodreads | Amazon | BookBub | Twitter | LinkedIn

Interview

Welcome to TRB! Please give our readers a brief introduction about yourself before we begin. 

I’m a troublemaker, an agitator when I think something can be better than it is, and rebel for the Hell of it, as Abbie Hoffman’s book refers to it. I don’t want to fit in; I want to break out. I don’t care if someone likes me, as long as they hear me. And I’m a human being, which is just a big ape, which is what all we human beings are. That, and I write stuff.

Please tell us something about your book other than what we have read in the blurb?

I’ve always been interested in languages and cryptography. I grew up learning about, solving, and creating ciphers at a young age. The first novels I read at twelve were Tolkien’s works. He was interested in languages, and I learned his runes and tengwar, and would write out things in those constructed languages that he was creating at Oxford. As a young man I spent several years in Korea, which has a phonetic alphabet, and that taught me a lot about language as well. I’ve been a long-time admirer of Noam Chomsky’s transformational grammar, and I think Leonard Bernstein’s The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard, which applies Chomsky’s linguistics to music, is stellar.

So naturally, when I took up guitar, I saw possibilities for expressing the disparate aspects of music theory involved as a language. I asked around. Nobody had it. It hadn’t been done. In fact, the last time we had innovation of that type was six centuries ago. So I set about deconstructing some of that music theory and finding common patterns in separate systems of understanding. The result was The Guitar Decoder Ring, which proffers a language for guitar that is simple, easy to learn almost at a glance, and explosive in the possibilities for not only mastering guitar scales, guitar modes, and guitar intervals, as well as generally learning guitar, but for flaming solos, new avenues of composition and improvisation, etc.       

Why did you choose this particular theme for your book? What is that one message that you’re trying to get across to the readers in this book?

Learning guitar takes work, but it’s not supposed to be a science experiment or a laboratory exercise. You’re not a lab rat. The wall charts, diagrams, and other tools that force your mind out of the creative mode and into a didactic one are not conducive to staying creatively engaged and creating interesting work.

We’re at a crossroads, where more people than ever can pick up an instrument and learn music, and even self-publish it on Spotify, Apple Music, or Youtube, but we’re getting frankly a decline in the kind of creativity that made the guitar a seminal instrument. We don’t have to sit down next to a radio anymore and try to work it out, or drive across the country in search of an obscure chord [The Beatles, and it was a 7th chord]—we can just go to the internet or maybe trust ChatGPT. But the result of all that information, in the form of new manuals, blogs, forums, and so on is not necessarily more light but often more confusion and discouragement, given that we’re still using learning methods from the middle ages and even older.

There’s nothing wrong with old stuff. The old stuff is the good stuff in so many categories. But I think a new era and new access to information needs something that addresses the way people actually learn now, and we’re not all belting out motets and madrigals. A lot of us just want to sit down with the instrument, stay in our creative zone, and make something cool.  

What inspired you to write this book?  An idea, some anecdote, a dream or something else?

Frustration is the mother of invention—at least it is for a creative problem solver. I got tired of consulting wall charts, looking up new ones, and printing things out. I got tired of asking if anyone more experienced could see a pattern between the interval values, circle of fifths, mode shifts, and scale patterns everyone is using and hearing the answer: “Not really. This all comes from the historic development of Western music. You have to understand . . .” Do we though? It’s useful, certainly, from a contextual standpoint, to understand the history, but are we stuck in it?

Fox Mulder, the FBI agent on The X-Files, asked “How many coincidences does it take to make a pattern?” I have that answer. Three. Three to at least suspect a pattern, deduce there might be one, and begin to accumulate enough evidence to move from correlation to causation, from mystery to meaning. I set about looking for patterns, like a code breaker or philologist or semioticist might, and what I saw was some rather obvious relationships that were sometimes understood but rarely joined in presentation or exploration. I drew out a lot of these as arcane-looking diagrams (we don’t need more diagrams, but it’s a starting place) and eventually was able to encode them in an alphabet we call SIGIL.

A sigil is an emblem of magic language, but what we often perceive as magic and therefore disbelieve or unfortunately turn around and entertain with magic thinking in the form of belief, is often just a rational, reproducible reality we don’t fully understand. A bit of playing with that concept and we had the name for the decoder ring in the book’s title.           

How long did it take you to write this particular book?

Nine months of hard work. That’s while working as a self-employed sales enablement professional and brand storyteller. It could have perhaps come faster, but there’s value in taking time for learning, reflection, and nurturing a new idea until it’s ready to show the public. I was anxious not to go out and get ‘hit by the milk truck’ before it was published, but I knew my co-author, Barry Gilman, would finish the task if I didn’t, in some form.

He’s now teaching lessons based on SIGIL and The Guitar Decoder Ring at GuitaRealm.com (one R). It was killing him keeping a lid on it, watching people struggle with the usual scale patterns, interval knowledge, and mode shifts—overall command of the guitar fretboard—while we got the book ready. He’s breathing a sigh of relief now that the book is out.

Barry made the book possible in record time by checking things, suggesting new directions, and finding new patterns that I, as a relative novice player, couldn’t have done at that pace or perhaps at all. It might have been an inferior book if we hadn’t paired these two personalities—a patient, dedicated instructor with albums under his belt and 30 years of experience (that’s Barry Gilman) with an upstart, smart-aleck, autodidact and polymath like myself who just won’t take the status quo for an answer. It really was the perfect mix, and I’m indebted to him.

Guitar instruction has changed my life, enabled me to express feelings that were imprisoned inside, because words just couldn’t convey them properly, but music can. What does it feel like—you name it—ache for something, longing, desire, passion, conviction, frustration, the wish to be loved? We could spend our lives writing novels and poetry to try to nail it and not get there. It’s like asking what is the sound of one hand clapping or the mind of a mountain lion with an elk in his sights. But you touch the strings, if you can stay on that feeling, if you can disregard the sterile laboratory charts, and if you have a language, you can make it known if it’s inside you.

What are your writing ambitions?  Where do you see yourself 5 years from today?

Ha. Anywhere I want to be. That’s not meant as arrogance, but I see a world of incredible possibility both within and without. What is Asher Black likely to do next? Anything. I’ve got two novels in the works, one finished but needing the edit, and the other nearly done. I’m passionate about these. They’re intended for the traditional publishing route through an agent, when I find one who’s interested in what I have to share through fiction.

I want to set aside all the ‘science’ work I did with guitar and now go back to just playing for the love like I was, but armed with the extra knowledge and insight I had to create for myself—which I’ve now shared with anyone else who wants it. My musical goals are all about expressing what’s inside. I have eight guitars, several amps, and a boatload of compositions I barely remember writing. I want to be onboard that train until they find me one day, my cold hands curled around the neck of a guitar, or slumped over my desk with an almost finished manuscript.

My great grandfather lived on a farm he built. I ate the best food in the world at his place. He died at the wood pile, and they found him with an ax in his hand and a smile on his face. It’s the way he said he wanted to go—on his own land, working his farm. That’s joy, man. We shouldn’t be afraid of death—only dying unfulfilled and unsatisfied because we never did the things we wanted, never made the sound playing in our heads, never told the story that was meant to be told.

I’m a karateka. I’m passionate about the arts, including the martial arts. It’s not a sport, for me. It’s an art form just like music and storytelling. I take it on that way, with my sensei Vlad, who’s a Ukrainian national champion. I do some exhibitions and the occasional tournament fight, more as a personal challenge than to show off or win a medal. I don’t care about medals. I care about what I can do, what’s inside, what kind of person art makes me. I suppose this passion could sound a bit melodramatic, but I feel it, like I feel the sound of cicadas looking out at the lone tree in an otherwise open field. I feel on fire. I won’t back up from that. Not ever.

Are you working on any other books presently?

Yeah, baby! The novel I finished in about 10-months last year is a hard-boiled action novel. I love that genre—Mickey Spillane, John D. MacDonald. There’s so much opportunity to comment on the world in fiction, and those guys did, that you’d have to write an essay about otherwise. But essays don’t reach many people and land on us the same way. Story hits deep. We’ve been telling stories since we came down out of the trees and built the first fires in front of the caves to drive away the snuffling in the night. Stories of what lurks out there, stories of our contests with it, stories about the lush valleys on the other side of the mountain with cool streams and fruit dripping from the trees, stories of the hunt and the hunters, of our tribes and how we came to be. I think genre fiction in particular enables that in a way that’s digestible to everyone—it’s fundamentally human.

I’m also writing literary fiction. I’m currently finishing a book about growing up in Appalachia. If John Knowles can say what a thing felt like in A Separate Peace, well I have my own things to say. Both of these books surprised me. I don’t think anyone tells you this, or maybe I just didn’t hear it, but I’ve wept, struck to the core by the act of telling these things, of saying the unsayable, speaking the unspeakable, showing the thing that only my eyes have seen. I think if that’s what fiction writing is, the commitment that takes, the courage, then OK, I’m up for it; I took this on, so I’ll stay in the ring. I got a busted rib in a tournament fight. It hurt so much I could barely stand. All I could do was grin around the mouthguard at my opponent and say, “this is fun”. It is fun, but the fun is becoming the person who can say that when you feel it that much. Writing fiction is like that.

Do you dabble in Fiction?

It’s more than dabbling—I’m committed. I want a life of doing it. I think locked up inside of us who are committed to this is a thing we don’t often put words to. So I’ll say it. I’ll go first, in case this is the first time here. I want to be loved. I want it desperately. But I know a thing. You can’t be loved, not fully, not for who you really are, until you have shown the world, or some world, some audience of people who might be open to it, who you are, what you are, what’s inside you.

Storytelling connects with the most basic impulses of the human ape. We’re riveted by good stories, because there’s really just one story, and we’ve been telling it since we sat cross-legged at the fire and opened our mouths to talk. It follows the same basic format every time: an aspiration (or problem), a hurdle or barrier that stops us, and the act of trying to overcome it. This is why fiction works. When we create great fiction, it pulls on the things that make us apes move, literally bother to move at all, to get out of bed, to do anything, to build that fire in the first place.

But also, this is why creating fiction is such a powerful act for the author. We want to be connected—to other people—and to a narrative of what our lives, even if expressed vicariously in the characters, even tangentially, mean. We are creatures built for meaning, wed to meaning, seeking the transcendent meaning of ourselves, the world, and our relationship to it. We get those answers if we stay on the questions long enough, in increments, with bits of clarity coming through like sunlight filtered through the leaves of a maple tree under which we’ve sheltered from the unapproachable sun that burns above.

The act of authorship, of being an auteur, of creating anything—a kata, a song, a story—it engages that part of us that searches for those answers, in a unique way, because the answers are unique for each of us.

When did you decide to become a writer?  Was it easy for you to follow your passion or did you have to make some sacrifices along the way?

The thing no one says, or seems to say, about authorship, and I’m thinking specifically of fiction, not necessarily the nonfiction work I’m doing, though that contains, inevitably because I’m a storyteller by design, bits of story throughout, is that it’s replete with pain. “Do you enjoy writing?” people ask. I don’t know how to answer. That’s like saying, “Did you enjoy Schindler’s List.” The best I can do is, “I found it meaningful, for me and in general.” Meaning is the thing. Not pleasure. If you’re in it for pleasure, maybe it’s a hobby. If you’re in it for enjoyment, maybe it’s a sport. For it to be an art, you have to take on the punctuated nature of it—it has moments of sheer ecstasy, and equal, perhaps more moments of agitation, anxiousness, and reflective suffering.

I began that journey when I decided to engage some of the suffering happening outside the act of writing, locked inside, and consign it to the page for others to gawk at. I started with poetry. I wrote a lot of it. I performed it at clubs. I published some. I burned some of it and nearly had my butt handed to me by my best friend at the time for destroying something he said was property of the world. It’s not. It’s my property, like everything I write, but it was just a draft—an unsatisfying one.

Writing is pushing on past the unsatisfying until we can look at something we’ve done and say, “ahhh.” I stayed on that train half my life. I’m finally able to produce work I feel that way about. I let it leak into the nonfiction to the degree I think anyone can stand it.

I have a comment on being a writer though. I don’t think of myself as a writer. It sounds tough, but I think writers go to writers’ conferences, talk online about writing, shop for pens and notebooks, and build trappings. Faulker said, “Don’t be a writer. Be writing.” A writer talks of it; an author makes something. Butt in seat until there’s an outcome. It may not be stellar the first go, but it beats ‘writing’ as a posture, a lifestyle, an identity. Not everything is an identity. I don’t want an identity. I know who I am. I want an action.

Writer is an identity we put on. Author is an outcome we created, a thing we’ve done, a contribution to the tangible, visceral things in the world. Authors create new worlds, build this one larger. Writers ask authors where their ideas come from. Authorship is a noun, not writership, because what we mean by author is “has produced something another person can touch, engage with, and feels complete”. It’s not a popular attitude, but taking that posture has helped me immensely by being unforgiving with the pose—for myself. I think if I was content to be a writer, I wouldn’t have written anything. I said this to a speechwriter once, and she nearly burst a kidney. I get it. It’s hard to hear. That’s the point. We need to be hard on ourselves in that way to produce anything substantial. I don’t mean beating ourselves up about whether our character is strong enough, or some literary archaeology like whether someone can find foreshadowing or symbolism in our work. I mean we need to be hard on the part of ourselves that resists doing the work. It is work, and work is tough, work is often painful, work is glorious, work is satisfying, work gets us from here to there.

What is your writing ritual?  How do you do it?

I have a day carved out every week dedicated to progress on my books. I don’t say “to writing” because I’m not interested in anything that doesn’t push that ball forward. I meet with two writing coaches to review the draft, and I write down their feedback. If I can, I’ll spend another half-day implementing some of the feedback.

I use Scrivener for fiction, Vellum for non-fiction, but I’m only referring to the fiction work. The non-fiction stuff, I belt out the rest of the week in the leftover time after business meetings and client work, and in between music and karate. I’m committed to no more than five things in my life. I love boating, dancing, and a host of other things, but I deliberately don’t do them for the sake of the things that MUST happen.

No one writes the great American novel by seeing all their shows, hanging out with all their friends, and going to bed on time. There are trade-offs. Five is the max. Most people will struggle past three things. For me, those are my relationships, business, fiction, karate, and music. The reason you have a nonfiction book about music is that it plugs into those interests. I’ll produce other non-fiction. I have some 40 books on my list to write in the nonfiction category (and countless novels) but I do them because they plug into what I’m already committed to doing.

Case in point, I am in business, running my own business, to make the world better. More specifically, I think we’re going to need a lot of new ideas faster to face the challenges coming down the pike. The way I plug into that is working with the revenue side of enterprises to increase their effectiveness—specifically the sales and brand teams—to reach more people sooner and convert them. I work with firms that are doing something a little bit better.

I’m industry agnostic. As long as it’s removing friction from the system in some category, I’m about plugging in. As a result, I see and hear a lot of things, have a lot of data inputs, and can apply those across domains. I’m a native interdisciplinarian (to coin a term)—a polymath. In the course of doing that work, firms rely on me for a variety of insights, and some of those insights have the potential to make things better for lots of people.

So I write about those, and talk about them, and think and reflect on them, and it’s my plan to put out some nonfiction work in a few domains to share them with the broader public. I don’t mean business books—I mean insights about how things work, why they break, and how they can work better, starting with the human ape itself, because effective firms have effective people, and the most effective people are effective on and off the clock.

Other than that, it’s just butt in seat, a little familiar music, a sandwich, and the laptop open with fingers flying. I’ve received incrementally the grace of needing very few things to be in ‘writing mode’ and I think that’s a worthy goal for anyone intending to do this continuously.

Is writing your profession, or do you work in some other field too?

My profession is thinking, reflecting, and creating, so storytelling, writing, researching, talking, and thinking some more comes out of that. I think of it as a vocation rather than a profession, looked at through a broader lens. David Lee Roth famously said, I believe it was in a Rolling Stone Interview, ‘You think we’re this way because we’re in rock and roll. No, man. We’re in rock and roll, because we’re this way.’ I think that about sums it up.

I don’t pretend I can’t help it. I just know what my own clothes feel like. You spend your younger years trying on hats. “Am I a crested blazer kind of guy? Am I a white pants kind of guy?” Eventually you have your haircut, your wardrobe, your shaving kit, and it doesn’t change. You know what kind of person you are, unless you’re one of those lost souls still searching or you haven’t accepted that, if you’re an artist, you’re weird, so is everyone else, but you’re weird in this way, and so you gotta stop trying to be otherwise.

You get that stuff set, unmessable. You become unmessable as Jocelyn Herman-Saccio says (she’s a spokesperson for Landmark Education), and then, having answered the question “Who am I?” to some degree of satisfaction, and hopefully “What is the world?” because you’re going to run smack into it fast asking who you are, you can move on to “What must I do now?” Those are the three questions all human apes ask (or run away from) and we talk about that in the guitar book. See what I mean? It’s a book for guitarists, but guitarists are fellow human beings and artists, so we’re going to tell stories, recount history, make jokes, and yes, share a little insight on what’s going on inside us all.

Can you recommend a book or two based on themes or ideas similar to your book? (You can share the name of the authors too.)

I found Do the Work by Steven Pressfield useful. Quit screwing around and do it. He tells you why we think that and then don’t, and nudges you into a lifelong fight with Resistance (capital R) which is great.

I like Stephen King’s work, because King is a master at conveying what is quintessentially human. Hearts in Atlantis is four books in one, so don’t take it on unless you’ve got the time, but it’s profound. It’s everywhere in his work, but I like that one.

How do you deal with Writer’s Block?

I murder it, salt the fields, and stick around to re-educate its children. I won’t live with it. I write down ideas constantly. I write down ideas about those ideas, and I jot outlines for potential books. More than one can make in a lifetime, but ones I’d be perfectly happy to make.

I suppose this has been helped greatly, not having writers’ block, by some of the things I’ve already mentioned, but I’ve got two other things going that won’t let it coexist with me. One, I’ve got two superb writing coaches, Noah and Matthew who, if I was ever blocked, would act like colonoscopists for the soul. They’d push until I was connected with whatever is driving me inside. It helped that I started by making a list of things I care about. Where the music is playing, I like to say. If you don’t know what you care about, or what you’re about as a person, it’s kind of a lost cause unless you stop and go after those things, which ARE answerable if you have the heart of a lion, as King says in that book.

Until you connect with yourself, how is anyone else, like a reader, going to connect with you? I think this is where a lot of people get discouraged and quit, and a lot of people who have taken on ‘writer’ as an identity sit and stare at the page, or walk around and think of a virtual page while engaged in avoidance behaviors—not just of writing but of personal learning and connection. Know thyself is a cliche’ for a reason. So is ‘the unreflective life isn’t worth living’. I wouldn’t be able to stand it if I had to go to my grave that way. I don’t fear the grave, I fear being that guy on his deathbed. No one ever lies there saying I wish I had made more money. They say I wish I had found the thing and done it. Find the treasure.

The other thing is I created The Black Academy of Storytelling. It’s a ‘virtual’ regiment of self-study—a construct for study—of dramatic structure. It took a couple of years, but I read everything I could get my hands on about the story spine, the arc, the structure, from inciting incident to climax to denouement. It didn’t help at first. It’s not a formula. It’s kind of useless for that, unless you want to write clones. In a way it’s literary archaeology—reverse engineering what someone with the fire inside them did. But I used that study under that rubric or concept to pay attention—to everything—everywhere I heard even the inkling of story—sales conversations, brand presentations, standup comedy, film, music, everything.

Before long, I had the rhythm. I was just breathing it. I knew when a story was working and what was missing if it wasn’t, not by some shake a stick formula with an inner geek saying ‘you skipped the inciting incident’. Great stories can break great rules. But I could tell the fundamental underlying beats that were either there or not and why they worked. I got so I could predict film trajectories a few minutes in. I could anticipate the direction songs would take, right down the drummer’s next tap. I could feel what needed to happen to keep the audience when I picked up my pen. It was immensely helpful.

So, having the fire in the belly, knowing who I am and what I care about and what I must do, and what the world is I’m talking to, and how good stories do that talking, intrinsically until it feels like instinct, I never looked at a blank page again.

I sometimes don’t know how to START what I’m doing. I have a rule: just start. The first few pages are always awkwardly executed. I don’t care. I’ll fix them in the edit. It’s like making a song. You just have to start humming. Your body and mind, your heart and soul, your gut and your bowels know what to do. Just lay down a rhythm and you’ll find your legs.

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

Nonfiction is storytelling. ChatGPT can’t do that. Not effectively, despite the hype. The glue that connects with the soul isn’t there, just like the air and breathing that Classic Rock has it in from those tube amplifiers, lack of compression, and analog recording feels human, but the super-compressed chugga-chugga deedly-deedly of what came later feels a little contrived, like a computer could do it.

You know, I can usually tell if a drummer is human. I listen to a record and there are microbeats we don’t measure in Western music. Musicologists and music theorists do in Non-Western cultures. There’s a lot of indigenous African music we don’t even have notation to document, because of that. You can hear when the drummer takes a breath—when he’s technically on-beat, but there’s a segment of time smaller than the official time signature, in which that humanity is conveyed. We can feel it, even if we can’t hear it. That’s why that music still is “the music” for a lot of us, along with the great old jazz, blues, and other Americana.

So that’s about AI, but there are also a lot of nonfiction works being put out that are like the backing tracks in a lot of recorded music, as if we’re just phoning it in and it’s just something to happen while the vocalist works. The musicians are optional. Drummers will even go into studios and do a track and the technician will hand that off to an algorithm to produce a perfect, and therefore sterile imitation. I dig Sia, her story, her vibe, a lot. But I don’t like the music behind Titanium. It doesn’t match what she’s really saying. It’s not human enough. It doesn’t ache with her. It doesn’t connect with the ache in me.

Nonfiction, a lot of it, risks being that—purely nonfiction, like a vocalist with a digital backing track. The best work is replete with real human stories and the idiosyncrasy that real human stories contain and convey. What makes something spectacularly unique and human, like us, is the weirdness, the divergence, the universality of the freaking weird. By that I mean open your gut a little. They tell fiction writers to bleed on the page, and I do it, but nonfiction? All you hear is be well-organized, succinct in presentation, comprehensive—Jeez man, that’s not music.

Tell us something about growing up with your grandmother without running water or refrigeration. Tell us about the time you nearly went down in a fight. Get a little dirt on the page. If you sanitize it, it feels like one of those coffee shops that come off like a science lab. Stainless steel chairs and tables, coffee made in test tubes—no one relaxes on a sofa and writes the opening line to the next spectacular novel, poem, song, or nonfiction work in such a place, so don’t mirror that place in your nonfiction. Let your hair down and have a drink with the unwashed.

Thank you, author Black, for taking out the time to answer our questions and for all your thought-provoking and interesting answers!

About the Book

The Guitar Decoder Ring

• 2023 NYC Big Book Award Winner in the category of Music.
• 2023 Pinnacle Book Achievement Award for a How-to Book.
• Hollywood Book Festival honorable mention, 2023.
• Global Book Awards finalist, 2023.

Meet SIGIL—the new language of guitar. Guitarists who want to improvise and compose, from novice to advanced, will find SIGIL works like a decoder ring for the guitar, yet it’s simple enough to keep in one’s head.

Visualize the whole fretboard. Gain portable knowledge of modes, scales, and intervals without wall charts. This is guitar study re-engineered for every level.

Create more interesting solos. Break through your lull or stall. Decrypt the instrument and unleash your play. The authors are a seasoned musician with albums under his belt and a lively storyteller who walk you through the toolset with eye-opening and sometimes hilarious examples.

You can find The Guitar Decoder Ring here:
Blurb| Amazon (print) | Amazon (ebook) | Barnes & Nobel | Kobo | SmashWords | Lulu | Scribd

If you are an author and wish to be featured as our guest or if you are a publicist and want to get your author featured on TRB, then please get in touch directly by e-mail at thereadingbud@gmail.com

Welcome to TRB Lounge. Today, I’d like to welcome the author of Brothers and Strangers: A German-Iraqi Memoir —Junis Sultan for an author interview with The Reading Bud.

About The Author

Junis Sultan studied in Frankfurt am Main, Eichstätt and at California State University Fullerton. He received a Fulbright and a Horizonte Scholarship. For the past six years, he has taught English, politics, and economics as a high school teacher in Frankfurt am Main. He is pursuing a doctorate in Modern Political Theory at the University of Heidelberg.

You can find author Sultan here:
Author Website | Hessenschau | UNO-Fluechtlingshilfe | Kohero Magazin

Interview

Welcome to TRB! Please give our readers a brief introduction about yourself before we begin. 

My name is Junis Sultan. I’m an author, a teacher, and a doctorate student. I was born in Mosul, Iraq in 1986 to a wealthy intercultural family. After the Gulf War in 1991, my family fled to Germany. We have stayed here since then; so, I’ve spent most of my life in Germany. I started journaling when I was 15 years old—after the 9/11 terror attacks, a very intense and emotional time. Since then writing has been my way to process things and find meaning.

I studied Politics, Economics, and English in Frankfurt, Eichstätt, and Fullerton and received a Fulbright and a Horizonte scholarship at the time. I currently teach part-time at a middle school near Frankfurt and pursue a doctorate in Modern Political Theory at the University of Heidelberg.

In my free time I love to be outside or do sports. One of my lifelong passions in addition to writing is boxing. It started with a movie—Rocky—when we came to Germany.

Please tell us something about your book other than what we have read in the blurb?

It was a quite a journey until my memoir got published. The first version of my memoir was titled “Struggles of Strangers: Of Bonding and Freedom” and self-published in 2017. It was staged at the German National Library in Frankfurt. In 2019, it was shortlisted for the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing in New York. Shortly, I signed a contract with Brandylane Publisher Inc. and Königshausen und Neumann to get a polished version of my memoir published with a new title in the US and in Germany. The US title is BROTHERS AND STRANGERS: A GERMAN-IRAQI MEMOIR; the German title is GLAUBENSKRIEGE: VON FREMDEN UND FREUNDEN.

Even though I mostly grew up in Germany and even though German is my mother tongue, I wrote my memoir in English. Writing in English started with some journal entries, mostly poems and lyrics. When I began to study English at Goethe University Frankfurt, I completely switched to journaling in English.

My memoir includes original journal entries; but not just that. It also includes classic storytelling, news-reports, photos, official correspondence, and even court verdicts. On top, it takes place in different settings: Iraq, Jordan, Germany, and the US.     

Why did you choose this particular theme for your book? What is that one message that you’re trying to get across to the readers in this book?

This might sound strange, but I think I did not choose the topic; I believe the topic or life chose me. My father is an Iraqi Muslim and my mother a German Christian. I was born to connect these two worlds, build bridges, and foster mutual understanding and integration. This has been my blessing and curse at the same time. In addition to my family structure, the flight to Germany was another personal fate that demanded my continuous efforts for integration. My happy, privileged childhood was abruptly cut short by the Gulf War in 1991. Our home was destroyed; we were forced to flee and eventually settled in a small conservative town in Germany, near Frankfurt, where we struggled to adapt to our new circumstances. I found myself increasingly torn between two worlds—fighting to carve out an identity for myself between my family’s expectations and a culture that demanded my assimilation. After the 9/11 terror attacks, I began to keep a diary, in which I reflected on questions of family, friendship, religion, and politics. These deep insights gradually expand beyond cultural borders, as I began to explore the universal human needs for bonding and freedom. If I had to break down my memoir to one message, it would be: Act with openness and love.

What inspired you to write this book? An idea, some anecdote, a dream or something else?

On November 11, 2011, I was so broken from the yearlong repercussions of the Gulf War, our flight, and ethnic and religious conflicts in my family and in our new environment that I didn’t see any sense in staying life. After having returned to Frankfurt, Germany, from a study-abroad year in Fullerton, California, I experienced a reverse culture shock: repeated experiences with racism, the uncovering of the racist NSU murder series, and the separation of my parents after decades of marital problems in which ethnic and religious differences were constantly played up. The feelings of loss, loneliness, and despair overwhelmed me that day. I was determined to end my, what I thought, cursed life. But then, pictures came to my mind, like flashes, picture of the positive experiences and relationships in my life. That day, the idea evolved in my mind. In order not only to survive, but to heal, I wanted to write down everything. I wanted to use my story and create something good for others. I wanted to help others deal with their fears and despairs. I wanted to encourage people to love themselves and those around them. I wanted to tear down the walls we have created and connect old and young, men and women, East and West—all people. This was the only way my life made sense to me: to encourage our human experiences—the needs for bonding and freedom, the struggles for happiness and peace, and the connecting and liberating powers of love.

How long did it take you to write this particular book?

It took me several years to finish this memoir as I was facing some challenges on the way: dealing with re-traumatization, developing personally, becoming a better writer in a second language, completing my studies, teacher training, and teaching full-time. The first version of my memoir was called “Struggles of Strangers: Of Bonding and Freedom.” I completed it in 2014/2015 and began to contact literary agents and agencies—without success. So I revised it, again and again. In 2017, I self-published it. In 2019, after about 1000 rejections, it was eventually shortlisted for the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing in New York. Shortly, I signed a contract with Brandylane Publisher Inc. and Königshausen und Neumann to get a polished version of my memoir with a new title published in the US and in Germany.

What are your writing ambitions? Where do you see yourself 5 years from today?

I would definitely like to write more books. I see myself in 5 years doing the same—teaching and writing—but on another, higher level. Ideally, I will be teaching at university and finishing my next book. I already have it in my mind. It is a continuation of my family’s story. The next book will tackle topics that have been taboos in my family: personality disorders, sexual abuse, homophobia, drug abuse, and suicide. Obviously, these topics are very serious. And it will be difficult to go through everything again. But I think I owe it my brother who was found dead in his apartment in 2021 as a victim of a drug overdose. I want to encourage people to openly talk about these problems—which go beyond cultural borders—so that we all take responsibility and find ways to help those who are affected, in some cases including ourselves, heal, make progress, and live a life in which everyone can prosper. 

Are you working on any other books presently?

Yes, I am, but it is another kind of book, an academic book. It is my doctoral dissertation I write at Karl-Ruprecht University Heidelberg. The title is “Linguistic justice: Rethinking Education in Liberal Democracy.” It’s about how public schools (analyzed by the example of Germany) can do more justice to the growing numbers of students that have a non-European background. It’s about the politics of recognition, the prioritization of integration, legally binding frameworks, linguistic and global citizenship, community-based multilingual education, longer joint learning, and inclusive education that is open for different cultures, languages, and religions. There are many ways to further integration; they all make a difference.      

Do you also dabble in Fiction?

No, I don’t and probably won’t because the topic I focus on—integration—is a matter of heart for me that does not only concern ethnic minorities. It’s about justice; it’s about how we want to live together as people. On the other hand, I have some dystopic novels with my students at school, which touched this topic indirectly or directly—like Brave New World or The Giver. So, maybe one day I will dabble in fiction but definitely not in the next five years.

When did you decide to become a writer? Was it easy for you follow your passion or did you have to make some sacrifices along the way?

I first dreamt of becoming a writer when I started journaling as a 15 year old. My dream was to live in a warm country close to the ocean, read a lot of books and write books. At the time, I also began writing and translating a number of speeches for my father, who was the chairman of the Council for Foreigners. Still, writing was more a hobby and I was more serious about becoming a boxer then. Boxing taught me many life lessons, above all discipline, which includes making sacrifices. So, being ambitious and disciplined has been part of my personality for a long time. It was and still is natural to me. I am a driven person. And yes, I made a lot of sacrifices on the way to follow my passion and become a writer. When you work 9 hours a day, commute, do the household, cook, eat, do sports, shower, and sleep 7 hours at night, there is not much time left every day to become something else—especially if you decide to use your free time watching TV or going out, being social etc. I radically cut back mostly all of those things, except family and health. There always needs to be time for these two things. But if you really want to become something else, you need to invest at least 2 hours every day in yourself, if not more.

What is your writing ritual? How do you do it?

I am a nighthawk. Since writing was never my full-time job, I always wrote after I had met my other obligations. I have the habit of changing place when I write. Sometimes I write at the dining table, sometimes at my desk, sometimes on the couch, sometimes standing, sometimes at the kitchen counter, sometimes in the train or bus, sometimes in a café, sometimes right after work or in my breaks in the classroom, sometimes at the train station or airport, sometimes at the pool or even the beach. Sometimes I change places because I have to, sometimes I change place because I want to; it somehow makes me approach the material with different eyes. I usually write on my laptop, but I also have loads of notes on small pieces of paper. My working place is normally a precious mess. Sometimes I like to listen to instrumental music, often soundtracks. When I am working on a difficult piece, I need absolute silence though. I will read the text aloud, again and again until it flows. I usually drink tea, mostly ginger tea with honey, or coffee with milk and sugar when I write. 

Is writing your profession or do you work in some other field too?

No, writing is not my profession; I currently work part-time in a middle school as an English and Politics and Economics teacher. In addition, I pursue a doctorate in Modern Political Theory at the Karl Ruprecht University of Heidelberg. I also taught high school for three years before that. I did enroll in several creative writing courses during my studies in Frankfurt and Fullerton though. I was also doing some translation work for my writing teacher in Fullerton, who had lost her uncle in a German concentration camp.                                                     

Can you recommend a book or two based on themes or ideas similar to your book? (You can share the name of the authors too.)

Reading “The Diary of Anne Frank” touched me very deeply as a teenager. Even though I cannot compare her story with mine, there are some similar topic like the mother-child conflict and feeling alone and sad as a teenager.  

Further, I have read many (auto-) biographies and memoirs by African-Americans who have covered themes similar to my book: the struggle for equality and freedom. To name some: W.E.B. Du Bois, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, and Michelle and Barak Obama.

How do you deal with Writer’s Block?

I normally use timeboxing as a technique. To give an example: I allocate an evening for a revision of two pages or two years for writing an entire book. This way I create some expectations of myself and take track if I reach my goals. I often do not share my goals with others; reaching new goals is a personal standard I have for myself. The bigger the goal, like writing a new book, the more flexibility I give myself. If, for instance, I am not able to write a halfway good text on one day, I accept that and take a break. I go outside, do sports, and most often that is already enough to approach the piece with more energy and new eyes. If that is still not enough, I try the next day again. And sometimes, I have days where I am very productive and make up for the other less productive days. These are the days when I work until midnight or even longer.

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

Never give up. Always keep working on your craft. Read and study your topic. Share your work with others. Everybody has got a story. But, always keep in mind that you need to answer the following two questions in the end: What can we learn from you? How does it make anyone’s life better?  

Thank you, author Sultan, for taking out the time to answer our questions and for all your thought-provoking and interesting answers!

About the Book

Brothers and Strangers: A German-Iraqi Memoir

Born in Mosul, Iraq, to a wealthy intercultural family, Junis Sultan’s happy, privileged childhood is abruptly cut short by the start of the Gulf War in 1991. With their home destroyed, Junis’s family flees to Germany, settling in a small conservative town near Frankfurt. As his family struggles to adapt to their new circumstances, Junis finds himself increasingly torn between two worlds—fighting to carve out an identity for himself between his family’s expectations and a culture that demands his assimilation. After the 9/11 terror attacks, Junis begins to keep a diary, in which he reflects on questions of family, friendship, religion, and politics. These deep insights gradually expand beyond cultural borders, as Junis begins to explore the universal human needs for bonding and freedom.

Brothers and Strangers is a unique, heartfelt memoir of endurance, forgiveness, and self-actualization, offering a timely message about the importance of acting with openness and love in a global reality.

You can find Brothers and Strangers here:
Amazon | Brandylane Publishers Inc. | Facebook

If you are an author and wish to be featured as our guest or if you are a publicist and want to get your author featured on TRB, then please get in touch directly by e-mail at thereadingbud@gmail.com

Welcome to TRB Lounge. Today, I’d like to welcome the author of The Fall of Immortals (Shogun of the Heavens #1) —I.D.G. Curry, from Atmosphere Press, for an author interview with The Reading Bud.

About The Author

I.D.G. Curry is a fiction novelist who was compelled to bring what started as a dream into an entire universe of characters that interact and intertwine with the mythology he loves. He believes that fiction, folklore, and myths are the true essences of storytelling; which opens the reader’s mind to what could be possible or even what the truth might actually be. Curry aims to collide the world we live in with centuries of man-kind’s imagination, even scattering elements from his own life into the journey. This is the journey’s beginning.

You can connect with Author Curry here:
Author Website

Interview

Welcome to TRB! Please give our readers a brief introduction about yourself before we begin. 

Thank you, Heena & TRB, for taking the time to interview me. I am a fiction novelist who felt compelled to bring to life what started as a dream during one of my darkest hours: an entire universe of characters that interact and intertwine with the mythology I grew to love. In my opinion, fiction, folklore, and myths are the true essences of storytelling; they open the reader’s mind to what could be possible or even what the truth might actually be.

Please tell us something about your book other than what we have read in the blurb?

One thing you will hear a lot about the Shogun of the Heavens series is its pace. It has been described as cinematic to a degree. That was actually very intentional. When I started the Shogun of the Heavens, I wanted it to be in a style and flavor of my own. Because there were characters from well-known artworks from our history, I did not focus too much on their individual details because everyone who is familiar with them already would know what they look like. However, my original characters were all unique and my goal was to bring them to life, with the story, within the minds of my readers. So, I aim to do that mentally and then visually on my website where there will be artwork continuously added over the course of the story: www.shogunoftheheavens.com

In regards to the pace itself, I never really liked “filler episodes” in the content I watched. I understood why they were there, though most of the time, I felt there were other ways to introduce the past into the present or the present into the future. So, although I could make the story longer if I wanted to, it would actually take away more from the story because it would become more like everything else. The story stays focused on what is happening or wherever there is progression. Ask yourself: Do you really need to read a bunch of short fights where you can easily predict who was going to win? Of course not. You want to grip onto your seat! Even if you have no idea who is fighting, it excites you. Because you don’t know what is going to happen. One extra exclusive fact is that Shogun of the Heavens was not the original name of the series. I was originally going to call it GodsGrave, but when I was creating the Facebook group, I learned the name was taken. Oh boy, was I upset, because I wanted there to be symbolism in the name. Not only that, there were volumes of it and I wanted this book to stand out like it deserves so I brainstormed about the story from start to finish and I took a look at where the journey was going and then it hit me: “The Shogun of the Heavens.” I searched across the internet for any other title or reference with that name and there were none, so from then on, Shogun of the Heavens has been it.

What is that one message that you’re trying to get across to the readers in this book?

For such a long time, stories have been based on the tried-and-true perception of good versus evil and that the world’s morality is in black and white. I challenge you to determine who is the hero and who is the villain in this story. What you will find as the story continues is that how you feel about a particular character may change from book to book. The way that all of the characters interact with one another and what motivates them are mixed into the story as if it truly happened, while remaining comparable to the stories told five thousand years ago.

Who is your favourite character in this book and why?

Xauldin is my favorite character. Because he is so multi-dimensional, which is also interesting since he himself started out as one of three dimensions of another being. His evolution throughout the story is a journey itself, fulfilling a prophecy of his own in a way.

What inspired you to write this book? An idea, some anecdote, a dream or something else?

It was a dream. The Acolytes of Dawn’s personalities each came from individuals that knew me personally, both now and at the time. Even then, I did not start writing it until eight years later in the summer of 2019. I hadn’t told anyone that I had started writing it because I was still planning it on my War Table as I called it at that time, though I had begun organizing it from point A to point Z.

How long did it take you to write this particular book?

This first installment took me around a year and six months, finishing in the middle of March of 2020. I was becoming a father, then later a husband, while learning a new family around the beginning of the Covid-19 era, so writing was a way for me to stay focused on a grander goal, rather than focus on the chaos that was happening around us.

What are your writing ambitions? Where do you see yourself 5 years from today?

Honestly five years from now, I hope to bring Shogun of the Heavens to a streaming service like Hulu or Netflix. One with a studio that will join me in bringing this epic story to the screen in a series that I know the fans would love.

Are you working on any other stories presently?

Not at this time. I have noted a few other stories to begin on after I have completed the Shogun of the Heavens series. Though right now I am focusing the same energy and attention into this series that I hope to draw from my audience, as I write Book Two. Everyone who finished that first page and then nearly panicked when at the end of The Fall of Immortals, fear not. Book Two: The Throne Crusher is expected to be published on December 9^th, 2023.

Why have you chosen this genre? Or do you write in multiple genres?

I have been caught up in this genre since the first time I saw Disney’s Hercules as a kid. I was a big follower of anime and animated films just as I am today. However, as I am now an adult, I expanded into more historical and philosophical book such as The Moors in Spain, The Prince, and the different studies on the mythologies, which in essence are the religions of the past. I believe I have the ability to write another genre, such as crime or a philosophical piece, but I don’t feel the need to get that serious with that right now. I am having fun with Shogun of the Heavens and don’t want to rush it.

When did you decide to become a writer? Was it easy for you follow your passion or did you have to make some sacrifices along the way?

The peculiar thing is I did not actually consider myself a writer until I got published by Atmosphere Press. Before that, I was just a person with an idea, ink, and some pages. I do not say this to demean anyone or discourage the writers of the future. What I am saying is that as I wrote my first book, I learned more about myself, my reality, and the story itself. As I wrote my book, I read others that helped to give me an understanding from multiple points of view. I had to come up with answers to questions like: What is a god? How did this god originate? How can their power and abilities be scaled?

You will know that you are a writer when you realize your ability to take a singular idea or concept and create a message to the world that only you and your audience will understand. The more relatable this concept is to understand, the more people you will inevitably reach.

What is your writing ritual? How do you do it?

I feel the power of music is underrated. Music can create feelings and emotions inside us and help us channel our energy into other mediums. I listen to music on YouTube that is either meditative or matches the intensity of a scene I am writing. Channels like Lofi Girl, TSWG, Tranquil Music, or even Tokyo Café Jazz. Hearing melodies that did not put words in my head.

How do you prefer to write – computer/laptop, typewriter, dictation or longhand with a pen?

I plan on paper for a visual medium to arrange my ideas on something I can touch. The rest of it, though, is done on my laptop. From the time I was in elementary or secondary school, I did not write fast or have “pretty handwriting” as referred to by my peers at the time. But I could cruise 45 words per minute on a keyboard. I decided to stick to my strengths.

What are your 5 favourite books? (You can share 5 favourite authors too.)

1. A Cruel Wind by Glen Cook
2. Marco Polo by Laurence Bergreen
3. Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford
4. Venus and Adonis by William Shakespeare
5. Gilgamesh translated by Stephen Mitchell

How do you deal with Writer’s Block?

Never believed in it. At least not for myself. To me, Writer’s Block means you’re out of ideas. I wouldn’t even want to admit that to myself. However, I have reached points in the story where I look left, right, and center. Then ask myself: Where do I go from here? The music I mentioned I listen to earlier is also helpful for stimulating the state a writer enters where you can see the story. I pace back and forth in my office, simulating the consequences, potential catastrophes or benefits that would result from one of my characters making a decision. This, as you can imagine, becomes more difficult the more characters that may be involved in one scene. “The King’s Trial” was one of those chapters, involving the princess and her host who was a Loyalist to her family’s regime. There are a few ways that something of that nature can go. I like the direction we went. 

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

The same advice I give to all of my friends and associates who tell me that they are writing. If you want to write then reading is going to be essential to you. It is not as though you are copying someone else. In fact, if you really think about it, most—if not all—artworks were inspired by something else or something similar that was also inspired by something or someone else. When you read books related to a topic you are writing on, you grasp the concept better, becoming able to view the world through another writer’s eyes. Everything that they learned while writing, you will then learn and incorporate it into your works that will inspire the generations of writers after you.

I love writing. When I first was selecting my career as a youth, being an author would have never made the list. Now, I write not because it makes a living or just as a hobby. I write because I love telling impactful stories that provoke both thought and self-reflection.

Once again, my thanks to you, our friends, at The Reading Bud.

Thank you, author I.D.G. Curry, for taking out the time to answer our questions and for all your thought-provoking and interesting answers!

About the Book

The Fall of Immortals

In the ancient world, during the time of war, gods, and monsters. A sensation had been detected approaching Gaia, so ominous that it was felt across the cosmos by the few who dwelled in its supreme echelon. 
One Fallen Immortal will be pursued by mercenaries, the divine, and above all, those he once held dear from his past life. The clashes between these factions will decide who becomes an ally or who’s next. The deep bonds of both friendship and love will be strained, some may even be severed.
How far would you go for the ultimate prize? How much would you be willing to sacrifice? Most of us spend so much time desperately holding on to what little we can. There are also those of us who are ostracized because we choose to walk a path different from our group or community and then for that simple choice, are treated as if we have committed treason. If you were given the opportunity to gain everything you always wanted at the cost of the aforementioned, would you take it? If your answer is yes, I invite you to turn these pages. If you don’t think it’s possible, I challenge you to witness as our champion accomplishes the impossible.

You can find The Fall of Immortals here:
Amazon | Goodreads

If you are an author and wish to be featured as our guest or if you are a publicist and want to get your author featured on TRB, then please get in touch directly by e-mail at thereadingbud@gmail.com

Welcome to TRB Lounge. Today, I’d like to welcome the author of The Lighthouse—Karin Ciholas, from Atmosphere Press, for an author interview with The Reading Bud.

About The Author

Karin Ciholas was born in Virginia and grew up in Switzerland where she studied classical languages. The study of Latin and Greek led to her fascination with the ancient world and its history. She earned advanced degrees in languages and comparative literature at UNC Chapel Hill and enjoyed teaching modern languages and courses on the ancient world. She has won twelve awards for her short stories and plays. She lives in Sarasota with her husband, author and theologian Paul Ciholas. 

Interview

Welcome to TRB! Please give our readers a brief introduction about yourself before we begin. 

 My father sang Norwegian songs to me and told me stories about his native Norway. My mother told me about her “old Kentucky home” where she grew up. As a child in Switzerland, I learned the Swiss dialect from my school friends, and all my courses were taught in German. All my life, I have been grateful for my gifted teachers in the Swiss school system that placed great emphasis on Greek and Latin and gave me a lifelong love of classical antiquity and ancient history. We spoke English at home, but the first class I ever had in English was when I came to the US to go to college. On a student trip to Rome, I fell in love with a young theology student from France, and when we married four years later, we lived in France for several years. After completing advanced degrees, we chose teaching careers in the US: Paul to teach religion and philosophy at universities in Kentucky and I to teach languages and humanities at Centre College. And that is how we ended up in “our new Kentucky home.”

Please tell us something about your book other than what we have read in the blurb?

The Lighthouse is about a dedicated Jewish physician named Simon who wants to heal and save lives and make the world a better place. But he is thwarted and opposed by violence and racism. Antisemitism rears its ugly head. He fights back at every turn. He fights against vicious criminals, against arbitrary Roman power, and against the injustices of racism. He struggles for freedom for his fellow Jews. One of the battles he cares most about is his struggle to find better ways to treat illness. When his sister is abducted and sold into slavery, he starts his fight against slavery. It is a deeply personal battle that endangers his family. It is a battle he cannot win.

He is a witness to several historical events that profoundly changed the world. He is neither responsible for those events, nor can he intervene to stop them. During the first pogrom of recorded history in Alexandria, Egypt, Simon tries but cannot stop the massacre. He does manage to save many lives.

What is that one message that you’re trying to get across to the readers in this book?

The fight against prejudice, racism, and antisemitism is never done. Prejudices against fellow human beings have distorted human behavior since Cain and Abel, and wars and hatred in the name of religion still mar our history and continue to cause havoc. Simon, the physician who seeks to heal, cannot find the way to cut this defect out of the human heart. And yet he tries. Boldly, Simon fights for justice for his family and his people. When Simon plunges into danger, we worry about him. Sometimes we want to shake him and talk sense into him. We are moved by historical drama where life and death are at stake. His urgent fight for justice is never done. At stake, for him, is the survival of his people. Despite many setbacks, Simon brings healing to many. We all need healing.

Who is your favourite character in this book and why?

Aurelia is my favorite character because she is strong. In many ways, she is stronger than Simon even though Simon does not see it that way. She often protects him, assists him in saving lives during the pogrom, and is not intimidated even when the emperor or the prefect of Egypt opposes her. There are several strong women who sometimes quietly and other times quite theatrically make a difference. Antonia, sister-in-law of Tiberius, saves Rome from an upstart tyrant who wants to take over the imperial throne. One of my favorite characters is Sosias, an orphan Simon rescues who has irrepressible curiosity and sets out to become an engineer. Through him, I show some of the scientific and technological advances of the times.

What inspired you to write this book? An idea, some anecdote, a dream or something else?

My Mother was a discerning and avid reader. She enjoyed reading my short stories and plays but complained she couldn’t find enough historical fiction set in New Testament times. She asked if I had ever thought about writing a novel about one of the characters in the New Testament who knew Jesus. I told her I was intrigued by Simon of Cyrene. I mentioned Simon did not really know Jesus, that he met Jesus under the most excruciating circumstances and that Simon was an unusual Jew since he gave his children Roman and Greek names. She turned to me and said, “Well, Karin, when will you write his story?”

How long did it take you to write this particular book?

It took about 15 years. During a demanding teaching career, I kept my mother’s request in mind, enjoyed studying primary sources in ancient history, and discovered so many jewels of information I could use for the novel she wanted. When I finished the first chapter, I sent it to her in the mail. Then she kept wanting more. I sent chapter by chapter until 1000 pages landed in her mailbox. There have been many changes since, but the basic bones of the novel are still there. A wise agent told me the book needed to be divided into a trilogy.

What are your writing ambitions? Where do you see yourself 5 years from today?

I hope to get the next two books in the trilogy into shape for publication. Between initial concept—even if on paper—and completion much needs to be done. After that, I may turn back to a historical novel I’m writing set during WWII. I have also ghostwritten several memoirs for veterans of WWII and helped them with the logistics of publishing. Alas, more and more vets are leaving us without having told their stories.

Are you working on any other stories presently?

History provides an endless source of material. My favorite era is the first century when so much was going on. I like to take a character like Simon and show events through his eyes, making him a witness to the great events that occurred in his lifetime: the rise of science in Alexandria, the power of the Roman empire, amazing advances in medicine that will later be lost for centuries, the crucifixion of Jesus, the beginnings of Christianity, the fall of the temple…. I might write a story about another historical character from that time.

Why have you chosen this genre? Or do you write in multiple genres?

I’ve written and published short stories and poems in literary journals, and five of my plays have been performed. But historical fiction is my preferred genre for reading and writing. Faulkner said: “The past is never dead…It’s not even past.”

When did you decide to become a writer? Was it easy for you follow your passion or did you have to make some sacrifices along the way?

I have always loved books. As children, my brother and I even started a little library and made library cards for each book he owned and each book I owned. When my mother discovered he was charging me a penny to read his books, and I charged nothing, she put a stop to his enterprise but not a stop to our reading. The impulse to write was first evident when I started rewriting the endings of stories I didn’t like. From there it was a logical step to just make up my own stories. From those childish beginnings came the urge to write short stories. All my first attempts at publishing them were rejected. I am sure the editors of the journals did me a favor by rejecting them. I started subscribing to the best literary journals and began to learn what was getting published. I also learned that what one publisher rejects can be submitted elsewhere and be accepted.

What is your writing ritual? How do you do it?

When I go to my computer in the morning, I read the news and check the last sentences I wrote the day before. Reading the news is quickly depressing. So, I turn to my writing. Writing makes me feel involved in the whole story of humanity. Research is exciting. I am in a different century. Except…some current events are not always that different from what was going on in the Roman empire.

How do you prefer to write – computer/laptop, typewriter, dictation or longhand with a pen?

I started out with pen and paper. All writing is now on the computer.

What are your 5 favourite books? (You can share 5 favourite authors too.)

Any book by Sharon Kay Penman. One special favorite: Here Be Dragons. She makes Welsh history come alive.

Books by Margaret George. She is the doyenne of historical fiction, the astute researcher who makes major historical characters live and breathe. The Autobiography of Henry VIII with Notes by his Fool, Will Somers is a compelling saga. The Prologue alone is a masterpiece of historical and psychological insights.

Books by Tan Twan Eng. The Gift of Rain is set in Malaysia during WWII. A beautifully written novel filled with mystery and wonder.

Books by Mark Helprin. Paris in the Present Tense is a personal favorite. Helprin’s writing is lyrical, visual, hauntingly beautiful, entrancing.

Books by Geraldine Brooks. My favorite new book this year: Horse. There are many levels of meaning in this book, woven together into a fine masterpiece. Brooks is a versatile writer who makes time travel to distant shores and times sound easy.

How do you deal with Writer’s Block?

Life can intervene. That’s ok. I just had cancer surgery a week ago. I need times when I must be gentle with myself. When at an impasse, I go to some writers I love most and reread my favorite passages and follow the flow of their sentences through a dramatic sequence and try to learn from them. If inspiration doesn’t come quickly, I like to sit in my garden or take a walk. The silliest thing I do is tell the story to my stuffed bear and explain what I want to do in the next scene. By the time I have told him, I often know what to do. I have a very intelligent bear, and he often warns me not to overthink it.

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

Besides getting an intelligent stuffed bear? Read, read, and read good writers you enjoy. After your enjoyment, take time to analyze why the writing moves you or inspires you or why it makes you smile or cry. Remember 3 p’s: perseverance, passion, and professionalism. It takes perseverance to complete a work and see it through the many steps toward publication. So don’t give up. If you are not passionate about your subject, your reader will not be. And if there is no passion in your main characters, they will not be interesting. Professionalism requires following the rules of submission to the letter, proper language use or having someone help with that, and being attentive and appreciative to those who give you advice, especially if they care enough to give you pointers when you get rejections. There is a fourth p. But you should avoid this one—perfectionism. Maybe Shakespeare wrote the perfect play, but I doubt it. At some point, you must stop the rewriting and editing and send your work out. Perfectionism is an enemy of success.

Thank you, author Karin Cicholas, for your insightful answers!

About the Book

The Lighthouse

Simon is a gifted physician who faces constant danger as a Jew in first-century Egypt under Roman rule.

When Meidias, an escaped convict, declares a “holy” war against Jews and abducts Simon’s sister, Simon’s search for her leads him on a treacherous journey to slave markets in Alexandria and to Jerusalem where a Roman soldier forces Simon to carry a crossbeam for a stranger. Simon is troubled by the stranger’s death but does not know that this moment will change the world forever.

Simon’s passion is Aurelia, inaccessible daughter of a Roman senator. His mission is revenge against the outlaw Meidias. His ambition is justice for his family and his people. His torment is the conflict between his Hippocratic oath and his vow to kill Meidias.

As his medical reputation grows, he comes face to face with prefects and emperors and the poor suffering masses of Alexandria and Rome. Overwhelmed by the plight of his people, he tries to stop what becomes the first pogrom in Alexandria.
THE LIGHTHOUSE moves between Egypt and Italy and back to Alexandria. It is a story about family love and loyalty, medical breakthroughs and heartbreaks, and one man’s quest for justice for his people.

You can find Balsamic Moon here:
Amazon | Goodreads

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