BRINGING RUST-CITY TO LIFE: FIRST ATTEMPTS AND THE SHIFT FROM FANTASY TO SCIENCE-FICTION

It’s 2017. The Last Survivors isn’t published yet, although its publication is becoming more and more of a reality. I have a lot of other ideas for novels, some which I am developing, some which will grow into stories that will take up several notebooks. Some might see the light of day too, at one point.

Until then, I had dabbled strictly in the realms of Fantasy. I had been writing fantastic literature since I was very young, since before I even knew such a genre existed. The patterns felt safe and familiar to me, the creation of new worlds a comfort. It gave me control and a way to let my imagination run wild. Even when I tried to write about a modern setting, I still kept it firmly tied to a fantasy world somewhere out there.

And then, something changed. I decided to try my hand at science-fiction. Perhaps it was natural. I was re-watching Babylon 5 every autumn. I had started to read extensively from the great authors of classic sci-fi – like Asimov and Bradbury and Clarke – and the structure and tone of the genre intrigued me. So, one day, I found myself with a notebook in my hand and a question in my mind: Why not set my next novel in the future?

I will be honest: Rust-city was something that I never intended to show to anyone. It was going to be a secret project, one that I would work on for my enjoyment alone. And certainly, the first drafts fit the criteria. I do not even have those early drafts, but the plot was probably shoddy, the characters not fully developed and the setting rather vague and unimportant. But I was learning. I was trying my hand at science-fiction, and something was coming out of it.

Eventually, I abandoned my first draft. It was about the time The Last Survivors had been published when I started to think I could do more with the story. It was not a priority, though. I was working on a prequel to The Last Survivors and a fantasy-horror novel that had been burning a hole inside my mind for about ten years. It’s been finished for a while, by the way. I very much hope I can find a home for it one day as well. I am rather proud of it.

It was about the end of 2018 that the novel began to grow a life of its own. The characters became clearer in my mind, their particularities now well-defined, their motivations finally believable enough. Rust-city itself became more than a location. It became a clearly defined character in its own right. The world, the future I had invented began to have its own rules, its own history, its own background.

Finishing the final (unedited as yet) draft of A Song for Rust-City on 14th of November 2020

The road to Rust-city was a long one. It took years for the story to take shape, and even more years for it to be finished and polished in the shape that it has now. Still, while challenging, the journey for me was a pleasant one, full of unexpected surprises. I hope you’ll decide to undertake this journey yourselves. You might find some unexpected discoveries along the way.