Writing INSATIABLE just now. Since the book is a futuristic, I have to walk a line between creating a world of the future and keeping things clear and understandable. Do I think they’ll be called shoes in a future after earth is dying and humans have had a diaspora to these Universes? Who knows. But I know if I call them bonkeybobs or whatever, I have to waste space to explain that bonkeybobs are shoes. Instead, I call them shoes. People’s names are absent a lot of umlauts and they contain vowels and consonants (boy do I want to curl up and weep when I read books where the protag’s name is like “urwyahaghaouosu” or “phgnx” and they all drink “gurgal” and eat ‘orgao” or whatever. When I read that stuff, I think the balance has been upset in a way that makes the story harder to access, even if hey, in the future in this other book, they don’t like vowels.

Of course, this means some people get angry with me and feel I’m not being true to a futuristic setting. I’m true to my book, to my story, but I’m not a purist and I’m not a scientist. Or like in another person’s review who insisted they couldn’t be universes because her brother was getting his physics degree – I make it up. It’s my world, shoes or bonkeybobs and if I say they’re universes, that’s what they are. Your brother’s physics degree notwithstanding, I must tell you – your physics don’t count in my world.

That doesn’t mean I don’t have to build a world that makes sense though. It simply means if I want to create a world where universes are stacked like a deck of cards and travel is through portals that breach spacetime – the rules are mine to create. It’s also why I don’t write tech science fiction, because I’m not going to deal with the realities of science and astrophysics because I don’t want to. (Not that I don’t devour it, I do, but I know my strengths)

Set in a contemporary or historical setting, I can’t do this. Rules are rules, the world is built. I can’t have people in jet cars in 2009 Seattle. I have deal with unprotected sex and the cost of living, all that stuff and it would be irresponsible of me to simply make stuff up when the world is set.

Just one of the many reasons I love to write paranormals and futuristics! I like to make my own rules.