Creating A New World
The old world becomes new. Working on volumes two and three of my series which started with A FALSE DAWN submerges me in creating a new world out of lives that took place in the mid-1700s. What a wonderful way to spend my time, while (like everyone else I know) I’m worrying about what’s going to happen in our next election.
I’m writing postcards to support progressive candidates for the Pennsylvania legislature. I’ve applied to work the polls on election day. But to keep myself sane, and to join with something larger than myself, I create my new world out of the old one. I write.
This week I had a cool revelation. I took some ideas for Louise, my main character, that I was writing for a possible revision of A FALSE DAWN and realized I could use the same ideas in the second volume. When I looked in the place in the story where I thought these new ideas would fit, the copy I had already written seemed really contrived and stiff.
Looking at the copy I had written weeks earlier, I wondered, Who wrote this shit? Of course it was me, and the new ideas quickly replaced the old shit. When this sequel, SUNRISING, appears, it will be that much better.
What a wonderful way to spend my time.
About The Author
Jeff Heller
I'm a historical novelist who focuses on Colonial America, particularly the French-Canadians who settled North America in the 1600s and 1700s. My first novel, A FALSE DAWN, features Louise, a young wife and mother who must search for her son and her husband when the English invade their home in French-held Montreal and torch the city.