Dead in a matter of pages! No self-respecting narrator would dare call such a story a novel, but the narrator of this novel has no self-respect, and his story doesn’t end with death. Absurdity of the highest order follows him down to hell, leaving death the least of his worries. Unable to sleep, and with a blue-and-green-eyed beauty dragging him ever forward through the horde of assorted horrors that stand between him and the only slice of normalcy left untouched, our narrator has his work cut out for him; as do we, the unsuspecting yet equally guilty masses swept along for the ride in the darkness beneath his hood, and the darker, deeper, and more terrifying truth lying therein. In turns hilarious and horrifying, self-reflective and self-reproachful, Keeping The Stars Awake is author Matthew J. McKee’s invitation into a mirror world much like our own, asking, are we all just coming home to lose?
Reviews
Reviewed by Barbara Bamberger Scott
A typical teenage boy – gutsy, rebellious, imaginative, sarcastic – finds himself dead, reborn and on a wild crazy trip with a beautiful non-human female in this non-conforming narrative by debut writer Matthew J. McKee.
The story begins as this teen is at his computer, when a voice simultaneous with its text, comes out of nowhere, telling him to “listen and obey.” The voice identifies itself as the Author, the Storyteller, who, overriding the boy’s objections, delivers its message: “Don’t trust the woman.” Moments later a terrifying but beautiful woman, the Queen, appears crouching on his windowsill, inviting him to take her hand. Or die. Using her sword, she whacks him, and begins to cut him to pieces. As he lies suffering, he hears other voices and sees nasty white goo oozing out of his computer. When he recovers, he finds himself imprisoned, watched over by another female – a pretty, girl-like creature who identifies herself as a Sentry, not human but a homunculus, who has eaten human flesh to survive.
The teen is asked to name himself, and he adopts the moniker “Oh Ok” and dubs the Sentry “Sen.” Together, with a trust blooming between them after she assures him that he has died as a human and now occupies a place where creatures like her live forever, they will make an escape from the cell he has landed in, after he is allowed two wishes. The first is the return of his hoody, which will allow him to disguise himself as he explores his new realm, and then a huge supply of Kinder Eggs. He and Sen will confront the sword-wielding Bloody, Bladed Queen of All and such mystical figures as The King of the Dead and the Mole-Men, as they seek and somehow locate a way out of whatever newly arising dilemma they encounter.
McKee follows this whacky whirlwind with an Afterword in which he humorously seeks to explain – or further obfuscate – his intentions in composing a book in which he, the Author, makes several brief appearances to set scenes right and remind Oh Ok that he is still in charge of the twisted, tangled plot skeins. His work seems designated for a young adult audience, featuring the wild, unclassifiable, creepy adventures of an intelligent, remarkably self-assured boy who has no shame about his caustic “four-letter” language, and a pretty, but also cleverly sardonic and equally intelligent girl who guides him as a good female should, without domineering. He is brave, she is his supportive and devious plotter as they boldly go forth. McKee states that his writing endeavors began in an isolated Alaskan cottage, and indeed this tale seems to have come out of the nowhere that such a scenario suggests, and begs a sequel.
Quill says: Keeping the Stars Awake is a lively epic of youthful grit in a thoroughly unearthly setting that will doubtless appeal to lovers of madcap, high-speed fantasy.
McKee takes readers into an unnamed protagonist’s journey as a blue-and-green-eyed beauty drags him through the horde of assorted horrors into an unknown realm in his latest novel. One moment the teenage narrator is sitting in front of his computer, the next he is pulled into an unfamiliar land where death is just the beginning of his story. What seems like a dream soon turns into a horrifying reality, with the protagonist learning he is just a character in the novel, and his fate lies entirely in the author’s hands. McKee’s moody story is suffused with an unsettlingly dark atmosphere. As the teenage narrator gets caught into a never-ending cycle of death and life, McKee turns the latter’s search for identity into an exhilarating adventure with danger, chases, escapades, and surprising narrative turns. Though the pacing is uneven, and the protagonist’s story never quite comes together to form a satisfying whole, the latter’s urgent voice, laced with adolescent wit and angst keeps the pages turning. The book is divided into four parts, revealing the events leading to the narrator’s journey through different phases. Unexpected plot twists contribute mystery and terror to this original and strange story about identity, survival, and power dynamic. Uneven but intriguing nonetheless.
Reviewed by Audrey Davis
Matthew McKee’s satirical novel Keeping the Stars Awake is undoubtedly unique. The main character, named “Oh, OK,” is just about as unreliable and unlikable as narrators come, yet surprisingly down to Earth, with “no idea how many lives have come and gone, […] but [believes] none of them are any more important than any other life.”
After awakening in his bedroom like any other unsuspecting protagonist, he suddenly finds himself on an inter-dimensional journey with only a mysterious girl and the scarce information he’s given to find the answers to his questions—yet he may end up only finding more questions.
This entire book feels like a fast-paced, crazy dream. McKee pens dark yet vivid scenes and weaves in a plethora of interesting background characters. Occasionally they can get a little lost under a mountain of pop culture, anime, and TV show callbacks, but interesting all the same.
It is a little unclear how the narrator’s journey begins, but this is intentional—the reader feels just as “lost” as the narrator throughout. The narrator is very aware of the “fourth wall,” speaking with the author on several occasions and learning that he is in fact, in a book being written, and other characters are able to read his narrations. This creates an odd atmosphere throughout the book—almost unnerving; if the narrator and author are characters, then by extension the reader is too.
The language in this novel is unique as well. It has a modern feel, and because the author is built into the story, McKee passes the literal task of writing the story to the narrator and supporting characters, who lean heavily into the pop culture references and jokes, and even assist him in finding the right words. This allows the diction to feel like a personal train of thought; a recognition and reminder of the fact that “society is always pressing its face up against the glass of everyone’s individual life,” infused with enough sassy, snarky quips to last for years.
The imagery can be dark and graphic at times, but it lends itself fittingly to the hellish landscape and monstrous characters. Under the last layer of comedy, misfortune, gore, and wit is a plotline, one the narrator doesn’t even know he is party to until it’s upon him. This hidden gem propels the reader through the absurd, provides a welcome walking stick in the wilderness of weird and wacky.
This book has come to ask the reader if they enjoy being alone with themselves, to identify parts of their inner selves that they may not enjoy or may not have initially seen as problematic. Oh, OK is occasionally eyeroll-inducing, and at times leaves a good example of how not to behave, but the structure, characters, and language produce a story for someone looking for… well, a story uniquely told. A ridiculous, bizarre tale with humor and horror, and without a specific message—this book wants to leave you with a yarn that’s “worthy of keeping the stars awake.”
Keeping the Stars Awake is a sci-fi novel that blends surreal atmosphere with ironic observation, introducing readers to a dystopian world where sleep and the futile pursuit of respite leads to dangerous avenues of despair and disquiet. It’s a world at once familiar and alien.
The first thing to note about this story is that Matthew J. McKee takes the time to cultivate a special brand of metaphorical examination that results in especially vivid scenes: “The cicadas have all gone to sleep, their restless wings broken and shorn. The chestnuts have all freed themselves from their sheathes, fat rotting carapaces littering the ground like discarded candy-bar wrappers. The wind is serene, quiet, yet steady in its determination to find succor and haven in the hearts of brave evening saunterers – and no amount of huddling will turn it away. The rain is furtive, yet omni-present. The land is muted and the roads, slated. Above, on thinning branches, frost sleeps, withered birds of ice, shadows drowsing like fish in torpid ponds pooled at their roots.”
Readers seeking fast-paced introductions will find the story builds slowly from these roots, which are essential introductions to the heart of this tale’s strength: its ability to pull readers into a parallel world in which demons and the divine co-exist side by side.
One doesn’t anticipate the sarcastic jokes “mocking the infectious nature of religion” and the chilling descriptions of place that permeate this thoroughly engrossing read, but McKee’s language at times reads with the evocative description akin to poetry as the narrator describes a Sacrifice Tree: “I had been horribly mistaken: the autumn foliage was not made bloody by the moon; it was simply bloody to begin with. The tree we had been sitting under had blood-red bark, the leaves that hung from the vein like branches pitch black.”
Dialogue, too, is well done and unexpectedly vivid. Witty, ironic, sarcastic, and filled with horror and realization, Keeping the Stars Awake is a work of literary excellence that deserves a place not just in sci-fi, but in literature collections. Matthew J. McKee has created a refreshingly original and unpredictable story of the mirror world of Oh and Sen, with flawed characters that represent questionable morals, rude awakenings, and startling perspectives.
Libraries and literary discussion groups will find Keeping the Stars Awake a compelling exploration that pushes the boundaries of the definition of sci-fi and ironic inspection alike. “‘Twas truly a story worthy of keeping the stars awake – one hell of a ridiculous ride – however!”
Interviews
Today, Feathered Quill reviewer Barbara Bamberger Scott is talking with Matthew J. McKee, author of Keeping the Stars Awake.
FQ: What single piece of advice would you give to someone preparing to read your work with no previous knowledge of its outré content?
McKEE: Wow! That’s a great starting question. Well, my advice would be: think of reading Keeping the Stars Awake on multiple levels. There is a story that is complete, acting as the basement level; it’s a humorous and self-contained creation that can be enjoyed all by itself. Above that there is a house full of psychological analysis and above that a meta-work sky that extends to eternity. Theses overlapping layers force themselves into that basement narrative and the book begins to bend and flex and ask you: as a reader, what power do you have here? The book asked a similar thing of me as the Author, and part of this outré—as you so eloquently put it—is that the book came alive to a certain extent and asked the characters to consider that question as well. What power do you have here? So, I’d advise my readers to look for those strains of story, psychological analysis, and meta-work and how they tie together, if they so wish. It’s wild, strange, and crazy, but also very upfront and real. Having a rotational perspective will make Keeping the Stars Awake that much more of an enjoyable and impressionable read.
FQ: “Dead in a matter of pages!” So starts the book’s synopsis. Did you ever hesitate about using that to open your book’s description? It certainly grabs one’s attention!
McKEE: I’m glad to hear it made some eyes boggle, ha ha! But did I ever hesitate? No, it was a very natural phrase that came to me and it worked on several levels, which I liked. First, it is—how you said—attention-grabbing, and second, it lets the reader know that plot armor doesn’t exist in the universe of Keeping the Stars Awake. I wanted in some way, even if only on a subconscious level, to let the reader know this book wasn’t safe. People will die; shit will hit the fan.
FQ: Did this teen saga have any connection to your own teen years?
McKEE: Well, nothing so ludicrous happened to me in small town Wyoming, of course, but books have always been a form of escape for me and I would be remiss if I didn’t admit that I had daydreamed more than once about some magical portal opening up and whisking me away on a grand adventure when I was young. I’m probably not alone there. That being said, I can distinctly remember a heavy lazy-haze hanging over my teenage years. And once again, I’m sure many people know what I mean. So, what if—just for example—a queen in battle armor showed up and offered teenage me a magic journey? Um, can I do it from my sofa? With a little bit of thought, teenage me probably wouldn’t have wanted to put in the effort. In that sense, it’s perfectly fair to say that yes, there is certainly a connection to my past experiences. That outlook certainly framed the story of Keeping the Stars Awake and informs the baseline for Oh Ok’s je ne sais blah blah blah attitude.
FQ: Have you ever experienced the kind of “shock” that your hero goes through?
McKEE: Hmmm. That’s an interesting question. And yes, I probably have. I was actually a danger-prone child growing up and I’ve broken a lot of bones. The worst of all, however, was when I broke my back. I was skiing in Grand Targhee and took a jump wrong. If I close my eyes I can still picture the sky floating above me, and the horror gripping my heart as I felt gravity claw at me. I fell backwards, face up, so that was pretty terrifying, too, in an existential dread sort of way. I never knew when I was going to hit the ground, so when I did, I hit hard and it jarred me so bad that I couldn’t breathe well for a few minutes afterward. Turns out I broke a vertebra in three places, and I’m pretty lucky that I still have full body function and no lasting trauma. Other than that, driving up to Anchorage in Alaska was a terrifying experience. I had to drive for almost a whole twenty-four hours straight through the dark on a road carved out of snow and there were signs posted along it telling me to keep the car moving over twenty miles per hour, else the engine would freeze and die. And as nerve-wracking as that was, worse were the eyes. They glinted in the dark just off the shoulder of the road: wolves, waiting. Just…waiting…
FQ: What writer(s) of bizarre fiction, or any fiction, inspired you to take off on this incredible fictional journey?
McKEE: Ah, this is the question to kill all those feelings of imposter syndrome! Because—yup. No matter what it is, someone has dipped their toe in it first and we who come after can be proud to take our inspiration and take our turn at the plate, swinging for the fences. In my case, here in Japan, the book world is overflowing with the “Isekai” genre, aka the “sent into another world” genre. There are also some great western classics that I can think of in “Portal Fantasy” like Jumanji, Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, The Chronicles of Narnia, or Tron, but Japan leads in the genre currently. And seeing as a core tenant of being a writer is: read, read a lot; I have done just that. In the case of Keeping the Stars Awake, direct influences would have to be Nisio Isin and his Bakemonogatari series, Natsume Akatsuki’s Konosuba series, and in a quick shift in pace, P.K. Dick’s Ubik, C.G. Jung’s The Red Book: Liber Novus, and Natsume Soseki’s world famous I, am a Cat. If those sound spread out, I wouldn’t disagree, but for me the underlying shift in perspective and the welcoming of absurd turns in logic connect them all, and it is that aspect that I drew inspiration and experience from.
FQ: Do you have plans for the next book, or a sequel?
McKEE: Plans? Well, it’s hard to make a plan of the absurd, but yes, Oh Ok and Sen will return—or rather, their turn to drive my brain will come back around. Those two occupy an important place in my Jungian Shadow, as it were, and I’m not through with them just yet.
FQ: Is writing now your primary avocation or will you explore other avenues of creativity?
McKEE: Oh, I’ve always been a writer. I can’t talk as lucidly or laconically as I write and anything I draw looks best on a refrigerator door. I’ve always loved writing and I always told people when I was growing up that I wanted to be a writer. Getting a good start with Keeping the Stars Awake is a fantastic experience for me and I’m only getting started.
FQ: In your afterword you characterize this work as satire – what do you feel it is most pointedly satirizing?
McKEE: The big question! Perhaps THE question! Well, the answer to that must start in a slightly roundabout way: I didn’t write Keeping the Stars Awake with the intention to satirize to begin with. My brother asked me to “write something serious.” So I thought: all right, let’s get out all my silly, first. Let’s make a vomitorium of stupid, low brow chuckle-hut bits. But, at some point in the process, I showed a page of what I’d written to a friend. And he didn’t laugh. Instead, he turned his nose up at it and said something along the lines of: “That’s…honest, yeah. But I don’t know man, if you gotta get this guy out of you I suppose its good, but I’d get rid of him if I was you.” And that really struck a chord with me. I had to have a sit down with myself and the pieces of myself that were these characters and have a discussion about what was really going on. And from that sort of self-analysis, I came to the conclusion that it was an expression of me “learning to grow up.” To quote Jung: “The descent into the depths always seems to precede the ascent.”
That was the journey Sen, Oh Ok, and I were on, and while those two aren’t capable of the changes, they put that change to work in me and helped me see it. I wasn’t a bad person, but the bad parts in me were not things I had been able to clearly see up until then. And then I thought: How many people do you see like that these days? People who are not “bad” perse, but who say or do things that make you go “wow, that person has ZERO self-awareness.”? The answer is: way too damn many. And that is who Keeping the Stars Awake is sending up with its satire. All the people who start sentences with “I’m not a (fill in blank with whatever evil word you can think of e.g. racist) but…”, all the people who are shocked to learn they aren’t the hero they thought they were but don’t change, all the people who refuse to be part of the solution even as they declare they aren’t part of the problem, all the people who think they’re being witty when in fact they are being mean—those people. Because I believe there are some people who are too dogmatic to change, but others just need to be approached the right way. They need to see the truth for themselves without having it shoved in their face. The people who could change for the better if they looked in the right place in the mirror, those are the people I think Keeping the Stars Awake can reach.
We’ll go down to Dimension 23 together, laugh, stop laughing, start thinking, and start to climb up.
FQ: Having successfully created a wild ride of a story, can you now imagine writing something – perhaps set in your childhood haunts of Wyoming – of a more realistic, settled nature?
McKEE: Absolutely. I’m currently writing a collection of short stories. It should be a book even my grandmother could read. Of course, I’m also writing another story that is more in keeping with my usual style of insanity. But I will say writing Keeping the Stars Awake took a lot out of me, and it feels good to write something a little quieter before heading off in to the great open wilds of the absurd once more.
When did you start writing, and what ultimately inspired you to do so?
Oh, I think I really started writing seriously in my first year out of college, although I’d always been a writer in my mind. By that I mean I was always an avid reader growing up and I wrote a lot of short stories and poems all through elementary, middle, and high school, but I only started taking it seriously after graduating college. But what inspired that turn from hobby and simple exploration to actual conscious mind to word to page quote unquote Writing with a capital W? It had a lot to do with my location and a specific novel.
After college I moved around the western USA a lot but got it in my mind to go up to Alaska, and I put myself in a situation where I was isolated—living in a cabin in the woods—with a lot of time to read and write and not a lot else to distract me. It gave me a good chance to assess my life and what I wanted to do with it, and I felt like writing had always been a strong undercurrent weaving throughout all my years. So why not take that undercurrent and let it break out of the mountainside and become a river? I planned to do a lot of various exploration of forms of writing and I started by reading Stephen King’s On Writing. In it he recommended that you should (paraphrasing here): READ. READ. READ! And I did just that.
Because living and working in Japan was my final goal, I thought I’d tackle some Japanese novels to start. I’d read many classics of Japanese fiction in college, things like Natsume Soseki’s I Am a Cat and Yasunari Kawabata’s The Sound of the Mountain, so I thought I’d give some more modern novels a try. I went to the local bookstore and picked out Nisio Isin’s Wound Tale and was mesmerized almost immediately. That book left a deep and lasting impression on me. I’d never encountered a writing style like that and it blew apart my whole idea of what writing could and should be. I really felt like a door had been opened to me and was inviting me in. Reading that book loosened up my image of book and prose and flow and gave my inner voice a different avenue to explore. I’ve moved on to other kinds of writing and authors of all stripes since then, but I owe Nisio Isin and Wound Tale for galvanizing my spirit for writing and breaking up that mountainside of hesitation in me so my writing could flow out into the world.
In your book’s Afterword, you discuss the way that many people are “forced to confront their darker natures.” Are your characters designed to emulate archetypes of people you know or are familiar with in real life?
That’s an interesting and tricky question. The characters are archetypical in a way that I hope will allow any reader to be able to see aspects of themselves so that lessons can be taken on an individual basis and everyone can learn or experience something pertinent to their individual lives, but the characters themselves are not based or designed off of an actual person or likeness I am familiar with outside of myself. These were internal demons that are part of me. Personifying them and putting them to work for myself was draft one. Draft two was expanding their voice and making it more accessible and applicable to an audience. One of the tenets of writing is to have an audience in mind who you write to, and another contradicting tenet is to write for yourself; I look at those rules as guides for draft #2 and draft #1 respectively.
Of course, there will be more refinements that will call for more drafts and edits, but in general, I start by writing for myself, to myself, with the door closed. Once I have something, I then try to ask the questions of “Would other people get this? Do I need to do more explaining here? Less? How can I clarify what I’m trying to say without hand-holding my audience?” My editor did a very good job at helping me ferret out all those tricky details and helped me re-evaluate them, and I owe him a huge thanks for that. One could even say that’s the main job of an editor, because it’s a very good thing for a writer to get lost in their own mind, but when they find a way back out, they need to make the path they created easy for others to see, too, and that can be hard for the writer to do alone. But because I worked through that process, the end result of all these darker natures that I personified is a more accessible archetypal image. They come from my own personal turmoil in my soul and have their own character, but I hope they can reach into others and help them fight their own darkness therein.
What books or authors have had a strong influence on you or your writing?
Obviously Nisio Isin, but also Stephen King, Michael Crichton, H. P. Lovecraft, P. K. Dick, Natsume Soseki, and Raymond Chandler to name a few, but the list could go on for pages. I grew up reading the likes of King and Crichton and they gave me the very basic building blocks to understand how and why to write, and I benefited from the Japanese authors (both classic and modern) because they showed me how lively a character’s dialogue and expression of humanity can be. The Japanese writers are imaginative in subtle and explosive ways that bring character out in ways that western writing does not, most likely because the Japanese scenery is so ubiquitous to the Japanese people that a few subtle flourishes of background are all the detail an average reader needs or wants, so it is the characters that take center stage. In western writing, place is very important. The context is an ever-shifting influence on the characters and the western writing tradition as a whole I think values location very much to evoke a sense of emotion. I get to cherry pick from both of these wonderful traditions, and I have strong influences from both.
I also take lots of inspiration from C. G. Jung because my writing style is free flowing, a semi-unconscious stream of story. I let my characters run the show, I let them have their own lives, and I understand that in a Jungian way. There are aspects of myself, but they do have their own lives and their own words and their own ways of doing things. This simultaneously attaches me to them and also detaches me, and it gives the characters a chance to breathe and be more realistic but also more fantastical and amazing! And that’s a wonderful and gratifying experience for me as well. I have also been heavily influenced by philosophy, especially that of Friedrich Nietzsche and Christopher Hitchens. Most wouldn’t call Hitchens a philosopher perse, but both Nietzsche and Hitchens share “the hammer technique.” They are merciless and truthful and take a hammer to things we hold sacred or mirrors that we wish to hold up to blind ourselves, and I have a great deal of admiration for their unwavering spirit of veritas. In that vein, I pulled no punches in Keeping the Stars Awake, and I hope that shows. I agree that the truth—if there is such a thing—should hurt.
Tell us a little about how the actual plot of Keeping the Stars Awake first came to be. Did it start with an image, a voice, a concept, a dilemma or something else?
That’s a great question. The genesis of Keeping the Stars Awake was a conversation I had with my brother. He was talking about another manuscript I had sent him to look at and he said something along the lines of, “It’s not bad, but can’t you write something serious for once?” And that got me thinking that I should make a book and pour all my silly and weird into one place. I thought of it as a sort of vomitorium, a place where I could just spew whatever I wanted, however I wanted, all over the page. I started with the concept of the denial of destiny—also called refusing the call—where the narrator refuses his role, and went from there. That was also a very natural choice when paired with my brother’s suggestion because it leads to ridiculous situations right away. The idea that certain characters themselves would have expectations and would be left in a void of intent when that expectation wasn’t fulfilled made my imagination giddy. Oh Ok showed up from the very start as an apathetic anti-hero (as his chosen moniker would lead you to suspect), and that led me to consider the actual plot as something that was background because Oh Ok was forcing it there. This led to a deep world where anything was possible and where rules were shadows on the walls. I thought that was a really neat avant-garde kind of world. It’s insane and immense and immersing and then here I had a character that was clearly the key to what was happening—but he actively sticks his fingers in his ears! How much could I try and force on him, and how much tension could I generate with his resistance? At the start I wanted to take the archetypal story of a hero on a magical quest and put it behind bars. And that worked as a good baseline, but something was a little off.
A few weeks after that I showed a page of the first draft to a friend and he sort of wrinkled up his nose at it and said, “Yeah, I get it, but I really don’t like this narrator. I suppose if you need to get him out of you…” And that really hit me. I thought I’d been writing for laughs, and just a general sort of lighthearted madness; I hadn’t meant to write anything serious or malignant. Yet, somehow the story—still in its infancy—had taken a turn somewhere from fantastical to fanatical. I consider those two incidents of my brother and friend to be the cornerstones of the framing of the direction the narrative would take, but the real thrust came after I finished C. G. Jung’s The Red Book: Liber Novus.
I had actually put the manuscript for Keeping the Stars Awake aside after about one hundred pages and hadn’t touched it for about half a year when I finally finished The Red Book and it hit me just why I’d had difficulty conceptualizing and working through Keeping the Stars Awake: I’d been trying to control too much of the narrative, and I’d been trying to keep the vomit to a dribble. That wouldn’t do. I really let Oh Ok and Sen off the chain so to speak and let them do and say whatever they wanted and the story took off like a rocket.
What was the most satisfying thing about writing Keeping the Stars Awake?
My god, the ending was so so so satisfying. I felt released from a burden almost? I felt lighter having found a place of resolution that didn’t definitively end. That was important because we as humans should never stop learning and we should always have a drive to keep improving our inner and outer worlds. So, I should never be done with Oh Ok and Sen, they should keep living and learning and growing in me, and I need to learn to live and grow and work with them. It’s not a game of dismissal or a question of how do I get rid of them like my friend and brother suggested. Instead, it’s a process of growth and becoming; if done properly, hopefully becoming a better and more well-rounded and self-aware person. The ending needed to reflect that, and when it naturally did so without me needing to put in a godly hand, I felt extraordinarily satisfied.
Which of your colorful characters was most challenging for you to create? Why?
This might be what most readers have already guessed, but: Sen.
Sen was far and away the most fun and also the most challenging character to write. She had a lot of hidden backstory that needed some way to be written and transmitted without it being obvious. But that had a lot to do with the nature of Keeping the Stars Awake and not so much the character of Sen herself. In terms of the character herself, what was difficult for me was trying to find the consistency in her inconsistencies. Sen is a shapeshifter, and her personality shifts as well depending on the situation and Oh Ok himself, but I felt like there was a real core of character that did not change no matter what. Getting to that core and getting a feeling for what it was that made Sen tick was a real challenge for me and it took a lot of extra writing and deep dives down some meandering imaginations for me to really get a good hold on it.
On top of that, trying to keep Sen separate from what she is took a lot of effort at first. A good section of Sen’s growth in the story comes from this journey of separating who and what first and foremost, but when I thought about just leaving it at that, it seemed shallow and untrue. It felt like I was trying to put a mask over the reality and call it good enough. I struggled with each line when I was writing with that fixed attitude, but once I assimilated that base idea and let the character be true to not only that ideal but to herself as a living entity, she really came alive (so to speak). I also wanted to leave room for me to be surprised and give Sen a chance to do some unexpected things as well, and once I found that core of who Sen was and really started writing her the proper way, she took over and did some of the most unexpected things in the whole story! But at first that wasn’t easy for me.
Which scene or chapter in the book is your favorite? Why?
My favorite scene has always been—since the moment I wrote it—Chapter 13: WAYLAID. It has everything. WAYLAID is a microcosm of everything in Keeping the Stars Awake. It has homages to my inspirations; it has big reveals and sudden wacky twists; it has silly, stupid, rude, thoughtful, and profound dialogue—and most of all, it has a genuine heartfelt feeling of growth in understanding and connection between Sen and Oh Ok. I enjoyed writing that scene so much, I re-read it on occasion and sigh with bliss. If only the muse that visited me the day I wrote it could visit me every day!
As a piece of satire, Keeping the Stars Awake has the power to communicate a message to its readers. What do you hope readers will take away from this story?
Hm, there’s a lot I hope for, and a lot I want to give. To start, I hope every reader—regardless of what I, the author, intended—gets something personal to work on out of the book. I hope they can find something of a mirror in the characters, grimace at what they see, but also receive the courage to face it and face up to it and work on that defect. And I can’t predict what that will be, if anything, but I hope this act of courage on my part gives others the courage to act, too. Because it’s okay to have faults and blind spots; we all have them. What is needed most of all is the ability to turn those faults and defects and blind spots into positives and grow with them and past them and be better people after seeing them. And that takes courage. It takes effort to look past the skin and look past the obvious.
Something of a moralist aphorism would be: Even the most inhuman monster is human; even the most human and innocent looking of us are monstrous.
I also hope readers shut Keeping the Stars Awake and have it keep them up at night, too, pondering just what it was that happened, what it means, and what is going on under the ink and the paper.
What’s next for you?
Me? Me, oh what could it be? Well, for starters, I recently finished a small book of short stories. Lovely little stories, too. No menace or crazy amounts of violence and cursing; a real 180 from Keeping the Stars Awake. I am also working on another long novel now that I would call “sci-fi noir.” This time I’m taking a cue from Raymond Chandler and Isaac Asimov and trying to aim for something with a heavier world-building style compared to Keeping the Stars Awake, which was closer to soft world-building. It’s harder for me, but I always like a challenge!
