Still, we’ve also known good people, or at least, people who try to do things with unsullied, unselfish motives. They seem rare, but I’m thinking more that they’re just not LOUD and ostentatious and call attention to themselves like the others do, so you never realize that they’re there.
Ron Rayborne – 31 January 2021
The Back Flap
Have you an adventurous spirit? Do you remember when the earth seemed so large, beautiful and mysterious? Now travel back in time to an actual epoch, the Miocene, when the whole world was lush and rife with life. Roaring waterfalls, and bellowing elephants. Clear blue skies and clear, clean water. Rolling hills of green alive with delightful bird song. Take a hike down the magnificent, and sometimes dangerous, coast of prehistoric California with your Aelurodon friend and experience REAL life – the way it was meant to be lived!
About the book
What is the book about?
Hi IndieView. Thank you for letting me have this interview. Well, I tried to make the book (mostly) something positive, and do we ever need that right now! We hear it everyday, the environmental warnings. We’re doing everything pretty much wrong. Thus, Opalescence starts out in the fairly near future with people frightened, hopeless and living in dread. The eco-systems of the earth are finally failing. It’s been a death by a thousand cuts. Then scientists at the Institute de Physica somehow stumble onto time travel to a distant, unspoiled past, and the government is immediately interested. For selfish reasons, of course.
After some back and forth, two people are chosen to temporarily travel back to the MidMiocene, where the device lands, some 15,000,000 years ago, for specimen gathering – but also, unknown to almost all of them at the time, for another purpose. Julie Pine, Under-Curator and paleontologist at the LA County Natural History Museum, and Dietrich Jaqzen, professional fighter and government hit-man, who is to be her bodyguard, are picked. Problem is, Jaqzen, a devious ruffian and rogue, has ulterior motives. After 30 days come and go, the scientists at the Institute learn of Jaqzen’s treachery. They then decide (subversively) to send back Julie’s husband to try to rescue her. Yet, at the last moment, a shootout occurs, and Tom is still sent – but now many miles off target. Consequently he spends the rest of this journey having to hike down the length of prehistoric California, both shivering in fear at the wild world all around him, a world he never knew existed, while, ironically, also savoring its many, many beauties. Along the way, he befriends an Aelurodon, a Barstovian wild dog, as his hiking companion, and together they grow and become ever more confident. He knows, though, that at the end, he will have to confront Jaqzen.
When did you start writing the book?
Hmm, I don’t remember exactly, But I think it was in 2010. Well, I tried before that, but I wasn’t anywhere near ready, and it came off rather lamely.
How long did it take you to write it?
Maybe a year or so…
Where did you get the idea from?
Once, when I was in a bookstore, I read a comment from a non-fiction book by Bjorn Kurten where he said that that time period, now known as the Miocene, was something of a paradise lost. I realized immediately that I wanted to know more. Despite the glut of information out there, this was something, I felt, that people didn’t know about. There’s a high and low to everything. I wanted to know when the “high” was for the earth.
Were there any parts of the book where you struggled?
Not the actual writing, but in the editing. Uh huh.
What came easily?
The writing. It just flowed like it really happened and I was just a medium of sorts.
Are your characters entirely fictitious or have you borrowed from real world people you know?
Both. For example, we all know or knew people like Jaqzen. People of no morals. At all. Entirely self-serving. I won’t mention, Mr. T. Still, we’ve also known good people, or at least, people who try to do things with unsullied, unselfish motives. They seem rare, but I’m thinking more that they’re just not LOUD and ostentatious and call attention to themselves like the others do, so you never realize that they’re there. There’s a joke I heard of once, a kind of twist on the saying, “no sooner said than done”. It reversed the words “said” and “done”. Yeah.
We all know how important it is for writers to read. Are there any particular authors that have influenced how you write and, if so, how have they influenced you?
Maybe the biggest influence has been the scientist, Loren Eiseley. His Incredible Journey is a good starting point. Kind of melancholy though. I’ve also enjoyed books like Arthur Clarke’s, Dolphin Island. The freeness of it. Happiness. You can feel the waves.
Do you have a target reader?
Anyone wanting to feel better, I hope. If they help in changing things for the positive, well that’s good too.
About Writing
Do you have a writing process? If so can you please describe it?
A process? Well, for the book, you know how people at times tend to write in black and white? “Just the facts, ma’am”. I, though, tried to write in color. Appeal to all the senses, not just the eyes. So you could feel the wind on your skin. Smell what’s there. Hear what it carries. Even taste it. That kind of thing. But you have to start with a love of your subject.
Do you outline? If so, do you do so extensively or just chapter headings and a couple of sentences?
I started with that single quote. Later I found others about the time. I then read numerous articles and a big, fat non-fiction book. Made lots of copies. Contacted lots of experts. Just before I began to write in earnest, I put all the facts down on paper. Things I wanted to have happen. Slowly I built a skeleton, threw on the muscles, skin and clothes. When I had everything down, I closed the shades and put on evocative music, then began to write. Like I say, it flowed.
Do you edit as you go or wait until you’ve finished?
The obvious things, I’d change on the spot. But by far the biggest edits were after the book was completed. That took a loong time. I don’t want to do that again.
Did you hire a professional editor?
I enquired about the editing services of a local author/editor, but her prices seemed pretty exorbitant to me, so I did it myself. The official editor of Opalescence was my college English teacher, Lynn Steiner. She was a woman who knew her craft and inspired us students to write. Since Opalescence was after college, I looked her up and asked. She accepted. But she only read part way in. I think Jaqzen made her so angry she couldn’t continue. The rest was done by myself and my daughter, Carissa.
Do you listen to music while you write? If yes, what gets the fingers tapping?
Definitely. If you want to know what kinds of music I used, samples are on my blog.
https://midmiocene.wordpress.com/2016/08/24/the-music-muse/ and https://midmiocene.wordpress.com/video/
About Publishing
Did you submit your work to Agents?
Oh, 37 I think. Rejected every time. I have a blog post about that too. I gave up after a while. I guess I only have the stomach for just so much rejection.
What made you decide to go Indie, whether self-publishing or with an indie publisher? Was it a particular event or a gradual process?
I read beforehand that it was very difficult getting a publisher. When I heard of someone making it by self-publishing I tried it instead. I used Smashwords. They’ve been very good about getting Opalescence out there to the different – I don’t know what you’d call them – publishers? Anyway, I have no complaints about them. Thank you, Smashwords.
Did you get your book cover professionally done or did you do it yourself?
My brother did it for me. I was constantly giving him advice though. He did a good job, but was pretty worried about the possibility of getting sued by using someone else’s base picture of the earth, so he kind of dulled it. For that reason, I kind of like it, but I also kind of don’t. We’ve wrangled about it lots of times, but I finally stopped bugging him about it. It’s good enough, I guess. Still, do you know anyone who does good book covers (for not too much money, that is)?
Do you have a marketing plan for the book or are you just winging it?
So far it’s been just winging it. I don’t market well, and don’t like marketing. In fact I don’t really care for marketers, ad-men or other spammers.
Any advice that you would like to give to other newbies considering becoming Indie authors?
As I’ve only written the one book, I don’t really feel qualified to give advice. But one thing I’d say is, and it applies to much of life, you gotta learn patience. You just can’t force things. Another thing is, if you’re going to write a book, get yourself a good thesaurus.
About You
Where did you grow up?
First in LA County (till about the ago of 17, I think), then in San Luis Obispo County. I’m still growing/changing/evolving.
Where do you live now?
In SLO County.
What would you like readers to know about you?
I don’t know. Maybe that, like them, I’m just human? All the foibles, I’ve made. Man! But I’ve tried to do things right (yet sometimes getting it spectacularly wrong). Maybe too much? A famous person once asked, “What is truth”? I don’t pretend to know either. So I’m agnostic about things. Would like to be more sure, like others, but I’d also like to be honest. I just know that writing Opalescence made me happy at the time. Finally, a peaceful world.
What are you working on now?
Just surviving.
End of Interview:
For more from Ron Rayborne, check out his blog.