The story behind �Wunderkind Rising� is a story in and of itself. From the beginning, the manuscript has been both the largest challenge I have ever tackled, and the gift that came to me with the most ease. I heard an introduction to �Christmas In the Trenches� once that said something along the lines of �some songs you write, and others you just write down.� . This is also true of stories of any kind. It was definitely the case with Wunderkind Rising.
Initially, Wunderkind was inspired by spending a little too long gazing at an image, wondering what the figure in it would say if she could speak. Then she started to speak. Not literally of course, but the story began to reveal itself in my mind. It began as a short story, and then expanded into several related short stories. Finally, much to my dismay at the time (for I was a very busy second year university student when it occurred), I realised that all of these short stories were linked. Not only that, they weren�t in order.
There followed two of the strangest months I�d ever experienced (and trust me when I say that I�ve experienced some odd things). The story of Wunderkind did not come as a whole, nor did it come in a neat outlined package. I would find myself awake and sitting at my computer at two in the morning, typing as fast as my fingers could go, and when I woke in the morning I would have to re-read what I�d written as I had no memory of it. The characters arrived in my mind�s eye fully formed and then grew to maturity in a surprisingly short period of time. Because the events of the story were �received� out of sequence, much of the time I did not know who was who or how old everyone was until well after the fact. Ages were changed frequently as the story developed, the names however, were the same from the beginning.
The story fought me at times, and at times I fought it. One particular section I had to rewrite 6 times before I was finally convinced that I�d gotten it right. Chapter headings were re-assigned, dialogue re-written constantly. I have pages of fragmented notes written on the backs of cafeteria serviettes, the margins of art history notebooks and scraps of receipt paper from the late shift of my dayjob. It was far from the easiest road, and parts of it did exhaust me. When the story was finally finished, when I knew instinctively that I had the last part down on paper, there followed the job of putting it all in order. Imagine a jigsaw puzzle where there were no edge pieces and no guiding picture and you would have some idea of the task that lay before me at that point.
Wunderkind has one final and vitally important element in its history. Her name is Silverfoot VanTaloths. The Wunderkind manuscript is one of the only cases where I found it absolutely necessary to join with a co-author. It was not so much that I contracted Silver to fill this role, because I wasn�t even aware that the need was there to be filled, it was more that she naturally became my sounding board. I call her a co-author, but that title is not exactly accurate. She is first to state that she did not write the story, that part she left to me. I channelled it, wrote it down, and got frustrated with it in its raw form, she helped refine it. As the pieces came to my fingertips, they were transferred to a private online journal where she would provide comments, twig me on when things didn�t make sense, and generally figure out where things fit. I suppose her role could be compared to that of a goldsmith, I provided the raw material; she helped form it into something that could be appreciated as beautiful. Without the help of the incredible patience and editing skills of Silver the story of Wunderkind would never have seen light.
The story will always be mine. The Project of giving it life will always be ours.
More importantly, the story belongs to itself, and to those who read it.
Enjoy.
