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Today I welcome Lila Lestrange to my site to talk about the genesis of her new novel, Black Silk, and going dark. As writers we have choices to make, like how violent, gritty and damaged we want to make our worlds. Lila talks about the choices she made and why…

“Black Silk” is a tale of thieves, evil and murder, set in a fantasy city state inspired by the European Renaissance. It contains a fair share of violence and atrocities, enough to be calle, perhaps, gritty and dark. Why? Because in real life, terrible things happen under comparable circumstances, and I could not feel honest about my writing without. I didn’t want to forget about these things, or pretend that they were not important and could be omitted, denying the experience of far too many for the reading comfort of the few. As a historian, I have always been interested in how individual lives are affected by circumstances, and how people arrive at the decisions they make. So, because of my interest in the individual, “Black Silk” takes the reader up close to killing, hanging and rape, and the impact of these experiences on the characters gives the story of unlikely allies against a common enemy its definite shape. It is the moment when the protagonists (and hopefully the reader) say- no more! – that the tale shifts towards victory. But more on that later.

For now, blame my historian self for the gritty setting. During my university years I read a lot of classic gender-equal, “clean” fantasy, and played many fantasy games where elves and dwarves and humans lived peacefully together in a kingdom that felt like a democracy, and an inner voice said: No. No way! You know it’s not like that. A big city with a very visible minority? Pre-Civil Rights Movement? Get real… My university was in a medieval city, and I would often walk home through what had been, 700 years ago, the local no-go-area. Now on the UNESCO’s world heritage list, it has a street name that translates to “so bad, not even your dog will follow you down here”. What was it like, back then in the 13th century? And what happens if you add fantasy creatures to the mix? Would there be angry mobs? Or ghettos, like the one that had been razed to the ground in the same city? What about special laws and taxes?
Enter the filthy and uneducated Wharf Rats gang, and their natural environment, the Lowtown slums of Naressina. With them came the fantasy creatures who settled all over the city. Speaking of fantasy creatures, although the setting owes a lot to European history, I wanted to stay away from European mythology and the classic fantasy races, and explore something different. I honestly don’t know when the first cat eared, clawed, fanged, tentacled “zereshi” appeared in my mind, but it probably was while doodling during biology lessons and daydreaming about parallel evolution, cats and aliens. I was fascinated to learn that a gesture of greeting declares non-hostile intentions and hides any natural weapons, and went on to think about alien body language, and non-human physiology. The social historian in me then had a go at wondering how the beings I’d dreamed up would fit in, and what kind of hair raising nonsense would be told at the bar in the equivalent of local pubs. And not only about the non-humans, but about rich and poor, rival guild member, nobleman and commoner.

The world of “Black Silk” is full of inequality, prejudice, dirt, and violence – and people who rise up and take a stand, often reinventing their position in the world as they do so. I like to think that this is precisely because the characters in the story know what injustice and pain feel like, and that nobody will care. When a single act of compassion by the merchant Kaliari earns him a favour with the Rats of Lowtown, it is because compassion is such a rare thing that his gesture stands out. (And he wouldn’t have done it without being driven to act by past experiences, either.) And when the Rats are good to their word, and set out to bring down the story’s main antagonist, they do so with the experience of blood and death behind them, knowing exactly what they will face. And they still do it. Terrified and in tears, but they do it. Because it needs to be done, and they know nobody else will. It is this knowledge that gives them the determination they need to settle the score, and ultimately become a force for good (and an even bigger nuisance to the magistrate and the city watch!) in a world where might makes right and justice goes to the highest bidder.

You can buy Black Silk, and read more about the novel. Cover Art by Bianca Schreck