I started to make the first draft of this novel at the end of the summer of 1983. I was twenty-three years old and I remember with what intensity I was captivating by reading a saga of a famous science fiction author (which for copyright reasons I do not name). Driven solely by my enthusiasm, I decided to make an equally imaginative novel of mine that preserved, as far as possible, the literary fluidity of the work that had fascinated me. All this happened because despite being enthusiastic about the saga, I disappointed by its somewhat hasty conclusion. At the time, I had already written a few short stories but I never thought of trying my hand at over four hundred and fifty folders. Considering my many ideas and their continuous variations, I realized that the amount of work was getting bigger if I do not apply control. I immediately understood that I was embarking on an arduous undertaking, which I could perhaps tackled only with more time available and greater skills and experience. Instead, blissful unconsciousness! It seems that difficulties sharpen creativity and I imagine this was precisely the ingredient that ignited the trigger of the challenge in me. I completed the novel. It was ready to publish, but life's events left it in a drawer.
At the end of 2019, I reread the manuscript and I found that the style still recalls atmospheres full of surreal nuances: "the detail that becomes the protagonist". I considered the aspects that today we could see as "naive" if compared to our times, but I appreciated the freshness and fluidity of the story and I decided to propose it in its entirety -without stylistic cuts- as I wrote it then.
It is an adventurous story with the five main characters who live their experiences from their different points of view. The intention of the novel, as well as the contents and development of the story is mine, free from the reading that had given me the initial impulse. In these pages is the hero depicted with his splendid values close to utopia, and the anti-hero with all his obsessions and his pathetic weaknesses. A surprising mix of action, feeling and passion; a return to the romantic part of ourselves that lives somewhere out of time. The return is therefore that to common origins, to the reality before the internet, where only pen and paper could shape our dreams. A real return to planet Earth, which "ours" is not ... and perhaps never has been.
This is the synopsis on the back cover of the book:
Alec Byrne is the only survivor of the crash of his vessel on the turbulent Considjar, dominated by four alien races fighting against each other for the dominance of the planet. After years of vicissitudes and escaped dangers, Alec and four companions embark on a busy journey aboard a stolen vessel, towards the coveted Planet Earth.
For Alec Byrne it is certainly the return home but for his companions, natives of Considjar, where humanity is confined to the last place of the social hierarchy, the journey - a leap in the dark - represents the possibility of redemption from a life of misery, violence and abuse: the last chance for an existence at last as free men.
The book is available on the major online platforms. Here is a link to Amazon: https://amzn.to/3h41Ix9