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Where does Charles Soule find the time?
Somehow he also managed to write a hefty novel calledThe Oracle Year.
When he makes those predictions public, the world quickly spirals into chaos.
Apparently, a name appeared into his head: Mr. Tagomi.
What was your Mr. Tagomi forThe Oracle Year?
Or can you not say, because its a spoiler?No, no!
Its not really much of a spoiler.
So, before I was a writer, I was working very full-time as an attorney.
I was at a big firm in Manhattan for years, and then I opened my own practice.
Because I knew what a mistake I had made.
So I started working on that book; I finished that novel.
It exists on my hard drive somewhere.
Will this actually ever happen?
So I thought that maybe there was a book there.
It was mostly that I didnt want to be a lawyer anymore.
Its not really that dramatic.
I want to jump back in time.
I didnt care about that at the time.
Its an author who I think has become weird with posterity.
Ive never really had this conversation, its just how I feel about his books.
Youre really building this up!
Who can this person be?Its an author called Piers Anthony.
Oh, sure, yeah!Yep.
Is he still writing?
I actually dont know.
It was all very interesting, but it also had these strange … Thats the main thing.
I mean, thats really the main difference.
Youre working with a phenomenal artist.
Its a beautiful process, when you make something that you didnt do by yourself.
Writing a novel, youre alone.
You have no support, I guess.
You do have support, but its different.
You have emotional support in all sorts of different ways.
You have editors who help, and agents, and different people who give you tips along the way.
Its some aliens and some Stormtroopers and just have a great time.
I cant wait to see it, and youre gonna do a great job.
There are no shortcuts.
Youve got to do it all, but thats also freeing.
I was going to say, on the plus side, youre a totalitarian dictator.
you might do whatever you want.Yeah.
What happened to that novel that you started in longhand on the beach?
Why is that not this novel?Thats a good question.
Where you used to live.Yes, where I used to live.
Not in 4 A.D.
Not 4 A.D., yes.But I did live in China for a while.
Its about the advent of Daoism.
Its sort of a magical-realism thing about Daoism appearing in China.
Its got kung fu and gods and all these crazy, magic things.
It was a book that I wrote in 2002, 2003, 2004.
And hes like, Listen, man, thats not really how it works.
Maybe its just not the time for it.
And so its still there.
I think its good, but I wrote it 15 years ago at this point.
The idea that that it would be a book that I would take out now?
I think its important to build a writerly brand to a degree.
But its a hell of a book!
Did you have the ending in mind when you began the first chapter?
Well, sure.Something should happen.
There should be some resolution.
I mean, the book has a million different pieces.
A lot of them, yes.I wanted it to feel like this bigthunk.
Youre like,Oh my god!
There was never any other way this book was gonna end.
Which is also thematic.
I was about to say.
You kinda have to have it feel that way.Yep, exactly.
The politics of Central Asia.
I already learned something tonight!Theyre not the same thing at all.
One of them is basically a massive collection of uncatalogued websites.
Things that are not in Google.
Theyre not in search engines, whatever.
Theyre just not there.
Well, which ones which?Thats it.
There was a point when I was writing this book that I knew.
Do you have pieces of information that just wont stay in your head?
So Dark versus Deep is one that just refuses to stay in my head.
I could make a guess, but I probably would be wrong.
So I looked that up, I dont know, 15 times over the course of writing this book.
I probably did anyway, but I did my best!
Why have 108 predictions?
Why that number?So, 108 is a number that is significant in Buddhism and Hinduism.
What kinds of notes did you get back from your editor that you took to heart?
What was something that you heard that you went,Oh, you know what?
Thats exactly what needs to happen.There were a number of things.
I was fortunate that my editor liked it from the beginning, which was great.
So I write comics, right?
So I hear.And in comics, theres a trope when youre writing dialogue where words are emphasized.
And so I do that all the time.
Its a lot better.
So that was a note that was very sharp.
Thats what I assume is going to happen.
Were all optimists, right?
Thats a big if.Exactly.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
