Okay.
So I figure I can't really post the question I received the other day without being a spoiler or assuming that everyone in the world has read The Marbury Lens, when, in fact, only twelve people have.
But the question was about the character of Henry Hewitt -- why he does what he does, whether or not he's real, how he acts as such a catalyst to events that seem out of everyone's control.
Generally, something like that.
So I have this recurring thought as I've written The Marbury Lens and also in writing things since then. And I think this idea plays a huge role in the novel, and especially in another novel that I have coming out next year, in 2012.
It goes like this:
[By the way, forgive me if you think this is totally insane. It probably is.]
Have you ever gone into a room, opened the door, stepped inside -- and the room is a totally familiar room to you, one that you've been in and out of countless times over years of your life -- and then you reach over to flick the light switch.
But you reach toward, say, the left side of the door without thinking about it. And you realize there is no switch there. There never has been a switch there. The switch has always been on the right side.
You might even rake your hand around on the wall trying to feel for the switch that has NEVER been there.
And you think, Wow. How crazy. How long have I lived here? Why was I trying to flip a switch that doesn't exist?
Well, what if the switch did pop up on the left, and, without noticing any difference, you turned it on and then went about your business and traveled through your universe as though everything had always been that way?
Would you ever know that things are messed up?
What if you never knew that things were now slightly different, and that the mere act of flipping that switch that wasn't supposed to be there but suddenly popped up on the wrong side of your door made everything - everything - in the universe, just a little bit changed?
That's what happens to Jack and the boys, every time they pop back and forth between here and all the not-heres where they end up. They just don't know it. Henry knows it. Jack kind of figures it out in The Marbury Lens, but everyone else is more or less along for the ride.
Here's another tidbit for you:
While I was sitting here this morning, working, writing something brand new and oh-so-shudderingly-strange, a fly buzzed between my face and the computer screen and dove, headfirst, into a large cup of very hot black coffee.
He buzzed around on the surface for a while.
Then he stopped.
I'm glad I noticed that slight change in my universe.
