▣ Back to Readers' Questions
0 Comments added to this post
No Tags Currently Defined
“How much of the story is real?”
Fiction versus non-fiction
Only A Girl has been classified as multi cultural historical women’s fiction since it addresses the dilemmas of Western and Eastern values; the World Depression, WWII, and the Indonesian Revolution serve as backdrops for the narrative, while the story chronicles the intricate relationships between women in a family of three generations.
Having said this, all historical events mentioned in the book actually happened. E.g. people did lose their jobs during the Depression years; the Japanese did occupy the Netherlands’ East Indies during WWII and they did intern anyone with more than 50% Dutch blood. The fire that revolutionaries set and burned half of Bandung to the ground on p.125 of Only A Girl did happen.
Are my characters anyone I knew? As a writer, I have acquired the habit of observing people and situations. I make a mental note every time someone or a situation catches my attention. During the course of writing, these individuals and situations may pop up and thus populate the story and shape the landscape. Often, a character is a composite of several individuals who have crossed my path; while a scene is often created by merging different situations.
As the story begins to set, characters will take on their own lives and drop into scenes which develop around them. At this time, all I do, is record my characters’ journey through a time and place of their choice. Only after the story is completed and I have turned it over to my editor, do I take back the controls.
last edited on May 17th, 2010 at 10:44 PM
