Friday, July 06, 2007

Stretching the Truth for Fiction?

I've been working on Epylium Aurelia and I have been finding that certain aspects of it are, well, unknown. I don't mean the obvious allohistorical bits (like whether or not the Romans could even work out an Transatlantic capable ship), but for example what was the state of the Maya during the mid First Century BC? Were they a handful of regional states? Were they a gaggle of independent city states? Were they somewhere between?

I suspect that I am going to have to make something up. Too much of the time period - the Late Preclassic - simply unexplored and unknown. Then the question is how much is too much for this sort of thing? Make it less than blatant - duh - and even plausible - ok - but in the end? Whatever I write will end up being obsolete even as I put it to page and I will get roasted by some Meso-American alt-hist geek for it too.

In some ways, it doesn't matter. The story is set some seven centuries after the conquest and incorporation of the Maian into the Imperium. It's a longer time of assimilation than they have had to date in Mexico OTL. However, it can and does matter to me as a writer for making the background as solid as I can. The period immediately after the conquest - oh about 15 years +/- - is present and actually already written, but I am hoping to include an appendix on the timeline at the end of the book. Also, I am hoping to hold this up a bit higher than the average althistory book on the shelf in the SF section.

We'll see. Just venting out some thoughts.

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