In my view of America—trying not to speak for the world, since they might resent it—dreams and chasing dreams are what define us as a people.

I grew up in the 90s in what I’d call a blue-collar working-class family. We were the rich family in a trailer park since our manufactured home was a doublewide. That kind of thing.

We were not poor, but not really even in the middle of the middle class. For the first twelve years of my life, we lived with my dad’s parents and one of his brothers. This familial closeness defined my formative years and absolutely contributed to the importance of family in my overall worldview. Like many of my ilk, family is probably sandwiched between God and country in descending order. 

Pursuant to that, one day marrying and having my own family was something I more expected of life than I ever dreamed about. But then, expectations and dreams are paradoxically at tension and muddled up with one another simultaneously, aren’t they?

I am also, like all Americans, a product of immigrants who made the leap to come to the States, followed all the rules (a point of emphasis in these times), and spent their entire lives working more for the betterment of their progeny than themselves. That was always the American dream to me. If you worked hard enough, you could carve out a better life for those that followed you. And probably for yourself, too, with some luck.

Moving on from that so as not to get bogged down in politics…

The dreams of my youth were working class dreams. Early boyhood notions of becoming a cowboy (note: you inherit some things) were replaced by adolescent ones of playing in the NFL. John Elway was one of my heroes at least until high school. I chased that dream as far as Northern Arizona University where I walked on in 2005, realizing partway through spring ball in 2006 that it—being honest and casting all other reasons aside—wasn’t for me or I for it. Life goes on.

Somewhere along the way, I picked up a thirst for storytelling. I credit fantasy novels and Japanese roleplaying (JRPGs) video games in equal measure. I began penning stories and plotting ideas (some that did make it into Raiders of Light) at the age of ten or eleven. By eighteen I was an English major dreaming of becoming a novelist, a dream which was realized in part with the release of Light’s Shadow last year. 

Of course, woven into all those dreams was the expectation that I was going to go to college (the first in the family to obtain a four-year degree as a first stop before entering the workforce or military) and not, in distilled terms, be a manual laborer like everyone else in the family had been. The sacrifices and hard work of my forebears had to amount to something. I had to. My best wasn’t good enough if it wasn’t the best. I try to live by this but probably fail more than succeed (see the football career). I believe the attempt is worth something. Such is life.

Anyway… In this mess of growing up, during my undergrad years, I latched on to the idea of teaching English to fund my world travels. My dream of traveling the world was seeded by my parents’ dream of traveling to Hawaii and Europe one day and stoked by a curiosity for world cultures, language, and food (I mean, who doesn’t like fine vittles and wine, so to speak). This dream, too, gave way to expectations of having a financially stable career. And following that expectation led to other dreams tied to that career. In the words of Billy Pilgrim, so it goes.

As I—now an older (but not old!) man with newer dreams like creating the American myth—reflect on the dreams I had as a younger person, I see them everywhere in Light’s Shadow. Lucas Devlin’s dreams are in part mine, and the world he enters draws heavily from my own interests and experiences. 

In chasing those older dreams from younger times, I lived enough to have something to talk (or to write) about. (Or I hope so!)

I never became a cowboy or an archeologist a la Indiana Jones, but in Belize I rode a horse through the jungle and a river, rappelled down a sinkhole formed out of an old limestone mound, caved in Actun Tunichil Muknal where Mayans made ritual sacrifices to bring rain, and trekked into Guatemala to explore the remnants of Tikal. Funnily enough, Tikal was featured in Star Wars, which was also one of my boyhood obsessions.

I never lived in Japan and became the next Hironobu Sakaguchi of Final Fantasy fame, but I’ve found my own path to creative expression (and maybe one day my composer brother and I will finally team up on that gaming project we both talk about all the time). I've also traveled a good chunk of the United States and the world, having been to 35 states, 1 US territory, and 16 foreign countries (with many trips to some of them, like China). 

I never became a professional athlete, but the experience of failing toughened me up enough to find and walk boldly the next path in life… and the next… and so on.

I had a false start in my early 20s at marriage, but now have a family (Jane, Caleb, and I guess even Dart are my crew). We’ve also continued the tradition of being a family of immigrants, with Jane (like my mom) being from the Philippines. 

I graduated college and spent my 20s climbing the next hill in front of me until I built a career that could fund all of those other dreams. Through some weird combination of work and MMO raid leading—which I was both good and terrible at—I stumbled into leadership roles. Growing as a leader took a long time for me, and I still do it reluctantly. But it pays the bills. 

I never expected any of this to actually happen, but I'm grateful it has. 

Yet, like Lucas and Rynn at the time the reader leaves them, I now have to ask myself what dreams I’ll chase next. The answer lies both in the past (its contents and trajectory) and the present, which is itself an aggregation and distillation of the past. 

I’m sure everyone reading this has their own path and their own dreams. So, in all seriousness, I urge readers of all ages: Grasp tightly the threads of fate! 

This is a central theme of Raiders of Light because it’s a central theme of life. None of us are in control of much in this world, but we should do the best we can with the little we do have agency over. 

Or so I say.... 

In closing, here’s the point: Storytelling is about the characters, who are of course in part “colored in” by the author’s own experiences, biases, and beliefs. Of course. And this was one way to let you, the readers, know where I’m coming from and what to expect. 

I look forward to exploring with all of you how each character in Raiders of Light will heed (or not) the white owl's omen.

Image Info | Childish Sweet Dreams. Source: Sergey Nivens, ID 625010075/Shutterstock