Hole in the World serves as a prequel of sorts to my novel, The Lost Level, and as such, should be considered a part of that series (even though the main protagonist, Aaron Pace, is missing from the novel you just read). The events in this book take place a short time before Aaron’s arrival in the pocket dimension known as the Lost Level, and explain a few of the mysteries from later in the series (such as the scene when Aaron, Kasheena, and Bloop find a wheelchair in a pile of dinosaur feces).
This novel is a bit different than your standard tale, in that—while it is a work of fiction—all of the characters featured in the book (with the exception of bus driver Lucinda Hawkins) are real people, who paid for the opportunity to be a character in the book via Kickstarter and several other programs. I’ve done this before, most notably with the two short story collections The Rising: Selected Scenes from the End of the World and Earthworm Gods: Selected Scenes from the End of the World.
In those two examples, each individual person starred in their own short story, and thus, they didn’t have to share the page with anyone else. In the case of Hole in the World, they were each a small part of a much larger ensemble cast. This proved challenging to me, as a writer. After all, these folks paid good money for this opportunity, and I wanted to make sure they saw a value for that. But at the same time, I also knew that in such a fictional setting, somebody would have to die. Otherwise, there’s no suspense for the reader.
I struggled with that for a long time, and as a result, the book missed its deadline. (My thanks to the publishers—Tony and Kim at Camelot Books and Jason and Lesley at Apex Book Company—for their infinite patience and understanding).
So, with the deadline slipping more and more, I decided the only fair thing to do was to kill everybody.
I scrapped a half-written, earlier draft of the novel and started completely over from scratch (which just delayed things further). Then, I wrote each person’s name down on a slip of paper, and put them into a mason jar. After that, I pulled out the names one by one, thus determining the order in which I’d kill them. I decided that to make things even fairer, I’d kill Lucinda first, since she was the only fictional character. Benn had the honor of being the first name drawn from the jar, so I think it’s only fitting that his books are the last scene of this novel. Benn never made it home, but his books did.
The only person I didn’t kill was Paula’s daughter, Erin. There are a couple of reasons for that. One, Erin hadn’t actually paid to be in the book. Her father (who purchased Paula’s placement) requested that I include her, as well. Secondly, I’ve met Erin. Her parents have brought her to numerous signings and conventions over the years, and I’ve watched her grow up, and she’s a remarkable young woman. Every time I see her, she gives me a gift—a picture she’s drawn for me or a craft that she’s made. So, there was just no way I could bring myself to pull that particular trigger. Believe me, I tried. There are several earlier drafts of this novel that fell apart because I tried. Ultimately, I decided to let her live, and thus, the gray aliens (which readers of my novel The Seven: The Labyrinth Book 1 know are really angels) provided me an out. I’d already established them as part of the Lost Level’s lore, so it was a pretty easy fix.
So, yes. I couldn’t kill the little girl. But I had no problem killing all the grown-ups, and indeed, it was a lot of fun inventing their various demises. I only hope that they—and you—had as much fun reading it as I did writing it.
If this was your first introduction to the world of the Lost Level, the story continues in The Lost Level and Return to the Lost Level (both currently available) and the forthcoming Beneath the Lost Level (and possibly more after that, if the universe allows it).
As always, thanks for reading.
Brian Keene
Somewhere along the Susquehanna River
July 2017