Written by Jayse Smith
Our writer Jayse sat down with Thalia Kalkipsakis, author of the book series Lifespan of Starlight to speak about her life, the final book in the trilogy and more.
Thalia lives in the town of Wangaratta after recently relocating from Melbourne. The trilogy, which will be concluding with the release of the final book in June, is set in 2084 dystopian Melbourne. In this future all citizens are microchipped giving them access to everything from food and water rations to education and safe road crossings. The main character Scout (or Courtlyn) is an illegal who wasn’t ‘chipped’ at birth because of the government-imposed birth restrictions. Scout’s mother risked everything to bribe a doctor to keep quiet and has been sharing her own meagre rations with Scout ever since. This harks to feelings of today’s society where illegals are being hidden or deported in countries around the world.
The novels in the trilogy tell a tale of a group of teenagers who discover the secret to travel or ‘trip’ forward through time, but not without consequence. The group soon begin to realise that once you trip forward, there’s no coming back. This series is absolutely addictive and totally worth checking out.
Read on to discover what Thalia had to say when we sat down with her!
For those who haven’t read the series, what would you say to attract them to it?
It’s time travel with a twist – once you skip forwards, there’s no coming back.
With the final book in the Lifespan of Starlight trilogy, Edge of Time coming out in June, what has been the most exciting part of writing the three books?
The most exciting part has also been the most frustrating. There are twists and ideas that I first developed way back while I came up with the idea (nearly five years ago) that had to wait until the story was ready for them. It’s been a long wait! But so much fun to finally see the whole structure come together. It’s as if I had to sit on a secret all this time, and I can finally tell other people about it.
Do you have a favourite character to write from the book?
I’ve really enjoyed writing Scout—there were times when I wasn’t sure I could write the story but somehow her determination made me keep going. Strangely, I’ve really enjoyed writing Boc as well. As a reader I’ve learnt that the best stories have well-developed antagonists (to the point where I’ll judge the strength of a story by the antagonist/s not by the main characters). Although, Boc probably doesn’t count as an antagonist any more, especially after the events in book 3.
What should we expect from the finale?
Time travel over massive distances, characters who are lost, weird biomimic tech, new revelations about how time works, and clarity about events that happened in the past. Best of all, the identity of the woman who Scout found in the cave at the start of book 1 is revealed.
What has been your favourite scene to write in the trilogy?
Gosh, that’s a tough one. I don’t think I can pick a single scene, but I most enjoyed writing the action scenes, so probably the events after they were training on the train tracks in books 1, and the helejet scene and firestorm in book 2.
Let’s just say I enjoyed writing the whole of book 3! Otherwise, the scenes with Scout and her mum have been favourites as well. I’ve enjoyed that relationship the whole way through.
With the theme of ‘time’ being heavily featured in the series, if you could travel to any time which would it be?
One of the ideas that came to me early when developing the series was the limitations you’d be faced with if you couldn’t easily return to your original time. So, any time I travel to would need to be with the people I love. Or with a promise of being able to come back.
But, if I could travel anywhere, and then come back? I’d check out a few years in the future. Then I’d check out 10 years in the future. Then 50… Yep, I’d love to see what happens in the future.
Can you give any tips to budding writers out there?
I’ve wanted to write since I could read, and for me that translated into trying to be the best writer that I could be. But writing this series has helped me realised that I was approaching it from the wrong way—if you have a strong story to tell, there is less pressure on the writing itself. In fact, the stronger your story, the less you need to worry about the sentence structure or choice of adjective. I’m not trying to say that quality of writing doesn’t matter, more that writing is also very much about the subject and the characters. So, my advice to writers would be this: get out, live life, find the story that you are burning to tell and then you can let the story guide you as you tell it.
If the series had a soundtrack, which songs would be included?
I’ve been asked this one before, so I already have the answer. It’s hard to go past the soundtrack to the movie Run Lola Run. I love the lyrics: “I wish I was a writer, who sees what’s yet unseen”. Check out the trailer for the movie!
How do you overcome the infamous ‘writers block’?
I’ll usually take a break and go for a walk or run. Trying to write a different scene can sometimes help. With the trilogy I spent a lot of time reading non-fiction and researching semi-related scientific facts about time, sleep, biology, the cosmos. That helped a lot.
Mostly, I’ve learnt to accept that some scenes are just tricky to write. If it takes me a week to write a single scene, then that’s just the time that it takes.
The main character Scout is so strong given all she’s been through, is she based on anyone in particular, if so who?
Actually, the original seed of an idea for Scout came from our cat! She’s a rescue cat – terribly small and timid. When we first brought her home she’d hide from us, but when we went out she’d jump up on the benches and break into bread bags to eat the bread (weird taste in food, or maybe that’s all that was left out). It struck me that the little cat was so helpless and didn’t have a place in the world until she settled in with us, but was still quite clever and resilient … I liked her fight and sneaky determination. So that was the initial gut-feeling that made Scout real for me.
Who is an author you look up to for inspiration?
Margo Lanagan makes me see the world in ways that I never would otherwise
Your previous work has been mainly in children’s fiction, how did you find writing your first young adult focused series, especially writing your first romance scene?
I enjoyed the freedom to work with more-complex plots and ideas, but I have pretty simple sentence structure and simple writing style, so I didn’t try to change that. There are some complex ideas about time so I tried to explain them as clearly and simply as I could.
I think the romance scenes are all about emotion so I focused on that instead of describing too much. I agree that the romance scenes are difficult to write and I think I followed the advice: ‘less is more’.
Has writing the series changed the way you view the future, if so, how?
Yes—it’s arriving at a rapid rate! I did a lot of reading about future tech developments and predictions for the future, but I’ve since started to suspect that elements I was writing as if they’d happen in 50 years will instead happen much sooner.
It’s made me very aware that climate change is happening, and the impacts are going to be very real, it’s not something that’s going to hit in a distant future. I’m optimistic about human resilience and our capacity to adjust. Unfortunately, I don’t think humans are very good at pre-emptive change—our ability to adjust is more likely to be a response. So my prediction for the future is that we will see massive impacts of climate change, and the suffering that comes with that, but we will find ways to respond and adapt as a result.
What was the last book that made you cry?
The History of Love by Nicole Krauss. It’s sad, beautiful, and even quite funny.
What kind of research do you do, and how long do you spend researching before beginning a book?
I read a lot of nonfiction about the topic, even if it doesn’t end up being part of the storyline, it still helps me get inside the topic, so to speak. I’m also much slower to begin writing than I used to be. I’ll write scenes and conversations in my notebook and basically ‘collect’ as much of the story as I can, but I’m more likely to wait until I have a clear idea of the story arch overall before starting to write scene after scene.
I’ll spend a lot of time thinking about and trying to find the opening scene too. If you can launch off from a great point in the story, you just have to keep the momentum going from there.
What’s the most difficult thing about writing characters from the opposite sex?
I think it’s the unconscious expectations and biases that I’m more likely to miss, the same reason why it’s difficult to write someone from a very different background.
Can you tell us any juicy secrets from Edge of Time?
And risk wrecking the surprise for readers? Ha ha. Good try, but nope.
What’s next for you?
I’m not really sure, maybe a standalone YA, although I’m not in any hurry to start working on a big project in a hurry. Maybe non-fiction, or something for younger kids. I think I’ll simply wait until I fall in love with an idea and take it from there.
Keep your eyes open for the final book in the series Edge of Time, which will be available everywhere in June.
Check out the series on Goodreads! You can purchase the series on Booktopia and Amazon.
