Opposing the First Emperor of China with Magic: An interview with historical fantasy author Troy Jackson

1) Please tell us about your book.

My novel, The Elementals, finds actual events that occurred some 2200 years ago in ancient China colliding with a supernatural twist. The First Emperor of China, Qin Shí Huangdi (pronounced CHIN-SHHR-HWANG-DEE) has united a region of the world that has not known peace for many hundreds of years. Some viewed him as a savior, but many saw him as a tyrant bent on furthering his own power. Upon the backs of those he conquered he began numerous projects, including the first Great Wall, the Linqu Canal, a standardized system of writing and money, and a highway system of roads. Overtaxed and overburdened, the citizens were powerless to stand up to the Emperor. However, a handful of brave men and women rose up in an effort to overthrow him. One such group is the Dragon’s Spite who must gather their strength before confronting what they view as the forces of pure evil. But first they must locate three young teenagers who hold vast supernatural powers that could bring balance to the region. Can they do so before the agents of the Emperor capture them, thus ensuring total victory?

2) Please tell us a bit about your main characters.

Unfortunately I cannot tell you much more than what I have below, or I may give away too much!

Protagonists:

Cai – a young orphan who has bounced from town to town most of her life
Shí Lin – eldest daughter of a prominent merchant
Jiao Ai – the third teenage girl who travels around with her reckless, uncaring parents
Li Jun – co-leader of the Dragon’s Spite tasked to find the three anomalies and keep them away from the Emperor

Antagonists:

Qin Shí Huangdi – the First Emperor of China who views himself as the Son of Heaven and righteous ruler of all
Li Si – the Emperor’s Prime Minister; the force behind the strict code of Legalism and many of the efforts to standardize everything in life
The Triad – three brothers, Meng Na, Meng Fei, and Meng Wen, who have declared their allegiance to the Emperor and will defend him to the death

3) What got you interested in writing a centered around China in the time of Qin Shi Huang?

I have always enjoyed history, even as a child. So it was no surprise that I latched on to it in college and received a degree in it. I have read many books and watched numerous movies and shows regarding various periods in history. But I always found myself engrossed in Chinese history. It is one of the oldest and most fascinating cultures that have ever existed on this Earth. I remember hearing about the First Emperor during a class in college and I never forgot about him. When the idea first popped in my head years ago about writing a book I thought back to a period of history that it would fit well in. Not to give too much away, but during the reign of the First Emperor, he and his Prime Minister (Li Si) hated and feared free-thinking, believing that it could lead citizens to rise up against the Qin Empire. And so they mercilessly cracked down on those they viewed as a threat, including Confucian scholars. They also burned nearly all texts that existed during that time period, and is why there is very little actually in print about the reign of the First Emperor. As a writer, it gave me a lot of “wiggle room” to implement my own twist to the story.

4) Many of the elements that Western people associate with China, even ancient China, are associated with somewhat later eras in Chinese history such as the Tang and Qing Eras. Did you have any concerns about setting accessibility when developing this title?

It is true that when most people think of ancient times, they think of the Egyptians, Romans, and Greeks, and generally not the Chinese. Throughout writing The Elementals I viewed it as a way of introducing Chinese history to the readership. Very little is actually known about them except maybe in the last 1,000 years, and I found it as a unique challenge to not only better educate people but to do so in an entertaining fashion.

5) What sort of research did you do when writing this book? Is your formal history background in ancient Chinese history? Was there anything particular fascinating you learned that challenged your preconceptions about this era?

In preparing to write this novel (and the subsequent novels that will hopefully be out in the next couple of years) I did a great deal of research. I’d conservatively say I put in 100-150 hours of research, including midnight shows on the History channel, seeking any website I could find on the time period, and reading several novels (including Records of the Grand Historian by Sima Qian, Tales of Emperor Qin Shihuang by Yuan Yang and Xiao Ding, and The First Emperor of China: The Greatest Archeological Find Of Our Time by Arthur Cotterell).

I received a Bachelor’s Degree in History, but there was no specific time period that I focused on. That is typically done for higher degrees in History.

As I read more and more about the First Emperor and events during that time it read to me like a TV mini-series. It had everything that today’s shows include and what audiences demand, from political intrigue to betrayals to a grand sense of good versus evil.

6) Do you have any links to any excerpts you'd like to share?

If by excerpts you mean from my book, I would direct anyone to Amazon or Barnes and Noble, where they can view the first eight chapters of The Elementals to get a taste and feel for it.

7) Please tell us about your other projects.

Currently I am plodding along in writing book two of The Elementals. It progresses the story and sets things up for the climatic conclusion set for the third and final book. I am hoping to have book two out by the end of 2013 or early 2014, and book three by the end of 2014 or early 2015.

I am also getting the word out on The Elementals. As a new author I am starting from the very beginning and having to really work to get my name and my work out there for people to see. Hopefully enough will enjoy it and spread the word. After seeing reviews on it I can say, “So far, so good!”

Finally, I am busily working on my website, Tempest Works (http://www.tempestworks.com), which is meant to not only introduce people to The Elementals, but all of my future works, and also keep readers in tune with the publishing world. Since I first launched it last year I have posted a great many interviews on my blog for people to check out.

Thank you for your time!

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The Elementals can be purchased at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

Magical Mondays #3: Poisonous Immortality: Taoist Alchemy

Welcome to my third Magical Monday. In these segments, I'll be briefly overviewing various magical traditions and elements that people have been believed in (or continue to believed in) throughout history. Eventually, I may also move onto depictions that appear only in novels, but there's plenty of historical stuff to keep me busy for a while.

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Humanity has conquered the skies, even walked on the moon. We can transmit information almost instantly from one side of the globe to the other. Despite all our knowledge, one of the most ancient desires, immortality, escapes our grasp. Different attempts at achieving immortality using modern technology are being attempted, such as cryonics. Technologically-based movements such as the transhumanists conjure up all sorts of schemes involving using the power of technology to free themselves from the shackles of mere mortal life. In this, these modern day seekers share a common bond with the first Chinese emperor, Qin Shi Huang (247 BC-221 BC), who was obsessed with immortality.

Of course, the ancient Chinese emperor couldn't even conceive of the technological innovations that inspire modern day immortality seekers. Instead, he focused his efforts on various potions and elixirs of immortality. In doing so, he often turned to Taoist alchemists.

Taoism, which emerged roughly six centuries prior, was originally relatively free of a lot of low-level mystical and directly magical attachments. The original texts are defined by a modest simplicity. As Taoism spread throughout China, it fused with and absorbed different folk beliefs. By the time of Qin Shi Huang and later contemporaries, complicated Taoist magic and alchemy was associated with many schools of Taoist thought.

While going into detail about Taoism is well beyond the scope of this entry (and would probably require an lengthy series of its own), there are a couple of relevant concepts I should briefly mention that are relevant to the emperor's quest for immortality. The Taoist alchemy tradition is divided into the so-called "inner"/"spiritual" alchemy and "outer"/"physical" alchemy. Incidentally, European alchemy also had a similar mix between spiritual and more physical elements.

The basis of inner alchemy were the "Three Treasures" of Jing, Qi, and Shen. Though it is a gross simplification, one can think of this as roughly equivalent to physical vitality, general life energy, and spiritual essence. A balance of these elements and proper maintenance of Jing were believed to extend life.

Inner alchemy depended on a variety of rather mundane techniques including eating a controlled diet, meditation, breathing exercises, and other things that make a certain logical sense even in our modern technological world. It also depended on other less straight-forward things including sperm retention and menstrual control.

Outer alchemy, on the other hand, made use of various herbs and chemical substances. Despite the mystical overtones, it was effectively proto-medicinal chemistry. They were used to manipulate the Treasures and the elements that make up the body (in Chinese philosophy these are wood, fire, water, metal, and earth). As with inner alchemy, manipulating the balances of the essences and treasures of the body could lead to extended life or even immortality. Jade, gold, hematite, and cinnabar (a mercury ore) were popular ingredients in immortality elixirs.

Taoist outer alchemy was also just as concerned with turning base metals into gold as European alchemy, but the alleged point of the quest for gold was to consume it to extend life. One Taoist sage was alleged to have remarked, "Have you ever seen a rich immortal?"

Now, an astute reader will probably notice that the continued consumption of things like toxic mercury ore is likely to lead not to immortality but to illness and/or death. Several Chinese emperors likely died of mercury poisoning. Qin Shi Huang, mighty first emperor of China, himself likely died from the consumption of mercury either in pill or elixir form.

The respect for mercury is obvious from the descriptions of Qin Shi Huang's tomb, which include entire scale "rivers" of mercury. Although once thought mere exaggeration, the emperor's tomb was re-discovered in 1974, and subsequent chemical testing has confirmed extremely high mercury residual vapor levels in the soil.

*The tomb was supposed to be a scale model of the imperial lands including the major rivers. Even if they were mere "creeks" of mercury, that is still a staggering amount.