The Inspiration Behind “Alpha”

As a keen student of history, both ancient and modern, it was hardly surprising this much of the inspiration for events in the second of the “Diaries of the Cŵn Annwn”, Alpha, came from historical events.

I had discovered a few years ago that my maternal great-grandmother had been an Ashkenazi Jewess from Palestine. She had converted to Christianity at some point in the process of marrying my maternal great-grandfather, so the only name I had for her was Agnes Angeline McCurley. On a business trip to Berlin, some ten years ago, I visited the Holocaust Museum, which left a significant impact on me, hardly surprising one might say, but it was more than I expected.

Stories and snippets came into play. There was the story of Sir Nicholas Winton (1909-2015) and the way that he had saved 669 children from death. There were letters, such as  those on the “Letters of Note” site: http://www.lettersofnote.com/2016/08/farewell-my-dear-brother.html, a letter from a brother before his deportation to Auschwitz, to his sibling in a forced labour camp. I wondered, with the focus of modern history, how many realised that not all Eastern European countries were immediate victims of the Nazi regime. Hungary did not suffer invasion until the Spring of 1944, for example, or that when the wrath of the Nazi regime fell on their former allies, it was with an impact which seemed greater as a result of how Germany had been viewed previously.

So many details and so much emotion. How would a member of a paranormal race like the Cŵn Annwn react to the knowledge that children were at risk? Bearing in mind that, for my interpretation of their legend, they lived under a duty to their Goddess of hunting down the souls of those who would do evil, could they sit back and do nothing, because it was the world of humans?

I would like to think that they would not. Knowing that innocent souls were at risk, it would not matter to them that they were human or a different species. What would matter to my interpretation of the Cŵn Annwn was that they had the ability to do something to help, perhaps to save some of those innocent lives, like Sir Nicholas Winton had done. I would like to think that if they could help, then they would do so.

But, at what cost? And, having paid that price, how would that impact on their willingness to help humans in need again? Knowing that a price was paid when humans had no idea of the cost paid by their rescuers, would they say “Enough!” or would they continue to help, even thought they would receive scant thanks for their efforts?

The research for section of Alpha which focussed on World War 2 was not easy reading, but it was necessary. To tell a story, I had to understand the motivations of those who lived through those events. Nothing is as straightforward as it might seem.  That is where the craft of telling a story plays a part.

Now, as I work on Volume 9 of the Diaries of the Cŵn Annwn, “Cythraul”, the research is again harrowing, because now, it is events happening in the world today, reported by the media with the different sources slanting the story for their own reasons. As with Alpha, my hope is that I have and can continue to do justice to those events and the individuals who refused to become victims.

 

 

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Book Links

“Bound”, Volume 1 of The Diaries of the Diaries of the Cŵn Annwn
currently free on Kindle Unlimited
Amazon.com $4.99: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B016TQFBNY
Amazon.co.uk £3.99: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B016TQFBNY