This novel was born in my attempt to heal from the
kind of heartache that was taking forever to wash off. Years after the blow had been
dealt, I still found myself torn between the sweetest memories of the start and
the tears I cried in the end. These two polar opposites kept playing havoc with
my life. I never enjoyed any of the beautiful romantic adventures that kept coming my way while I was interpreting the present through the lenses of
that wound. So I decided I wanted to get the whole experience out of my system,
and allow it to transform me.
Often
situations come to a head and sorrow becomes almost unbearable to provide us with
an opportunity for re-invention, for rebirth into a higher, better, stronger
version of the persons we were before the experience that hurt us crossed our
path. In my case, it took me a long time because the depth of my feelings was unchartered
territory, and the pain that I felt when that particular relationship came to an end was
really unbearable.
But art can
change things, and writing makes you process experiences. You can turn your
monster into a kitten, and you reprogram yourself and your heart as a result.
So that’s what I spent the past four years doing, churning out all kinds of
feelings, images, fragments of memories and situations from my broken heart, in the attempt to make it whole again.
Cassandra’s
story is one of struggle for ideals that do not seem to exist on Earth, and
acceptance of normality, imperfection, pain and even defeat. She is on a
journey, of course. It’s a heart-journey where time is irrelevant. She
time-travels to various points of her life experience with Oscar, trying to heal the void that’s come between them. It’s an adventure in consciousness
where love is the fuel. It starts off as a quest for the stars which turns into
a wrestling match with one’s true identity, and ends up in the welcoming embrace
of physical reality in its simplicity and beautiful bareness.
