Even before the first word was committed to paper, I began envisioning the worlds, the technology, and the people who would inhabit them. I considered every detail: their attire, their speech patterns, their private hobbies—even those traits that might never explicitly appear on the page. I understood that in a novel, much remains ‘internal,’ and the ultimate ‘vision’ is a collaboration with the reader’s own imagination.
My goal was to craft scenes and dialogues with a fluid, cinematic quality. I purposefully avoided over-explaining or providing dense physical descriptions; I wanted to step back and trust the reader. My intent was for everyone to project the story onto their own internal ‘screen’ in a way that resonates with them personally. I merely provide the cues; the reader directs the film.
Of course, the creative process is rarely a straight line. Many elements did not unfold as originally conceived. I often found myself improvising as the ink flowed, yet those early blueprints frequently helped shape the evolving plot. Countless ideas emerged in the heat of writing that were never part of the initial plan, and there were times when the story itself demanded a departure from my original vision, leading to something entirely unexpected.
I possess no formal education in design; instead, I have always relied on my instincts. I would envision a concept, commit it to my notes, and draft sketches to bring it into focus. Naturally, the cinematic worlds of film and the intricate art of comics provided a rich foundation, serving as a vital starting point for many of my creations.
Much like the ‘masters’ of the genre, I found myself gravitating toward familiar or captivating shapes found in the natural world. I looked for geometry in the living: the formidable silhouette of a hammerhead shark, the prehistoric curves of a horseshoe crab, or even the familiar lines of my own hands. By translating these organic forms into the cold steel of starships and technology, I sought to create a universe that felt both alien and strangely intuitive.
To craft the ‘extraterrestrial’ phonetics of my universe, I found an unexpected ally in a book of IQ tests. One exercise presented hundreds of words, tasking the reader with identifying known terms. Amidst the list lay a wealth of meaningless gibberish—a goldmine for a science fiction author. Some of these I adopted wholesale; others I reshaped until they rang true. To ground this fiction in our own reality, I ‘borrowed’ established astronomical names such as Spica and Pollux, creating a deliberate bridge between the present day and a possible human future.
My creative process involved maintaining separate ledgers for planetary systems and characters, though these boundaries remained fluid. A name originally intended for a celestial body might find its home with a protagonist if the cadence demanded it. My inspirations were as diverse as my surroundings: during a period of watching the German action series Cobra 11, two characters were christened after a lead officer and his actor (Semir and Erdogan—the latter eventually evolving into Erdan). Another name, Beryl, found its spark in the nickname of a high school classmate.
While much was transformed in the crucible of writing, many of these original blueprints and names remained untouched from their first conception. Yet, I knew that a collection of alien-sounding names and a mountain of sketches were merely a foundation; they were a world waiting for its inhabitants.