What would you go back to see?

By Kris Neri

If a time machine existed, what events would you go back in history to see? Lincoln’s delivery of the Gettysburg Address? John F. Kennedy’s “I am a Berliner” speech? Maybe if you’re particular bloodthirsty, you’d like to go back far enough to see Anne Boleyn beheaded. Or to storm the beach at Normandy for the D-Day invasion.

Except for the beheading, I’d enjoy witnessing all of those events and many more. But an event I have always wished I could have been present for would be to be in that field in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947, when a particular aircraft was said to have crashed.

Was it really an aircraft? The government has maintained all these years that it was a failed weather balloon. Probably true, right? Still, witnesses at the time insisted it was a spacecraft and that alien bodies were taken from it. Mostly likely it was just a weather balloon — real life can be so dreary.

The great thing about writing is that it’s just like having a time machine. No, it’s even better. Through my new Magical Mystery, MAGICAL ALIENATION, I not got to visit that field, I was able create the truth about what really happened there.

And not just Roswell, either. I also got to decide what really goes on at the infamous Area 51 at Groom Lake, Nevada. And if you think you know what those places are all about, you’re in for a big surprise.

MAGICAL ALIENATION once again features fake psychic Samantha Brennan and genuine Celtic goddess/FBI agent Annabelle Haggerty. Cheerful Samantha figures she has finally hit the mother lode in this book, having signed on as the spiritual adviser of the aging bad boy of rock, Rand Riker. It’s all fun and games at first, and Samantha, deserves some fun after her breakup from her former beau, Angus, the ever-hot Celtic god of youth and love and laughter, who, after stealing her heart, broke it by having a fling with a mermaid.

If only Rand weren’t headed to the New Age town of Sedona, Arizona to host a benefit concert for the most hated man in America, militia guru Normal Frankly, accused of trying to kill Arizona’s charismatic senator, Kenny Campbell. Samantha tangles with goddess-in-hiding, Special Agent Annabelle Haggerty of the FBI. Though Samantha and Annabelle were once mismatched partners in crime, they’re now on opposite sides, since Annabelle has become responsible for Senator Campbell’s safety.

Tensions spike when Normal Frankly’s militia pals free him from captivity. In their raid, they not only abduct his judge and jury, but also a passing U.S. Army convoy, allowing them to take possession of prisoner who has been the government’s most closely guarded secret for over sixty years — the Roswell alien.

By writing MAGICAL ALIENATION, I not only had the chance to look into unexplained happenings of the past, I also was able to look into the future, to a time of unprecedented war of the gods that manifested on Earth as an unheard of worldwide storm.

MAGICAL ALIENATION  picks up with HIGH CRIMES ON THE MAGICAL PLANE left off, introducing new gods and goddesses, including Fiona, Annabelle’s secretive goddess mother, and the trickster gods of Lugh and Taliesin, responsible for such real present-day phenomenon as bizarre weather patterns and crop circles. There is a reason why Allyson James, the national bestselling author of Stormwalker called MAGICAL ALIENATION, “…a hilarious tangle of gods and goddesses.”

With gods wielding unimaginable powers, and the shape shifting rock people twisting the very surface of the earth, as Sedona heads into the darkest night the planet has ever seen, Samantha rightfully concludes the fun and games have truly ended, and she wonders which, if any of them, will survive it.

But when Celtic gods are involved, nothing is ever as it appears.

Mostly, I love that they allowed me to travel to a space that was so fun. I hope you’ll find it so, too.

What would you go back to see if you could?

Comments

[Hank Phillippi Ryan]

Oh,Kris, I just read Stephen King's 11/23/63--and that makes the Kennedy assassination irresistible.

What would I go see? Could I change it? Or would I just have to watch it?

But of course, given a chance to time travel? Count me in. As long as there was a guaranteed return.

[Dana]

Hmm, I guess I'd have to ask for a little wiggle room, because what I'd want to see is what actually happened to Queen Boudica after the Romans quelled her revolt in 60 or 61. It might take a little time to find the exact place of her death...but I guess we'd have time, right?

[krisneri]

Hank, isn't that the issue that always arises with the question of time travel? If we were able to change some tragic events, as we would certainly want to, mightn't that ripple out in other changes throughout the course of history? But it sure is a tempting idea.

Dana, you might have to go back for a couple of years then, to get it exactly right. But to live for a while in ancient Rome...wouldn't that be exciting. Of course, after reading CLEOPATRA, I feel I have!

[Donna Andrews]

Kris, I'd go back to see what Richard III was really up to. As a long-time Ricardian, I hope he got a bum rap, but I'd really love to know.

Of course, Josephine Tey and Elizabeth Peters and a dozen others have already written the fiction about this, alas.

[krisneri]

Donna, it would be good to know for sure. In this case, it's not a matter of going back to see, you'd have to be either an inner-circle courtier or a fly on the wall. I secret camera would be pretty good, too.