Eleanor Bluestein, the author of Tea and Other Ayama Na Tales, was kind enough to take some time out of her busy interview and PR schedule for her book tour to answer some questions. If you missed my review of Ms. Bluestein’s novel last week you can find it here.
Also, the winner of Wednesday’s contest is Kim V. – proud recipient of a free copy of Tea and Other Ayama Na Tales, courtesy of Ms. Bluestein and TLC Book Tours.
1979 SEMIFINALIST: Welcome Ms. Bluestein – thank you for taking the time to speak with me here on 1979 Semi-Finalist.
ELEANOR: Thank you for having me Kelly.
1979 SEMIFINALIST: While creating fictional countries, languages, and worlds are quite common in science fiction and fantasy short fiction, it tends to be more rare in traditional literary short fiction – what inspired you to create the fictional universe of Ayama Na where all the stories in Tea and Other Ayama Na Tales takes place?
ELEANOR: Some years ago I wrote a novel set in a futuristic world. It was never published, but an imagined universe isn’t unprecedented for me. The South East Asian setting, however, is new. I was inspired to write Tea and Other Ayama Na Tales by my travels to Thailand, Singapore, Viet Nam, and especially Cambodia, a country still recovering from a genocide and, at the same time, coping with rapid modernization. I wanted to try to imagine what that felt like. As the stories evolved, I saw that I was combining elements of settings from various countries, so it seemed natural at some point to create a new country.
1979 SEMIFINALIST: You even went so far in your creation of this country as to create an Ayama Na language and you use it in your stories – how did you come up with the language?