For her sixth and latest collection of short stories, A Place Between Waking And Forgetting (paperback), author Eugen Bacon has assembled a collection that — as she explains in the following email interview — “largely comprises black people stories exploring affection, dread, anguish, or hope.”
To start, is there a theme that connects the stories in A Place Between Waking And Forgetting?
Yes, and no. Unlike my collection Chasing Whispers, in which the connecting theme was a black protagonist with a deep longing for someone, someplace, something…and a recurring phrase in each story: “a deep and terrible sadness,” A Place Between Waking And Forgetting largely comprises black people stories exploring affection, dread, anguish, or hope.
Along with my general focus on black people stories, I knew that I had to have my World Fantasy Award finalist story “The Devil Don’t Come With Horns” in this collection. The short story features a black protagonist who assumes a fathering role, despite racism and viciousness. It’s a story that engages with difference in subversive activism. It was for a Horror Writers Association (HWA) anthology about horror from and about underrepresented voices, showcasing authors from historically excluded backgrounds telling terrifying tales of what it means to be, or merely to seem, “other.”
This story paved the way for the other stories I hand-picked for this collection, along the sub-genre of the literary strange and writing the “other,” betwixt, hauntings, futurisms.
I gradually grew this collection with emerging stories, affiliated or unaffiliated with anthologies. “Naked Earth” was a natural selection, a story set in a futuristic world changing socially and politically because of climate action. Increasingly, as her world changes in a sociopolitical way, protagonist Naeema is compelled towards a distinctive stand about her life. She can no longer sit on the fence about the “every day.” “The Set” was a hybrid story in prose and script form a multiverse anthology, and I saw it fit right in, as did “Human Beans,” a story about the existence of another Earth: what if higher beings understood a solution to our current Earth’s problems (war, poverty, climate change, disease…) and could introduce us to a Super Earth in a different dimension?
I started looking at original stories to add to this collection “on the go.”
And did you write any new stories to flesh the book out?
Original stories that felt just right for this collection include: “Derive, Moderately,” about a refugee mother and son escaping an attack of the droids in their homeworld who find themselves entrapped in space; “Dimension Stone,” an Afrocentric story set in Dar-es-salaam about a haunting stone that steals everything from our protagonist Pendo; “The Zanzibar Trail,” a darkly playful tale re-imagining Dalton and Evelyn’s path to OmniPark, in a story set in a Realm between the Realms, somewhere in Zanzibar; “The Mystery of A Place Between Waking and Forgetting,” initially written for a Sherlock Holmes anthology, where Sherlock is a woman, [but while] I crafted a story to the theme, I liked it too much as an original, with its unique voice to this Afrocentric female sleuth, so I handpicked it for this individual collection and withdrew it from the invited anthology, to the editors’ chagrin. But I wrote them a new story: our sleuth, this time in an alternate universe.
So, what genres are represented by the stories in A Place Between Waking And Forgetting?
My stories are mostly cross genre; they’re genre benders that comprise dark fantasy, the literary strange, and black speculative fiction that could be termed the Afro-irreal. I try to explain irreal fiction in my chapter in the book Afro-Centered Futurisms In Our Speculative Fiction: it’s fantastical literature that demands trust and immersion in the impossible. It’s illusionary text, almost dreamlike. It may be strange and familiar all at once — subconsciously surreal, but with more grounding to reality than the reader might imagine.
A Place Between Waking And Forgetting is your sixth short story collection after Hadithi & The State Of Black Speculative Fiction (which you co-wrote with Milton Davis), Black Moon: Graphic Speculative Flash Fiction, Road To Woop Woop & Other Stories (which we discussed when it came out in 2020), Danged Black Thing, Saving Shadows, and Chasing Whispers. What makes Forgetting different from those collections?
All my collections are distinct…yet true representations of my writing range. I think Forgetting is different for…its newness?
So, are there any writers who had a big influence on A Place Between Waking And Forgetting, or specific stories in it, but were not as big an influence on your previous collections or any of the stories in them?
I am settling more on my own as a writer, and I can’t think of other writers (except myself) who largely influenced this new collection.
But I did collaborate with Clare Rhoden, an Australian writer and editor, on “The Zanzibar Trail,” which was much fun to write.
How about non-literary influences? Were any of the stories in A Place Between Waking And Forgetting influenced by any movies, shows, or games?
I wouldn’t say so, to be honest, except the titular story “The Mystery Of A Place Between Waking And Forgetting” which is a postmodern adaptation of the famed sleuth Holmes and his faithful companion Watson, herein as the colorful characters Shalok Homsi and Watison — a child.
Hollywood loves making movies out of short stories. Are there any stories in A Place Between Waking And Forgetting that you think could work especially well as a movie?
“The Devil Don’t Come With Horns” for the twist in its racism themes involving children.
And the titular story is relatable with its Sherlock-is-a-girl theme, and this girl is Black.
So, is there anything else you think people need to know about A Place Between Waking And Forgetting?
Approach this collection with an open mind, and you can read the short stories in any order — be prepared to be astonished.
Finally, it’s been my experience that short story collections are a great way to get to know a writer. Do you think the stories in A Place Between Waking And Forgetting are a good representation of who you are as a writer?
I have an affection for language and playfulness with text. My short story collections are a degustation, and I adore them all. Read one or all and you get a deep insight into my curiosity and flare as a writer.
In that case, if someone liked A Place Between Waking And Forgetting, which of your novels would you suggest they read next?
I have much affection for Serengotti, an African-Australian migrant’s story with minimal elements of magical realism, and Mage Of Fools has a special place in my heart as an Afro-futuristic dystopian novel set in Mafinga, a real place in my birth country Tanzania.
