Title: The Human Inside
Author: Y.T. Cheng
Publisher: Book Venture Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-944849-84-9
Pages: 512
Genre: Science Fiction
Interviewed by: Suzanne Gattis
Author Interview with Y.T. Cheng
Today we are talking with Y.T. Cheng author of “The Human Inside.”
PBR: What were your inspirations for writing this book?
I dreamed of a world in the future where in the midst of all the chaos, my characters came in and gave people a reason to hope for a better future. Science-fiction is my life and my inspiration. Fictional settings, movies, books, action, comedy, and romance are all things that I often wish to have happen to me. The reality however is that it doesn’t always work out like that so this book was pretty much a world that I wanted to dive into and create for any other fans out there. Many of the characters are inspired by real people among my friends and family and they all contributed in their own ways to bringing this book to life.
PBR: What was your process of keeping track of all the characters and complex storylines?
A lot of writing and a lot of notes. Like any novel, you definitely want to establish a very personal connection to characters you’ve seen in other places like in movies, shows, books or even in ourselves. I think everyone would consider it complex because of the fact that there are so many numbers for the characters. To make it easy to understand though, I just started with the featured main group of characters. The cast, so to speak, of the story. I needed a main character, David 117 who is shy like me, needs to get a little direction to get where he needs to go. Therefore, he had a technician (Mandy) assigned to him. Someone who was young and mature that could take charge at a computer. Dr. Kendrick obviously is the character responsible for this whole story but he’s not the main character. Serina 43 serves as a love interest for 117. It was all about choosing characters that interact with the minor ones often and the story progressed from there. Even the minor characters began developing their personalities as I wrote this first book and you start to see a new group of characters come to light. If you looked closely that is.
PBR: Do you believe the creation of amborgs was ethical?
This is definitely a really important question. I’m glad the review highlighted this. Originally, I had no ethical concerns because it’s a story right? But, there are problems and that’s what generates conflict which is what readers crave. So there had to be a lot of revisions to the intent to create and alter the physical features of a human being in general. “Experimenting on humans.” Did anyone else feel uncomfortable hearing that?
Whether or not it was ethical is definitely up to the civilian population in the setting of my novel. I like to think that it was because the volunteers that Dr. Kendrick sought out were orphans. Kids and teenagers who were on the brink of death who chose to go along. They weren’t coerced, tricked or kidnapped. They were found and they were asked if they wanted this. People that he felt deserved a chance to save more just like them. Now if Dr. Kendrick had failed, yes, it would have been very severe. It’s such a big controversy because nobody has successfully enhanced a human before. This is literally a story about the creation of the world’s first cybernetically enhanced humans. Dr. Kendrick comes from a rich background, is an accomplished scientist, and his interests are to give the world his creations. Ethical concerns are definitely a great subject to debate about this.
A lot of stories have settings where technology or a certain event is the social norm. I wanted to write a story where the amborgs’ origins are explained. There is a lot of critique and scrutiny. Many of the amborgs would say that their lives are better though. Perhaps the most important question we should ask is what if they aren’t needed anymore?
PBR: Why was it so important to you that the amborgs still had the “human inside”
I think that it was just important because I wanted a human to be at the steering wheel if that makes sense. I think the point of it was to… create characters that had these special abilities and the drawback was they had to learn from humanity in an entirely new perspective. Some of them have rather quick adaptations into human life but there are some who don’t like the main character 117. I didn’t want to tell a human story and I didn’t want to tell a robot story if that makes sense. This story is about bridging the gap between something that is human with technology which is familiar but also sketchy and unknown. It’s important that the amborgs understand they are a higher form of humans but they still have their human traces within themselves. For some, it’s about them not leaving their human sides behind for good. Personally, I just wanted another kind of superhero to save the day.
PBR: Will we see parts of this storyline continued in a future book?
Absolutely. I’m not planning on stopping here. The sequel will bring back the characters again for another world-wide event. This storyline does not end with just this book. Better character development as well as new characters. New ideas and notes are always flooding the way for new story plots. As the review stated, it was suggested that it be broken down into short stories or into a series to fit time expectations. I will say this though, there have been requests to write stand-along origin stories or tales for other characters featured in this first novel. With my connection to these characters, I’m hoping this won’t fade. The stories I’m writing are definitely ones I hope will bring these characters closer to the public.
PBR: How did you begin writing?
I never thought I could write. That’s the thing. I only really started writing this novel in my first year of college. It became a thing where I shared the rough drafts on Facebook. Facebook notes had that thing where if you wrote something, it would publish for friends to see. My friends loved the ideas I had, the futuristic story that would eventually become “The Human Inside.” That’s really where it began. When my friends wanted to see more and now I can’t imagine my life without this book. I don’t feel that I would have this chance to talk to amazing people and extend my reach to so many if this book never stayed with me and my writing. Thank you.
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