Kacen Callender dedicates their first foray into younger grownup fantasy, Infinity Alchemist, to “the younger me who always wanted to write a YA fantasy.” While this may make one think about a teenage Callender dreaming of a future as an writer, Callender explains it’s really in reference to their early days of their profession, once they struggled to write down fantasy. “It was very difficult at that time, for whatever reason, to get the story out,” they are saying. ”Infinity Alchemist had been percolating for lots of years, so it felt like a large triumph for me to lastly write it.”
What made this ebook such a problem in these early days? Callender factors to their wrestle to drag collectively all the many vital threads of this narrative right into a cohesive storyline: “I didn’t quite understand plotting yet. Now, hopefully, I do.”
Some readers may view this focus on plot and motion as a departure from Callender’s earlier books, that are character-driven and transfer at a slower tempo, titles that is perhaps deemed “quiet” by the publishing business. In Infinity Alchemist, “there’s a lot of fighting scenes, a lot of explosive battles, a lot of excitement, alongside the emotional depth,” Callender says. Yet with its theme of studying about one’s self-worth, Infinity Alchemist nonetheless has a attribute Callender feeling to it. “With all of my books, I tend to focus on a theme, some sort of internal healing and a message that I hope will resonate with readers,” they are saying.
Read our evaluate of ‘Infinity Alchemist.’
One of the guiding rules of the fantasy world of Infinity Alchemist is that everybody has equal entry to alchemy, however individuals nonetheless expertise totally different levels of success in studying alchemy, usually resulting from the deliberate manipulation of the system by these in energy. Protagonist Ash Woods is unusually gifted, however he has been denied entry to the coaching that might make his energy reliable. Regarding the stress that creates, Callender says, “For me, it was always important that there not be a Chosen One, to include the idea that everyone is powerful and everyone is magical, and everyone is Chosen in the eyes of the Source or the Creator or what have you. I wanted to explain how power is internal; power is realizing that you are worthy without being gaslit by the idea of societal power.” But Callender provides: “You can feel power for yourself and feel that self-worth, but there are still other people who have the power to decide that you aren’t worthy. I wanted those different versions of power to be in conversation.”
“I wanted to explain how power is internal; power is realizing that you are worthy without being gaslit by the idea of societal power.”
Callender has a historical past of telling the tales of characters whose identities aren’t usually represented in media, and Infinity Alchemist continues that work with a various solid of queer, trans, and polyamorous characters. Ramsay Thorne, for example, is genderfluid, and the ebook seamlessly shifts pronouns all through the character’s arc. This method foregrounds Ramsay’s story greater than Ramsay’s pronouns. “Ramsay comes to life in that way because it is going to be different for every reader, depending on where they last left the character. For example, I’m writing the sequel now, so for me the last I saw Ramsay, he was using he/him pronouns. But for you, having just read Infinity Alchemist, she was using she/her pronouns.”
Whether by way of the use of shifting pronouns or depicting a trusting polyamorous relationship, Callender’s work makes extra seen the lived realities of numerous individuals, and Infinity Alchemist is flooded with empathy and compassion. “That’s one of the great beauties of being able to write about these identities,” Callender says, as they clarify how the imaginative act of studying permits anybody to “become” a personality. “Even though you as a reader might not ever understand all the ways an identity can work, you can for a moment become that queer Black trans kid, and you’re understanding all of their wounds and their traumas and their grief and their healing.”
Callender builds on this concept: “Regardless of identity, that’s where a character is built: inside the idea that we all have these wounds that we either inherited or experienced. From my perspective, life is the story arc of healing those wounds.”
“That’s where a character is built: inside the idea that we all have these wounds that we either inherited or experienced.”
That knowledge comes by way of in each web page of Infinity Alchemist. In the ebook, as Ash and Ramsay are coming to belief one another, Ramsay lists some of Ash’s extra irritating qualities, claiming him to be “selfish . . . and hot-tempered, and irrational, and you act without thinking.” Then Ramsay pivots to Ash’s kindness and curiosity, explaining, “It’s lazy to put a multifaceted human being, created from the alchemy of the universe, into a box of good or bad. No one is only one of the two.” When I ask Callender about the apt specificity of “lazy” right here, they giggle and agree that it’s the good phrase. “It’s easy to decide that someone is good or bad instead of wanting to do the work. It’s a lot of work to look at a person and consider their traumas and wounds and all that has built them to be the person who they are today.”
We closed our time by discussing the relationships depicted in Infinity Alchemist and the approach “polyamory reflects the concept of healing in the book, where everyone is worthy of love, and the idea that love cannot be limited.” Callender says, “I understand that some readers might ask why polyamory, or might not understand what it is as an identity. But it’s my hope that as there are more books with the topic of polyamory, it will be more accepted.”
Acceptance, self-worth, therapeutic, love. “What’s better than that?” I ask, to which Callender replies, “Exactly.”
Photo of Kacen Callender by Bella Porter.
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