As preparation for my next writing project, I’m working on a short story involving the novel’s main character in his younger days. I’m having a blast with it, but it’s turning out to be one of the most challenging things I’ve ever written.
For starters, it’s not always easy to decide when events in Egyptian history occurred. My story is set against the backdrop of the tomb robberies in the Valley of the Kings. I’ve been using James Breasted’s Ancient Records of Egypt as a source, and he dates the particular trial I was using to year 19 of Ramesses IX. The trouble is, modern scholarship gives Ramesses IX a reign of only 18 years and the trial itself is now dated to the reign of Ramesses XI. I ended up having to use a totally different trial as the basis for my story. Thankfully, I hadn’t gotten so far that I had to do a major rewrite, but it was frustrating nonetheless.
The other problem I’ve encountered is that the Egyptian way of life was so radically different from ours. I have a scene where the main character goes into a tavern and orders lunch, but, once I’d written it, I realized that I had no idea how he’s going to pay for his meal. The Egyptian economy was based on bartering and I’m not quite sure how one would purchase a meal in a tavern under that system. It’s not like he’s going to be carrying a bunch of stuff to trade. That little problem forced me to hit the books to come up with a solution (the tavern lets him run a tab).
Compared to this, writing the Andrewverse is a cakewalk!
Codex Lochianus 