Wraithsandworlds

. The first episode was released online March 27, 2006.

Description

Taking place in present day, the novel spans two plotlines that are happening at the same time. The first plotline involves the main character, African-American law student Grace Tiffen, who has died in a car crash and finds herself alone in the afterlife. The second plotline involves Grace's still-living, psychic aunt Abigail, who is in her eighties, blind and confined to a wheelchair.The novel hinges on the connection between the two women by means of Abigail's psychic abilities. The storyline is propelled along by the circumstantial jeopardy of both of these characters in their respective environments. Grace is motivated by her desire to find her deceased father. Abigail is motivated by her desire to escape from villain, Jonathan Sand.Wilson takes a chance by setting part the story in the present day Middle East. But the reader is only taken as far as is needed to address story elements and is wisely kept away from exploring the myriad of current tensions. Science also plays a major role as the story suggests that real-life particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider was intregal in creating some of the character's peril.

History

The seed for Wraithsandworlds was sewn in Wilson's first full-length novel written in 2003 called [http://www.wraithsandworlds.com/pine.html The Curse of Pine Shallow (TCOPS).] It established a mythology that suggested the afterlife was a cold and desolate landscape. Wilson introduced the character of Akshelar Saturaal who was joined with a demon named Pellemn, a Veonissic (the demonic entities that run around the afterlife in Wraiths).

Wraithsandworlds had a very rocky beginning full of starts and stops. It began as an idea Wilson had in 2005 stemming from a 'What if' scenario. He started writing the first episode in late October 2005 and posted it on e-library.net on March 27, 2006 for free. Through his blog, he began receiving email from fans asking questions about the series. He sent out blanket emails to promote the book and began listing his site in online e-book directories around the web. Eventually, the bulk of his readers were finding his site through search engines, peer-to-peer sharing, and online networks.

He briefly experimented with a way to generate ad revenue on his site by designing an advertising strategy. Episodes would be 'locked' by a cryptogram puzzle. To unlock them, one had to solve the puzzle and post the solution on his blog, When Wilson saw the correct answer he would 'unlock' the episode for download. Simultaneously, advertisers could post small $200 ads on a pixel grid. Clues to solve the puzzle were placed in advertiser's alt tags. Readers would have to mouse over all the ads to find the secret advertisers with the clues. Wilson attracted several advertisers with the concept but he felt not enough money was generated to justify the effort to maintain the puzzle pages. And with only a few advertisers, the challenge for the fans was minimal. Wilson pulled the concept in January 2008, redesigned the site and began releasing episodes in quick succession. His readership exploded. People were downloading episodes 28 times a day on average and he began to track hundreds of repeat downloads from the same cities and countries. By June 2008, Wilson was beginning to see the first signs of wraithsandworlds included in independent articles about pop culture [ [http://www.geskka.com/articles/articles/210/1/Will-the-Large-Hadron-Collider-create-a-black-hole-on-earth-Scientists-think-so/Page1.html Geskka - Science News and Articles] - June 2, 2008 "Wraithsandworlds recognized as influencing an aspect of pop culture along with mainstream Internet entities."] .

Readership

Readership for wraithsandworlds is evenly distributed among dozens of countries around the world. This becomes more interesting as the novel is only available in English. Some of the countries that have exhibited high repeat downloads of the novel are:
*Africa
*Australia
*Belgium
*Canada
*India
*Italy
*Lebanon
*Russia
*United Kingdom
*United States

Religious impact

Some readers hold the belief that the series is consistent with the minority view of the atheist or humanist movement which describes a commitment to the search for truth and morality through human as opposed to supernatural or divine means. However, the story's themes also suggest it is pro-religion by treating the belief in God as sacred.The story juxtaposes mainstream with minority belief systems and combines them to create a common, unique mythology. His idea that the afterlife is a naturally 'frozen wasteland' and doesn't subscribe to either heaven, hell or purgatory is contrary to most religions and belief systems. The story also explores the notion that everyone goes to the same place when they die regardless of how they lived their lives. Within the context is also the idea that there is a God but no real Devil, suggesting that all evil comes from man and is not the work of any demonic influence. Further, Wilson examines the possibility that God, much like some beliefs about Jesus Christ, may have been a charismatic but ordinary and fallible man.

Episode ten expands the mythology and sets up the story for the next volume of ten episodes. The narrative introduces a group of female Catholic priests who use the structure of the Church, including The Pope, to conceal the fact that it is these women who are the ones influencing the direction of mankind. This concept is expanded to include a similar group of female priests in the Middle East. Both of these covert Catholic and Islamic priests apparently work together seamlessly, and have done so for centuries.

Notes and references

ee also

*The Da Vinci Code
*EBooks
*Cyberpunk
*Roman Catholic Church
*Atheism

External links

* [http://www.wraithsandworlds.com Wraithsandworlds official website.]
* [http://www.geskka.com/articles/articles/210/1/Will-the-Large-Hadron-Collider-create-a-black-hole-on-earth-Scientists-think-so/Page1.html Geskka - Scientific News - June 2, 2008 - Article authored by Fred Forizano discussing how popular culture has embraced CERN's Large Hadron Collider.]
* [http://www.articlesbase.com/religion-articles/is-there-a-worldwide-backlash-against-religion-dont-bet-on-it-443415.html Articlesbase.com - June 9, 2008 - A freelance article by Neil Turgene discussing how a documented rise in atheist beliefs has affected certain genre fiction on the web.]