Somehow this evening I was thinking of Brazil–one of my first books–and the spin-offs I hope to write. Of course, I am not altogether sure why: the book has so few fans among my friends. Yet I am in love with the book and its characters, that I must–at some point–write more. The first book shall be God’s Laughter Reverberates on Sugar Loaf Mountain. It is the biography of Father Joao, the priest who marries Other and Noemia in Brazil. He is an orphanage keeper who runs a school for poor children in his adopted homeland… the book begins with the story of his free-thinking youth, the death of his younger brother, his conversion to Roman Catholicism, and then his vision of taking care of Brazilian orphans and finally his experiences with COVID-19. I will work out the book when I write it. The second book will be Wild Rose, about Other’s adopted orphan Isaias, his struggles as a Afro Brazilian orphan embracing his father’s Jewish Orthodoxy, and his budding as an Artist.
However, the thing I wanted to write the most about are two novellas I hope to house in a single book: one about Carlos (a lunatic that Rabbi Abrams looks on occasionally) and one about Talita (one of Noemia’s two best friends). I will skip Talita for now. Carlos will go to Portugal so he can be treated by a “Western” doctor who speaks his native tongue…
And now I think I will get to how come a minor character in Brazil, and a character I hope to explore in a novella someday is so important to me. Carlos is an especially difficult character for me to portray and understand… Carlos believes he can see demons… he believes if he curses people they will honestly suffer the effects… and these things frighten him… though he cannot put it that way—his illness is too advanced—he cannot escape his own mind… it is like a cage. Because he can’t get out. And I sympathize with him because I have Bipolar Schizoaffective Disorder myself and I once imagined demons and ghosts and other strange things… it was when I was diagnosed with Bipolar Schizoaffective Disorder… re-diagnosed because at one time I was diagnosed Major Depression. Isn’t it odd that the person in a book hardest to portray is the character most like you?