Fellow Travellers
by Jesse Bethea
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Who is Jesse Bethea on any given day? What are some common characteristics between JB the writer and JB the private citizen? How does your writing reflect those traits?
In my daily life, I’m an assistant producer for The Ohio Channel in Columbus, Ohio. Most of my work revolves around filming and editing educational videos for people in the legal profession and making short documentaries about the history of the justice system. I tend to think working in video really helps me nail down the pacing of what I’m writing since effective video depends so much on proper pacing and timing. Naturally my experience with writing helps me a lot when outlining and scripting video projects and making sure each video tells a full and satisfying story. In addition to my video work, I’m also a freelance journalist, mostly writing long-form features on environmental or historical topics. A lot of the skills I’ve learned in how to research and structure a nonfiction story have helped me research and structure my fictional work, and vice versa. |
Photo: courtesy of the artist |
Tell us about your latest work titled Fellow Travellers. What did it take to finalize this project? What’s the next phase?
Fellow Travellers is a novel I started writing in about 2015 without any real intention of seeing it published. It’s a science fiction/fantasy adventure about a community of time travellers that live in our world without us noticing. It follows a young woman just starting out in her career as a professional time traveller and ends up in a century-spanning battle of wits with a criminal time traveller.
I finished the first draft of the book in about 2017 and never really stopped editing and revising it. Then in 2019 I saw a call for submissions for the annual Great Novel Contest by the Ohio Writers’ Association. I submitted the manuscript, not really expecting it to go anywhere. To my surprise it was selected as the contest winner to be published through OWA’s imprint Bellwether Publishing. Of course, the book went through a much more rigorous developmental editing phase, a copy editing phase, and a proofreading phase. It was really great to have so many new eyes looking at the book and trying to make it better. It was also good for me to get to work on it again after a few years as by that time I was a much better writer than I was when I started the book in 2015. I ended up entirely rewriting a couple of chapters just to get it all to flow better.
As for the next phase, it’s now a matter of marketing the book and getting people interested and getting it in bookstores. Bellwether is a small press publication so it doesn’t have as much marketing capability as one of the major publishers. I’m having to learn more about selling myself and my work, which is not something that comes naturally to me. I’m also working on the first draft of a sequel. But my experience with the first book suggests that it will be quite a while before it’s ready.
Have you heard the opera Fellow Travelers by Gregory Spears? Do you listen to music while you write?
I have not heard of that opera, but just from looking it up it seems to be about the McCarthy Era and the “red” and “lavender” scares in the United States, which makes sense. In politics, “fellow traveler” typically refers to a person during the Cold War who was not quite a member of the Communist Party, but shared many of the same beliefs. Many of the other books called “Fellow Travellers” seem to revolve around this theme. To be honest, Fellow Travellers was always sort of a placeholder title for my book, and I was never quite happy with it, but I also never came up with a better title to replace it, so the name stuck.
I do listen to music while I write, but I’ve learned that I can’t listen to music that has any lyrics or singing. That will distract me too much. So I try to stick with instrumental music only. While writing Fellow Travellers, I would typically listen to the album “Ball of Fire” by The Skatalites all the way through. It’s almost completely instrumental, very repetitive and rhythmic ska music, and it really helped me get into a rhythm of focus.
Fellow Travellers is a novel I started writing in about 2015 without any real intention of seeing it published. It’s a science fiction/fantasy adventure about a community of time travellers that live in our world without us noticing. It follows a young woman just starting out in her career as a professional time traveller and ends up in a century-spanning battle of wits with a criminal time traveller.
I finished the first draft of the book in about 2017 and never really stopped editing and revising it. Then in 2019 I saw a call for submissions for the annual Great Novel Contest by the Ohio Writers’ Association. I submitted the manuscript, not really expecting it to go anywhere. To my surprise it was selected as the contest winner to be published through OWA’s imprint Bellwether Publishing. Of course, the book went through a much more rigorous developmental editing phase, a copy editing phase, and a proofreading phase. It was really great to have so many new eyes looking at the book and trying to make it better. It was also good for me to get to work on it again after a few years as by that time I was a much better writer than I was when I started the book in 2015. I ended up entirely rewriting a couple of chapters just to get it all to flow better.
As for the next phase, it’s now a matter of marketing the book and getting people interested and getting it in bookstores. Bellwether is a small press publication so it doesn’t have as much marketing capability as one of the major publishers. I’m having to learn more about selling myself and my work, which is not something that comes naturally to me. I’m also working on the first draft of a sequel. But my experience with the first book suggests that it will be quite a while before it’s ready.
Have you heard the opera Fellow Travelers by Gregory Spears? Do you listen to music while you write?
I have not heard of that opera, but just from looking it up it seems to be about the McCarthy Era and the “red” and “lavender” scares in the United States, which makes sense. In politics, “fellow traveler” typically refers to a person during the Cold War who was not quite a member of the Communist Party, but shared many of the same beliefs. Many of the other books called “Fellow Travellers” seem to revolve around this theme. To be honest, Fellow Travellers was always sort of a placeholder title for my book, and I was never quite happy with it, but I also never came up with a better title to replace it, so the name stuck.
I do listen to music while I write, but I’ve learned that I can’t listen to music that has any lyrics or singing. That will distract me too much. So I try to stick with instrumental music only. While writing Fellow Travellers, I would typically listen to the album “Ball of Fire” by The Skatalites all the way through. It’s almost completely instrumental, very repetitive and rhythmic ska music, and it really helped me get into a rhythm of focus.
* * *
Excerpt from Fellow Travellers
“May I see your bracelet?”
Bindra glanced at the bracelet on her right wrist.
“It's metal, right?” asked the old man.
Bindra nodded. "Silver. My grandmother gave it to me.”
“It’s important to you?”
“Yes, very.”
“If I promise to give it back,” said the old man, “may I borrow it?”
He held out his hand. After a moment’s hesitation, Bindra took the bracelet from her wrist and gave it to the old man, who put it into his jacket pocket.
“Walk with me,” he said to Bindra.
The old man and Bindra walked down the road for several minutes in silence. Bindra watched the old man as he admired the mountains and the landscape around them. Finally, he pointed to a tall, leafless tree and said, “There. That one should work just fine.”
The old man and Bindra approached the tree.
“Do you think you can climb it?” said the old man. “All the way up to the hollow at the top of the tree?”
“Of course I can.”
He gestured for her to try. She approached the tree and surveyed it for a moment. She removed her father’s jacket for better mobility and started to climb. It didn’t take her long to reach the hollow.
“I found it,” she called down to the old man.
“What’s inside?” he said, still admiring the mountains.
Bindra looked back into the darkness of the tree hollow and reached inside. Her hand soon found something that clearly didn’t belong in the hollow of a tree. It was a small, plastic bag and when she pulled it out, she could see that sitting inside was her bracelet. She looked down to the old man.
“How did you do that?” she asked.
“Do what?”
“How did you get my bracelet all the way up here?”
“I didn’t,” said the old man, and he held up the bracelet for her to see.
“How is that possible?” she said, and she pulled the bracelet out for him to see in case he didn’t understand.
The old man smiled. “It was always in the tree. Because I put it there. I will put it there. I am putting it there, right now. I’ll put it in the hollow of the tree when the tree is barely taller than you are. For as long as you’ve been alive, your bracelet was in that tree.”
The old man walked to the base of the tree trunk.
“What’s your name?” he said.
“Bindra Dhar.”
The old man seemed almost startled. He cocked his head to the side and smiled before making a gesture that Bindra thought looked like a bow.
“Well, it’s an honor to meet you, Bindra Dhar,” he said. “My name is Walter Franklin Brooks, and I am a time traveller. If you really want it, and if you will work hard and study hard, you can be a time traveller too.”
Bindra glanced at the bracelet on her right wrist.
“It's metal, right?” asked the old man.
Bindra nodded. "Silver. My grandmother gave it to me.”
“It’s important to you?”
“Yes, very.”
“If I promise to give it back,” said the old man, “may I borrow it?”
He held out his hand. After a moment’s hesitation, Bindra took the bracelet from her wrist and gave it to the old man, who put it into his jacket pocket.
“Walk with me,” he said to Bindra.
The old man and Bindra walked down the road for several minutes in silence. Bindra watched the old man as he admired the mountains and the landscape around them. Finally, he pointed to a tall, leafless tree and said, “There. That one should work just fine.”
The old man and Bindra approached the tree.
“Do you think you can climb it?” said the old man. “All the way up to the hollow at the top of the tree?”
“Of course I can.”
He gestured for her to try. She approached the tree and surveyed it for a moment. She removed her father’s jacket for better mobility and started to climb. It didn’t take her long to reach the hollow.
“I found it,” she called down to the old man.
“What’s inside?” he said, still admiring the mountains.
Bindra looked back into the darkness of the tree hollow and reached inside. Her hand soon found something that clearly didn’t belong in the hollow of a tree. It was a small, plastic bag and when she pulled it out, she could see that sitting inside was her bracelet. She looked down to the old man.
“How did you do that?” she asked.
“Do what?”
“How did you get my bracelet all the way up here?”
“I didn’t,” said the old man, and he held up the bracelet for her to see.
“How is that possible?” she said, and she pulled the bracelet out for him to see in case he didn’t understand.
The old man smiled. “It was always in the tree. Because I put it there. I will put it there. I am putting it there, right now. I’ll put it in the hollow of the tree when the tree is barely taller than you are. For as long as you’ve been alive, your bracelet was in that tree.”
The old man walked to the base of the tree trunk.
“What’s your name?” he said.
“Bindra Dhar.”
The old man seemed almost startled. He cocked his head to the side and smiled before making a gesture that Bindra thought looked like a bow.
“Well, it’s an honor to meet you, Bindra Dhar,” he said. “My name is Walter Franklin Brooks, and I am a time traveller. If you really want it, and if you will work hard and study hard, you can be a time traveller too.”
* * *
What have been your inseparable companions during this exhausting pandemic?
My wife Melissa has been a great companion to have while working from home. Recently we were able to get our first doses of the vaccine together. It’s also been nice to have people who are always available to talk on the phone or text or Zoom with. I think my extended family has been able to get together for more board game nights over Zoom than we ever did before the pandemic.
Being a writer means what exactly?
From my own perspective, I like to think of writing as a job. I like to think of it as work. I think a lot of writers might disagree with that, or might not want to think of it that way, but my reasoning is that making art is almost always work. I try to embrace that mentality whenever I start writing something. I know that eventually a story has to have a structure. A structure is something that has to be built and building something is always work. I always try to outline everything I write. I try to be aware of what tools I’ll need, what materials I’ll need, and especially the problem areas where the structure might collapse. But I always try to be honest with myself that it will be work. There are rarely any of those very romantic moments of inspiration or strokes of genius. If those moments ever do come, when pieces of the structure suddenly become clear, or when I suddenly see a solution to one of the problem areas, I know I need to write the idea down immediately, no matter the time of day or night, or I’ll never remember.
When I’m writing nonfiction, the elements with which I’m building a story structure are generally either information I’ve found during research or information I’ve gathered from interviews with sources. Typically when writing nonfiction I’ll try to color-code everything (sometimes I skip this step, but I’m trying to be more diligent about it). If I interview four different people for a story, for example, I’ll assign a color to each of their interviews after I’ve transcribed them, so I can more easily keep track of who said what and where their bricks of information will fit in the structure I’m building.
Who are some contemporary writers whose books you have enjoyed reading lately?
I have trouble sticking with a particular author over more than one book. I tend to read books as individual works and it’s rare that I decide I need to read everything written by a particular author.
The two current exceptions are not exactly “contemporary,” but I’ve started habitually reading the spy novels of John le Carré, who passed away last year. I enjoy how he always seemed to know exactly how much or how little he needed to tell a reader about what’s happening in his plots, so that his novels always have a sort of dreadful buildup of inevitability.
I’ve also been reading a lot of Joan Didion’s work, both her classic collection of essays The White Album and her newest collection Let Me Tell You What I Mean. I really appreciate her underlying suspicion of how narrative tends to creep into real life. I also love her fiction novel The Last Thing He Wanted, which is also very much about how individuals, governments and societies try to orchestrate narratives for themselves that don’t always fit.
Is there a literary hero whose life and work has inspired you? How so?
It can be kind of tricky having literary heroes because they usually end up disappointing us in one way or another. I’m tempted to pick William Shakespeare just because we know so little about his life outside of writing. I usually return to reading his plays when I need something comforting yet also challenging. I also appreciate that he approached his work as work. He had to write for the stage, which meant that he had a lot more limitations and a lot more problems to solve. People like to ascribe brilliance to Shakespeare—and he was brilliant—but writing was also clearly a job for him.
We have an ongoing campaign titled #BeatTheBlues on ways to prioritize mental health. What does Jesse Bethea do to #BeatTheBlues?
I try to be open and honest about my own mental health concerns. I try to be diligent about always taking my anxiety and depression medication as prescribed. I try to always remember that my brain is a part of my body and like any part of the body it needs to be nurtured and exercised and taken care of when it’s in pain.
What cultural events are you looking forward to experiencing in your own community as soon as things return to normal?
Well, the Minor League Baseball season was canceled last year, and as it happens, soon after I get my second vaccine dose, the Columbus Clippers will play a home opener series against the Omaha Storm Chasers. I am going to ride the bus down to Huntington Park, I am going to get a hotdog and popcorn, maybe a Coke, I am going to sit somewhere above first base and I am going to watch a baseball game for the first time in a year and a half. And then I’ll go from there.
Share with us your favorite word today.
Latticework
Thank you and good luck!
You can buy the book here
My wife Melissa has been a great companion to have while working from home. Recently we were able to get our first doses of the vaccine together. It’s also been nice to have people who are always available to talk on the phone or text or Zoom with. I think my extended family has been able to get together for more board game nights over Zoom than we ever did before the pandemic.
Being a writer means what exactly?
From my own perspective, I like to think of writing as a job. I like to think of it as work. I think a lot of writers might disagree with that, or might not want to think of it that way, but my reasoning is that making art is almost always work. I try to embrace that mentality whenever I start writing something. I know that eventually a story has to have a structure. A structure is something that has to be built and building something is always work. I always try to outline everything I write. I try to be aware of what tools I’ll need, what materials I’ll need, and especially the problem areas where the structure might collapse. But I always try to be honest with myself that it will be work. There are rarely any of those very romantic moments of inspiration or strokes of genius. If those moments ever do come, when pieces of the structure suddenly become clear, or when I suddenly see a solution to one of the problem areas, I know I need to write the idea down immediately, no matter the time of day or night, or I’ll never remember.
When I’m writing nonfiction, the elements with which I’m building a story structure are generally either information I’ve found during research or information I’ve gathered from interviews with sources. Typically when writing nonfiction I’ll try to color-code everything (sometimes I skip this step, but I’m trying to be more diligent about it). If I interview four different people for a story, for example, I’ll assign a color to each of their interviews after I’ve transcribed them, so I can more easily keep track of who said what and where their bricks of information will fit in the structure I’m building.
Who are some contemporary writers whose books you have enjoyed reading lately?
I have trouble sticking with a particular author over more than one book. I tend to read books as individual works and it’s rare that I decide I need to read everything written by a particular author.
The two current exceptions are not exactly “contemporary,” but I’ve started habitually reading the spy novels of John le Carré, who passed away last year. I enjoy how he always seemed to know exactly how much or how little he needed to tell a reader about what’s happening in his plots, so that his novels always have a sort of dreadful buildup of inevitability.
I’ve also been reading a lot of Joan Didion’s work, both her classic collection of essays The White Album and her newest collection Let Me Tell You What I Mean. I really appreciate her underlying suspicion of how narrative tends to creep into real life. I also love her fiction novel The Last Thing He Wanted, which is also very much about how individuals, governments and societies try to orchestrate narratives for themselves that don’t always fit.
Is there a literary hero whose life and work has inspired you? How so?
It can be kind of tricky having literary heroes because they usually end up disappointing us in one way or another. I’m tempted to pick William Shakespeare just because we know so little about his life outside of writing. I usually return to reading his plays when I need something comforting yet also challenging. I also appreciate that he approached his work as work. He had to write for the stage, which meant that he had a lot more limitations and a lot more problems to solve. People like to ascribe brilliance to Shakespeare—and he was brilliant—but writing was also clearly a job for him.
We have an ongoing campaign titled #BeatTheBlues on ways to prioritize mental health. What does Jesse Bethea do to #BeatTheBlues?
I try to be open and honest about my own mental health concerns. I try to be diligent about always taking my anxiety and depression medication as prescribed. I try to always remember that my brain is a part of my body and like any part of the body it needs to be nurtured and exercised and taken care of when it’s in pain.
What cultural events are you looking forward to experiencing in your own community as soon as things return to normal?
Well, the Minor League Baseball season was canceled last year, and as it happens, soon after I get my second vaccine dose, the Columbus Clippers will play a home opener series against the Omaha Storm Chasers. I am going to ride the bus down to Huntington Park, I am going to get a hotdog and popcorn, maybe a Coke, I am going to sit somewhere above first base and I am going to watch a baseball game for the first time in a year and a half. And then I’ll go from there.
Share with us your favorite word today.
Latticework
Thank you and good luck!
You can buy the book here