“What if an FBI agent, sitting alone in his or her car at night on surveillance, saw something–unexplainable?” That was the idea that started VOLK. This all started one night when my squad was conducting a survey of activity in preparation for a covert install. We were all positioned around a particular area keeping tabs on the level of activity during the wee morning hours. Who is coming home from work? Who is getting up for work? When do the buses come through? Who gets on and off? We did this for several nights in a row. As you can imagine, there is a lot of down time alone in the dark.
At one point, my partner Jim, who is very tall, got out of his car to check on something. As he walked onto the dark street, a corner light created a long menacing shadow. At that moment, one of the other squad members, Scotty, a Pennsylvania State Trooper, made a radio call imitating a sasquatch howl. Perhaps it was being sleep deprived. Perhaps it was the mood I was in. Either way, it was one of the funniest things I have ever seen. Years later, that event took root and grew.
The other aspect regarding the genesis of VOLK is that I am a father. A father of two wonderful girls (women now). I wanted to create a story with powerful and smart female characters. This came about watching animated movies when they were very little. It occurred to me that too often in the classics, the females were waiting to be: saved / rescued / fall in love. I found myself constantly telling them, “You know, (insert princess’s name) doesn’t need a prince to save her here.” Although VOLK isn’t for young children, that idea of damsels in distress bothered the crap out of me for years, and I wanted to create a story that countered that narrative.
Anyway, those are the kernels that grew into the story.
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