Planets

A little bit about the planets in the Brandon Sparks Universe – Joshua Fuld

Someone once said, “Everyone has to come from somewhere.” While creating the Brandon Sparks Universe my options for creating different worlds was limitless, but I imposed a loose set of guidelines on myself that would preserve my idea that the more real things felt, the easier it would be for the audience to accept the fantastical.

Everything started with Earth, and trying to keep Earth as familiar as possible. People still live in houses and apartments, we use telephones and refrigerators, cars aren’t flying up walls, etc. I took the realities of Earth and imposed them on the alien planets. In my opinion, it is much more believable if the hated Ptevos live on a planet very similar to our own than on a world that feels unfamiliar. This also has the desired effect of being quite shocking to the reader.

Simplifying some of the scientific issues we would have with traveling to other worlds was an important step. One of the major decisions I made early on was to establish that most worlds in the Brandon Sparks Universe were breathable, just like Earth. If Brandon had to put on a re-breather every time he went to a different planet, explaining that would get old very quickly. It would also limit his ability to interact with other species and as the story goes on, you will see that his face-to-face encounters with different creatures are some of the most compelling moments in the story.

While the individual aliens get most of the attention, each planet has a rich story of its own. Instead of using the planets as forgettable locations for the characters to interact in, each world plays a large role in the direction of the story. Harr is the most prominent example of this. While Praggun City’s sugar-coated exterior is a beacon of hope, its insides are rotten as it is a safe haven for the most despicable aliens in the universe.