The Layers - How it came to be

Writing The Layers has been an adventure that started a few years back when my son Leonardo was 10 years old. In fact, if it wasn’t for him, The Layers wouldn’t exist all together.

Before my son could read, I loved reading to him stories from amazing and inspiring authors like Dr. Seuss, Graeme Base, Eric Carle, and Robert Munsch.

When Leonardo became old enough to read on his own, I started reading what he was reading. It was wonderful to share with my young boy the magic of a good story. Books kept us connected in a very special way.

Then one day, I don’t remember how, we came up with the idea of writing our own story. We shared a preference for sci-fi and dystopian novels and that’s why we started brainstorming ideas of what kind of world we wanted to create.

Leonardo had always been sensitive to social and environmental issues so I was not surprised when he proposed to write a story about global warming. I paired that idea with an article published in the National Geographic on Paris underground, and boom, the Layers came to life!

At first, we wrote together. He would write the 'rough' of a scene and I would then take it and stretch it. We did that for about a month until he lost interest. He found his passion in music and since then he hasn't looked back. 

When my son found his passion in music, and I was left writing on my own, I begun to understand that what I was embarking on was much more than a hobby. There were a few things happening inside and around me at that time that had led to a deep personal and professional transformation and writing the Layers played a major role in all of this:

I discovered that I had stories to tell and that I couldn’t wait to share them;

I visited the Arctic (Iqaluit, Nunavut) and what I experienced there had a transformative impact on me;

I let go of my insecurity linked to English being my second language (my first language is Italian) and I just wrote from the heart;

I looked at my personal life and professional experience as sources of inspiration and motivation;

I relentlessly looked for opportunities to self-improve both as a person and as a story teller;

I opened myself to whatever came my way, good or bad, knowing everything in life plays a role in our growth, if we only take the time to listen and observe the world around us.

I have learned so much while writing the Layers, and not just about sentence structure or how to build a chapter. 

The world and the people of the Layers are the fruit of my imagination. But so many details of the story, the technology and the architecture, the social structures, the personalities and general plot line have been inspired by science and my personal experience.

I hope you will enjoy reading my book as much as I have enjoyed writing it!