Matthew Chin

Re­porter

matthew.chin@guardian.co.tt

You can see on the news the num­ber of chal­lenges peo­ple are ex­pe­ri­enc­ing every day. Ob­serv­ing the in­jus­tices and in­equal­i­ties plagu­ing our world, lo­cal writer Joy Hink­son said she felt com­pelled to au­thor her spin on re­al­i­ty with The Kill.

The adult sci­ence fic­tion nov­el, re­leased last year, cen­tres on a ro­mance shared be­tween the pro­tag­o­nist Luther Keyes and Jade Fair­weath­er. Keyes is a black play­boy, who must be rit­u­alised in­to a weapon to de­fend Earth from a cos­mic force seek­ing to rid the uni­verse of con­scious­ness. How­ev­er, he must de­cide whether to give every­thing up to save the uni­verse or not. Ac­cord­ing to Hink­son, The Kill be­gan as a pre-COVID ro­mance and trans­formed in­to sci­ence fic­tion in 2023. She us­es the pseu­do­nym, J A Med­ford, for this adult work.

Hink­son, who lives in Chatham-Kent, On­tario, said when it comes to writ­ing, her in­spi­ra­tion comes from ob­serv­ing the many chal­lenges cur­rent­ly af­flict­ing our world.

“I find in­spi­ra­tion all around me, in racial is­sues, in cli­mate change, in gen­der and age is­sues, in the act that ed­u­ca­tion is un­equal, in the lack of hous­ing for some, on a plan­et where oth­ers have far too much space, in ad­dic­tions, in rich ver­sus poor, in whether AI will have rights or not, all of which are raised in The Kill,” Hink­son said.

The Kill is avail­able on Ama­zon, from pub­lish­ers Friesen­Press. Hink­son is urg­ing those who are in­ter­est­ed to Google her book.

Q&A with Joy

Who is J A Med­ford?

J A Med­ford is my maid­en name, used for this adult sci­ence fic­tion genre be­cause I used Joy A Hink­son to pub­lish chil­dren’s books.

What do you like to do when you’re not writ­ing?

I was born in Bar­ba­dos but spent much of my life liv­ing in Trinidad where hik­ing was my favourite pas­time.

 Do we need AI more now than ever?

I ques­tion whether mankind is ca­pa­ble of prop­er­ly man­ag­ing Earth’s peo­ple and its en­vi­ron­ment. Per­haps AI is need­ed to as­sist.

What about sci­ence fic­tion ex­cites you as a writer?

I’ve al­ways want­ed to write sci­ence fic­tion. This genre al­lows you to mix fact and fic­tion. We are now privy to spec­tac­u­lar im­ages of var­i­ous ob­jects in space be­cause of NASA’s tech­nol­o­gy, see­ing things that were al­ways there, but in­vis­i­ble to mankind. I have read The Rev­e­la­tion of St John the Di­vine over and over and pon­dered about the Beast. I’ve al­lowed my imag­i­na­tion full reign to mesh fact and fic­tion to write The Kill.

Have you ever ex­pe­ri­enced writer’s block? If so, what was your way of han­dling it and mov­ing for­ward?

Matthew, I hon­est­ly have nev­er ex­pe­ri­enced writer’s block, so I have no rit­u­al to as­sist in get­ting out of it. But I do have a rit­u­al to curb my over-ac­tive imag­i­na­tion. I sketch or I try acrylic paint­ing.

What ad­vice would you give lo­cal writ­ers, re­gard­less of age?

My ad­vice for lo­cal writ­ers, re­gard­less of age, is sim­ply to be­gin writ­ing with­out think­ing of an au­di­ence. Write for your­self. Once you be­gin you will find that some­thing else takes over. There are twists in The Kill which puz­zle me, which I nev­er saw com­ing. That’s the mys­tery of al­low­ing your in­ner self to flow. Don’t ques­tion. Just write.

Rapid fire seg­ment:

1.Favourite book?

Dune by Frank Her­bert

2. Favourite movie?

James Cameron’s The Abyss

3. Do mag­ic or go through due process?

I don’t be­lieve in any­thing like obeah or black mag­ic. If these arts worked, they’d be rulers of the uni­verse.

4. One sur­pris­ing fact about J A Med­ford, aka Joy Hink­son?

She’s al­ways want­ed to be a jour­nal­ist.