Chapter Three

Chapter three was originally a flashback sequence nearer the middle of the book, but then I realised that it was interfering with the tempo of the story and firstly I wrote it as a complete chapter of flashback - still in the same place.
But this didn't work and eventually I had to decide to put the Boukae Chapter near the begining and I was then forced to eliminate all flashbacks and set out the chapters in chronological order, not an easy task if you also consider how many times I had been advised to remove dates from the novel.
So it became clear that the opening chapters of the novel were setting up the background of most of the important characters and I then needed a new chapter explaining Alicia's background (she is know by the pet name Leesh)
However all that was to come- Chapter three opens with Pride hiding out in a ruined villa in Boukae after the Skyhook disaster (you don't know this yet though) and still suffering from the injuries he sustained then. Boukae is on the edges of a whole section of Africa caught in a long term war between a number of factions and Pride's tiny community of children and servants are threatened by a crazed soldier. Pride is forced by circumstances to do something about it, he has to care and just as he makes this important change - Bron Lainey appears to take him back to civilisation.