Backstory

Backstory for The Acts of Judas

The nurse sprays my shoulder with anesthetic. The icy fluid quickly deadens the skin. Moments later she inserts a 22-gauge needle into the subcutaneous catheter that leads directly to a vein. A catheter is a relatively safe way to pump one of the strongest chemotherapy drugs available into my body. The prospects frighten me, but the alternative is even more frightening. I watch the needle going in, and I do what I must to survive.

Six surgeries, six months of chemotherapy and radiation treatments kept the cancer from spreading. While going through chemotherapy, it was sometimes difficult to think clearly. My thoughts would stick like a programming loop, and I would say the same things several times without realizing it. In other ways, however, my thoughts were more lucid than before. I learned empathy, especially for people who face hard choices, and I understood life’s challenges in ways I never had.

Both the good and bad experiences of 2001 influenced the novel I was writing. The book ultimately became The Acts of Judas. The idea for ACTS had occurred to me five years earlier. In 1996 I traded novels with a fellow writer, Phil Porter. Phil and I “met” in an on-line writing workshop. His fiction was filled with exciting action scenes, and mine was character-driven. I appreciated his honest critiques of my work and agreed to read a draft of a novel he was working on. Phil was writing a story about the conflicts between Jewish Pharisees and Sadducees at the time of Christ.

My exchanges with Phil sparked an interest I had in Judas Iscariot. I wrote a fictional gospel, as if it were penned by Judas. I also did some preliminary research, but nothing more came of the idea until 2001. That was the year I took out the old files and began to plot the rest of the story. If a Judas scroll turned up in modern times, what controversy would arise? Who would find it? What would the discoverers do — use it for political purposes, or burn it? If you think back to 2001, you may recall that President Bush was beginning his first term. The Palestinians thought Bush favored Israel, and they responded by raising the stakes with more violence. Tensions in the Middle East escalated.

In March I decided to go ahead with my novel. In April the doctors diagnosed my cancer. I coped by not talking about it. Avoidance was my defense mechanism. Instead of facing it openly I put personal pain and uncertainty into the characters. I could vividly imagine how they reacted to duress. By the end of the summer in 2001 I was struggling with the accumulative effects of chemotherapy and trying to write a cohesive ending to the book. Then September 11th made personal concerns fade into the background.

When I finally came back to the book, the terrorists’ actions made the ending clearer. I knew I had to incorporate those events into the story. Not long after that Treble Heart Books agreed to publish the novel. It took two years to see the book in print. Now whenever I look at the cover, I remember what I went through and, more importantly, what the world has gone through. My own future looks bright. I wish I could say the same for everyone who survived the upheaval of 2001.

Treble Heart Books released my novel, The Acts of Judas, in December of 2004. Publication took my journey down a very different road. Whatever else happens, I believe that releasing my emotions vicariously through my characters was a factor in my recovery.

To read the book's reviews, please visit: http://www.trebleheartbooks.com/WDBaldino.html