Character study: Joseph Pepper IV

"He calls his cane the Wand of Blue Light." - Ethan Cassidy

Joseph Pepper IV is a character featured in The Fable Avenue Saga™, specifically the books The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn and the yet-to-be-title-revealed follow-up novel. He appears in The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn’s fifth chapter titled Water Bug Hollow, Louisiana 1917. Joseph’s visit to Water Bug Hollow is on August 12, the night designated for the annual celebration marking the area’s independence from slave owner Elias Jakobi. Joseph is there specifically to see his sweetheart, jazz songstress Theresa Amat. He has a gift for her, an ancient veil he claims is magically enchanted and to have been worn by a long line of African Queens, including the legendary Queen Califia, supposedly for whom after the state of California is named. Joseph also brags that he was given the veil after pursuing a bracket of finely cut precious stones named the Pillar Jewels, also referred to as The Sunrise Gems. More alluring, Joseph tells Theresa that he employed the services of the legendary African-American outlaw Thunder John and his crew The Brother Dogs to aid him on the failed excursion. Ever skeptical, but twice as intrigued by Joseph’s astounding tales, Theresa accepts the mysterious garment. Joseph Pepper also proposes marriage, which an excited Theresa also accepts. Joseph leaves Water Bug Hollow weeks later, heading to London. For the remainder of The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn, Joseph Pepper IV is not seen but spoken about by various characters, with hints on his adventurous exploits in London. Theresa Amat anxiously awaits his return, dedicating several songs to him in her performances, and overjoyed when she finds out she’s pregnant with his child. In London, Joseph is pursued by a former American soldier named Ethan Cassidy, an associate of the villainous Sarinda Fallows.

Concept: Joseph Pepper IV is a dashing, erudite adventurer. He is an amalgam of famed spiritualist Paschal Beverly Randolph, literary and cinematic characters Sherlock Holmes and Indiana Jones, and real-life professor, author and all-around expert scholar on the Moors, Professor Jose V. Pimienta-Bey. Inspired by four people, Joseph Pepper (the English translation of Professor Jose Pimienta’s name) was labeled as “the fourth.” Joseph Pepper’s character was greatly inspired by the tales of black spiritualist Paschal Beverly Randolph and his travels around the world deciphering ancient languages, unlocking occult teachings. His physical description comes from P.B. Randolph, with a few modifications. His intellect and dress mirror that of Sherlock Holmes, his jaunts to procure ancient items for the greater good borrows from cinematic hero Indiana Jones, and his knowledge of various African cultures (and his name) is credited to Professor Jose V. Pimienta-Bey.

Joseph Pepper was added to The Fable Avenue Saga™ as a means to incorporate an adventurer who could point the story in the proper direction for ancient, mystical items. In earlier drafts from around 2002, 2004, he served as the main character’s great-grandfather. This was when Fable Avenue was called The Nu Ancients, and was meant to be a graphic novel or comic book series. Later on, and through study, he developed into the character he’s presented as. This was around 2010, near the end of editing and toward the release of A Company of Moors. Joseph Pepper’s erudite mannerisms come from British actor Jeremy Brett’s classic portrayal of Sherlock Holmes.

Joseph Pepper often wears the most fanciful clothes of his time, and presents himself as an aristocrat. Joseph likes being a ‘fancy nigger’ as he believes many whites probably refer to him, and he indulges in scholarly conversations that trip up many a prejudice person. He cares deeply for the well-being of black people scattered throughout the diaspora, and believes with all his heart that it is his duty to present correctly all of the pieces of African and black history, solo or in a team. Joseph always carries with him a peculiar cane said to be blessed with an alchemical anointment. It’s also encrusted with seven sapphires. Joseph Pepper refers to his cane as “Wanda,” which many believe to be either his grandmother or mother’s name. However, “Wanda” is a feminine play on the word “wand.” Joseph Pepper truly refers to his cane as the Wand of Blue Light, a self-made, mystical weapon that carries within it, according to Joseph Pepper, the power of Shango and Indra.

Both Joseph Pepper’s adventures in London and his adventures with the outlaw Thunder John and the Brother Dogs will appear in the next installment of The Fable Avenue Saga™.

The first Act, a wrap!

The first act of this new installment to The Fable Avenue Saga™ is complete. It clocks in at nine chapters and about 130 pages. Not too bad. A little over budget, but what had to be written was essential. I do wish it could’ve hit at around 100-110 pgs. But that was ideal. Realistically, I knew it would come in at around 120-125. So, 130 isn’t too bad (if I ignore my ideal). There were a lot of changes made. I stuck to the outline, but many happenings and goings-on and tiny details had their presentation reworked. One of the last scenes in the act was supposed to be a big blowup between characters, but I started seeing the confrontation as being too much. So I pulled back and toned it down. It comes off a lot better for both characters.

I’ve also introduced the first scene of my fourth and final epic poem which will be intertwined with the plot. The scene attacks the novel’s main character like a train crash and leaves him tight with emotions. I’ve plotted the course for the remainder of the fourth epic poem, now I have to hit the proper beats within the story’s narrative to put them on display.

I won’t be going directly into the second act. I’m now composing two short stories, in a sense, that will arc the narrative back to London, 1917 and Tanzania, 1883. Two major events, hinted at in The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn will be the center of attention for the next (hopefully) 50 pages. One of those events deals with the question: What happened to Joseph Pepper IV while over in London? And what mythological bauble was he seeking? We will also get to know a young Madison Goodspeed who was constantly talked up in The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn, and finally presented here.

The second act will have a focus on the story’s female protagonist. She was introduced as a six-year-old girl in the first chapter, but now she’s nineteen and a college student. Much of the fourth epic poem will inhabit the second act, a device used to bring the female protagonist and the male protagonist together. We will see her confront the trauma she witnessed as a young girl, and blossom into a young, bright leader on Fable Avenue. A few villains will step into the story’s narrative within the second act. Unlike Sarinda Fallows, these villains are not cunning, destroying lives indirectly through clandestine means. The first villain to appear, on orders of the two Big Bads is a brutal man. And his followers are worse than him.

There will be no rest for this writer. I’ve already plotted and outlined Joseph Pepper’s London adventure, and the story dealing with the ‘Tanzanian incident’. On the move. Getting things done.

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An Expansive Universe...

“…You've become part of a bigger universe. You just don't know it yet.” – Nick Fury

Some of the stories in my book 12 Stories High are part of The Fable Avenue Saga™. There has already been a reference to the story Ah Moor: The Woman That Wore a Veil But Had Nothing to Hide. The character Sarinda Fallows, in The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn, makes a references to Nazirah and her medicinal discoveries. Sarinda reveals that she has a copy of Nazirah’s medical notebook. Nazirah is the main female protagonist of the story Ah, Moor. A closer look at the first past life of Pete Peters and Virginia Tara-Peters will reveal that the story Ah, Moor also serves as their past lives in Moorish Spain. Pete Peters was Aswad, and Virginia Tara-Peters was Nazirah. In this next book for Fable Avenue, two more stories from 12 Stories High will be shown as having a place in Fable Avenue's mythology.

This wasn’t entirely intentional when I first composed the stories, although Ah Moor was partially intentional. It was late 2004, early 2005 when I was writing Ah Moor. It was a story inspired by a friend that was feeling down. At the same time I was composing the opening for The Son Dial Tone. I really enjoyed the epic poem’s opening scene, writing it, having the voice of Mojuba Kimoyo (at the time was only written as Kimoyo) speaking about being entertained by ‘hieroglyphs’ etched inside his mother’s womb to feed him information. Through the hieroglyphs of DNA he saw his parents meet one another in an earlier lifetime. All this as he gestated in the womb in his contemporary time. He’d know the love of his parents beyond this lifetime, and understood it crossed the boundaries of time and covered multiple existences. But the meeting in a thirteenth century, Moorish town square in Spain was a sight. Ah Moor’s opening came next. The notes to open The Son Dial Tone were finalized and scripted. “If Adam existed literally – in the flesh physically – instead of meta-euphoric, allegoric, scientifically…” I wanted a reference to the Moors in Spain with Father Voice and Mother Harmony existing in that time period. I made Father Voice a poet serenading a crowd but only having eyes for one among the gathered people. Again, a lot of ideas for Fable Avenue were written simultaneously but unconnected between 2002 and 2005, and that’s not including ideas I’m going way, way, way, way, way back for.

Somewhere around the time I was writing A Company of Moors I started wondering if the stories in 12 Stories High could exist together. I started splitting them up and saying, “These stories seem like they would take place in the same universe.” So I started categorizing stories. When I got closer to working on The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn, and it was time to dive into The Son Dial Tone, I was forced to look at Ah, Moor again because in 2006 I’d lost the notebook containing the first two completed scenes from The Son Dial Tone. Luckily I had notes in another notebook for a lot of the lines, and some very complicated poetry was preserved. But the details of the meeting in the Moorish square were lost. I blatantly copied the short story's text. Reading the opening to Ah, Moor and reading that section of The Son Dial Tone will expose the fact that a lot of text was lifted from the short story but scripted more poetic. It wasn’t really official until Sarinda made reference to the Moorish woman’s medical notebook in the late chapter, and reciting the ‘legend’ of the notebook and its medical and alchemical equations.

By the time the ‘legend’ of Ah, Moor was written into The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn, I already planned for other stories in 12 Stories High to come into the Fable Avenue fold. I won’t say which stories until they are properly referenced and the work is complete and on the shelves. I did think long and hard over which stories to make a part of Fable Avenue, the ones that made the most sense. And not every story that has a mystical element is included. And some that have none actually have been. In total, it’s only 5 of the 12 stories. Of course, that’s close to half. And one of them I keep going back and forth on whether or not to include. In this ever-expanding universe it’s fun to know that there are other stories in existence, and here they are referenced.

I do have this to say, concerning the story of The Curse of Cain’an. Although it features the ‘skeptic stone,’ the very stone Sarinda Fallows and her ‘culture’ worship and use for its diabolical properties, The Curse of Cain’an has no connection to this series. It’s just the story where I first used the item.

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As I lay me down to sleep

On the grind...

Finished writing for the day. Just crept into Chapter 6, creeping in over 69 pages, 8.5 x 11 paper size. Page 70 paginated as a 5.5 x 8.5 book.

It's really amazing to bring a character you've been waiting over 10 years to write into a situation you've been waiting just as long to write them in. And the adventure is only beginning.

One of many things I enjoy about this new project, this new chapter in The Fable Avenue Saga™, is that it's filled with so many of these moments. Notes that are over ten years old are finally being expanded into the narrative they were meant to be.

Chapter 5 was running a little long, so it's been split into 2 (much like chapter 2). Chapter 6 will be short, but it has enough of it's own arc to warrant a separate chapter.

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More information about the current project on the way.

12 STORIES HAS A NEW COVER!!!!

12 Stories High has a new cover! Same stories! Some stories have a tie-in with The Fable Avenue Saga™ (more on that later).

12 STORIES HIGH: THE IMAGINATIVE TRIP THRU A BLACK MIND!!!!

Magic ReKINDLED!!!!!!!

I'm happy to announce that both Code-47: Memoirs of a Hip Hop Heist and The Ghost of Gabriel's Horn: Prologue to the Fable Avenue Saga are now AVAILABLE ON AMAZON KINDLE!!!!!!

THE GHOST OF GABRIEL'S HORN: PROLOGUE TO THE FABLE AVENUE SAGA

CODE-47: MEMOIRS OF A HIP HOP HEIST

Freedom and Culture

The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn was a prologue to a grand, magical folktale, an African-American mythology that will continue for three more books. The book was actually copyrighted under the title The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn: A Prologue to The Fable Avenue Saga.

I’m presenting a respectful amalgam of African and African-American folklore wrapped in a unique culture. I take some liberties so as not to be bogged down by definition, but great respect is paid to the concepts I’ve used as inspiration. This culture isn’t hidden, either. It’s right out in the open. There, on a fictional street in Brooklyn, New York. Fable Avenue. The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn was written for the readers of the Fable Avenue Saga™ to gain an understanding of what went into securing this wonderful, black culture.

We will learn how the culture on this street operates. We will learn their system of rites and rituals. Who are their matriarchs and patriarchs—elders? What is their belief system? What opposes them? From The Ronin Poetz to A Company of Moors, I like presenting culture, expressed in one way or another. In The Ghostof Gabriel’s Horn, I set one up. It looks disjointed at first, until the audience discovers how everything is tied together. And there was a lot within The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn that served as clues for what’s to come.

So now, we have this mystical black culture. Within the pages of the prologue for the Fable Avenue Saga™ I’ve presented the physical origins of this black culture as a street in Brooklyn, and from there, the Diaspora of black folklore around the world. To make this culture authentic, I’m looking at the stages and rites within different African mystery systems found anciently throughout black kingdoms in and outside of Africa, and I’m putting together a culture that represents these aspects symbolically. This is all to get the feel of the culture. It’s not the focal point of the series. The culture validates the people and characters we get to know, and whose journey we follow, throughout the remaining chapters of this saga, and, as well, the people validate the culture, their culture.

When creating this culture, I didn’t want to look at a concept like the Legba family and say, “I’m using that!” Instead, I studied the makeup of the folklore, the mythology, and asked, “How does this operate?” and take from that. Once that answer came to me through research (research, research, research, and research) I then understood how certain aspects of this culture would function without simply copying and pasting.
 

Taking respectful, creative liberties gives me the freedom to present this authentic, black, magical culture. Inside this universe there are wonderful characters, contemporary and historical, and they validate the atmosphere of this grand story.

One thing I like is that the main character is born into the culture. He doesn’t have to be introduced to it. The main female protagonist is a part of the culture too, but her family has had a falling out with the Fable Avenue community. With her, there are bridges to be re-built. Her grandmother respects the community greatly, but also believes it’s failed her family. I like this in contrast to other stories and heroes such as Harry Potter or Luke Skywalker. They are from wizarding and Jedi lineage, but they’re not born into it. In fact, it’s hidden from them until the proper age. As I’m outlining the story, I’m realizing that I like dealing with characters that have already been a part of a culture. It cuts down on a lot of exposition. There’s still stuff to explain, and familiar tropes to travel, but we start fresh by stating, “Look, these characters know most of what’s going on.” Even still, a mystery prevails, that no one of the culture is aware of; questions that need answering, and as can happen, many of the Elders have their secrets. A lot can happen in fifty-seven years from the end of The Ghost of Gabriel’s Horn. The rest of the chapters in this saga will take place in contemporary times.
 

The Fable Avenue culture is fifty-seven years strong. Unified under African, ancestral concepts. But there are diabolical forces that want to tear it apart like Set did Osiris.

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