It would be difficult – nay foolish – for The Author to speculate at this juncture on the whys and the wherefores of The Subject’s taciturnity. The Author is both saddened and frustrated by The Subject’s seeming unwillingness to place his trust/confidence in her (The Author’s) natural sense of balance and fair play in relation to this/her text(s). The Author has informed The Subject – via telepathy and WhatsApp – that she is merely trying to tell the simple – almost trite – story of a twenty-odd-minute house viewing in Llandudno during which The Subject makes a brief, relatively inconsequential appearance, but The Subject – while accepting that he was conceived of as ‘present’ during said viewing – is determined to remain abstruse, impenetrable and enigmatic. The Subject also disagrees with the idea that his appearance is merely ‘inconsequential’, but rather describes his role as ‘climactic’, even ‘seminal’ (The Author is unconvinced that The Subject understands the real meaning of the word ‘seminal’).

The Author wishes The Reader to understand that she thought – long and hard – about cutting The Subject from I Am Sovereign altogether, but ultimately felt that to do so would involve a profound compromise of her febrile and unconstrained imagination (The Subject is unconvinced that The Author understands the real meaning of the word ‘febrile’).

The Author sincerely hopes that The Reader will extend a measure of compassion and understanding towards herself/the text during the following three chapters and do their best to work with The Author in imagining the extraordinary richness and diversity of The Subject’s potential role – as it was originally conceived – in I Am Sovereign.

(The Subject also sincerely hopes that The Reader will extend a measure of compassion and understanding towards himself/his right to self-determination during the following three chapters and do their best to work with him in imagining the extraordinary richness and diversity of his actual role – as opposed to the role he is to be patronisingly ‘gifted’ by The Author – in I Am Sovereign.)

The Author wishes to make it clear (and she feels that this actually ‘goes without saying’ – although she is saying it) that it has been necessary to make certain – very subtle – adjustments to I Am Sovereign in order to try and counterbalance the problems engendered by The Subject’s unexpected reticence. Novels are finely honed and delicate organisms. The character of Wang Shu (for example) has been greatly reduced and simplified as a consequence of these necessary adjustments. In the original version Wang Shu spent only a fraction of her time on the phone talking in Chinese. Several pages in which Wang Shu spoke – most touchingly and evocatively – about her skill in playing the ‘erhu’, a traditional two (‘er’ in Chinese) stringed instrument with its horsetail and bamboo bow and box-like body featuring – among other exotica: python skin – were summarily eradicated. These included the moving story of Wang Shu’s unsuccessful (nay, borderline tragic), audition for the Guangzhou Symphony Youth Orchestra as a teenager, her shows of extraordinary bravery and persistence in bouncing back from this terrible disappointment, and her eventual – joyous/life-affirming – acceptance into the National Youth Orchestra of China.