People have asked how I came up with the structure of Little Worlds - the intertwining of my fifty years of documentary photographs and journal entries with a fictional story set fifty years in the future.
The documentary photo book model has been in place for close to seventy years. it usually meant a portfolio of images, oral histories and/or narrative writing, perhaps an academic essay explaining the works’ significance. This model has remained intact because of its effectiveness. It works, but I wanted to do something different.
I often told stories with my children as they were growing up. These stories often involved characters from a distant past or an unimaginable future. But the kids also wanted tales of my past life - my travels, my time in Madison County and people I had met.
After a difficult publishing experience with my second book, The New Road, I had vowed to never do another book. It was simply too gut wrenching. But during a long solitary drive out west, I realized I had not finished what I had originally set out to do, which was tell a more complete story of my time in the county.
I began revisiting my journals and stories and the thousands of photographs I had made over my time here. I was reading Octavia Butler’s work at the time, which reminded me of the bedtime stories I told my children. I had never written fiction but I just started writing and soon a story began to take shape. Diana Stoll, my editorial advisor, was instrumental in helping me organize the complimentary narratives.
To remind myself, and viewers, that this is in effect a bedtime story, every chapter in the book begins with a photograph of Kate.
The Little Worlds fundraiser is ongoing. Details are at: https://www.robamberg.com/blog/2023/8/12/little-worlds-the book

Pictures & Words