Recorded by history are the triumphs and tribulations of extraordinary individuals who shaped the outcome of contemporary civilization. However, some stories went unrecorded and lost in the ether of time.
John Christian Hopkins, an author from Page, Ariz., gave a fictional life to the nonfictional son of Metacomet, also known as King Phillip of the Wampanoag tribe, who during the 1670s initially sought peace with European colonists in New England but later led a bloody uprising against colonial encroachment dubbed King Phillips War.
Metacomet would eventually be killed and his 8-year-old son was sold to slavery in Bermuda where he disappeared from the history books.
Hopkins book takes up where history left off in an adventurous fictional twist where the boy becomes Carlomagno the fiercest of Caribbean pirates.
I came up with that name in the ninth grade, Hopkins said. I wanted to take Spanish, and my guidance councilor basically told me I wasnt smart enough to keep up with the rest of the class. So I spent a year learning it on my own. I came across this name. Its Spanish for Charlemagne. And I tell myself, someday, Im going to have a character with that name.
As it turns out, Metacomets son came of age around the same time as the peak age of piracy in the Caribbean.
What I wanted to do was give this kid a life story, Hopkins said. I love the old swashbucklers like Errol Flynn and Douglas Fairbanks. I love those. So it wasnt a big leap for me. ... I knew I wanted to do something on the native front. Then Im in the library reading about pirates, just killing time, and I just noticed the dates line up perfectly.
A former newspaper reporter, nationally syndicated columnist, poet and fiction writer, Hopkins said this years book is the second incarnation of The Pirate Prince Carlomagno. The first edition was published in 2003 during a rocky time in the authors life when he didnt have as much time to devote to the book.
Hopkins later went to a publisher with a manuscript on a book about the Mayan calendar and sent the original Carlomagno along as a writing sample, which he said the publisher fell in love with.
This publisher was just begging me to re-do this book. It just seemed like the right time to do it, he said.
Hopkins went back and rewrote the book, breathing new life into it. The 2011 version of the book is longer and features new characters and plot lines, he said.
I used real characters, and then I introduced fictional characters to kind of move the action, he said. Everything just kind of fell into place. I finally got to realize my dream more on the scale that I wanted.
Hopkins is circuitously related to the protagonists father in real life.
My fathers bloodline goes to King Phillips uncle, he said. Hes the one who brought popcorn to the Pilgrims at the first Thanksgiving.
Although he is proud to be Native American, Hopkins said he doesnt want to be known only as a Native author.
Im proud of being native, and Im certainly willing to sell my book in Native communities, he said. But I dont want to stop there. I want to sell my book all over the world, I dont want to limit myself. I hope when people read my book, theyre enjoying a book by a good author, a good writer and theyre not thinking: Oh, this guys a native. No wonder he wrote about a Native. The fact that the main character in this book is Native is for story.
As a journalist, Hopkins said he was accused of not being Native American enough.
One thing Ive learned as a Native American journalist is they want to pigeon hole them as THE native journalist, he said. Every paper Ive been at has said, You go write the pow-wow story this week.
He said he wrote a letter to his editor stating, You have to look somewhere else for an Uncle Tomahawk.
Now Hopkins hopes to live his dream of writing books.
I dont want to be 90 years old and on my deathbed wondering if I could have done it, he said. I have to know. And at least if you fail, you know you gave it the best shot you could have.
The Pirate Prince Carlomagno is available online at amazon.com and at Barnes and Noble.
Reach Reid Wright at [email protected].
