Twenty seven million people are enslaved in the world today, out of which 1.2 million are children trapped in India’s sex trade. As the largest lucrative underworld business, second only to the illegal drug trade, human trafficking is a human rights issue still prevalent today, according to “Disposable People,” by Kevin Bales, and CNN.

Written by Corban Addison, A Walk Across the Sun is a novel that traces the heart-breaking journey of two sisters as they are sold and peddled until they reach the dark underworld brothel of Mumbai. In the spring of 2008, Addison decided to write this fiction in the hope of motivating others to stop this trade from further expanding in society.

“Fiction has the power of really changing the way a person sees the world, engages the intellect and also the heart,” Addison said in an interview with TalonWP.

As a corporate lawyer by training who is painfully aware of various human rights issues of the world, Addison did not find it hard to respond immediately to the plight of human trafficking.

“This is the reality of the world in which we live and most people do not know it. […] We have to use our voice to talk about the reality,” he said.

However, Addison was also aware that it would be overwhelming to delve into this underground trade, write, and research as well as obtain the information needed to write a compelling novel.

“It was definitely a leap of faith in a way to take this journey. But thankfully I found that as soon as [I] started talking to people, courageous people were willing to help me in spite of my background. It is because of them I was able to write this book,” Addison said.

Although human trafficking is prevalent throughout the world, Addison stated that he had specifically chosen the location of Mumbai because the amount of human trafficking there is “monstrous,” with at least half a million girls being subject to it. Very few are rescued even after massive searches and sting operations, he said.

According to Addison, even the names of his two protagonists were chosen with an unexpected and deep meaning behind them. In fact, they were inspired by the Ramayana, an ancient epic which is extremely significant to the culture of India and written in Sanskrit.

“As I was reading [Ramayana], it struck me that the story I have outlined in my mind about these girls actually paralleled in some basic ways to the story line of Ramayana,” he said. “I had been thinking about the names to give to these two girls, and Sita jumped out of me as the younger girl’s story parallels Sita, the princess of Mythila, in so many ways. Indian readers who are familiar with Ramayana will pick up on the symbolism.”

While researching for his book, Addison spent a tremendous amount of time with The International Justice Mission (IJM), an organization dedicated to stopping sex trafficking in countries all over the world.

During his time with the organization, Addison learned that many facets of the judicial system in India had actually supported the crimes instead of putting an end to it.

“When the [IJM tries] to rescue a girl but their operation is tipped off by a corrupt cop, […] they lose the girl, who slips out of their hands and [goes] back into the trafficking pipeline, maybe never to be found again,” he said. “[The IJM is] also dealing with the incredible sluggishness of the justice system when cases last for years before a verdict. They worked on a daily basis with just the belief that they could make a difference one person at a time. In my mind, that was a great source of inspiration for me as I was researching the book. I felt more frustration in many cases than they did.”

What can we do to stop human trafficking from becoming a larger issue? Addison says that the answer lies in controlling the demand and punishing the “Johns” (customers) of sex as much as the traffickers.

“There is supply because there is a huge demand. Supplying three virgins for a party is as easy as a cake if you pay right,” he said.

Furthermore, Addison believes that the biggest obstacle in preventing human trafficking is ignorance.

“People may know that there are slaves in the world today, they may know that there are sex slaves in the world today, but I guarantee [when] you ask them if it’s happening in their own city, they’re going tell you no, or they’re going to say ‘Well, it’s so minor, I don’t know, the problem of drugs is far worse,’” he said. “The reality is the problem of sex slavery is prolific in the U.S. We don’t have vivid numbers, but just about everybody agrees that it’s at least 100,000 minors on the streets of the United States who are being exploited in the sex trade.”

For teenagers who wish to become involved in the campaign against human trafficking, Addison advises them to take action in the school community.

“I encourage you to look into school groups, to encourage fundraisers, [and] to raise awareness. Do your teachers know that there are girls, probably in the school, that are being targeted by traffickers? I would think so, but a lot of high school teachers and principals don’t understand that this is an issue that affects students,” he said.

As of now, Addison is working on his next book, which is expected to be released in the spring of 2013.

“It’s not about India or about trafficking, but it is about global human rights with legal overtones and [is] fast paced. It has family dynamics and a sort of love story embedded in it,” he said.

Addison wishes to write many stories about human rights issues as he feels that they are a prevalent problem that is often given the least priority in society.

“I hope to bring people around the world together to confront issues that matter and in a new way. As a society, we can make good decisions about how we combat these things and these problems and over the course of time make changes,” he said.

How can one be hopeful after so much injustice? Can one expect the world to be free of human trafficking and modern slavery? To these questions, Addison asks us to look back in history.

“The answer is written in the pages of our history,” he said. “However pervasive and powerful it may be, slavery is no more inevitable now than it was in the 1850s. But we cannot expect to counter a $32-billion-a-year industry without a huge effort. To vanquish this monster, we must pool our talents and resources, petition our elected officials to turn the millions in our war chest into billions, and commit ourselves to the cause of freedom for as long as it takes to win. It may take a generation, but it can be done. The only question is whether we have the courage to say yes.”

In observance of national human trafficking awareness day, January 11, TalonWP has published a series of articles relating to the subject: an interview with author Corban Addison and a review of his book A Walk Across the Sun.