Wednesday, November 20, 2024

Poetry Corner: When We Had No Flag


by Sean Taylor

When we had no flag 
There were only white sheets, hanging on clotheslines 
Flapping on windy days, 
Waving greetings like so many neighbors on so many dusty paths

White not for surrender 
But for sleeping, for rest because white was easy 
Easy to bleach our odors away, 
Dirt and sweat from one person's work, one man's labor, one woman's toil

One day we  painted bars deep red
Crimson with the blood of the people who lived here first 
But there wasn't enough
So we added more from the backs of the people we owned

And so we painted what was left blue
Blue with the bruises of our slaves and red with their stripes 
Even if we had to wrench the paint out of the whips after use, 
Twisting leather until our fingers too were as calloused as theirs

We found some white remained
But it was not for sleeping, not anymore; it was for the Virgin Innocent
Our children who would inherit a world 
Built on the paint dripped from the wounds of those we had  conquered

Perhaps it's time again
Wash day for the flag, with fresh bleach to clean away the red and blue
To allow the colors to surrender and fade
And once more flap greetings in the wind

Perhaps you, or me, 
or that woman over there, the one in all the colors of the rainbow
Or that vermin, that enemy, that animal,
Could be the bleach to get the job started
To speak the change we all should hear
Whistling in the wind
That blew when we had no flag

(c) 2024

Tuesday, November 19, 2024

Nikki Nelson-Hicks: Opening a Vein of Anger

In second-grade, Nikki was tagged as being gifted when she attempted to check out a book on bats and it was discovered she read at a fourth-grade level. The truth of the matter was that she believed bats could turn into people.

When Nikki was in sixth grade, she wrote and performed a play, The Hunt for Bigfoot, and later created the Monster Hunter’s Club which entered a cryptozoology exhibit, the first of its kind, in the annual school fair.

It won an honorable mention.

After that, things started to get weird. 

Meet Nikki Nelson-Hicks.

Tell us a bit about your latest work.

Since 2022, I have been working on a collection of short stories that circle around the theme of revenge titled, Politics of Children and Other Stories of Revenge. These stories range from the black and white vision of children in Politics of Children, to justice being meted out by the desperate in Brother Marvel’s Old Time Revival, to how the vengeance of a protector can last eons in A Beautiful Thing to a modern retelling of Poe’s Cask of Amontillado in Black Cherry. There’s also a quick bit of body horror in Sweet Revenge that I threw in there for fun. If the editing process continues for as long as I fear it will, I might also add the story, What the Cat Dragged In, that was published in 2023 by St. Rooster in the horror comedy anthology, Razor Blade in Fun Size Candy.

Hopefully this will come out sometime in 2024.  Sometimes, persistence is more valuable than talent in this game. 

What are the themes and subjects you tend to revisit in your work?

Years ago, a writing teacher told me during a review that everything I write has a vein of anger in it. “If you wrote about kittens, they’d be angry kittens. What’s up with that?”

So, yeah. There’s a lot of anger in my work. Also, loneliness, isolation and injustice.

Just like the real world which, let’s face it, is a shitshow.

SO, as the Creator of my own little worlds, I like to dispense justice as I see fit. Call me an Agent of Nemesis. In my stories, the bad get gutted and the good get what they deserve.

Oh, and monsters because they are fun. 

What happened in your life that prompted you to become a writer? 

My therapist told me that most people who survived a childhood like mine ended up either as an alcoholic, a drug addict, or a prostitute.

I took another path. I became a reader. 

I read as a form of self-defense. I shielded myself in fantasy and story to survive. 

That’s why I write stories. To give people that sort of shelter and diversion to help them cope.  I write stories to give people distractions for when they need one, say, at the doctor’s office, riding the bus or on the toilet. It’s a lofty goal.

What inspires you to write? 

I’m not sure how to answer this. 

If you mean, “What inspires you to sit down, tap on the keyboard and write stories?” I guess it would be the simple answer of  “To maintain my sanity.” When I don’t write or pour myself into something creative, I tend to go dark and that isn’t good for anyone.

If you mean, “What inspires my stories?” Well, that is hard to answer cohesively. Many of my stories that are out there so far were created because I was challenged by a publisher to do them. 

“Give me a story about a fairytale creature versus a historical Wild West person.” The Problem at Gruff Springs 

“Take two cryptids and make them fight.” Rumble 

“Write me a pulp detective story that involves chickens.” A Chick, A Dick and a Witch Walk Into a Barn (The first of the Jake Istenhegy stories)

OR

I’ll read something and have a question: “Why do all the women in Poe’s life die?” The Perverse Muse

OR

A few years ago, my son popped his head in my office and asked, “Hey….if rats ate a golem, would they become the golem? Like a flesh golem made of rats?” Well, HELL! That story rolled around in my brain and I’ve been working on it ever since. It’s the core root of my story, A Beautiful Thing, that will be in the Politics of Children and Other Stories of Revenge

In the end, I must blame this compulsion on either poor mental health or just a stubborn competitive edge. 

What would be your dream project?

I don’t really have a dream project. I start every story as if it were my Breakout Work. So far, it’s not happened but, who knows….maybe the next one will be it. And if it’s not. Oh well. Keep on trucking. 

But, if we’re going to dream, let’s dream big.

My favorite daydream is where, out of the blue, I get a phone call from Mike Flanagan. 

“Hey, Nikki, this is Mike Flanagan. My brother, Jeremy, met you last year at Authorcon and was so impressed by you at the panel you two did together (editor’s note: this part is true. Jeremy Flanagan and I were on a panel together and I made him laugh. Twice. It was the highlight of the weekend for me.) that he bought all your books and, well, I read them and, damn, girl! You are good! Want to team up and make some movies from your books?”

We’d make movies that would be blockbusters and we’d become BFFs.

The end.

If you have any former project to do over to make it better, which one would it be, and what would you do?

It’s the Creator’s Dilemma, isn’t it? You look back on past work and see nothing but faults and how you’d do it better now because you’ve grown and changed since the time you created that story.

When I got all the rights back to my Jake Istenhegyi stories, I spent a year rewriting and recrafting that world. Trying to make it better and more polished. 

I suppose the same could be done for all my stories but…that’s okay. I like them to stay the way they are. They show my growth as a writer. 

They are all my babies, lumpy and imperfect as they are, and I love them.

What writers have influenced your style and technique?

Terry Pratchett, Flannery O’Connor, Stephen King, Rod Serling, Sharyn McCrumb, E.A. Poe, Octavia Butler, Josephine Tey (The Daughter of Time…excellent), Neil Gaiman, et al. 

Where would you rank writing on the "Is it an art or it is a science continuum?" Why?

Writing is a form of magic. Almost necromancy, in a way. I can talk to dead people, hear their voices in my head when I read their work. So, it’s a dab of art and a dash of science.

What is the most difficult part of your artistic process? 

Getting out of my goddamn way.

Did you know, neuroscience has found the Sweet Spot of Creativity? And, yes, it includes alcohol. 

They found that a BAC 0.075 was the magic number when it came to creativity. Why? It was *just enough* to lower inhibitions, shut off your temporal cortex enough so it quieted the inner editor but left you still cognizant enough to actually create something worthwhile. 

AMAZING! 

How do your writer friends help you become a better writer? Or do they not? 

Healthy competition is a wonderful thing. However, more than not, my writer buds have talked me off the ledge more times than I can count. Writers need a special kind of tribe that keep them encouraged and strong enough to put up with the shit we get from publishers, critics and general trolls. 

Plus, it’s good to be with people that understand the struggle. They get how hard it is to create a world from nothing. 

What does literary success look like to you? 

When I was a kid, the idea of getting published was the cherry on top of everything. HAHAHA! Sweet summer child.

Now, as a grizzled old fart, I’d really like a royalty statement that has more in the front of the decimal than the back. 

Sure, I crave external validation, awards and opportunities but, but, in the end, it comes down to writing a story that you believe in, and you know, in your heart of hearts, is a *good* story.  

Although having someone give me the thumbs up is nice too. 

Any other upcoming projects you would like to plug?  

No, Politics of Children and Other Stories of Revenge is taking up a lot of 2024. I really want this collection to be good. Maybe even Stoker quality good. Aim high!

I’m not doing too much in the con circuit this year but I will be at Authorcon in Williamsburg, VA from April 11-14. 

OH! I am the Co-Chairperson for the Horror Writers Association, Tennessee Chapter and if anyone in the Tennessee would like to become a member, reach out! We are a new branch with 20 people strong and would love to add more members. 

For more information, visit: 

Nikki's Altars:


Hecate

Bridgid

Maeve

Saturday, November 16, 2024

[Link] Centring Marginalized Voices and Decolonizing My Bookshelf

by Heather Plett 

At the beginning of 2016, I made a commitment to read only books by authors who weren’t from the dominant culture. My intent was to broaden my education and stretch myself by staying away from books written by white able-bodied cisgender heterosexuals. Books have always helped me make sense of the world, and I knew that if I wanted to catch glimpses of the world through lenses that were different from mine, books would help me get there. Though my bookshelves reflect some diversity, I knew there was much more I could do.

It was harder than I expected. It’s not that there aren’t plenty of books by other voices – there are, but I had to dig harder to find them. It became clear, early on, that few publishers and booksellers are willing to bank on books by marginalized voices. They don’t invest in them as often and don’t put them front and centre in the bookstores. Walk through almost any bookstore (or at least those that I’m most familiar with, in North America), or browse through Amazon, and you’ll see fairly quickly what types of books get the most space and attention. Those voices that feel most “safe” for the average bookstore shopper will sell the most books, and I think it’s fairly safe to say that the “average bookstore shopper” is expected to be a white person with privilege.

That was one of my first realizations in this year-long quest… It is far more challenging to find a publisher and make a living from your writing if you do not fit the dominant paradigm. Other voices have to work twice as hard just to get a spot on the bookshelf. Like any other space ruled by capitalism, the bookstore centres those with privilege.

It was easiest to find books by marginalized voices in the fiction section, so I started there. Friends gave me lots of recommendations and my nightstand quickly filled with borrowed books. I started with Indigenous authors (in Canada, those are the voices that are often the most marginalized) and moved on to people of colour from the U.S., Africa, and Southeast Asia. Many of those books were gritty and challenging, and some of them brought up my white guilt. There were moments when I questioned why I was putting myself through this. Reading was starting to feel more like a chore and less like a pleasure. 

Though I enjoy fiction, I don’t read nearly as much of it as I used to, and soon found myself searching for the kinds of books I lean toward – memoirs, books about the human condition, cultural exploration, leadership books, and other non-fiction. These became increasingly more difficult to find. Memoirs were fairly plentiful, once I started digging deeper than the typical bookstore shelves (and I found some great ones by writers who gave me a new perspective on what it means to be gender non-binary, what it’s like to be raised by a residential school survivor, etc.), but hardest to find were the non-fiction books I tend to read that are relevant for my work.

I’m not sure how to define the books I most love to read, because they don’t tend to fit bookstore categorization. I read a lot of “ideas and culture” books – on leadership, spirituality, feminism, trauma, engagement, facilitation, personal development, etc. When I turned my attention to these books, my quest became the most challenging. Very few of these books are written by people who aren’t from the dominant culture.

And this was my second major realization in this quest… While we may be willing to read fiction, and sometimes memoirs by people who don’t look like us, we very rarely will accept as experts anyone who doesn’t fit the dominant paradigm.

Read the full article: https://heatherplett.com/2017/03/centring-marginalized-voices-decolonizing-bookshelf/

Friday, November 15, 2024

MVmedia is delighted to announce the official release of Too Old to Dance but Young Enough to Rock ‘n’ Roll by L. Gene Brown and K. Ceres Wright.

MVmedia Press Release
Too Old to Dance but Young Enough to Rock ‘n’ Roll
November 11, 2024
For Immediate Release 11/11/24

Fayetteville, GA: MVmedia is delighted to announce the official release of Too Old to Dance but Young Enough to Rock ‘n’ Roll by L. Gene Brown and K. Ceres Wright.

Too Old to Dance But Young Enough to Rock 'n' Roll by L. Gene Brown and K. Ceres Wright is an exciting postapocalyptic SF military story from the point of view of two soldiers, one an African American man, the other an Ethiopian Israeli woman, each commanding their troops to search out and obtain a mysterious element promising to end the war —Protocol 45. In their quest, they must either fight, avoid, or negotiate with armies from Korea, China, and Russia, as well as local gang members, to obtain an elusive peace. But what will this peace cost?

L. Gene Brown is the co-author of several novels with writing partners L. Ann (Bonded in Blood and Blood Carousel) and Kathleen McClure (The Gemini Hustle, The Libra Gambit, and the upcoming 3rd in the series to be entitled The Scorpio Sting).

K. Ceres Wright's short stories, poems, and articles have appeared on the Strange Horizons and Amazing Stories websites; in the FIYAH Magazine of Black Speculative Fiction; Luminescent Threads: Connections to Octavia Butler (Locus Award winner; Hugo Award nominee); and Sycorax’s Daughters (Bram Stoker Award nominee); among others. Ms. Wright is the founder and president of Diverse Writers and Artists of Speculative Fiction, an educational group for creatives.

Too Old to Dance but Young Enough to Rock ‘n’ Roll is available from MVmedia, LLC, and anywhere books are sold. Send all sales inquiries to mv_media@bellsouth.net 

MVmedia, LLC  (www.mvmediaatl.com) is a small Black-owned press specializing in speculative fiction based on African/African Diaspora history, culture, and traditions. 

To purchase: https://www.mvmediaatl.com/product-page/too-old-to-dance-but-young-enough-to-rock-and-roll

Thursday, November 14, 2024

Normalizing Marginalized People In Your Fiction


Okay writers, let's talk about diversity and slice that pie in terms of marginalized groups. 

What is the difference between including diversity in your work and using your work as a platform to encourage understanding and empathy in regard to diversity? Is one better or worse for authors?

Rachel Burda Taylor: Hmm... For me, I don't know that diversity is something I set as any type of goal.

At the same time, I live in a place that is crazy diverse where it's normal to be surrounded by and be friends with a range of people from different backgrounds, lives, etc. (Visiting the nearest mall is about like going to an international airport. My WASP kids are the minority-by-numbers at their high school.) It would be weird to not include the same diversity in my books that I have in my daily life.

Josh Nealis: In novels, not always but often, I never mention skin color of a character. Also, I try not to create a character in comics specifically to be black or female etc, the charcter idea needs to be pure. Not pandering, but purposeful.

John Anthony Chihak Soltero: The difference would lie in the intent and the knowledge and experience one has on the subject, just like any other story or character. 

Chris Riker: If the aspect/trait/feature/preference is important to the plot, SHOW DON'T TELL. If it's not important to the plot, be satisfied with representation. Don't force it. Don't preach. Don't kill the lesbian just for the hell of it. Above all, remember to tell a story. I invite you to review my work and tell me if I handle things well. (Getting to Know People at the Rainbow Connection, Itsy Bitsy).

Jesse James Fain: David Weber once said when complemented for his female characters that his success in writing a woman without being one was "That's because I wrote a person, a character, that just so happened to be female."

I try my damnedest to do this with any character of any marginalized or oppressed group. My latest sold story has a mixed native hero with complex beliefs. He venerates the great spirits and the Norse gods. He is a child of his two cultures. Two cultures I myself have ancestry in and know academically and from being involved in ritual. I give the details you need, and let you fill the rest, because this is fiction, and it's my world, and my tale, and you were kind enough to share it.

Kay Iscah: The difference is intent. Which is better? Depends. If you want to feature a culture/disability or bring awareness to it, you have a higher responsibility to get the details right, but well done, those stories can be very engaging and meaningful.

I generally write stories removed from the context of Earth, so that gives me some freedom to think it about it more in terms of creating variety. What's jarring is taking current-day issues and trying to cut and paste them into a setting where they don't fit. But as long the issue or inclusion is organic to the story, it's fine. As a general rule low tech, remote villages should be more homogenous, and high tech, urban settings are more natural to blended populations. But diversity isn't limited to skin tone (or species if you're writing sci-fi/fantasy). Diversity is personalities and perspectives, heights, talents, etc. etc. You should write different characters with distinct personalities and goals.

Brian K Morris: I've just dabbled in what I call "pulp with a social conscience." Until now, I've managed to write some really strong female characters, as opposed to "romantic interest/hostage." But I've not built up the moxie to go further until a year ago.

Building diversity is a good thing. In the introduction of ANY character, the reader should be able to UNDERSTAND them and why they do what they do.

Sean Taylor: I've actually done several posts on this blog about this, and my POV on it is constantly evolving. I still believe we can force diversity into our writing without it coming out well, forced, and without hurting the stories themselves. However, I do not feel that we can intentionally choose themes that offer us the opportunities to include a more diverse cast or create situations and settings when and where a more diverse cast makes sense without having to be forced like a triangle block into a circle hole. And I am embracing that aesthetic more and more in my writing. That way, the intentionality is there, but it still doesn't come across, at least to me, as trying to write "message fiction." But honestly, our history as writers is filled with what some folks derogatorily call message fiction nowadays. Look no further than the poetry and stories of Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Kate Chopin, Oscar Wilde, Harper Lee, and Khaled Hosseini. Sadly, when most folks I hear bag on "message fiction" is not because the fiction is bad, but because they don't agree with the message. Case in point: The Narnia books are straight-up message fiction, but whether you agree with the message or not, the stories still hold up as fun adventure yarns for children and children at heart. 

What have you done up to this point in your fiction to put a focus on the marginalized and to build intentional diversity into your stories?

Rachel Burda Taylor: I do try to reflect the actual populations of the places I write about. So if a place (talking about you Gander, Newfoundland) is primarily WASPs, it's important to me to reflect that while also having the visiting protag have a more diverse friend group that reflects the population of her hometown.

TJ Keitt: You need to avoid tokenization, as well as tropes that are insulting and bigoted (e.g. the "noble savage" and "magic negro"). There are two ways to do this:

1) Tell a story that only your character from the marginalized community could lead. I think this is what made the first Black Panther movie, for example, so interesting. If you inserted any other Marvel hero into that story, it would not have made sense. It's also why I think the Tom Holland Spider-Man movies worked so well (they truly were stories about a teenager) and why I thought the first Wonder Woman missed the mark (aside from a couple of scenes, any DC hero who was overpowered and long-lived could have helmed that story). The challenge with this is you have to have a deep understanding of the character and story to pull that off, or else it becomes cringe.

2) Allow the marginalized character to exist normally in your broader world. Black, Hispanic, Gay, Trans, etc. are just ordinary people who interact with other people from different communities on a daily basis. Those interactions can include conversations about their identities, but most often, people are just interacting and discussing regular stuff. It's actually why characters like War Machine and Falcon work in the MCU: Yes, they're Black Americans, but they're also just regular (in the context of this world) people who are working through extraordinary circumstances. They don't have to be "credits" to their community; they just have to be represented as fully realized humans and not tokens or tropes.

Sean Taylor: I have also written stories with a theme, not just a plot. Those themes were ideas that were important to me at the time of the writing. My first published story was about the change in the heart of a small-town sheriff when he has to choose between letting his town give vigilante justice to a black kid accused on flimsy proof or to protect the kid until he can actually have a fair trial. I guess the story was still strong enough to make the message worth telling because it won an Award judged by the late Judith Ortiz Cofer. Even in my Pulp work, Bobby Nash and I were intentional when we set Rick Ruby, a white P.I., in an almost black world. Not only did it give up better opportunities to tell good stories with a variety of diverse characters, but it also allowed us to use even classic Pulp tropes to tell stories that mattered beyond mere punching and shooting tales. 

Jesse James Fain: I can only write what I know and understand. So I make no specific efforts to represent anyone I have not witnessed, and that I cannot flush out to be A PERSON and a Character with a role to fill.

This only applies to me, and my approach, but In fiction I am no one's champion. I am a storyteller weaving threads of human themes, themes that everyone from Vladivostok to Lisbon and Patagonia to the Arctic would understand if they read English.

Message fiction irritates me heavily. I don't want real-life politics or struggle in my fantastic escape. I champion my beliefs all day by example and debate. I don't need to thinly veil them in someone's good time. If the quiet part is noble, you will say it out loud. That goes for my own beliefs as well.

Every writer shows ideals, that's part of the human experience and thinking, but the difference between "this is how I think and it bleeds in a little." And "HEY GUYS THIS IS THE POINT, SEE! SEE! SEE ME SUPPORTING THE THING." IS normally sparkly clear, and the story normally sucks in the latter example.

John Anthony Chihak Soltero: I have done a lot. I don't know what to point out or suggest. I have mainly female characters of various racial backgrounds in my comic books. I attempt to make them pointed and have purpose instead of just being women. 

Connor Alexander: Years back, I had a Sikh character in a book I was writing (While I'm not religious, I find Sikhism fascinating). I was mostly using the internet and not feeling great about the character. Then, I was at a pizza place and realized the owner and his family were Sikhs. I asked the owner if I could buy him lunch and ask him about his faith. He agreed and we sat over lunch for hours. He was so generous with his beliefs and perspectives. Really made the character come to life.

Carl Moore: I let the geography do it naturally -- my horror novel that took place in New York City would be silly if it didn't have a diverse cast of characters.

Brian K Morris: As seen above, I've not done a lot until The Terrors from last year. I did my research on African-American communities during World War II and talked with a number of my Black friends in the hopes that I got it right.

Kay Iscah: Unfortunately my best stories for showcasing diversity aren't published yet (which frustrates me, but it's a long story). Seventh Night is vaguely medieval, so the conflict is more class diversity than racial or cultural diversity. You see a bit more of the broader world in the Before the Fairytale set, but not at a level I would brag about. I did have a subplot about the young sorceress using magic to treat someone with a harelip (cleft lip/cleft palate) and promoted Operation Smile when I first released those chapters. I have several back-burner projects that are more deliberate with racial diversity, particularly in protagonists... I don't think every story needs to hit every check box, but I do see the value in diverse stories, settings, and characters. Hoping to live long enough that my catalog of work will show a better variety. I didn't worry about Seventh Night being a bit Eurocentric because other stories I had in the works explored other cultures or more naturally diverse settings, but I honestly thought those would be out long before now.

Do you plan to ramp that up or back off or make any other changes to the way you include the marginalized in your work based on recent events?

Ef Deal: In my recent book, Aeros & Heroes, tout Paris is at the chateau, including the infamous Count Custine, an open homosexual in France, where it wasn't illegal. The king states, "It's an offense against God. Scripture is clear." Jacqueline says, "Scripture is rarely clear." She then expounds, for the sake of her 'salon' audience, on what is natural. She challenges the king to heal a guest's crippled leg, or turn water into wine, or walk across her pond. Yet we're all commanded to be imitators of the Christ, so why can't he do it? She then points out that Scripture is very clear on one point: The punishment for adultery (of which the king is notoriously guilty) is death. The king quickly shuts up.

Later, her lady's maid, a young teen, confesses that she's a lesbian, and the local priest has told her it's a sin. Jacqueline says, “I can’t tell you what sin is for you, Gaudin. If the curé says it’s a sin, I’m sure he will be happy to hear your confession. At the least, you’ll do penance. At the worst, you’ll be looked down upon by everyone except those who truly love you. If I could, I’d send you away to school to learn Greek and Hebrew properly. Then you could read the Holy Scripture for yourself, study it, and wrestle with God as Jacob did, and as I have done, to learn what God wants from you. Confess yourself to God. I’ve found God to be far more forgiving than the church.”

John Anthony Chihak Soltero: I am changing how I create these stories as I feel someone with better experience should share that voice. I will be concentrating my efforts on what I know, which is being Latino, having mental illness and being queer. I don't know that I am qualified to give a voice to other minorities. 

Jesse James Fain: I'm writing people. People who may be of any race, creed, or color, but I'm not banging on mental doors for anyone, not even my own groups. I'm telling tales about heroes and villains and badasses that come from where they come from, and I believe that's the best way to do them justice in speculative fiction.

Shay Vetter: I'm struggling with this right now. The books I have out are middle grades with a diverse cast, including LGBTQIA+ characters. The new administration wants to call those characters porn, even though there is absolutely nothing spicy in my books. Certain billionaires who own book platforms support the new administration. Do I pull them off those platforms? What about the cozy SF series I'm writing for adults?

I'm nonbinary and bisexual. What I write is reflective of who I am and the kind of world I want to see. It's not just about normalizing marginal groups but making a world where people like me can live to their fullest. I don't believe my existence takes away from someone else. If anything, I think we'll all be richer through diversity. I think the belief that I infringe on someone else just by existing is propaganda by people who need someone to blame so their followers will focus on that and not on the fact that their leaders are actual ones who want to infringe on them.

I'm pretty upset at the world right now.

Brian K Morris: When I released The Terrors, one person accused me of "race swapping" and equating it to lazy writing (which would have been to just stick with a white cast). Two minutes later, I got a 2-star rating on Amazon. While I got some amazing reviews for the book, the comments on FB were all about their disappointment in seeing someone introduce a strong, Black set of characters. (For the record, when I checked out the accounts, they were all middle-aged white guys who probably weren't even around when the characters MY cast were based on were in print). And I am petty at heart...I wanted to tweak their noses and annoy them. So I'm working on the sequel novel, along with two other novellas in the same universe. The only change I'm making is that there will be more of what upsets the bigots, and I couldn't be happier.

Klara Schmitt: I know TikTok often gets a lot of pushback for being a time-suck and/or an echo chamber, but I will credit it to really exposing me to a ton of different voices and perspectives. Anytime I wanted to learn more about what it was like being ADHD or Ace or even what experiencing seizures might feel like, I search it and watch videos exploring peoples' lived experiences and listen to their thoughts. I am also grateful to the resource https://www.tumblr.com/writingwithcolor, which has helped me tremendously.

In high school I took a course Teaching Tolerance through a homeschool co-op, which I believe has since been renamed Learning for Justice, but that course really stuck with me. I think that course was perhaps more inline with the first point "encourage understanding and empathy in regard to diversity." I think it's important to have both, to expose folks to diversity, but to also build up empathy for what it's like to live an experience other than your own.

My story actually blends a lot of cultures' folklore with elements of a lot of mainstream religions and I'm trying to do my best to keep it in grays. My main characters might have perspectives of the legitimacy of certain beliefs, but that doesn't mean they are right in their thinking, which will evolve as they continue to be exposed to more people and more context.

In addition to religion, I have two non-profits essentially brokering diversity in pursuit of peace and the right of existence, one of which is international, so I wanted that represented in the makeup of their employees. I try to include people of different races, ethnicities, genders, sexualities, disabilities, etc., but also put them in positions of authority. Perhaps as a woman, who works a corporate job where there aren't a ton of women in leadership roles, I wanted to write what I wish was more readily prevalent. So now I have a lot of women in my book, some questing for honor, some for power, but the variance is in their motivation, not their gender.

The one lesson I learned the hard way though is to definitely find 2-3 sources on name pronunciations that originate outside my own language/country. One chick is stuck with an incorrect pronunciation because I only verified her name once before writing it down phonetically. But then I fell in love with the name and now I can't seem to change it in my head. Oops. Coincidentally, I am really glad I listened to books #2 and #3 of Naomi Novik's Scholomance series, because it allowed me to hear all the international students' names with proper pronunciation and I definitely missed out on reading book #1.

Also, writing accents is a lot harder than I thought and I've spent a lot of time on websites teaching Haitian Creole because I value authenticity. I am still hoping to find some folks who might be able to vet my dialog for the various accents before I publish, because incorporating languages that I don't speak into my writing means I'm much more likely to get it wrong. (See previous paragraph, lol.)

Kay Iscah: I have too many projects on the back burner to react to recent events through fiction.

For readers, it may seem to ramp up as I go along. For me, it was always part of the plan. Though I think of it more as variety than highlighting marginalization. Phillip is essentially a nerd stuck in the life of a medieval peasant, so he's marginalized in his society. Meanwhile, the princess is neurodivergent (on the psychopathy spectrum) but there's no language for that in a medieval setting, so I just hint at it with things like "thought more than she felt". The sorceress lives a marginal existence as the only practicing magic user in the country, and she has a magical ability that was a bit of a disability in her youth. The prince has a bizarre family situation... so there are many ways to be an outsider.

A lot of my unpublished protagonists are outsiders or marginalized in some way, but that may be more subtle with some characters than others. I do think it's important to see demographics as a trait of a character and not the whole character.

Sean Taylor: I'm ramping up. Like Kamala said, we're not backing down. The marginalized are going to face a lot of troubles in the years to come, and I like to think that as a writer, I can at least open an eye onto that world and those troubles and the ones who benefit from their hardships. 

 What authors do you recommend who are doing a commendable job of highlighting this kind of diversity in their work?

John Anthony Chihak Soltero: Sophie Campbell does an amazing job in her work on Wet Moon. She features great character development, stories and artwork, while also giving voice to Queer characters, those with disabilities and various races and body types.

Kay Iscah: My reading is all over the place, but I'm reading a lot of dead authors and older books at the moment. I think readers need to put in some of the effort and just try new authors and genres. There's so much pressure on authors to build a "brand" that individual authors may stick to one type of issue rather trying to hit all of them. I watch a lot of Asian media and have started dipping my toe into some Nollywood series. The internet has made the world far more accessible to us. Instead of expecting an Irish author to highlight African stories, I think it's better for readers to try out African authors.

Lot of my personal focus is fairytales and folklore. So I'm constantly (if slowly) trying to expand my imagination by reading the mythologies of different cultures.

Marginalization is a concept where setting is very important, and anyone tackling the issue should be very aware there's a difference between being the only one of something in the city, and a city full of people like your character. Same character, different level of marginalization because the setting changed. Both place and time. Being a witch in London in 1524 and being a witch in London in 2024 are completely different experiences.

Sean Taylor: I think if you look past the works of more old, white dudes like me and read more LGBTQIA+, POC, refuge, and international writers, you'll find all the stories you could ever find. Sure, that means you may read fewer folks like me, and that'll hurt my wallet, but I'd rather you learn to be a more diverse thinker and more active in fighting for marginal peoples. Heather Plett has a wonder article about this called Centring Marginalized Voices and De-Colonizing My Bookshelf that is well worth checking out. 

A lot of my own interest in reading marginalized voice comes from being an American Lit/Comp teacher. As I mentioned in my response to question #1, I think back to the poems of Langston Hughes writing about being Black in a White United States, Kate Chopin writing about being little more than property in a patriarchal world, and Oscar Wilde, who had to hide (though clearly not very well - 😏) his homosexuality in metaphor and symbolism in his fiction. 

Connor Alexander, who replied above, is a board creator creating amazing RPGs and board games based on marginalized groups. 

Wednesday, November 13, 2024

Poetry Corner: Punk Rock


They busted the windows on Wall Street today
Trash cans filled with garbage and old food made the first crack
And sent all the happy people in nice suits scurrying
For once thinking about something other than the numbers
That make them better at ignoring the rest of us.
They stepped over the banana peels and potato chip bags
The crushed soda cans that should have been recycled instead 
On their way to the exits, the only light they were
Suddenly focused on—But that kind of thing isn’t really my style. 

They’ll gather up a million men and women tomorrow
And put them in matching T-shirts that say “Not Going Back”
With rapidly practiced chants, call-backs to great leaders
Of yesterdays gone by, times we thought we had moved beyond
Times we assumed we had put behind us. I can join them
Of course I can. It’s the least—the very least, if I’m honest—
I can do, right behind merely sending money on my phone
While I stream Agatha All Along on Disney Plus. But
It still doesn’t quite feel like the thing I was created to do at this time.

They dyed their mohawks in rainbows and shoved the middle finger
Into the air while their fans screamed and moshed and bled
Showing camaraderie, empathy, solidarity the only way
They understood fully, with anger, with energy, with activity. 
And it felt amazing to jump, and yell,  and raise my fist, and shout obscenities 
At the powers, and yet… Even when they kissed—tongues and leather 
And lace and fingers and hair—Man on man, woman on woman, 
Man on woman, trans on trans, Trans on straight
Straight on till sunrise… It still was not enough. 

Yesterday I am a writer. Tomorrow I paint in words. Today
I have words or many colors, many spectrums that correspond 
To those that swirl in the sky, dance in the puddles, blur through smoke
“Vandalize” city walls with slogans: Trans rights are human rights.
Abortion is healthcare. Gay and proud. Black lives matter.
I have all these, and my keyboard has been selfish, complacent,
Too satisfied in my place of safety. But no more. 
I cannot break windows. My knees may give out on a march. 
My money can only go so far. My shouting can be drowned out by other music. 

But I can write. And by God, I will. We are not going back. 

(c) 2024 Sean Taylor

Tuesday, November 12, 2024

Kevin Pettway, Misplaced Adventurer

Welcome to the continuing series of post-Multiverse Con "Meet the Authors" interviews! For the next several weeks I'll be showcasing interviews with the talented folks I met at the show. Be sure to check out their links and their work. 

Next in the hotseat... Kevin Pettway!

Tell us a bit about your latest work.

Having just come off the humorous fantasy series Misplaced Mercenaries (and still working on the ongoing Misplaced Adventures expanded universe), I was excited to work on something sort of different. The newest book, The Gordian, is a sci-fi thriller about a man who is paid by wealthy ex-husbands to seduce and marry their ex-wives, and thus cancel out their alimony payments. In the middle of a post-climate change Florida, he chooses the wrong woman to con and finds both his own life, as well as that of his younger sister, in immediate and mortal peril. There are also lots of monkeys.

What are the themes and subjects you tend to revisit in your work?

Flawed or broken people struggling to be worthy of their loved ones come up a lot. I’m sure that says nothing about me. I like the idea of kinda bad folks with otherwise entirely understandable motivations navigating through worlds where they don’t quite fit, and finding themselves changed from the experience. Also humor. I can’t seem to avoid it. If I wrote a story about invading aliens who only wanted to murder kittens, it would still end up funny. (Well, to me, but I’m more of a dog person.)

What happened in your life that prompted you to become a writer? 

A complete inability to take authority figures seriously. It always bugged the shit out of me to go to an office where I was compensated 10 percent of my earnings, the rest of which went into some undeserving asshole’s pocket. So I figured out a way to only split my money with people I wanted to and to take home a much bigger percentage of that pie. (Money pie is always pecan, by the way.)

What inspires you to write? 

My wife, Lena. When I don’t write I get cranky, and she yells at me until I go back to the computer and write something.

What would be your dream project?

Executive producer/writer of an HBO adaptation of my work where everyone thought my name was Carlos from Venezuela, and I got paid millions and millions of dollars. Then I get to go back to Florida and relative obscurity again, but I can afford the iPhone with the slightly bigger screen.

If you have any former project to do over to make it better, which one would it be, and what would you do?

I put too much cayenne in the chili the last time I made it and Lena didn’t eat any. I mean, I thought it was good, but I could have added spice at the table. At least I didn’t have to watch her put ketchup in it.

What writers have influenced your style and technique?

Boy. That’s a long list. I’ll try to pare it down some. I’ve always admired Roger Zelazny’s almost Hemingwayesque directness, coupled with nearly poetic prose. It’s a heady mix. Terry Pratchett is both clever and tight with his writing. No scene is wasted. Joe Abercrombie has a fantastically understated sense of humor and brilliantly drawn characters with very real motivations. I’ve found Stephen King’s endings to be hit-or-miss, but his people simply walk off the page—occasionally with an axe in their hands. Carl Hiaasen is both funny and a master of tension, always knowing when to pull and when to slacken. There are more, but that’s probably a good place to stop.

Where would you rank writing on the "Is it an art or it is a science continuum?" Why?

“Writing” is too big. It’s holding chopsticks. Everyone does it differently. “My writing,” generally, is a combination. I can’t make art without a technical command of the tools, and that includes plotting, dialog, humor, characterization, arcs, and every other piece of what goes into making a book. Thinking about it, it’s difficult to separate art from science. You can’t have one without the other. The art is the manipulation of the science. Like baking. And pecan pie. Well, now I’m hungry.

What is the most difficult part of your artistic process? 

Waiting for the editor’s notes to get back. I love to write, and I love to edit my work. But from the instant I send off that draft until I get those notes back, I am entirely convinced that everything is crap and no one will ever like it and everyone in the world is just buying my books in an effort to be polite to me. Then I get the notes and I’m all happy again.

But what if my editor is just being polite in their notes when they say the book is good? Aw, crap …

How do your writer friends help you become a better writer? Or do they not? 

It’s great having folks to bounce ideas around with who genuinely understand what you do. Our writers’ community at Cursed Dragon Ship (my publisher) is both active and engaging and filled with really smart people who want to help. A writer with a strong support system is always going to produce better work than someone writing in a hole in the ground. Unless you’re a gopher. I think they get a pass.

What does literary success look like to you? 

Honestly? There are always going to be people who are more well-known than you are, or who sell more books, or who get the HBO adaptations under a Venezuelan pseudonym. But if I never sold another book again, I would still be happy. Getting to do what I do, surrounded by the people I know and love, is a tremendous reward in and of itself. And I don’t work for assholes. (Maybe. I do work for myself, so …)

Any other upcoming projects you would like to plug? 

Going back to the top, the biggest project right now is Misplaced Adventures. Based on the world of the Misplaced Mercenaries, these are six brand-new series of novels, each written by a different, and amazingly talented, author. Every series is tonally different, but they all fit the setting beautifully. This has been an immensely flattering, humbling, and satisfying project. All the smartest and prettiest people are reading it.

For more information, visit:

https://kevinpettway.com

Saturday, November 9, 2024

[Link] Why Every Writer Should Try Their Hand at a Horror Story

by Savannah Cordova

It’s that time of year again: the leaves are changing color, the wind is getting chillier, and pumpkins are decorating doorsteps. And given that today is Halloween, there’s no better time to pen a spooky story of your own — even (perhaps especially!) if you’ve never done it before.

True, horror stories might not be everyone’s cup of tea… but as they say, variety is the spice of life, and attempting to write horror can be incredibly valuable for writers looking to refine their abilities. So light a candle and sharpen your quill — here are three essential reasons why every writer should try their hand at writing a horror story.

Horror Teaches You to Build Great Tension

Knowing how to properly build tension is a must for any writer, no matter your genre of choice. At its core, creating narrative tension requires you to understand your reader’s expectations; they may know that something bad is coming, but it’s your job to make them wonder when, where, and how. This is no easy feat — in order to properly scare your readers, you’ll need a strong understanding of how to methodically build anticipation, gradually raising your story’s stakes until its dramatic crescendo.

Read the full article: https://writershelpingwriters.net/2024/10/why-every-writer-should-try-their-hand-at-a-horror-story/

Friday, November 8, 2024

A Personal, Post-Election Manifesto for My Writing Life

Dear women, POC, immigrants, LGBTQIA+ folks who are feeling the impact of being disenfranchised and distanced after the election, please know that there are still people who see you, still people who support you, still people who love you, still people who are your allies, and still people who will fight for you. 

I'm one of them.

I say that as an old, white, straight man who personally loses nothing thanks to the election. Technically, I'm still golden. 

Except I'm not because it's not about me. It's about you. 

So...

Viva la revolución! As long as I believe the ideals written in the flag image below, I guess I will now be considered #TheEnemyWithin.

Don't worry. It won't be hard to find me when you need to report me to the Gestapo for continuing to support and fight for:

  • Women's reproductive rights at the national level
  • Equal marriage protection for lgbtqia+ 
  • Acceptance for my trans brothers and sisters
  • Open paths to citizenship for documented and undocumented immigrants and migrants
  • Restrictions on weapons designed to kill many quickly
  • Safe schools where active shooter drills become a footnote in our history
  • Restrictions to keep convicted felons out of public office
  • A world where we embrace kindness over bullying and name-calling
  • A world where we choose humility over braggart hyperbole
  • A world where facts, research, and expertise actually matter
  • Presidents who don't use hateful rhetoric to incite insurrections

If you follow my writing, you'll know my work has always leaned into multiculturalism and diversity and empowered female leads in terms of plots and characters. I think from this point on, my work needs to take a much sharper turn into Woke themes.

It's not like it's gonna hurt my sales. (Ha! Heck, it might actually help.) 

  • My trans psychic detective in the 60s with the ghost of a lesbian go-go dancer as her sidekick? I'm almost done with that novel. 
  • More BLM themes in Rick Ruby and his black world? I'm just getting started. 
  • Racist/misogynistic Thulist fascists behind the big bad in my Golden Amazon and Tribunal stories? Just you wait. 

Am I losing you as a reader when I say that? 

That's okay. Now isn't the time to back down. Now is the time to stand our ground and say proudly, "We are not going back." Even if we lost the election. This fire may not be the hottest on the block, but it's burning strong. 

I will be loud. I will be outspoken (even more) in my support for those who need their allies to be more vocal. 

Because I am and will continue to be...

#TheEnemyWithin

Thursday, November 7, 2024

The Sweaty-Toothed Madman: Reading Is Becoming; Writing Is Telling Who We Are


Editor's Note: In the interest of full disclosure, in my day job, I am a reading teacher and a literature teacher for special education students. I live this stuff every damn day of my life. And I love it.

There are hundreds of movies about writers and writing. I should know. I've reviewed many of them here for the blog. And I'm currently compiling those reviews into a book. But back to the point. Sadly, there aren't as many movies about reading. Writing is something people aspire to. Writers are something people seek to become for fame, fortune, or (for some of us) immortality of a certain kind. 

But readers, well, where are the movies that demonstrate the importance and the immortality of the flip side of writing -- READING? There aren't as many. Perhaps that's because reading is seen as something else -- a pastime, an enjoyment, an additive to life, not a calling, not an aspiration. 

Perhaps the best of the lot is Dead Poets Society. One of the things I really love about Dead Poets Society is how it stresses how much reading is tied to becoming who we are as people. Ideas are learned and adapted or learned and discarded. That's the power of reading. That's why I think a liberal arts education is so important, even for business and STEM folks.

As John Keating (played with legendary panache by Robin Williams) says in the film:

“We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, 'O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless... of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?' Answer. That you are here -- that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?”

It's not uncommon for Robin Williams to choose roles that make viewers stop and think. He's done it in his serious flicks like Good Morning, Vietnam (another favorite of mine), The Fisher King,  and What Dreams May Come and in his comedies like Mrs. Doubtfire and The Birdcage. His performances have a way of changing the viewer in the same way he explains poetry can as John Keating. 

"What will your verse be?" I can't think of a more inspiring question. 

There is a world, and you get to leave a mark on it. But how do you do that? How do you learn who you are? Sure, a lot of that knowledge comes from the people we grow up with. Family, friends, and community shape many of our views and many of our opinions along the lines of religion, politics, culture, etc. But our growth as human beings doesn't stop there. 

Have you ever heard someone complain that a child went off to college and came back a different person? The word often unfairly thrown around is "brainwashed," but let's be honest. It's not that at all. It's exposure. Suddenly that child is exposed to differing, various, equally valid points of view, and that child has the opportunity to think for himself/herself/themself and decide on their own whether the new knowledge or or the former knowledge, whether the need to think and process for oneself or the familial/community pressure to conform is the greater cause -- or how those two opposing forces are to be blended into something new. 

This takes us directly into our first responsibility when reading as lifelong learners.

"We must constantly look at things from a different way."


"Today a reader, tomorrow a leader," says Margaret Fuller, because she understood the power of opening our minds to the experiences of others that can be discovered in the written word. So many people don't have the opportunity to visit all the peoples and places in the world. Books are their tickets to these peoples and these places. It is through reading that the world becomes part of us and us part of it. 

C.S. Lewis tells us, "We read to know we are not alone," and it's true. That's precisely why Stephen King goes even further to call books "a uniquely portable magic." 

Readers consistently and continually  (even continuously for those grammar and vocabulary nerds among us) learning and growing and changing. Readers are far more likely to look back on the people they were ten years ago and shudder, thinking "Was I really like that?" And the greater variety of voices readers expose themselves to, the greater the breath of that growth -- again, not because they accept willy-nilly every new idea and every new point of view they come across, but because such exposure allows them to truly pick and choose where their truths and ideas lie for (in many cases) the first time. The more ideas readers expose themselves to, the better they become at weighing and prioritizing the varying points of view rather than becoming less able to confront them. 

"When I look back," says Maya Angelou, "I am so impressed again with the life-giving power of literature. If I were a young person today, trying to gain a sense of myself in the world, I would do that again by reading, just as I did when I was young." It is precisely by reading that writers become... well, just become. They don't exist before the "writer" begins as "reader." They are a non-entity before they discover the power of written words, or as Margaret Atwoods puts it: "A word after a word after a word is power." 

That power is the magic, the nuclear energy, the joie de vivre creates the infantile stirrings to tell stories, to matter, to exist (damn it!), and to make it know that we exist (damn it!). Margaret Atwood calls it power. Stephen King calls it magic. C.S. Lewis calls it sehnsucht

“Sehnsucht” is a German word that roughly translates as longing… but Lewis does a brilliant job of fleshing this rather bland translation... Lewis described Sehnsucht as an inconsolable longing in the human heart “for which we know not what.”  It is a haunting sense of longing which Lewis said touched him throughout his life.  It has elements of nostalgia and joy, but also an intense awareness of missing something. (Elizabeth Camden , "C.S. Lewis and Sehnsucht," https://elizabethcamden.com/2011/05/16/c-s-lewis-and-sehnsucht)

In many cases, Lewis uses the word for the long for belief and faith, but I think it's equally evident that he saw it as that longing for story within each of us and for engaging in the pursuit of the imaginative, and for him (by and large) that is a discovery that comes through the stories that are shared from others, particularly for him, fairy stories and mythical legends. Those shaped his understanding of life, not just fiction. And they enabled him to tell us who he is through works that continue to live on, both fiction like The Chronicles of Narnia and nonfiction like A Grief Observed.

What authors and what books you choose to read can and will and should help to shape the way you see the world -- and that is exactly the kind of truth that should be exposed in your writing as well. 

"We're not talking artists, George. We're talking free thinkers."


One of the great wrong beliefs about writing (or really any artistic endeavor) is that the person making art must obtain mastery. The goal of creating any kind of art isn't to become the most proficient or to achieve the capital "A" in Artiste. It is to create. It's that simple. Well, almost that simple. It does go one step further -- it is to create what is uniquely yours and can't be created by anyone else. 

That may sound broader and more daunting, but it's still just as simple. 

Reading helps you think. Thinking builds the imagination. Imagination fuels inspiration. Inspiration fills the mind to become its true self. 

The goal isn't to just rehash everything you read, but to take it in, to mull it over, to keep what feels like you, and then to dump the rest of it out and into the garbage. Or, as Keating tells his students:

"Boys, you must strive to find your own voice. Because the longer you wait to begin, the less likely you are to find it at all. Thoreau said, 'Most men lead lives of quiet desperation.' Don't be resigned to that. Break out!"

If Step One is to read, then Step Two is to take what you read and form opinions about it. Do you believe it or disbelieve it? Do you use it to build on who you already are? Or do you disregard it? Do you break it apart and mix the pieces into who you are?

Content that is consumed without being reviewed, without being experienced, without being analyzed is meaningless. Or, as Charlie (Nuwanda) tells the other members of the Society: "Are we just playing around out here? If all we do is come together and read a bunch of poems to each other, what the hell are we doing?"

Does what you read help you become? If it doesn't help you do that, then what the hell are you doing? And it's not just reading. It's experience. If what you are experiencing -- both read and lived -- isn't constantly creating and recreating you -- it's just the life equivalent of empty calories. 

Putting words into your brain should lead to something. Putting words into your brain should lead to becoming someone. 

According to Ursula K. Le Guin: 

"As you read a book word by word and page by page, you participate in its creation, just as a cellist playing a Bach suite participates, note by note, in the creation, the coming-to-be, the existence, of the music. And, as you read and re-read, the book of course participates in the creation of you, your thoughts and feelings, the size and temper of your soul."

Once that work of mutual creation has begun, we have both the authority and responsibility to share that new creation we have become, or as Uncle Walt says, ""I sound my barbaric YAWP over the world’s roofs."

"Words and ideals can change the world." (a.k.a. sounding your barbaric yawp)

What does your writing, what do your stories say about the world you inhabit? What do your characters say about human nature? What do the kind of plot your create say about a sense of fairness, liberty, existential dread, love, passion, etc. in the world? 


Even if you don't say it intentionally, these are the things that your writing will say about you regardless of your silence. Why? Because that silence isn't really silence at all. Your work has been subtly (or not so subtly) speaking about you with every freakin' word you've written. 

I've written about theme several times before. Theme is where the writer can't help but enter the work -- not in any kind of Mary Sue or Marty Stu way -- but in the authentic ways no writer can avoid. Some might say even when they try to avoid doing it. Theme is never something to be ashamed of. Theme is to writers the "barbaric yawp" Walt Whitman wants to shout from the rooftops. Theme is to writers the recognition that your opinions and your points of view and your ideals matter and that it's okay for them to be inside your work. They shouldn't be merely tolerated but celebrated. 

"Books can be dangerous. The best ones should be labeled 'This could change your life," says Helen Exley. Are yours dangerous? Are they the kinds of stories that change people and alter the ways people think about each other? Do they "happen" to the people who read them in any experiential way? According to Haruki Murakami, that's the purpose of books and stories. "Have books ‘happened’ to you?" he asks. "Unless your answer to that question is ‘yes,’ I’m unsure how to talk to you."

Even those of us who "just want to tell an interesting story and not change the world" are going to change someone. And that's okay. In fact, that's fantastic. Who wants to create art that goes into the brain and gets discarded without a second thought? Who wants to write throwaway content? What wants to waste a life creating something that didn't matter to anyone? 

It's not just a yawp. It's a barbaric yawp you're screaming. I am here. I mattered. I matter. As writers, you are taking a courageous stance. You are shouting to the universe that you are worth noticing. You are living out loud the kind of life that says "Look at me and what I created!"

"Damn it, Neil, the name is Nuwanda."


The final part of our discussion (okay, monolog) is that of not just discovering who we are and how reading plays into that discovery, of learning to put all that stuff we read together to recreate who we are, or to have the guts to start writing down on paper (or digital space) those new thoughts that stem from who we are newly recreated to be, but it is to proudly proclaim our new identity without embarrassment, to proudly show how it defines not only us as individuals but identifies our people, our tribe as well. 

I know it's a sort of insulting cliche that we all tend to want to be ourselves by copying others (often leveled unfairly against Goths by folks dressed in Country Club cosplay), but even when we do pursue individuality it is often to find where we fit in the world. In fact, it is only when we become truly ourselves can we realize where we actually belong.

I love the way the gonzo director John Waters says this: "It wasn't until I started reading and found books they wouldn't let us read in school that I discovered you could be insane and happy and have a good life without being like everybody else."

It's precisely when we find who we are, what we believe, how we spread that to others and how it helps us find "our people" that we find that safety zone from which to proclaim, as Charlie, "Damn it, Neil, the name is Nuwanda." 

We find strength in both our voices and the voices of the others we surround ourselves with. That means both human beings in our circles and the human beings in our books. As much as my people are my convention and writing buddies such as Bobby Nash, Ellie Raine, Elizabeth Donalds, Barry Reese, Sorella Smith, Nikki Nelson-Hicks, and so many others, I also consider my people to be Hemingway, O'Connor, Chandler, Hammett, Phillips, Mosely, McBain, Jackson, and the other writers whose work graces my shelves. Both the living and the dead, the near and the never-have-met are my people. They help shape me and help empower me to keep creating. 

And it is that strong, continuously strengthened voice that allows us to yawp and keep yawping, against an industry that is floundering, against a public that devalues reading more and more each year (it often seems), against family members that tell us to be sensible, against the folks who would insist our name is Charlie.

Note: Quotes used in the article come from either the movie script or from this article: https://celadonbooks.com/inspiring-quotes-about-books-and-reading/