OMM: Compressing Real-Life Politics into a Fantasy Timeline

This Week's Topic: On My Mind -- Compressing Real-Life Politics into a Believable Fantasy Timeline

Today's an election day here in Ohio. We're mostly voting for who will represent the party on the November ballot. As we spin in yet another face-off between tyranny and democracy, it's too easy to see the hellpit awaiting us. As a citizen, it's horrifying. As a writer, it's enlightening fodder. To have lived through 4 years of a massive and flagrant regression in morals, ethics, and basic compassion only to be threatened (again and again) with another 4 years of it, I'm trying to set aside my disappointment and fury so that I can distill the pivotal moments that enabled The Collapse to figure out where to start The Story. 

There are so many inciting moments in real life over the last fifty to seventy-five years that it's difficult to pick where our protagonist's inciting moment should happen. How do I show an audience the erasure of self-regulating concepts like shame and public censure that once held higher authorities in check? That's something that happened over a long stretch of time, but is there a single moment--or three key moments--that can be built up to convey the crumbling of an institutional pillar? How do I show it without screwing up the pacing? It's easy enough to show capitalistic corruption leading to the downfall, it's been done a lot. Showing the process of the extinction of compassion is harder for me, mostly because it's the reality that makes me the most furious. Putting current real-world events into a fantasy setting with a story that expresses the futile yet desperate fight to revive integrity and altruism has to happen in a compressed timeline yet unfold over a believable blip in time. The pivotal events have to be pushed forward by the actions of the protagonist, when the reality involves a confluence of powerful people over generations.

As I head off to the polls, that's what's On My Mind.

Pandemics, Politics, and Face Plant

This photo is 100% representative of the past two years of writing for me. The picture is from July 2021. I'd just face-planted on a downtown Austin sidewalk. Fat lip. Broken nose. 

So yeah. Pandemic. Politics. Face-plants. I've been a mental and emotional train wreck since January 2020. I've finished nothing. I've barely managed to put one word in behind another on a book that should have been finished in late 2019. 

Why?

1. Lock down and unrelenting introvert exhaustion. Don't get me wrong. I love my family. Most of the time. But I need serious alone time. THERE'S BEEN NONE FOR TWO YEARS AND I'M ABOUT TO CRACK. Four adults and too many cats in one house has been crushing to this introvert. 

2. Living with someone who's immune-compromised. If you look up 'COVID-19 comorbidities' you'll find my father's photo. That's a lot of worry and a lot of pressure. It meant living in several months of fear that one of us would bring illness home and kill my father. As a result, no one went anywhere. For a really, really long time. Even past being vaccinated. To this day, no one goes anywhere unless double masked. It also means that while I used to be able to leave the house to get some alone time out in the world, you can see how THAT stopped.

3. I picked up a day job. Initially, when I picked up the technical writing gig, there was plenty of time and brain space for fiction. Then the projects at work kicked into high gear and ate my brain. 

Now, there are parts of life in these times that I cannot impact. I can't do anything about a pandemic. Nor can I do as much about politics as I'd like. But I can change how work happens and the day job is scaling back in January. I can't change the fact that life has fundamentally shifted. The parental units both need extra help and I'm having to adjust to the fact that alone time is going to be thin on the ground for the foreseeable future. 

Adapt or die. I thought it was a movie slogan. I'd never expected a bit of Jurassic Park to apply to me.
 

Talking too Much

This may come as a shock, but there’s a whole-ass human being behind this screen. A human with messy thoughts, ideas, beliefs, ideologies, ethics, and a whole bunch of flaws. This human also has wisely or unwisely decided that story telling is their method of making sense of the world and this life. That means putting waaaaay too much stuff in writing and then lobbing it out into the world. The open question this week is whether we as authors believe we should tone down our individual thoughts and opinions in pursuit of offending fewer potential readers and thus securing more robust book sales. 

For my part, Imma talk. I’m going to talk about everything and anything that crosses my mind or that matters to me. Politics. Cats. Religion. Cats. Beliefs. More cats. Thoughts. Feelings. Holy cats, ALL the emo. Will I lose sales over this? Probably. Do I care? Not in the least. Because I AM a whole-ass human being with that long list of stuff packed inside. AND IT ALL ENDS UP IN MY BOOKS, ANYWAY. I’m going to talk about all the things on socials because it’s truth in advertising. If you hate what I say on social media, you are not my audience. If I can’t be a sterling example, I aim to be a terrible, stern warning. I am perfectly okay with waving people off.

Every single one of my books is political. Every single one. Social justice is a major theme throughout every story I tell. If those things chap your hide, I am not your author. Straight up. I do no one any favors by staying silent to hide these facts. So, I leave money on the table. I’m foolishly comfortable with that because I do not want someone to buy one of my books and be subsequently enraged by the viewpoints and content. Those sales would lead to poor reviews. Poor reviews drag an author’s store.

Maybe I’m too enmeshed in the romance community because I’m all in for enthusiastic consent. I want readers who ache to read about all kinds and shapes of humans, aliens, love, adventure, danger, and good triumphing in the end. Mostly. I’d rather have ten people grinning over my socially awkward humor and occasionally macabre posts rushing out to buy my books than have 100 people blindly picking me up. Those 10 people are going to be much, much happier readers and that will leave me a much happier author.

Where'd our common ground go?

 

Ullr the husky pup on a front porch

How does that go…if the world had a front porch? 

My fellow SFF Seveners have posted some great takes on this week’s topic and they’re all different. Isn’t that fabulous! Each of us have our own backgrounds and experiences—differences are what makes the human race interesting…and keeps us from the robotic monotony portrayed in so many sci-fi novels. 

But with the rise of social media we’ve lost our ability to discuss respectfully and continue to be courteous afterwards. There is no longer the ability to agree to disagree. There’s no more front porch. 

I believe there’s enough politics on the socials and not enough compassion. It’s too easy to shout opinions and accusations at a computer screen and too easily forget that there’s another human being on the other side. We’ve lost our ability to sit down next to one another over a cup of coffee or plate of food. 

On Netflix there’s a show called Somebody Feed Phil. In Season 4, episode The Mississippi Delta, Phil goes to Jim’s Cafe, it’s been open since 1909. In this episode Phil joins a table of elderly gentlemen who sit at the same table every day and to hold their place they set a paper placard that states: Table of Knowledge.

This group of men are friends, despite having different political stances. Phil asks them about this and they tell him they “agree to disagree and be agreeable about it”…and because of that, they're able to talk about their opinions and continue to enjoy their egg sandwiches at the same time! 

It’s a great show if you’re up for binging. Phil is funny and the people he meets, as well as the food he gets to eat, are fantastic!

But it’s the Mississippi Delta episode that encompasses why I believe we all need a front porch to meet on. If all of our countries leaders were to sit down to eat and visit over some cocktails we might reach more of a middle ground, maybe things would happen faster and help those who really need it. 

No, I don’t think everything can be fixed on the front porch. But I do know food and drink help us find common ground and with common ground comes respect. 

I’ll continue to spread happiness and compassion wherever I can, as well as protect my mental health by abstaining from getting into politics online with strangers that tend to treat others as less than.

Have a great weekend, everyone! 

Is Shouting into Void Worth Your Personal Safety

There's a luxury to being politically vocal, and it's seated in your perception of your personal safety.  It's one big reason why men dominate the discourse and feel entitled to highjack, derail, and weaponize it. They're not worried about what they say online following them offline. Those who do not identify as male do have to worry about that in the same way we have to worry about where and how we park in a public garage, how we have to have our keys in hand before we reach our destination, how we continually monitor the number, distance, and sobriety of men in our immediate surrounds. 

Because social media is intertwined with our offline lives, we expose too much personally-identifying information to the masses. Often without realizing it because we're being social. As authors, we're being social because we need to increase our visibility, because the more people who know about us, the more people who know about our books, the more books we'll sell. It's the closest we can get to a "sure thing" for sales.  

So what does that have to do with us being politically outspoken online? These days, political activism lights a beacon for those of nefarious intent. They suddenly have a reason to take a closer look at you and what you've posted. Do you live alone? Do you have a pet that might defend you or that might make you more accessible? Do you have routine days? A regular coffee shop habit? Do you reside in a small community where strangers might be noticed? What about a city where everyone is a stranger? Are you in the frequent company of others or are you a loner? Spouse? Children? What school do they attend? What do they look like? What are their social accounts? You didn't file for copyright of your works with your real name and address, did you? What about that required mailing address in the footer of your newsletter? Used a PO Box, but still in the same city? What about your property tax records, they wouldn't happen to be under your name or a family member's, would they?  

As states resume using vigilantes to police their neighbors and reestablish witchhunts in the 21 century with cash bounties, the threat to personal safety is going to get worse. Worrying about whether your political opinions will negatively impact your author brand is pointless if your life's been destroyed because you made a stand online. 

Now, you may scoff and think, "Wow, Debby Downer, way to go with the doomsday hysteria." That's fine. That's also a testament to your perception of your personal safety as well as your privilege. Good for you. That means you have a plan for dealing with online harassment, right? You're one of those authors whose day isn't ruined because of one bad review, let alone dozens, or hundreds, right? You're ready to invest in remedying the crashing of your online store/website? You're ready to be dropped by your agent/publisher based on manufactured drama (truthful or not)? You're solid on the steps you'll have to take if the harassment moves offline, right? You've brushed up on stalker laws...and what they don't protect against, right?

This isn't to say you ought to sit down, shut up, and take what's dealt to you. It's a reminder that as an author, you've put yourself in the public space--whether you've written one book that's sold ten copies, or written ten books that sell a few hundred thousand copies each--which makes you a more "interesting" target to those who want to make trouble. It only takes one asshat with a modicum of skills to rock you back on your heels. Are you emotionally, physically, and financially prepared for it? 

If, however, you are comfortable with your safety and feel you're at low risk for harassment, then by all means, drag the fools as politely or brazenly as suits you. Be a voice for those who cannot.  

Regardless of whether you get political online or not, ask yourself, is there a better, more effective way to advance your cause(s)? Does volunteering an hour a week offline do more good than tweeting an opinion? Sure, the former is more inconvenient for you, but it's also more impactful, isn't it?

While it's great and noble to organize and fight for a more perfect union, take a beat to figure out if shouting into the void is worth the risk to your safety...and the safety of those around you. The answer might be yes. Then again if it's no, there is no shame in holding back.

Social Media, Politics, and the New Etiquette

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is "Social Media and politics: Should you speak your mind or keep your tongue?"

So, once upon a time, friends and neighbors, this used to be a subject for actual debate. Social media was new, the internet itself was new, and we had a lot of conversations that involved determining the etiquette of this new, virtual world. Especially where social media was concerned, there was a lot of advice-giving around establishing a persona/brand. Many of us first adopted social media as a way to gain viewers/readers. I joined Facebook and Twitter originally to funnel people into reading my newly created blog. So we treated social media as a kind of moving billboard for ourselves. 

Accordingly, we focused on creating a non-controversial, attractive persona/brand. We also took the longstanding holiday dinner etiquette of staying away from money, religion, and politics. It was the approach of someone who wanted to maintain family connection enough to hold their tongue for a few hours - and then depart to go live an unedited life after.

Well, a funny thing happened as the internet grew and more people adopted social media: it became a globally connected form of communication. News could be transmitted immediately, from people directly involved. Grassroots efforts became more effective than ever. It became more difficult to hide or suppress injustices. 

In ecology, we talk about the predator-prey cycle. If there are too many coyotes, they eat all the rabbits. Because there are no more rabbits, the coyotes die off and the population diminishes. With fewer coyotes around, the rabbit population bounces back - and so follows the coyote population. 

Well, those interested in perpetuating injustice, feeling thwarted by the power of the internet to drag their nasty business into the scorching light of social disapproval, countered by developing an elaborate misinformation effort. The internet and social media shared damaging information? Well, they would kill it by flooding social media with so much false and misleading information that people wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

And so the cycle continues.

I don't know if I'm a rabbit or a coyote - it could depend on the day - but I do know that the way I combat the flood of misinformation is by being authentic. I don't feel we have the luxury of presenting a bland persona to the online world. If we don't speak up, then we create a silence that allows other voices to dominate. We're not talking about a family dinner that lasts a few hours. This IS our lives, day in and day out. If we choose to hold our tongues in the name of seducing readers with a blandly non-offensive position, then we're choosing to live edited lives - and to allow the blowhards to dominate the conversation. We can't afford to hold our tongues, even for a few hours. 

Turns out, family dinners have gotten a lot more contentious, too. Frankly, I think that's a good thing. Harmony that comes from voices being silenced is no harmony at all. 

Terrible Politics

Sit back and let me tell you a terrible story. 

I have a friend who is a military veteran. This isn't hard. I grew up in a military family and on military bases. This friend is terminally ill. Doesn't matter how or with what. Just know they are. They are aware they are. This friend is also very, very poor and because of that is currently homeless and living out of a car. 

When this friend was first diagnosed, they did some mental math and decided that they'd rather die by their own hand than endure disability and increasing doses of pain medications that probably wouldn't actually dull the pain but which WOULD dull my friend. Two weeks ago Sunday, my friend emailed me their suicide note saying goodbye.

You very likely just had a visceral reaction to that. Look at it. Examine it. That reaction is political. Even if you believe it's moral or compassionate, your reaction is political because it's shaped by the culture that shaped you - a culture shaped by and that shapes the politics with which we all live. What was it? Horror over suicide? Horror over someone forced into a position where suicide seems like the best option? Or was it sadness over the recognition that this person is actively dying anyway, and deciding to take that death into their own hands seems like the final piece of control they can wrest from this world? Whatever it your reaction was, with a little thought, you can trace it to either religious conditioning, or to secular conditioning around right and wrong as defined by Western cultural and political thought.

Still, we're fortunate. Most of us can point to other cultures in the world that don't have the same suicide taboo that our Christianized culture does. We're at least aware there are other viewpoints on death in the world. My point in telling this tale is to point out how deeply entwined politics (and religion) is in our lives and our attitudes and in how we see the world. So you bet politics plays into my stories. I submit that it plays into every story and all world-building, whether we want it to or not. If you're writing romance, the notion of one person falling in love with another (and only one other) person is political. Ask anyone who's polyamorous. 

As for the story about my friend - I didn't make it up. The friend was found by the police and taken to the ER. They survived the suicide attempt, only to be denied hospice care by the VA and turned out onto the streets again today. Still terminally ill. Still homeless. Still living out of a car while I scramble for solutions for getting them housed so that Medicare can provide in-home hospice to them for however long remains.

THAT situation is also deeply political. Not to mention deeply damning of our political system.

Politics in Fiction

 

Politics. It’s all about who has what, who doesn’t have what, and who wants what. And that’s why I’d argue that politics play an important role in nearly every book, because politics are all about the conflict over power. 

Not sure how to do that? Let’s check out some examples.

I write science fiction and fantasy, two genres rife with politics, and so I give you: 

Game of Thrones—gobs of conflict over the iron throne 

The Last Astronaut—a horrific fight between us and aliens

The Twelve Kingdoms series—serious struggle over over which kingdom controls the power that forms the world

The Lady Astronaut Universe series—a struggle between those with the brains and those in control

Shadow and Bone series—a war between two powerful Grisha (power wielders) and the country stuck in the middle of it

Hopefully you’re familiar with some of these. And if you’re not, I highly suggest picking them up because these are all fantastic reads! But it really doesn’t matter if you’re unfamiliar with the plots because they’re all the same: the players without the power do three things. 

1: they strategize

2: they recruit

3: they act

But what if your inciting incident doesn’t involve a takeover/overthrow/uprising? Then I say you’re missing out on leveling up by adding in some politics. Let’s go a little deeper. My audiobook, The Mars Strain, follows this politics breakdown more than one way.

The main plot line is a Martian organism that arrives and threatens life on Earth. My heroine and her team study and figure out how they are going to counter it, they pull in assistance from the Mars Colony and the CDC, and when they’re ready they put everything they’ve got into making their plan happen. 

Excellent, right? That’s enough to carry a novel. But come on, we want a great story instead of a good one. So I added another layer.

The other thread is another entity—no I can’t say who because spoiler—who has watched the Mars Space Program from inception, utilized intrigue to recruit spies, and is now forcing the coalition to remove the program out of the US. This is big because the world is looking at the Mars Colony as the only escape pod!

What do you think? Are the politics in your story transforming the landscape of your book? 

Politics and the Protagonist

 How does politics (of the fictional world) flavor the outcome of our stories?

I'm like Jeffe in that politics is a BFD in my fictional worlds. Be it UF or HF, the underlying theme across all my stories is about changing society and social structures. After all, what is politics but the manipulation of social contracts by individuals and/or organizations? Part of the fun of worldbuilding is defining the current political landscape, then spending the next three hundred-ish pages trying to uphold or rebel against it. The protagonist's relationship to society, and, by extension, authority, is a foundational character definition. The plot unfolds from that relationship. 

I do tend to write protagonists who are in a position to affect large-scale change. Macro movers who are plagued by consequences on a micro level. The contrast keeps the character relatable while reinforcing how decisions made by the top of the food chain come to bear on individuals. That's not to say every protag has to be part of the 0.0001% of the world's elite in order to influence politics. To the contrary. The most classic hero archetype is the nobody who becomes the king/god. 

My schtick is that I like to show the repercussions of forced change. The ugly consequences of shattering social contracts. The unrest stemming from ambiguity. The insecurity of crumbling of boundaries. The conflicts of redefining social expectations. That's the reason I write series instead of standalones. I'm fascinated by what happens after the hero achieves the initial win. Not just how the hero changes, but how society changes for better and worse. How are the new rules decided, and who cements them? How does the political landscape shift and can it ever be stabilized?

In-world politics, even when subtly displayed, is the spinal disk amid the backbone of my stories. 

Worldbuilding and Political Landscapes

 

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is politics and - no, wait! Come back!!

Politics in FICTION, okay???

We're asking how politics and the political landscape of the world flavor the outcome of stories.

This is my particular catnip as the political landscape of my books is always as important - if not more so - than other facets of the worlds I build. I even teach a workshop called "Worldbuilding: Political Systems in Conflict." Why politics? Because they are about the conflicts that affect an entire society - and societies beyond them, too. As we've all learned from the political turmoil of recent years, politics affects the bedrock of our lives, our very rights as sentient beings. 

So, I argue that the political landscape is always going to flavor a story, perhaps more profoundly than the actual landscape. Sure, some stories try to present themselves as absent of politics, but basics aspects of the characters' lives - access to food, housing, education, etc. - are always going to be influenced by the political landscape.

Right now I'm looking at the release of Book #2 in my Bonds of Magic series - BRIGHT FAMILIAR releases on July 9! - and so I'm getting impassioned messages from early readers. Often when I wake up in the morning, because they're staying awake all night reading it. (Best compliment there is!) Many of them are commenting about the power dynamics and how much resonance they have - on a personal and sexual basis, but also on a societal level. When I set out to write Book #1, DARK WIZARD, I wanted to portray an entire society based on a fundamental, incontrovertible power imbalance. In the Convocation, all political power derives from the ability to wield magic. Wizards can. Familiars have magic, but can't use it - so they become the ones who are used. 

As with all of us, the politics of who has the power affects what rights we have - and which we don't. In life, love, and the pursuit of all that is worthwhile. 

     

He wanted her with consuming passion... and so did the monster within.

Lady Veronica Elal has been freed from her tower—and entered a life of servitude. It doesn’t matter that her wizard master has odd ideas about circumventing Convocation tradition and making their relationship equal. Nic prides herself on her practicality and that means not pretending her marriage is full of hearts and flowers. Besides she understands that, despite her new husband’s idealism, they face obstacles so great the pair of them could be crushed to nothing, even without dashing themselves brainless trying to fight the Convocation.

Lord Gabriel Phel has come this far against impossible odds. He was born with powerful wizard magic, the first in his family in generations. He’s managed to begin the process of reinstating his fallen house. And—having staked his family’s meager fortune to win a familiar to amplify his magic, a highborn daughter to be mother to his children, his lady, and lover—he rescued Nic in a distant land, successfully bringing her home to House Phel. Though she’s cynical about their chances of success, he’s certain they can defy their enemies and flourish. Together.

But, the more Gabriel discovers about working with the fiery Nic, attempting to learn the finer points of wizardry and marriage, the more illicit fantasies plague him. His need for Nic—and the dark cravings she stirs in his black wizard’s heart—grow daily. Though Nic has reconciled herself to being possessed by Gabriel—and indeed yearns for even more from her brooding and reluctant master—creating a new life for herself isn’t easy. Especially when Gabriel seems determined to subvert the foundation of her world. Starting with her father.

Political World Building

Political world building, next on Nov. . .no. Wait. I'm not PBS. Sorry. Still. We are examining the merits and deficits of governmental bodies in our world building.

The original question was president or monarch - I'd like to think that from a SF standpoint there are more options than that, but you wouldn't know it based on my work. My answer to the question is: Both. At the very least. Because in my main SFR series, I have at least four separate populations vying for territory and resources, I have more than one option for structuring governments.

Confession time. Never, ever in my life did I aspire to write political stories. At. All. Yet here I am, having painted myself into a corner because you can't write military-ish SFR without talking about the governments that send people into battle in the first place and the philosophies for which they're fighting. Whether for good or for ill.

Tagreth Federated Council - this is a presidential government and several chamber council system that knits a group of planets together into a pooled resource. It has draw backs because the seat of government shifts world every few years so that no one world gets all the economic advantage or becomes the seat of power. Until a ruthless, power-hungry man who thinks he's the only one with all the right answers gets hold of the reins. Things go bad fast. My heroes and heroines have to claw their way back up from the debris pile before they can do anything like damage control.

The Claugh nib Dovyyth Empire - this is a monarchy. The queen has her nobles council and her elected council of the people to which she's beholden, but she has very broad latitude, especially when it comes to serving the people. So you don't often see her cowering in a corner while the bad guys are attacking. She's usually out there on the front lines. She's more than a figurehead, less than a living god. If that makes any sense. She's young and open-minded about how a royal ought to go about ending a war. So she's willing to make alliances no one else would consider. It's earned her a few enemies. Some of them roost close to home.

The other three governments that I can think of in the books all operate based on councils. There may be a single leader at the front of that council. Or a trio. Or some number. But the point is that in SFR having just one person standing up in front saying, "This is how it's gonna be just because I say so." is only going to last as long as someone showing up with a laser pistol and really good aim. But give a population the feeling that they're represented and at least partially heard? They'll wait for someone else to rise against the government.

The only thing I wonder is whether the people in my made up worlds avoid answering the phone during election cycles the same way that I do.

On My Mind: The Political Price of Convenience

Riding heavy in my thoughts today: the political price of convenience.

It's on my mind because we're voting today in Ohio for gubernatorial primaries, a half-assed gerrymandering fix, and a tax increase to save our county's libraries. One of those votes is a no-brainer. One is a case of three-card monte that is likely to pass so politicians on both sides can say, "be grateful you got this much." Never mind that we voted--overwhelmingly (71% For)--to fix gerrymandering three years ago with an effective date of 2021 (after the next census, which is the normal timing for redistricting and one of a thousand reasons an accurate non-partisan census is critical...and why certain political entities are actively trying to skew the 2020 census through under-resourcing, lax oversight, and biased questions).

The primaries are, well, a reflection of which puppets rise to power when the public doesn't pay attention and doesn't act. It'll be interesting to see the voter-turnout numbers come morning. November isn't that far away, and it will be a make-or-break election for equality and justice on local, state, and national levels. Yet in non-presidential election years, voter turnout is notoriously low. Zealots tend to show up, the mainstream doesn't. That's how a nation wakes up one morning to find their status as a person has been reclassified as a target or as a vessel.

Why don't most US citizens 18+ show up to vote? Because it's not convenient. Time off work, queues, parking, identification on hand, etc. It really is the little things that keep most voters away. Sure, there are the bigger issues of voter suppression, bullying/threats at the polling sites, etc., and I'm not dismissing those as very real problems in far too many communities. That said, if you ask rando on the street why they didn't vote, "too busy" is the most common answer.  A pity really.

Yes, there are those who think "my vote won't matter, it's just one vote and I've more important things to do." Things like taking care of family, meeting up with friends, going to the grocery, going to social services, waiting in the ER...Yet if voting was as convenient as taking a Facebook quiz many more citizens and communities would have their voices heard.

Let's face it, Congress really screwed the pooch when they fucked off enough that their constituents started paying attention. Making the common voter care for longer than 24 hours on an election day is the worst thing a politician can do, regardless of party. Constituents with informed opinions are inconvenient and dangerous to the longevity of a political career; particularly when that career is built on corporate interests overriding community interests. Informed constituents who have minimal barriers to voting would be revolutionaries.

The technology is there to support palm-of-your-hand convenience. Can voting be convenient and secure? Of course. The power is in the local and federal governments' hands, they just have to want to do it badly enough that they're willing to pay for it...financially and politically.

Making voting convenient, and you make politicians accountable.

To Run or Not to Run

On my mind this week and the week past: Running for public office. I can't believe I said it out loud. I hate politics. Yeah, I see you laughing and nodding. We roll our eyes and say things like 'all politicians are liars/crooks/insert accusation du jour here'. It's sort of this decade's lawyer joke. Except that's not what I'm talking about when I say I hate politics. 

You know I'm an introvert. So when I say I loathe politics, I mean that the idea of going to meetings with people wasting time, breath, and money using too many words and hours in an attempt to manipulate me into doing what they want makes me want to stab icepicks in my ears. And maybe theirs. HATES it, my precious. 

I laugh nervously about my chances of even getting voted into anything resembling an office. I'm a Wiccan living in the south. That's a tough sell. And frankly, I'm kinda left of left. So I'd expect to get laughed right out of the polls. But eh. I've had my share of unkind rejection letters. Losing would frankly be a bit of a relief. And yet I still mull the idea of filing to run. 

Why would I entertain the thought of doing something like running for public office when I claim to hate the whole process?  ESPECIALLY the fund raising part? Because I've discovered there's something I hate even more.

Dead children. Specifically, needlessly dead children. I am sick to death of 'thoughts and prayers'. I am sick to my soul of a bunch of old guys in suits wringing their hands in front of the TV cameras only to back to jacking off the NRA in the back office with one hand and eviscerating healthcare that might treat disturbed, hurting children with the other. I'm done with them. It's clear that more and more parents in this country are also done with them.

So I don't know yet. I'm still noodling. Because it's something I *really* do not want to do. It wouldn't be a step out of my comfort zone. It would be a damned drop from orbit. In just a wing suit. Still. Were I to take that leap, it would be because James wrote an excellent position paper. And I feel like plenty of parents would resonate with a platform of:

No parent should have to drop a kid at school with the parting words: May the odds be ever in your favor.

My Three Favorite Charities

Jackson likes to sit outside my office window and stare at me. I have no idea why. If I offer to let him in, he's not interested. I suspect attempts at kitty mind control.

Before I go much further - and though I don't often mention my contemporary romances here - I thought I should point out that my WITH A PRINCE takes place during U.S. Thanksgiving. Which is this week for us! So if you or someone near and dear who loves romance, are looking for a seasonal read. This is a fine choice. There's cooking, the actual feast - and dinner table drama complete with hashtags. It's very fun.

And because it's Thanksgiving, this week at the SFF Seven we're all talking about our three favorite charities, those ways we give back and share our bounty.

I'm not a big fan of broadcasting how and when I give to charity. I'm a big believer that the only true charity is anonymous, that you're only truly giving if no one knows you've done it. If people know, or if you make a big deal of yourself, then it can be more about ego than actual giving. This is one reason I rarely get involved in book-selling efforts that give a percentage to charity. To my mind, this is using giving as a marketing technique. I think it's fine to funnel proceeds to a worthy cause, but if the core reason for doing that is to increase sales, then I find that squicky.

I do, however, believe in financially supporting the organizations and causes I believe in. As much as possible, I prefer to pick and choose those myself.

Go Fund Me

This is a general bucket for my very specific choices. I like Go Fund Me because I can support individuals who need help. A lot of the time these are older authors who've fallen on hard times - many writers are self-insured, which means they might have crappy health insurance or none at all - and their incomes can be uneven. It's a great way to lend a helping hand and I feel the small amount I can afford goes a long way, with no corporate overhead to support.

Planned Parenthood

I believe that core to women's ability to live and work as free human beings is access to birth control and abortion. Both of these are about control of one's own body and health. Also, I believe all children in a wealthy, technological society should be wanted, planned, and given every advantage, pre- and post-natal. Thus I support Planned Parenthood, which is also often the only source of health care, full stop, for many lower income women. I give often.

Political Campaigns

I was raised in a politically active family, and I donate to the campaigns of the candidates who espouse the values I believe in. With a House of Representatives chock-a-block full of GOP privileged rich kids that just passed a tax reform bill that will hammer the middle class while giving the wealthiest Americans tax breaks, you can believe I'm donating to Democratic candidates across the country. Until we legislate campaign finance reform, the only way to battle money is with money. And it's no longer enough to support only local candidates - if senators and representatives from other states can mess with my health insurance and ability to pay my bills, you bet I have an investment in whether or not they're re-elected.

Unexpectedly political for a Thanksgiving post! But so it goes in the land of plenty, where we've passed the one year mark since Trump was elected and the GOP given free reign to loot as much as they can until we clean house in the 2018 mid-term elections. 

Next Thanksgiving, I'm hoping to be a LOT more grateful!

In the meanwhile, enjoy your own celebrations of gratitude, whether it be with family, friends, or savoring your own quiet. Eat something delicious with joy, get some rest, do something only because it's fun, and give something to someone else anonymously. May it bring you happiness. 

A Place for Politics

Remember group projects in high school? Or maybe it was in a college class. Or around the meeting table at your first job. You had an idea. A good one. You started talking. Everyone was looking at you. And then one of the other people started talking. As if you weren't speaking. All those people who you thought had been paying attention blink and turn away.

No one ever asked you to finish your thought. No one ever asked to hear your idea. It's as if you didn't even exist.

If you're  better human being than I am, you don't stand up and scream, "Oh my GOD WILL YOU LET ME FINISH?"  (FYI - this rarely actually gets your ideas listened to. It may get security called. Only once did a manager laugh and tell the developer trying to talk over me that he'd earned getting yelled at.)

If you've ever said "I wish *insert famous person name here* would stop talking politics and go back to . . . " you're guilty of doing to them what was to you. (Guys, help me out here - I have someone suggesting this being talked over thing only happens to women and minorities. Rebuttals??)

This is the long way of saying that my beliefs and I are a package deal. That's why if you read my books - especially my sci fi, you know my politics and most of my belief systems. If you're on my personal Facebook page, you know my politics. I won't hide because life is too short to live on mute. I mean to live my life out loud. Too much time and energy has gone to making sure other people were comfortable, whether I was or not. Maybe I'm just all out of fucks to give because my loyalty isn't to anyone party or person. It's to ideals. Rights. Equal protection for all people under the law. Very strict separation of church and state.

I think that one of the great things about living in the United States is that you are called by your civil duty to participate in the democratic process. Plenty of people abdicate that responsibility. Fine. That, too, is a right. But frankly, anyone with a pulse has the right to an opinion and the right to voice it. I suspect that when well-known people take heat for expressing their opinions, it's because someone envies the platform and reach (not to mention it's only when the opinion disagrees with someone's preconceived notions.) No one says, 'I wish famous person x would shut up.' when the opinions agree. Which is code for, 'I'm uncomfortable and I don't want to be forced to examine my thoughts and beliefs!' I get it. It's not easy. But the last time it was legit for any of us to express that kind of discomfort it was because we were doing unspeakable things to our diapers.

So you'll likely also see on my Facebook page that I don't shut down political opinions that differ from my own. Because I want my thinking challenged. Not that I'm above participating in the world wide call upon witches to spell cast Saturday. The stated goal is to bind the current US administration from doing any further harm. I prefer something more colorful, I think. Maybe a spell inspired by a new Chuck Tingle title. I'll leave the content of the spell to your imagination.

Any spell suggestions? Or requests? (Remember the genie in Aladdin - I won't kill anyone and I won't bring anyone back from the dead . . .)

Should Authors Comment on Politics?

This photo didn't come out in focus - too dark - but I'm sharing it anyway because the moment of this full supermoon rising through clouds in Santa Fe during a penumbral eclipse was absolutely incredible to see. My wonderful friend, Anne Calhoun, was visiting. We climbed up onto the roof and watched the sun set and the moon rise. Neither of us got great photographs.

Too much magic, maybe,

But you're not here to listen to me talk about friendship, moonrises and magic. Or maybe you are. If you know me or follow me on social media, you'll expect this sort of thing. If you clicked on a link because you found the topic interesting, you're maybe wondering when I'll get to the point.

Eventually, my new visitor!

Because this week's subject is Hot Topics & the Author's Social Media Voice, it seems the perfect time to point out that the these three things - voice, social media, and an author's response to hot topics - are inextricable. Let me unpack that a bit.

Voice

The best explanation of "voice" that I've ever heard - that is, the one that made me understand what an author's voice is - is that it stems from our beliefs.

In the writing world we spend a lot of time discussing voice. Readers recognize it, even if they can't articulate how or why. Industry folks will almost uniformly agree that it's an author's voice that keeps readers coming back for more. Authors, especially beginning ones, work to refine their personal voice. Which isn't easy, since it's not simple to explain, define or teach. Daunting for an element so critical to being a successful author.

One thing is clear - voice cannot be faked. It takes sometimes years of writing, and likely publishing, to refine that voice to its purest form. I saw paintings the other day by a 78-year-old artist. Her recent work is distinctly hers, but she completes in a few brushstrokes what she did with thousands in her youth. I saw that and thought, wow - look at how she's honed her voice. I did a post a little while back that talks about voice more. (In looking it up, I'm amused to find a photo with it of another Santa Fe landscape. See? My voice.)

It was Jayne Ann Krentz who, in a workshop, said that voice arises from our beliefs, from who we most essentially are. She's interesting because she's reinvented herself as an author several times, and has written under several names, including that one, Jayne Castle, and Amanda Quick. Each name indicates a different genre, but many of her readers (including me) read all three because we love her voice. Many love "all three authors," not realizing they're the same person.

Hot Topics

Which leads us to what we each believe in. In talking about "hot topics," I'm not referring to the clothing store (though I totally bought the Loki dress) or about the latest celebrity gossip, I'm talking about the tremendous political upheaval we've been going through all around the world, but most pointedly for me, in the U.S. with the 2016 presidential election.

The standard social media advice for authors is to stay away from politics. And I have several friends who follow it assiduously. They never post anything publicly on which way they stand. The argument is that politics shouldn't enter into what is essentially a conversation with your readers about books. I can see that. In fact, I often follow it. For the most part I'm not all that interested in debating politics anyway.

But this last election put me to the test. I kept coming back to Edmund Burke's quote: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” That's something I believe to be true.

In a typical election, I'm not going to say much. I'm not an economist, so I don't have strong opinions on the federal deficit and so forth. To a great extent, I don't think it matters greatly if the Democrats or Republicans hold the White House, because they tend to balance each other out. I take a long view on these sorts of things. I still do.

However, I do have strongly held beliefs that are impacted by what's going on. I believe that women are people first and female second, and that the key to women having personal and financial independence and equality is access to birth control and abortion. In fact, I believe all people are people first, and the rest - gender, sexual orientation, skin color, social status - all comes after that. I believe all people deserve to be treated as people, that some people don't get better perks than others, simply because of what family or set of genes they were born into.

I also believe that power and the pursuit of power corrupts.

If you've read my books, I suspect you'll know all of this about me because my beliefs come out in my work. That's my voice.

Social Media

The thing about social media is, we're trying to do two things at once: be our authentic selves and also promote our books. So, the theory that authors should stay away from controversial topics comes from the concern that offending readers could impact the perception and sales of our books.

Which, it could. It happens all the time. I do it myself. If I fundamentally disagree with an artist's beliefs and actions - Woody Allen comes to mind - I won't support them with my money. That's my vote and I get to do that. We all do.

Particularly in this day and age, social media is one of the primary avenues for authors to reach readers. However, as one smart literary agent, Jennifer Udden, says, "Social media is for promoting authors, not books."

And that brings us back to the sticking point. If social media is about the author, and the author's books are about their voice, and voice is about our beliefs - how can our social media presence NOT involve our beliefs?

It can be done, sure. As I said, I know some who can do it. One author friend of mine who steadfastly refuses to reveal her politics online commented to me, "Anyone who reads my books should be able to figure out where I stand." Some people, like her, are able to maintain a greater division between their public and private presence.

After long thought on the matter, I finally came to terms with the fact that this isn't me. I started out as a writer of personal essays and I've long had a greater degree of sharing my personal life and thoughts through my work. That's who I am. And it's important to me to be honest about who I am - which includes my beliefs - in a congruent way. That means in public or in private. I'm not willing to disguise those beliefs, which is what not ever commenting would amount to for me, particularly in favor of marketing my books.

In standing by my beliefs, I also accept that some people won't agree, and that they'll express that with their monetary vote. Perfectly legit. Ultimately it all comes down to personal choice.

It's probably something that's obvious by now, but - Personal choice is something I strongly believe in.

Politics Optional

When two unrelated factions meet, the thing that keeps everyone alive to go home at the end of the day is politics. Unless you're George R. R. Martin.

Case in point: This photo is politics in action. Two felines, both alike in dignity, on the sunny dock, where we lay our scene. (With apologies to Shakespeare) Max (the boy facing the camera) is a neighbor who desperately wants to be accepted by my cats. He is particularly taken with Hatshepsut (foreground). She, being a decade older and wiser than he, has been known to shove him in the water. True story. This moment of détente brought to you by catnip. I'd make a joke about US politics needing some weed, but frankly, I think maybe anti-psychotics are called for at this point.

So there you have it. Do I include politics in my SFF? Absolutely. I contend that it's impossible to avoid

Humans are social animals, which naturally sort themselves into hierarchies as a matter of survival - this is the stuff hardwired into the oldest parts of our brains. When we were still cheetah-snacks wandering the savannahs, the social hierarchy determined who led a group. Who ate first. Who reproduced. Who lived. Who didn't. Jockeying for position within a given social structure is part of being human.

Since Science Fiction is as a genre, one big, open ended 'what comes next?' there's really no way to avoid politics. Which isn't to say that an authors personal political views ought to intrude. They shouldn't, however, I admit that my voice, my experiences and my world view are so colored by my beliefs/thoughts/ideals that I suspect it all bleeds through. If my characters hold political convictions, I want them to belong to those characters, not to me. I'm not writing to make my characters a megaphone for my own views.

That said. I have a fondness for shining light on certain marginalized populations. As a result, many of my characters hold alternative religious views, or are other-abled, or are non-hetero. In all those cases, there are politics surrounding the issues those characters face. And because I'm usually writing romance where HEAs are the expectation, my politics DO slip into the story - I'm going for acceptance and equality. Some days, like today, after more men were killed by police (and I freely admit I will never have the full story on those incidents, but the mounting death toll of young black men in this country is unacceptable) I wonder if inserting politics into writing isn't a duty - a way of saying something, as Elie Wiesel urged - a way of sounding the alarm at enough of a remove that the message of and for compassion slips in beneath a reader's skin and takes root.

I don't know yet how to respond to something that bothers me so deeply about my society. Maybe it requires someone more skilled than I. All I know is that I grew up on the golden-eyed optimism of Star Trek. Apparently, some of that optimism rubbed off on me. Because I do think politics end up in fiction anytime there's more than one character on a page. What I don't know is where the line in the sand lies. At what point does a socially conscious scifi story turn into a morality tale? I'd prefer to stand firmly on SFF side of that equation.