The Writer's Block Radio Show Interview

On December 7th, I had the privilege of being interviewed on The Writer's Block Radio Show. The show is unique in that the hosts take time to read the books and so are able to discuss them in depth. In my case, Jim chose to read The Product and Bobbi took Chasing Freedom. We talked about my choice of dystopia as a preferred writing genre, the different characters and concepts in my books and of course the ups and downs of the creative process.

It was my first time being interviewed by hosts I didn't know personally through online interaction, and it was a pleasure meeting both Jim Christina and Bobbi Bell. It was an all-around fun experience, even though we spent a while discussing some rather heavy topics. Those who heard my interviews in other venues will still hear plenty of new material because many of the questions were really interesting and different. I hope my answers would prove interesting as well. Enjoy!

Listen to the podcast here

Oh and of course: BUY MY BOOKS :) 

Chasing Freedom

The Product

Coming Nov. 8 in MAGA 2020 and Beyond: Exile, a Short Story

When I first heard of a pro-Trump anthology intended to show the bright side of Trump’s election, I was curious about the concept, but had no thought of contributing. For one, stories of a great future are hard to write. There is less conflict in a utopia. Typically, positive future stories tend to be science fiction, with Star Trek being probably the prime example. The appeal of Star Trek at its best comes from the sense of wonder and adventure, and the conflict, when it happens, is usually external in nature, be it hostile aliens or technical difficulties.The Federation is essentially a utopia, but the show doesn't linger on the details. If someone decided to tell a story of the greatness of life in The Federation, it would likely be a snooze fest.

Add to it the fact that I am a dystopian author, and you can see why I initially scrolled on by when the submission call came across my Facebook feed.

But then, as I suppose is the case with many speculative fiction writers, I started thinking of the “what if.”

What if a group of hardcore Trump opponents decided to separate themselves from the society, not through a secession that created two side-by-side states, but by entirely cutting themselves off? (Think the Galt’s Gulch, but populated by… let’s just say they’re not the Randian hero types). No flow of information. No knowledge whether Trump’s policies succeeded. As the first generation dies off, even stories of the past are fading. The outside might be great, or it might be an Apocalyptic wasteland where people starve in the streets. The only way to know is to leave, but there is no coming back.

What would you do?

Sure, your life isn’t great. Work is hard. Food is limited. There is no privacy. Government officials watch your every move.

So leaving is a no-brainer, then?

Well…

You have a job. A place to live. Food. Friendship. Respect. It’s not much, but it’s a life.

Do you throw it all away and venture into the unknown?

And just like that, it’s not so simple, is it?

As an immigrant whose family waited for permission to leave the Soviet Union for ten years, let me tell you: it’s really not. When that final moment comes, when you realize all you’re giving up, when you suddenly remember the little things about your life that you do like… No matter how motivated you are, the doubt will be there.

Conversely, what if you were content to stay? How would you react to someone who wanted to leave? Would you feel worried, angry, betrayed, or some combination of both? Would you try to stop them?

And so, I had enough questions in my mind to write a story of almost 6,000 words called Exile. I hope you enjoy the result.

Read the full Press Release and Pre-Order MAGA2020 Here

Guest Post by Matthew Quinn: Classism, "Evil Rednecks" and The Thing in the Woods

Matthew Quinn is an author friend of mine who has just come out with a new book on Amazon. Below are this thoughts on the traditional horror genre and how his work challenges some of the stereotypes of the classics. I am not personally a horror fan, but I love it when authors veer from the tired tropes and create something fresh, which is why I agreed to host Matthew's promotion on my blog. Enjoy!
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Once upon a time, I was visiting the East Cobb Borders and read from a Call of Cthulhu role-playing game manual. The manual begins a proposed gaming scenario describes how in many cases the Great Old Ones and other horrors from beyond are worshiped in rural, isolated areas. What happens if these areas become suburbanized? The book uses the phrase "supernatural Love Canal," a reference to a New York neighborhood built on top of a forgotten toxic waste dump. That scenario got my creative gears turning and soon spawned The Thing in the Woods, which takes place in the small town of Edington just south of Atlanta. Edington is rapidly becoming a bedroom community for Atlanta, much to the annoyance of Phil Davidson, owner of a local barbecue restaurant and the high priest of a cult worshiping an alien tentacle monster in the local woods.

However, this is not a book about evil "rednecks." H.P. Lovecraft, the man whose writings on Cthulhu and other cosmic horrors, was  classist toward "degenerate" whites and rural folk as well as a racist toward non-whites and "ethnics" like Italians. I'm not going to look down my nose on people who live outside the big cities, the people who disproportionately serve in the military and produce much of our food. This is reflected in three of the Edington-born characters in The Thing in the Woods.

The female lead in Thing is Amber Webb. She's an Edington native, a high-school senior like Buckhead transplant and story protagonist James Daly. Instead of a being a cultureless hick, she's active in the local arts scene and the community theater, including a major role in the play Once Upon a Mattress. She has no objection to another white teenage girl dating an young Indian man from Atlanta, and when other members of her small-town girl posse believe James to be a murderer, she's open-minded enough to dig further rather than merely assume. We all know what "assume" stands for, after all. And when the cult unleashes its wrath, her initiative and sheer nerve come in handy.

Another character from Edington is Sam Dixon. Sam served in the 1991 Persian Gulf War (he explicitly references Medina Ridge, and the First Armored Division was at other battles as well). Given his references to "damned blue on blue," at times he was in danger from both the Iraqis and his own side. Since the war, he's worked at the local sheet metal plant and done well for himself. He is a devoted husband, although he and his wife are unable to have children. Although he serves Phil and the abomination in the woods, he has a very strong sense of fair play and duty toward his fellow veterans and isn't drinking the racist Kool-Aid poured by another cult member who is a bigot. It's that moral sense that propels his story arc. I am reminded of Romans 2, which states every man has the law of God written on their hearts.

Even Phil, for all his many faults, is not without his virtues. He's a decorated Vietnam veteran, a member of the Third Marine Division who saw action as a junior officer at the Battle of Con Thien. He pays his restaurant employees more than the typical wage to keep the wheels of the local economy spinning and to encourage employee loyalty. This is much like the great industrialist Henry Ford, who paid his employees more than the usual wage for the auto industry to ensure his employees could buy his cars. Phil also has members of the cult keep up properties left vacant during the recession, to ensure they don't get stripped for metal or become drug houses. Although his methods are extreme and immoral, keeping Edington a functional community in an dark time is very important to him. And he's a father and grandfather who prioritizes the welfare of family, even very distant relations like his cousin's stepdaughter, Sam's wife Brenda.
So if you like the style and concepts of H.P. Lovecraft but are tired of evil hick stereotypes, check out The Thing in the Woods

The Right Geek Chat: Dystopia, Darkness and the Real World

It was my privilege to be the very first guest on the newly launched The Right Geek show hosted by my friend, blogger and all around great gal Stephanie Souders. We discussed my novel Chasing Freedom and other related topics, including but not limited to:

- World-building through the eyes of the characters vs. the narrative style
- Creating realistic "bad guys"
- Using one's life experiences add realism to a dystopian world (OK, coming from the former USSR, I have an advantage on that one, but other authors can apply the concept in their own way)
- Classic vs modern dystopias
- Can A Handmaid's Tale happen here?
- How did "dark" come to equal "deep" and can anything be done to change this perception?

All of the above is covered in the first forty minutes or so, at which time the technology gremlins attacked and my side of the conversation became very difficult to hear. You can still figure out most of what I said from Stephanie's follow-up and responses. We were talking mostly of the current college campus environment and whether or not it indicates a fundamental shift in the mood of the country.

I want to thank Stephanie for having me over and making for a very intellectually stimulating conversation. I hope everyone tunes in for her future live broadcasts to make her new show a success.

Youtube video of the full interview is below.

Chasing Freedom is available on Amazon.

Make sure to check out Stephanie's blog for reviews and commentary.

Movie Musings: The Fate of the Furious

***Cross-posted from SuperversiveSF.com***

On one level, The Fate of the Furious is the easiest movie to review:
1. Great fun

2. Leave your brain (especially the part that understands physics) at home

And now, folks, your seat belts (HA!) because I will try to make this post deep. How deep? Glad you asked. I’m going to take the recent discussion of what qualifies as superversive fiction and apply it to this movie. If you’re rolling on the floor in fits of laughter, I don’t blame you. But stick with me here. Just because something is lowbrow, doesn’t mean it can’t be superversive, at least in part. And if we can see superversive elements in this piece of schlock, maybe they would become easier to identify elsewhere. Thus, let the experiment begin!

Aspiring/Inspiring. Our heroes are far from being role models, that’s for sure. But are they reaching for something higher? Are they attempting to improve the world, what little of it is in their control? The opening segment includes a prolonged drag-racing sequence that ends with Dom Toretto acting with both generosity and honor towards a person who really deserves neither. Much later, when the villainess questions why Dom seemingly rewarded the man who tried to kill him, the response is, “I changed him.” Does it work like that in real life? Probably not. Thugs don’t choose to join the side of light because of one event, not commonly anyway. Is it possible? Yes, I suppose it is. Is it something we’d like to occasionally see in our art? Absolutely.

Virtuous. I can see how this requirement can be viewed as problematic at first glance, but we need to remember that superversive heroes don’t need to be perfect. They do, however, need to know right from wrong, and more importantly, the story itself must be clear on the matter. An advantage of a well crafted dumb action movie is that the central conflict is very clear. The good guys are… maybe not all that good, not all of them, but they are working for a good cause. And the villainess Cipher, played with obvious delight by Charlize Theron, is as cold and vicious as they come. Her purported justification sounds vaguely noble from throwing around words like “accountability,” but at no point are we sympathetic or thinking, “Well, she’s kind of right…” Nope. Not even close. In this story, shades of gray are non-existent.

Heroic. This one is easy. Unlike in some of the other entries in F&F franchise, the protagonists’ motives here are mostly pure: family, loyalty, honor and oh yeah, saving the world. There is revenge mixed in for some, and an opportunity for a second chance for others. In particular, Deckard (Jason Statham), a villain from one of the previous films, is at first hard to accept as one of the good guys, but he does redeem himself in one of the more spectacular and absurd scenes in a movie that’s full of them. In the end, they all rise to the occasion and do what they must to fight evil, no matter the cost. Additionally, in what to me is the stand-out moment of the movie, Letty bets her life, without hesitation, for a chance to reach and save her husband who appears to have gone rogue. It plays much better if you know the history of these characters, but it’s powerful in either case.

Decisive. Again, easy, as per requirements of the genre. The protagonists don’t have time to agonize over their choices, in part because there aren’t too many. Saving the world is a non-negotiable goal. While there are heart-breaking scenes, we see not a hint of the modern “why me?” angst that has infected even many of the superhero movies. They hurt and they grieve, but never stop moving towards the goal.

Non-subversive. You’d think a movie in a franchise built around essentially glorifying outlaws would be subversive by definition. Not so. This entry in particular has a villainess whose main intent is destruction of the current order, but there’s even more than that. In one of the obligatory Villain Exposition scenes, she’s intent on convincing Dom Toretto, the man who values family and faith, that he is wrong in his priorities. It’s not enough for her to use Dom’s skills. She has a need to destroy who he is, to prove that his life has no meaning, and by extension, no one’s life has meaning. This is an important point. If life is of no value, if family, faith and honor are but an illusion, then mass murder is a perfectly acceptable stepping stone to one’s goals. The villainess is a nearly perfect embodiment of subversion. She would not, in fact, be out of place in an old-fashioned fairly tale, from the time before our culture has developed a need to understand, justify, and sympathize with villains rather than to advocate and celebrate their unconditional defeat.

There were other things that are remarkable on that front. For all the banter and joking around, there’s not a hint of irony when it comes to good old fashioned values. Dom talk constantly about family as if it’s some kind of magic mantra needed to pull him back to the light. (One reviewer commented that at times the movie has a feel of a GOP convention, with the word “family” being mentioned over 50 times.) They pause before a meal to say grace. Crosses figure prominently, both in the visuals and once actually in the plot. Two young hot-blooded men are courting an attractive woman, but that’s where it stays. There is no obligatory danger-inspired hookup, but on the flip side, no blanket rejection of men or romance either. It’s a small scene, fun and light-hearted, but also old-fashioned. And in the end, for all the ridiculous special effects and action, I think this is one of the reasons the franchise has endured. These movies entertain and amuse without tearing down, and they leave you, if not inspired, at least satisfied with a simple tale that shows the world working mostly as you know it should. Not so bad for a piece of dumb action after all.

Superversive Chat: Love Is In the Air

For those who missed today's live chat, the replay is below. Romance is a part of life, so naturally it plays a large part in fiction of all genres. Whether you're a writer, a reader, or just someone interested in cultural trends, this chat has something to offer. Among the topics: how cultural/political changes affected the way romance is portrayed in fiction; thoughts on writing male and female characters; including romantic subplots in non-romantic stories; rise of fan fiction and "slash" fiction and many others. In addition, participating authors discuss their own works as they relate to the topic of romance.

Thanks to Jasyn Jones (a.k.a. Daddy Warpig) for hosting the chat and L. Jagi Lamplighter Wright for moderating.