Imagination for the win!

are we all trapped in a generation ship governed by AI and headed towards a desolate exoplanet?

Do you know anyone near Ithaca NY? Today I’m doing a reading of Hermetica, my scifi novella, at Autumn Leaves books at 6pm! Spread the word!

Hermetica is not the first novel I’ve written, but it is the first I’ve published. Discounting the multiple manuscripts I completed and threw away, like any growing writer must (including one that was basically the angsty philosophical conversations held by a boatload of Vikings as they sailed back and forth between their hometown in Scandinavia and their pillaging in coastal Britain), I actually have two finished manuscripts and another half-finished draft.

The first is a thousand page high fantasy novel which will be part of a five book series. The second is a two hundred page near future scifi, which will be the first in a trilogy. For years I looked for a publisher or an agent for these books, and whenever I did get a response, it was generally, “This is really good. But there’s no way I can get it published.”

That is, in some ways, the result of the industrialization and monopolization of book publishing, particularly genre fiction. This has created a situation whereby marketing and market projections lead the writing. Publishers know what subgenres they want to publish, targeting which demographics, so they’re more interested in a certain type of story than in a good story.

Furthermore, the industry is conditioned by the conveyor belt it has become: agents and editors are reading hundreds of pitches and manuscripts a day, which means it is more important to know how to write a pitch than to develop characters, a much better to write an enticing first paragraph that leads into a comfortingly predictable genre, than to break rules and give free rein to imagination.

I would really love to get these stories published before I die, and maybe that means I need your help. Most of you probably don’t know any literary agents or editors who do speculative fiction, but maybe if Hermetica gets more buzz then a fiction publisher equipped to take on a huge fantasy series might give me a chance.

And – if you don’t think Hermetica is really that good and doesn’t deserve the support, please let me know. Serious writers need real feedback in order to grow.

So, come out for the reading if you’re nearby, and for a little weekend fun here’s the next installment of 3TFs!

Hopefully in a week I’ll have a follow up on “Our Roles for Revolution” or the third part in my series on Words Lost and Stolen.

3TFs!

You know how it works: below are three statements. Decide whether they’re true or false, and put your answer in the comments, like TTT, FFT, etc. And, if you think one of them is neither true nor false as phrased, let me know why!

The answers for the last round, from May 18, are below.

• The original meaning of “tribe” actually denotes subordination to empire.

• Excess cholesterol in the diet goes to your arteries, where it can cause plaque buildup and heart attack.

• “What happens when an immovable object meets an unstoppable force” was an important problem in late 19^th century physics.

May 18 3TF answers:

TFT!

But, since I was in a rush and didn’t copyedit, there’s a mistake in the third one so if you put down TFF we’ll accept that too.

• There are giant holes in Mozambique, South Africa, and Madagascar so global capitalism can make things whiter. (T) The reason is titanium dioxide mining. https://www.statista.com/statistics/480822/titanium-dioxide-global-production-by-country-share/

• The country name “Brazil,” which comes from the Portuguese word for ember, is a reference to all the fires set by the invaders to clear the dense forests. (F) They didn’t burn these particular forests, they enslaved Indigenous and African peoples to cut them down for export. The burning red color of the Pau Brasilia or Brazilwood tree was highly valued in European markets.

• The root meaning of the word “decadence” is a reference to the end of the world. (T) I edited it within a day, but in the original newsletter I wrote “decade” instead of “decadence.” They do share the same root though: decade, ten, the completion of a cycle and end of all things. In other words, “decadence” is a reference to a decade, the end of a cycle of ten, which in a Christian worldview was indeed a reference to the apocalypse. The word in English shifted, though, as Puritans later associated it the end of the world with the vainglorious display of wealth (good Puritans dress simply, work hard, invest smart, kill viciously, and put all their money in a bank account). In Spanish, it still refers to things falling apart.

Here’s Hermetica, published by movement press Detritus Books.

Here’s Margaret Killjoy on her podcast with the audiobooks version of Hermetica.

You can get your library to order a copy, if you’re a teacher or prof, include it in a curriculum, give it a good review, recommend it to your friends. Don’t order it on Amazon. You can get it instead from a radical bookstore that needs support, like Firestorm.

Until next time, take care of each other!