Introspection

Writing Journal: Writing away on The Adjusters #52. Nothing particularly interesting to report. Except perhaps that I had a tidbit of insight for Book VI that has me reconsider one of my subplots.

Throughout May and June, I'm asking for your input about the sort of kinks you might want to see in The Adjusters.

---

Still somewhat reeling from last week's events in Isla Vista, California. It's nothing new, sadly, but the document that the killer left reads like bad fiction, and is altogether depressing. The one (only?) bright spot to come out of those events is the #YesAllWomen movement that with some luck opened a few people's eyes. Though I had to avoid like the plague most comment threads on the topic, because man! you can really see the filthy crud rising up to the surface.

Every time something like that happens, it forces me to think about my own role in the grand scheme of things. I mean, I spin tales involving misogynistic characters whose contempt for consent and agency is extreme. I know, I know—it's all fantasy, it's all fiction, but fantasy and fiction do not occur in a vacuum, they are embedded in a sociological context, and worse, those stories actually are part of the sociological context and help form it.

It's something I struggle with once in a while. Not the part about having dark fantasies—I've read enough psychology to not be particularly worried about that. But sharing them, in the way that I do, it has an impact. And I just don't know what that impact is.

I don't have answers. Just more questions. So I'll just keep reflecting about this.

In the meantime, let me close with two stories, one for whichever mood you happen to find yourself in on this rainy Friday night.

The first is a happy story where all is essentially rosy and loving and sexy, Beauty and the Geek by Frozenhero1: “The rumors were true; the geek was hung.”

The second is a dark depressing story where everyone is a bastard and the sex is... well... special, A Study in Scarlett, by AMoveableBeast: “A man follows the sway of a stripper's hips into depravity.”