As I dip my toes into the pool of self publishing, testing the waters before I dive in, a strange pressure builds over me. You've got to publish at least four books a year to be successful. If you don't, your readers will forget about you. Amazon will forget about you. You'll vanish off the edge of the four second attention span, like the name of the cashier at the fuel station who pointed you back to the highway you got lost from.
The flip happened fast.
One moment I'm curiously
The cruelest villains are ordinary people, their thoughts and actions shaped by systems. They haven't chosen violence. They've simply become what is demanded.
There are many systems that govern our lives. Sometimes, we operate against them, fighting to break their frameworks. Often we operate within them, and inevitably forget we are even participating, taking each step without thought of the skeleton that keeps us from collapse.
Words like systems and frameworks give an
I have an awe-filled fascination with power. I've been on the underside of power systems for most of my life. They've crushed me, shaped me, reshaped and shattered me again. And yet, every time I can't help but step back, awestruck as I watch the cycle run again.
Where fantasy exposes power through spectacle, burst of magic and wonder and overwhelming force, the power systems in our lives often linger beneath the surface. They hide in a guise of the mundane, of routine and comfort, stability
