Content Warning
So, I've gotten several reviews on Incorrigible which complain about it being 'too political' and I wanted to issue a blanket statement.
All of my novels contain things which could bother the faint of heart. Obviously, this includes sex and violence, but it also includes main characters who, to a greater or lesser degree, reflect my own worldview. The whole reason I started writing was because I didn't see enough novels out there which had protagonists with whom I could genuinely identify. I think of myself as a liberal southern gentleman. I am a father and husband and, when I look at our world, I fear for our future.
Long ago, I read Heinlein's Future History and found his descriptions of the "Crazy Years" to be fantastical. Now, just a few short decades later, I found that we're living through Heinlein's dystopian vision. If you haven't read it, I urge you to do so. Fair warning that you'll find it quite prophetic (and likely extremely depressing considering his Crazy Years get a lot worse than our current world before they start to improve) considering parts of it were written seventy-five years ago.
In my worldview, and the worldview of my protagonists, three of the biggest threats to our species' future are white nationalism, toxic capitalism and organized religion. If you think these things are great and can't stand to read a contrarian viewpoint, please feel free to skip my novels. For everyone else, I welcome your readership and your feedback. But no matter which side of the spectrum you find yourself on, I hope you'll keep reading.
Novels should be entertaining, but they are also art. And art isn't about a closed feedback loop, it's about making you feel something. One of the ways I try to convey emotion to my readers is to feature protagonists who fall victim, on a personal level, to the same things which threaten our species' future and, by the virtue of their character, overcome that which threatens to destroy them. Their journey is the point, but I personally far prefer novel where the antagonist is external rather than internal. And when writing about modern times, it's hard to find a bigger antagonist than the three groups I mentioned earlier.
I hope those of you who are either fellow liberals or are open minded continue to enjoy my work because I would rather stop writing than pen a novel which shies away from these most critical issues of our time.
Thanks for reading,
Jake
All of my novels contain things which could bother the faint of heart. Obviously, this includes sex and violence, but it also includes main characters who, to a greater or lesser degree, reflect my own worldview. The whole reason I started writing was because I didn't see enough novels out there which had protagonists with whom I could genuinely identify. I think of myself as a liberal southern gentleman. I am a father and husband and, when I look at our world, I fear for our future.
Long ago, I read Heinlein's Future History and found his descriptions of the "Crazy Years" to be fantastical. Now, just a few short decades later, I found that we're living through Heinlein's dystopian vision. If you haven't read it, I urge you to do so. Fair warning that you'll find it quite prophetic (and likely extremely depressing considering his Crazy Years get a lot worse than our current world before they start to improve) considering parts of it were written seventy-five years ago.
In my worldview, and the worldview of my protagonists, three of the biggest threats to our species' future are white nationalism, toxic capitalism and organized religion. If you think these things are great and can't stand to read a contrarian viewpoint, please feel free to skip my novels. For everyone else, I welcome your readership and your feedback. But no matter which side of the spectrum you find yourself on, I hope you'll keep reading.
Novels should be entertaining, but they are also art. And art isn't about a closed feedback loop, it's about making you feel something. One of the ways I try to convey emotion to my readers is to feature protagonists who fall victim, on a personal level, to the same things which threaten our species' future and, by the virtue of their character, overcome that which threatens to destroy them. Their journey is the point, but I personally far prefer novel where the antagonist is external rather than internal. And when writing about modern times, it's hard to find a bigger antagonist than the three groups I mentioned earlier.
I hope those of you who are either fellow liberals or are open minded continue to enjoy my work because I would rather stop writing than pen a novel which shies away from these most critical issues of our time.
Thanks for reading,
Jake
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message 1:
by
Bosbrand
(new)
Aug 04, 2022 10:55PM
It's not your politics that bother me, it's the change in how they are expressed. In your early books, your protagonists had reasons and arguments for their worldview, and I really could identify with the thinking liberal that they represented. In your later works, they scream their hate unthinkingly at the world.
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