But, what are Books in Conversation?

Before 2016, I usedTwitter with a frequency that made my husband raise his brows. Ilive-tweeted debates; I followed the news to the point that I neverlost a Breaking News Off. I had always been exposed to the news—myparents never thought to protect me from current events, for betteror worse, and some of my earlier memories are of my mother talkingabout Carter’s inauguration, watching Carter at Camp David withAnwar Sadat and Menachem Begin, and Reagan getting shot on livetelevision. And don’t get me started on the Iran Hostage Crisis. Iwas better informed than most seven and eight year olds, though myunderstanding was probably more age-appropriate.

I studied history incollege. I talked to people. I’d like to think my understandingimproved. Some things still didn’t make sense to me, but at thispoint I think that was because they didn’t make sense, period. Iwas very, very well-informed by 2016, and for more than twenty yearshad been “the political one” in most circles that weren’t,well, political. I expected Hillary Clinton to win the USpresidential election not because I wished it so, but because thesmartest people in media told me I should.

The smartest peoplewere wrong.

I was as devastatedas many other people by the results of the election. I didn’tbelieve Trump could be as evil as he turned out to be, if onlybecause I thought he would be stopped. I was wrong. But I was alsoangry that I had been so misled. By my reckoning, the media had tolda story that they thought should be true because it always had beenbefore; they saw what they wanted to see, and it wasted precioustime. (Also: “But, her emails.”)

I had alreadyintended to start writing my science-fantasy series, and I needed toknow a lot more than I already did to flesh out the family saga thatdealt with the aftermath of genocide. I had an ambitious amount ofreading to do, and after stumbling onto a book about recent Japanesehistory, it occurred to me that my time was going to better spentreading books for a deeper understanding than memorizing how manychildren a tertiary character in an ongoing news-of-the-week storyhad, or what color tie they favored. I wasn’t going to be theperson who kept track of intrigue in the presidential cabinet—boy,would that have been a full-time job—but I was going to be theperson who understood better what was really going on.

I read more history.It’s what I do and how I am, but I branched out into militaryhistory and areas of the world I’d been too afraid to delve intobecause they were so complex. I read less political history andfinally dived into Edward Said’s Orientalism.That was intense! However, I’m a better person for it. I foundIbram Kendi’s Stampedfrom the Beginning and hadmy mind blown every other paragraph as I read about things I thoughtI already knew. I learned about Asian American history and laterSouth Korean sociology. I read King (thecivil rights leader, not the horror author),Fanon, and more Said. I finally found someone who put into words myfeelings about the Syrian Civil War and reminded me that my memorywasn’t faulty. I learnedthe term “settler colonialism”, and I’ll probably never stopshuddering.

Iread about the value of solitude and that, no, you actually don’twant everyone to be a prodigy a la Tiger Woods. I read about theimportance of nature in our lives, and I read yet more Marie Kondobefore I read about what it really means to “collect”.

Becauseof what I wanted to write, Ifinally decided to readscience fiction and fantasy, even as I cringed over getting caught upin medieval imperialist fantasies. I got started with TheColors of Madeline, V.E.Schwabb’s Shades of Magictrilogy—Amazon’sVine Program was good for something—and then read Naomi Novik’sstandalone novels.I branched out to N. K. Jemison’s BrokenEarth trilogy, and started feeling seen. I finally jumped intoLiu Cixin’s Remembranceof Earth’s Past trilogy, and everything followed from there,including Ken Liu’s amazing DandelionDynasty Quartet, Fonda Lee’s GreenBone Saga trilogy, the NamelessRepublic Series by Suyi Davies Okungbowa, the devastatingstandalones of TochiOnyebuchi, and the Akata series by NnediOkorafor. (And how can I leave out the works of ShannonChakraborty?) And more! I had finally found the niche I wanted tospend a lot of time in.

Throughit all, I’ve been struggling to be the most productive, Modernperson that I can be, and believe mewhen I tell you that I loved my BulletJournal as much as I loved MarieKondo. That community, as well as the artist AustinKleon, recommended Howto Take Smart Notes by SonkeAhrens, and the idea that I could do something interesting with mynonfiction observations and book reviews beyond using theperspectives in my fictionbegan to take shape. Ahrens talked about notes beginning to“converse” with each other to create new information, and I gotexcited because it reminded me of all of the times I’d made anoff-the-wall connection between two disparate facts. I took copiousnotes in my Bullet Journal—I am Team #OneNotebookToRuleThemAll—andhalf-heartedly took some notes on note cards (500 isn’t that many,is it?).

Myhusband read many of these books with me, but at a certain point thatwasn’t tenable, and I didn’t have people to discuss these topicswith. I can write book reviews, but that doesn’t invite the samekinds of conversation on my library website as I might like. I havebeen thrilled to interview authors in the past, but while I’veenjoyed most of those writers, I wanted to put some of those peoplein the same room and have them talk about specific ideas in theirbooks. I’m really not that persuasive, especially when the subjectmatter is vastly different, and some of the authors in question aregone. (How sad to know Edward Said isn’t here for me, since he wasthe person who made me realize I hadn’t been imagining racismeverywhere I turned.) I can’t get the authors to talk to eachother, but I can—after a fashion—get the books to talk to eachother.

“InConversation” will hopefully not only apply to books but toreaders as well. Idesperately hope that people who have read some of these titles willchime in—whether in the comments or their own blogs or videos—totalk about the themes that I see and what these books meant to them.I don’t know how we get out of this mess, but I do know that wehave to do it together, in solidarity.

Atthe time of this writing,we are seeing a degradation of the establishment news media we couldonly barely imagine eight years ago. Major papers pulled endorsementsfor Kamala Harris because they were betting Trump would win and theywanted to make sure that their other businesses wouldn’t bepunished for allowing some journalistic integrity. Thisis a predictable outcome of monopolization—and by predicted, I meanpeople were warning of it in the 1990s, notjust the 1910s—but to seeit happen so shamelessly is still shocking.

DoI sound smug about my reliance on books over current event coverage?Sure, but please know that I rarely enjoy feeling superior aboutanything for long. I’m an indie author, and I’ve followedAmazon’s predations on traditional publishing. I’ve also beenaware since the 1990s that all aspects of the media landscape,including book publishers, have been subject to consolidation. Withvery few exceptions, publishers are always more powerful than theirauthors; this is the way of the world, and this is why so many of usjumped at the chance to publish independently. But when there weretwelve important publishers, authors at least had more theoreticaloptions. Today, there are four that are making decisions about thevast majority of what is being read and discussed, and publishers andeditors are not making decisions in a vacuum. Those decisions areshaping our narrative, and it is *always* worth pausing to considerto what extent our beliefs are being actively shaped. Questioningyour own beliefs is always a good idea. I would add that readingolder books—going back at least one generation—can be one way todiversify perspective, but again, those books were chosen by someoneas well. Another is to lookfor truly independent authors, although it is much rarer to findindie history and politics than it is indie fiction.

Iwant to mention a couple of invaluable resources for helping me buildmy virtual library. The selection at the New and Notable area of theBoston Public Library at Copley shouldwin an award; if I’m ever hurting for reading material, I know Ican go there and find a title that I’ll be glad to have read—Iwould never have found DonnaLeon’s CommissarioBrunetti Series withoutthem. The NoveList feature on the library website helped me find orconfirm fiction titles that enriched my life. Brooke Gladstone of OnThe Media is amazing—I found the magnificent Fearingthe Black Body on one of hershows, as well as the author Cory Doctorow, whose blogpluralistic.net has been aninvaluable source of information. I reluctantly admit that the blogof Austin Kleon has pointed me in the right direction more than once;now, I hope, someone will convince Kleon to get off of Substack andlet someone else keep Nazis company. Finally, I must also admit thatGoodreads has been helpful—not because of their algorithm, butbecause of the recommendations of several authors, including N.K.Jemisin, Ken Liu and ShelleyParker-Chan; without them, it probably wouldn’t have occurredto me to read Considerthe Fork, Oralityand Literacy, and Womenin the Picture. I also wouldnot have found the podcast GaslitNation, which has been a source of irreplaceable community duringthis bleak moment in history.

Ifany of that sounds like an endorsement for a subsidiary platform ofAmazon, it’s NOT. I’m not so grand to hope that my little projectwill be the beginning of a return to a decentralized blogosphere, butI do hope we start writing about what we’re reading and what we’reexperiencing in spaces that can’t be weaponized against us on awhim. Let’s stop worrying about SEO—the fact that you’re notgoing to make a lot of money on Facebook hasn’t stopped you fromposting there—and start talking to each other again. Who knows? Aconversation in the ether just might turn into a meaningfulrelationship...one that hopefully includes discussing new ideas, andacting on them.

I'll update this page as I post the "conversations". Thank you for your patience!

Deb in the City