WiP Wednesday: The Seastead Girl

 

There's nothing wrong with a good Dystopia, but I love positive, optimistic Science Fiction. The great thing about being an author is that if you don't see the genre you want to read more of, you can write it yourself. 

I said to myself, "I want to see some SF that has a bright future. Not a utopia, but not, 'we're all going to live in a grungy, grey, overpopulated world, eating bugs, ruled by a 'Corporation' that acts more like the CCP where the only hope is to run away or overthrow the government.'"

In the interests of full disclosure, I started a Dystopian series one year during NaNoWriMo, which was a science fiction retelling of Persephone and Hades. I found that story on my hard drive -- 50,000 words of a novel -- and thought, "Hey, this is good, why didn't I write the rest?" So I might still publish a Dysopia! 

But, ahem, back to the non-dystopia idea...

Rachel Huffmire has a post on "Hopepunk" which isn't too dissimilar to my Bright Future idea. I'm not crazy about using "--punk," as a generic suffix for subgenres of science fiction, so I won't use that term, but the spirit behind it is similar:

Just a few years ago, apocalyptic fiction was flying off the shelves like there was no tomorrow and dystopian novels were all the rage. Hunger Games. Maze Runner. 1984. The Giver. We just couldn’t get enough of it! After the quarantine hit, sweet romance, and “wholesome” stories saw a huge rise in popularity. Why? I think we all needed a healthy dose of positive escapism in our lives. Especially as wild science fiction turned into science fact. (Raise your hand if you’ve put down a book recently because it hit a little too close to home… Yeah, me too.)

Fiction has always been a great tool to help us process and experience the world in a safe environment. Unfortunately, the world isn’t always fluffy and bright and “wholesome”--we still have to deal with hard things. So, where is the happy medium between genres? How can we show the world realistically without watching depressed heros hit rock bottom as they fight dismal odds alone.

This is where hopepunk comes in.

Hopepunk is a genre that explores diverse characters banding together and fighting for radical positive change by using weaponized optimism. Hopepunk shows us a better way to come out victorious: with compassion and unity.

We might differ a bit on the details about what a bright future looks like. I don't want stories that are nothing but Mary Sues engaged in politically correct virtue signally. 'Found families' are wonderful to explore, but you know what else I haven't seen shown in a positive light in a long time? Biological families, with parents who are NOT divorced, who aren't perfect, but try their best to set a good example for their children. And how about a reaffirmation of individualism that isn't a Hobbesian straw-man that looking out for your own best interests means crushing others--rather than uplifting and empowering others?

Also, just to be clear: a story can be set in a dyspotian nightmare world and still be uplifting and optimistic. Or a story can be set in a world, that honestly, seems pretty cool, if every single character in the story wasn't an enormous jerk. Too many new series on television these days have protagonists that are simply horrible people--even when they are clearly "supposed" to be sympathetic. 

For instance, I really related to Wanda and loved the original concept in WandaVision... right up until it was clear that Wanda herself was not the hero, but the villain, who had enslaved and tortured an entire town... and then just walked away and did nothing to apologize or make up for it. That reminded me of how Game of Thrones set up Danarys as a flawed but relatable heroine ready for an arc to grow into a better person... but instead, decided to simply turn her into a hysterical, genocidal maniac who could never be redeemed. 

It wasn't the Worldbuilding in those stories that was awful, it was the character arcs.

In contrast, Katniss in The Hunger Games came from a deeply unpleasant and unfair world, but she herself was a noble heroine, who struggled for victory, and grew as a character.

I will always prefer a Dystopia with a good character to a Utopia or "hopeful" story with an awful character. 

But what I'm talking about is having both a future society and technology which evokes the feeling of, "I can't wait to make that real!" along with characters who are realistic and relatable and heroic. It also helps if the story is romantic!

It's possible to show vastly different kinds of optimistic worlds populated by quirky good characters, to have many kinds of unique yet positive visions of the future. Isn't that the whole point of science fiction? To explore many possible futures?

So in between other projects (I've been very busy!), I co-authored the outlines of the first three books in an open ended series. I'm returning to YA Romance, a genre I enjoy a lot; they will be sweet and not at all violent, appropriate even for Middle Grade readers. 

(Let's face it, although The Unfinished Song series has a young heroine, the content includes some dark themes. I originally labeled it "Young Adult Epic Fantasy" to distinguish it from the even bloodier and more cynical trends in Epic Fantasy for Grimdark stories where your favorite heroes get killed or fail or go insane and burn down King's Landing with her dragon and other annoying bullsh!t. Which just reminds me that the same dark, cynical themes which have been dominating Science Fiction have also been dominating Fantasy.)

Each book will stand alone, with its own heroine and a Happy For Now ending (happy for now because the heroines are young, so they aren't ready to get married or anything like that, but the couple is together). 

Each book will also focus on the heroine starting a business or a science endeavor that involves a real problem and a possible solution. For instance, the heroine in The Seastead Girl is trying to figure out how help create sustainable coral beds around the seastead. 

The draft of the first book is done, the draft of the second book is about half done, and there's a third book which is only a skeleton of an outline. My co-writer, Mathiya Adams, and I both have other series that we know we'll be working on next year-- I'm going to be working on the last trilogy in The Unfinished Song series (YAY!) and she's working on a new paranormal cozy mystery series. But we have agreed to make time to finish at least the first three books. After that, we'll evaluate how popular the series is before we decide if we want to write more. So let me know if you think you might be interested in this!

Excerpt from The Seastead Girl (work in progress):

While Fiona babbled, I looked around the island. I was, honestly, a little disappointed. Compared to the lush tropical green of Hawaii, the island seemed to be made of mostly pavement. There were no beaches. What good is an island without beaches? An attempt had been made to plant some trees, but they were bare, stubby saplings. They were baby trees, decades away from providing shade or fruit. I guess that was to be expected since the seastead had been operational for only four years.

The third ring was almost completely blank, except for long stretches of concrete. The lots looked like empty concrete sinks. There wasn’t even dirt in most spots. In a few areas, around the distant bend of the curve, I could see yellow construction machines toiling over big piles of dirt. Since the seastead was not a natural island, every little piece of dirt had to be imported. Most of that probably hadn’t come by plane, but by the sea train. That was out of sight deep underwater, but I knew that it connected to the seastead

The second ring was a little less desolate. Not only had dirt already been filled into those cement sinks, but grass and tropical plants had taken root. In places, houses had been built, or were, apparently, in the process of being built. At any rate, some of the lots had stacks of building bricks, piled up in cubes and pyramids.

“We’re kind of like terraformers,” Fiona said proudly, noting the direction of my gaze. “The only thing that makes what we do easier than building a colony on Mars is that we already have the correct gravity and atmosphere. Granted, that’s pretty huge, but there are also a lot of challenges to building on water that you wouldn’t have on Mars. But how can the human race ever hope to go to Mars if we can’t even conquer our own oceans? That’s what makes being here so exciting." She leaned forward confidentially. “Plus, there’s no life on Mars, but we are close to the second most intelligent life form on the planet out here.”

I tilted my head at her, puzzled. The second most intelligent life form? “Do you mean boys?”

Fiona threw back her head and laughed. “No, I only wish I were clever enough to have thought of it.”

We exchanged conspiratorial grins. I felt myself warm up to her. I don’t make jokes often, so anyone who laughs at them wins my instant gratitude.

Still giggling, Fiona corrected, “I meant ... the other intelligent species...dolphins.”

“Horses are also very smart,” I said quickly. “They each have their own personality, just like people.”

“Oh!” she said, “Do you have a horse?”

“I wish,” I said. “I had a horse, a sweetie I was able to ride once a week back in California, but she wasn’t my horse. When my dad told us he was going to get a horse ranch when I was six, I thought I was going to get a horse of my own, but no, he just filled the stable with his dumb algae tanks.”

She winced along with me. “Oh, that’s terrible," she said. "If that had happened to me, I would’ve been so mad. But if you like animals you should definitely come out to the marina with me and see the dolphins and other animals we have there.”

“Wait… You mean, you actually have dolphins here at the seastead? I thought they were just in the ocean nearby.” A horrible thought hit me. “You don’t farm dolphins, do you?”

“No, of course not! We have a rescue center to help dolphins that get injured by fisherman, or get trapped in the garbage floating in the sea, or have other injuries. We have one now that was almost harvested by pirates. As soon as you see it, you’ll know why pirates targeted that particular dolphin. But I won’t ruin the surprise.”

Contact me or email me if you want to be informed when this books comes out.