Chuck Wendig's Blog, page 83

Ruminations On The Release Of Empire’s End

Empire’s End is now out in paperback.

(Indiebound | Amazon | B&N)

I don’t expect this to be the end of my Star Wars journey — at least, I certainly hope it isn’t. With a story in the upcoming From A Certain Point Of View charity anthology landing, I’ve got at least one more trip to a Galaxy Far, Far Away that I can talk about.

But I have some thoughts.

Uncomfortable thoughts.

I started writing the Aftermath trilogy in March 2015, and finished writing the first draft of the third book in July of 2016 — months before the election, but also in the midst of the very contentious campaigning. I had no idea what was coming, but in a way, I probably should have.

The Aftermath trilogy serves as a pivot point between the two cinematic trilogies — the so-called Original Trilogy and the newest one that began with The Force Awakens, and that fulcrum point is really the fall of the Empire and the rise of the First Order. The Empire has long served as a galactic sci-fi stand-in for the Nazis, and I think it’s safe to say that the First Order is a neo-fascist resurrection of that, just in better haircuts and nicer outfits, much like we see now the surge in white supremacy. Our current crop of nationalists and neo-Nazis wink and shrug and pretend they’re not the incarnation of the Third Reich, but then they get the same Nazi prick haircut and they stomp around with military rifles and they shout Nazi slogans and pretend they’re hipsters doing it for irony’s sake when really, they’re earnest as anything.

And some of them make me think a little of Kylo Ren: a stung, weak, radicalized man with Daddy Issues, who idolizes the glory of an Empire past, who has tantrums and is a bully and yet knows in his heart of hearts that he can (and will) be beaten by a woman. He pretends to be more powerful than he is. He has a lightsaber that fizzles and spits — a weaponized mirror of his own emotional state. He is angry. He is petulant. You could half imagine him thinking of the rest of the world as full of snowflakes and cucks, even as he melts down at the slightest insult, even as he falls to Rey’s saber — into, you guessed it, a pile of snowflakes.

But in the Aftermath trilogy, he’s just a baby — first in Leia’s womb, then born in the world at the end of Empire’s End. All his potential is there, both the potential to be a force for good, and the potential to be a force for darkness. Both equating to the potential for change, good and bad.

And I think too to Mon Mothma in that serious, a beleaguered politician, a woman who has had to make difficult decisions and who has been punished for them in the media — you cannot rule a galaxy, or even a small part of it, without accumulating some baggage. It means she cannot simply spout platitudes and slogans and win an election: she’s stained by the realities of the office, marred by the imperfections of the role, nearly doomed by hard choices.

And then I think about the reaction to the books — yes, yes, I know, some people didn’t like Aftermath because of the writing, or the present tense, or the fact it was not immediately and directly about the principle three characters, and I get that, and I hear you and I’m sorry the book did not satisfy you on those fronts. But I also think about the tweets and emails I still to this day get about how people are mad about Sinjir and Conder, or mad about Eleodie Maracavanya, or mad about Rae Sloane — and these emails are 99.9% of the time from people who appear to be… well, stung, weak, radicalized men. Maybe they don’t know who they are or where they’re headed, but they’re the types to call you a snowclake and a cuck, even as they melt down from safely within the confines of their mother’s basement, even as they yell at you online near a pull-out couch-bed full of rifles and pistols. They want me to know that their complaints about my novel aren’t about the LGBT stuff or the Grand Admiral who is a woman of color, but rather, about ethics in HoloNet Star Wars journalism, dontchaknow. About how well actually, zhe and zher are not words, dontchaknow, no no, we’re not Nazis, just grammar Nazis, but also, didn’t Hitler have some cool ideas, hey, come check out my Twitch stream, my podcast, no, no, that Swastika and pepe frog are just ironic, I’m just a funny ol’ silly ol’ troll?

Then I think about the prequels, and how — no matter what you felt about their storytelling — they predicted some of our political realities, too. Sinister forces lining up, spinning crises not to bring us together but rather as an excuse for greater war, to stir up fear, to seize power. To destroy our safeguards — and our guardians. Guardians who were themselves wildly imperfect and eager to lend a hand in their self-destruction. In the prequels, those manipulations and falls-from-grace were more overt (and arguably, appropriately more cartoonish), but easy enough to find some parallels in the last two decades.

I think about how Rogue One landed right after the election — here came a movie about the peak of the Empire’s power, and how a small but focused resistance found a crack in the mantle to exploit. And how those character sacrificed to free a galaxy from authoritarian rule.

I think about Rey and Finn and Cassian and Jyn and Poe, I think about Sinjir and Conder and Rae and Eleodie, and I think about how white guys (like, well, me) are no longer finding pop culture to be as perfect a mirror for them as it used to be. How they are not reflected as constantly — their narcissism, long fed so achingly on the food of that reflection. But that reflection is now complicated, it’s changed, and to them feels like a damaging, howling void even as it seems to uplift others at their expense. And these men feel lost and alone, even though pop culture still shows them Luke, Han, Obi-Wan, Anakin, Superman, Batman, Greens Lantern and Arrow, Flash, John McClane, John Wick, Star Lord, Iron Man, Captain America in or out of his Hydra guise, Thor, Spider-Man, Jack Sparrow, Harry Potter, and *unfurls list that’s a hundred years long* on and on. After so long of having not to share, we’re being made to share. That excites some people. And it enrages others. Because children don’t always like to share. We no longer have the mirror to ourselves. We no longer have toys that are ours and ours alone. We’ve been told for so long that we’re special, and here comes Star Wars to say, maybe not just you, maybe we’re all special, maybe we can have toys for a lot of people and stories for a lot of people, and wouldn’t that be grand? To some, that’s amazing. The chance to widen the doorway, to see more than just yourself in the glass. Others hear that and they just want to break the mirror.

If they can’t have it all to themselves, then nobody can have it.

That’s the Empire.

That’s the First Order.

Maybe we’re living just a little bit of Aftermath right here, right now.

And maybe we need Star Wars more than ever.

I don’t necessarily mean as an instruction manual, but I do think there are lessons in there that go deeper than just some GOOD VERSUS EVIL battle — even when those lessons actually are, hey, sometimes it really is good versus evil. Sometimes oppression is oppression, and evil is evil. Sometimes resistance and rebellion are necessary. Sometimes governing is hard but that doesn’t mean government is bad. Sometimes government is taken over by sinister forces, and other times we fear sinister forces so much, we end up inviting them inside, like vampires we ask to come inside because we are afraid of werewolves. (I know, I’m mixing my storyworlds here; apologies.)

I don’t mean to suggest Star Wars does not yet have work to do on itself. I think it’s time to see some LGBT representation on-screen, not just in books or in comics. I think we need it confirmed, up there, in bold colors and with love on display — a refutation of the hate that goes on off-screen. But I think too that the great people behind Star Wars are there for that, they’re here to do the work, and they’ve shown that they’re willing to listen and show a galaxy that includes, not excludes. And that’s another reason we need it.

What I hope is, this tumultuous (and if I may, particularly stupid) era of politics ends up being a footnote — we see that rocky, broken speedbump fast receding in our rear-view even as Star Wars sticks around, through 40 years and onward another 40, showing us not a utopia, but instead revealing t0 us a world that can break and be broken, but also one that can be mended by friendship and resistance and by striving to do good in the face of the worst evil.

Thanks to those who have read the trilogy.

Thanks to Star Wars for having me. Thanks to Del Rey for taking a chance with me. Thanks to the fans for sticking with me.

I hope my journey isn’t done there, but even if it is, it meant everything.

The Girl And The Tiger (And Other Updates)

I’ll share with you a ZOO TALE in just a moment, but first, a couple updates —

Houston and its environs is obviously in peril due to the hurricane, so I’d encourage you to donate in order to help people and help address the mounting devastation. Lots of folks can offer solid suggestions as to where your money goes best, and I’ll note that CharityNavigator has a good list. If you nab either of my Mookie Pearl books this week (The Blue Blazes and its followup, The Hellsblood Bride), I’ll donate all the proceeds to Americares.  (We’ll say this goes for roughly a week, till Monday, 11:59PM EST) I can only do this if you buy through those links, not Amazon or other e-retailers, FYI, just because I trust the tracking through direct sales, and less so through other sites.

Let’s see, what else?

I talked a little about writing and resistance at Inside 254 podcast.

Several books of mine are still on sale until the end of August, so only a couple more days to grab: the Heartland trilogy ($0.99 per book, the Atlanta Burns books (also under a buck per book), Zer0es. ($4.99), and Invasive ($4.99), on sale at all the standard e-tailer sites. If you’ve already read them, tell a friend, leave a review, scream about them to random passersby, tattoo their opening lines above your nethercrack, etc.

I’ve learned I’ll be at NYCC in October, so gird your loins.

Plus: Pelee Island, San Fran, Portland, Seattle, all in October. Woo.

And now, the tale of the Girl and the Tiger, amidst other zoo shenanigans:

[View the story “The Girl And The Tiger” on Storify]

Flash Fiction Challenge: Let’s Keep This Party Going With A Title

Okay, last week I said, “come up with an opening line.”

The week before that I said, “come up with a last line.”

Now, I want a title.

Then we will mash up all three challenges into one proper short story.

For now, drop down into the comments, and I want:

One five-word title.

Just one.

Not three words.

Not six words.

Five words.

Due by Friday, September 1st, noon EST.

Go.

A Simple Solution For When Your Story Hits The Wall

This is a thing that happens sometimes:

The story you’re writing drives top speed into a mountain and stops short in a ball of flames and crumpled metal. Or, it slowly putters out of gas, or drives off a cliff, or you’re stuck in a swamp, or you feel like an old person lost at the mall, endlessly circling Bed, Bath and Beyond. The plot crashes. The narrative gassily sputters. Whatever. The effect is ultimately the same: it feels like you don’t know where to go next, like you don’t have enough story to carry you forward.

Here, I think, is what might be happening:

Your characters don’t have enough to do.

They are like a six-year-old child whose endless refrain is I’M BORED I’M BORED I’M BORED and they just stare at you as they say it I’M BORED I’M BORED I’M BORED.

Simply put, the characters are driving this car. Not you. Yes, yes, you’re the God of this domain and they’re your little narrative meat-puppets — I’m not suggesting that your characters are independently alive. They have no sentience beyond your own. Just the same, they are the ones driving the car — and you’re the one giving them the map, the GPS, the destination.

If the car stops or hits the wall, it’s because you either gave them the wrong destination, or no destination at all. Orrrrrr, you instead let plot be the driver — meaning, you drop-kicked the characters into the backseat and gave the keys to the plot, which is very bad.

*swats your nose with a newspaper*

VERY BAD NO DO THAT

BAD AUTHOR

BAD

The reason that’s bad is because events are not compelling drivers of narrative. Think of how we learn history, and the difference between a good teacher of history and a poor one: a bad teacher of history concentrates on events, on dates, on occasions. A good teacher focuses on the people involved and the stories that surround them — history is made by people with motivations. They want things. They fear things. They have problems and beliefs, and they act to solve those problems and enact or enforce those beliefs. Be they noble or be they selfish, it is people with motivations who make history — and, more importantly, who make history interesting.

Your fiction is just like that.

Fiction should not comprise a series of inert, disconnected events. It is not a string of dates. It is not an unrolling carpet of happenstance.

Characters are not little paperboats in a stream of plot.

Characters are rocks that divide the waters. They change the course of the river. But that only happens when you give them things to do, when you drive them forward with problems at their heels and at their fore, when you fill their heads with things they want and things they fear.

This forms their character arcs. From this, they make plot.

Plot is the thing that characters poop.

*checks notes*

Okay, that’s not exactly right, but it’s good enough.

If your story has hit a wall, if you don’t know where to go, look to the characters. Ask them. If they cannot tell you, then you have not adequately given them enough to do. Look to their motivations. Look to their problems. Go back through the work, strengthen these emotional seawalls. Give them things to do. Give them somewhere to go.

(Then make it hard for it to do them. Think of the characters like your players and you like the Dungeon Master who is there to fuck with their quest.)

Character is everything. If something isn’t working, look to your characters first.

Give them the tools to move forward. Hand the characters a gun. Give them some crazy space drugs. Stick them in a fast car.

Then point them to the horizon and watch the story move.

* * *

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Coming soon:

DAMN FINE STORY: Mastering the Tools of a Powerful Narrative

by Chuck Wendig, from Writer’s Digest, October 17th

A new writing/storytelling book by yours truly! All about the fiddly bits of storytelling — creating great characters, growing narrative organically, identifying and creating theme. Hope you dig it.

Pre-order now:

Indiebound

Amazon

B&N

(Come see me launch the book on October 17th at Borderlands in San Francisco with Kevin Hearne launching the amazing Plague of Giants and Fran Wilde supporting her sublime Bone Universe books! 6pm!)

These Skulls Won’t Leave Me Alone

Once again, sometimes authors talk on Twitter. And when they do, the results are, uhh, well. The results are something else, boy howdy, whistle-dee-doo. Like, how can you forget the endearing tale of Spider Pals, with Maureen Johnson? Or that time when Sam Sykes became a camp counselor and it didn’t go so well? Or how about now, a tale of skulls and bread and sinfulness and old VHS tapes, with Sam Sykes once again?

[View the story “These Skulls Won’t Leave Me Alone” on Storify]

Macro Monday Brings The Eclipse-Watching Tips

Hey, look, it’s me, trapped in a frog’s eye, all because I went ahead and upset some wizard. That’s what I get for messing with wizards again! Pesky wizards, always running around, with their magic. Also that’s what I get for misidentifying a toad as a frog!

Poor toads.

Anyway.

Let’s see, what’s going on?

There be an eclipse today, avast ye scurvy eclipse watchers.

Here are some vital eclipse tips:

a) stare at it

b) stare right at it

c) keep staring at it until you can see nothing but the glory of the sun

d) get mad at the grandstanding moon for unfairly maligning the sun

e) keep staring until all is light

f) resolve to kill the moon

g) kill the moon with your mind

h) become the moon

i) continue to prop up the sinister sun regime

j) begin to feel bad about your role in supporting the sun’s heinous activities against the Earth and the rest of the cosmos

k) go through a self-discovery of guilt and empowerment

l) form a revenge plan that consists solely of “eclipse the sun”

m) eclipse the sun

n) never stop eclipsing the sun

o) watch the narcissistic sun die without the attention it truly needs to continue surviving in the sky, that glowing bastard

p) become the sun, but a variant of the sun called the shadowsun, just a dark glowing coin in the endless expanse

q) oh no you killed the earth

r) now it’s just you

s) you and all the other stars

t) hey, the other stars are suns, too, right

u) fuck those guys

v) kill the other stars

w) they don’t understand you anyway

x) did you kill them yet? all the stars?

y) now it’s just you all alone in the galaxy, the sole sovereign of the Milky Way cosmos, the shadowsun governing all the darkness, and there are no other stars and no other — wait, what’s that? there are other galaxies?

z) yeah those gotta go

Pretty sure that’s what all the scientists recommend, anyway.

What else?

Invasive and Zeroes, still on sale.

So too are Atlanta Burns and the Heartland trilogy.

A reminder that I’m on Instagram now.

I think Mark Ruffalo thinks I am a right-wing MAGA-head?

I’m sure there’s more I’m forgetting but fuck it.

Happy Monday!

HAVE A BUMBLEBEE.

Flash Fiction Challenge: And Now, The First Sentence, Please

Last week I asked you for the last sentence of a story.

This week, I’m asking you for the first sentence of a different story.

How this will work is this:

Next week, I will pick ten of each, allowing you to then randomly choose from that selection for an opening and final sentence to a short story you’ll write.

But that means we need another sentence that will start this unwritten story.

So, get to doing that.

You again have one week.

Due by Friday, August 25th, noon EST.

Pop the sentence in the comments below. Please only one sentence, and keep it to under 13 words long. You may begin.

Invasive And Zer0es E-Books Are On Sale

I don’t know why they’re on sale — let’s go with serendipity, or maybe time-travelers did it, or maybe it’s the cosmic result of two wizards battling. Either way, it’s a thing, and it’s happening.

Both are on sale for your many e-reading devices.

INVASIVE is about ants and anxiety and will also give you a free trip to Hawaii*, and features Hannah Stander, a futurist consultant for the FBI contending with a horde of killer genetically-modified ants as well as an enigmatic billionaire and a secret atoll laboratory.

Amazon, B&N, iBooks!

ZER0ES is about hackers and trolls scooped up by the government who find out from the inside about a secret wet-wired artificial intelligence that has invaded all our networks and nope, that’s probably not a good thing.

Amazon, B&N, iBooks!

They are fun, I hope.

Despite what many sites will tell you, INVASIVE is not a sequel to ZER0ES, but both take place in the same world and share a few characters. Neither is necessary to understand the other.

If you like this site and you like my rampant shenanigans, here is a chance to show your support and grabby-grab some booky-books. Also, please tell your friends. And your enemies. What, I don’t know who your enemies are, maybe they like to read books, too, jeez.

* I mean, not really, but the book is set there so let’s pretend it’s literally true

Last Chance To Get Off The Ride

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I know, I know, I don’t want to be talking about this shit either.

I’d rather be talking about literally anything else.

Puppies. Sunshine. Empanadas. Butt plugs.

(Not coincidentally, those are also the nuclear launch codes.)

Anyway, short post, but here it is:

If you’re a person out there who supported this president and who supported the political party to which he supposedly belongs, here’s your chance to get off the ride. Well, first, fuck you, because you should’ve known better. Smarter people told you this was bad, that he was a mean, evil dope. He told you that he was a mean evil dope when he called Mexicans rapists and he copped to sexual assaulting women and making fun of a disabled reporter and pushing the Obama birther conspiracy for miles past its already ludicrous inception point. We all knew he was the human embodiment of two rats fucking inside an old clown shoe. That pantsuit lady with the emails also told us all who we were dealing with. She warned us about Russia. She warned us about a guy you can bait with a tweet. She told us who he was even as he also told us who he was. The newspapers told us. The experts told us. Little children told us. We knew.

We totally knew. You knew, too.

But hey, let’s pretend you didn’t know.

Let’s say this is your period of amnesty.

This period of amnesty — and this goes toward voters, politicians, businessfolk — is a very small window. Like, so small the window is closing as we speak. So small you’re going to have to leap through it like Indiana Jones grabbing his hat before the catacomb door comes slamming down on his hand. (Indiana Jones, by the way, is one of many pop culture heroes of ours who punched Nazis. Just in case you were confused about what we once believed was good and just.)

We know who is in the Oval Office.

We know he’s a kiss-ass quisling who wants to sell us to Russia.

We know he’s a guy who can’t get anything done except tweet.

We know he’s a hypocrite who does everything he has ever criticized.

We know he’s a mean evil dope.

And now we know that he is a white supremacist who stands with white supremacists. He will not condemn them. He will condemn everyone but them, just as he won’t condemn Russia. He is compromised politically, morally, emotionally. He stands up for Nazis more than he stands up for the common man. He stands for two of our past enemies, and not for our present allies.

He is a danger. He is a craven cur. He is a con-man. He is a grease-slick turd. He’s King Midas with poopy shit-fingers instead of a gold touch.

It is time to get off the train.

Because right now, it’s up over the hill. It’s on the downward slope. It’s gaining speed as it roars down the tracks. You can jump out now, maybe sprain a wrist, maybe scuff your knees, but you’ll live. Our democracy will live. But you stay on this train? It’s going to crash hard into a wall. Just as we told you who you were electing, we’re also warning you know that the wall is swiftly rushing up to greet us — oh no, not his wall, not the wall across the border, but the wall that will end his presidency and, if our luck does not hold, our democracy. This is real. It’s happening. Get off now or you’ll be onboard when it crashes, too.

If you’re not one of those people, you probably know some who are. Friends or family. People on Facebook. The media you watch, the writers you read. Even the politicians who represent you. Confront them. Condemn them. Let them know that you will not stand by them if they choose to stand by this administration. If they continue to stand by it, then they need to go. They must get gone. Because either they’re mean, or they’re evil, or they’re dopes, too.

This is it, folks.

Up over the hill, rickety-clack down the tracks we go.

(P.S. — above image is Photoshopped.)

(P.P.S. — if you have not seen the Vice documentary out of Charlottesville — well, go watch it. It’s not an easy thing to watch, but if you can stomach it, I suggest you try.)

(P.P.S.S. — if your response to this is some kind of LESS POLITICS MORE FUNNY BOOK STUFF rebuke, trust me, I wish that’s where my head was at right now, but it’s not. I’m going to talk about this stuff because it’s real and because it matters and because it matters a lot more than where you put a comma or whether or not write what you know is a thing or whether or not that character on Game of Thrones is faking her pregnancy. You can read the blog or not, you can buy my books or not. You can engage with what’s going on around you or not.)

Fight On, Space Unicorns: Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction

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And now, a vital guest post from Michael Damian Thomas, co-editor of Uncanny Magazine along with Lynne M. Thomas, who wants to talk about their daughter, the political state of America, and the mission behind the new Disabled People Destroy Science-Fiction series — you will find the Kickstarter for that right here, so go click and go give.

* * *

The above picture is of my daughter, Caitlin, at her appointment to pick up her ankle-foot orthotics on November 8, 2016. Earlier that day, Caitlin voted with me. As we waited for her orthotist to finish grinding the orthotics to fit her, I told her our candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton, was about to become the first woman president.

That was her smile about HRC—a smile so magical I had to take a photo to share with the other HRC supporters in our lives who were about to experience this historic moment together.

Twelve hours later Caitlin was in bed, and we were all in tears.

Not because history was missed, but because we knew what this could mean for Caitlin’s life, and the lives of so many other people. A corrupt, treasonous, hateful, asshole conman was now going to be our president, with a Republican-controlled legislature. A man who made it very clear when he mocked reporter Serge Kovaleski how he felt about disabled people. A man who had no problem cutting off his own nephew’s 18-month-old child from medical insurance—a child with infantile spasms.

Caitlin had infantile spasms. It’s a main marker of her Aicardi syndrome. They’re violent, rare seizures that made her infant body fold repeatedly in half, causing brain damage with each spasm. They would happen over and over again (the worst series went for 45 minutes before the paramedics got Caitlin to the ER). The medicines which finally controlled her infantile spasms cost our health insurance $18,000 per month. Thankfully, we had insurance without lifetime caps and access to a Medicaid program, which was codified through the Affordable Care Act. This kept us from going bankrupt.

We have walked that fine edge of financial disaster for her entire life. Caitlin’s 2014 alone cost a million dollars, thanks in part to a spinal fusion surgery that vastly improved her quality of life. And now, because of the election, these hateful GOP assholes who wanted to destroy the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and so many other laws and programs for disabled people have the power to do so. Without these protections and programs, Caitlin wouldn’t have been able to live with us and thrive. Others, too, saw their lives in peril. They fought. National ADAPT claimed this summer, waging civil disobedience war against the GOP. Rooted in Rights published articles about the political struggles disabled Americans like Caitlin found themselves in.

What would happen to Caitlin if we lost? What could we do?

This was just our story as the year started. So many different groups of people were suddenly scared and in trouble: women, immigrants, POC, Muslims, Jews, queers, women, disabled people, and so many more. (My wife and I are both queer, and I’m also disabled.) As fascist white supremacists moved into power, we did Tweetstorms. We called our legislators constantly. We fought and tried not to collapse in discouragement. Often Lynne and I felt frustrated that we couldn’t do more.

Then a dear friend reminded us that we have a magazine. Uncanny Magazine, to be exact.

The Thomases have a history of pissing off the alt-right. Wired named two things Lynne edited in “The Books and Stories That Sparked a Culture War” for their Sad/Rabid Puppies’ article. Milo attacked these works and Lynne’s Hugo Awards on Breitbart. Some of our more political stories, like Brooke Bolander’s “Our Talons Can Crush Galaxies,” have gone viral and been nominated for numerous awards.

This is what we do. We help create and publish art that pisses hateful people off.

We decided it was time to get even louder.

Uncanny Magazine first started with a community coming together, which we named the Space Unicorn Ranger Corps after our Space Unicorn mascot, during our initial Kickstarter. Now, this community is getting politically active together, which is glorious.

We made an open call for Uncanny Resistance essays. People flooded us with pitches. We published essays that taught civil disobedience methods, how to run for office, how to lobby, and personal stories about how merely existing when you’re marginalized is a form of Resistance to this regime. Science Fiction and Fantasy fans and writers came together as a community in our pages, sharing information and support for the fight.

As part of this mission, we also took Lightspeed Magazine up on their offer to continue the Destroy series with Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction. We brought together an amazing team of disabled guest editors:

Editor-in-Chief/Fiction Editor: Dominik Parisien
Editor-in-Chief/Nonfiction Editor: Elsa Sjunneson-Henry
Reprint Editor: Judith Tarr
Poetry Editor: S. Qiouyi Lu
Personal Essays Editor: Nicolette Barischoff

As Co-Editor-in-Chief/Nonfiction Editor Elsa Sjunneson-Henry said:

Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction is a continuation of the Destroy series (now brought to people by Uncanny Magazine) in which we, disabled members of the science fiction community, will put ourselves where we belong: at the center of the story. Often, disabled people are an afterthought, a punchline, or simply forgotten in the face of new horizons, scientific discovery, or magical invention. We intend to destroy ableism and bring forth voices, narratives, and truths most important to disabled writers, editors, and creators with this special issue.

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We are currently running the Kickstarter for Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction/Uncanny Magazine Year 4. (Above art by Galen Dara.) We will continue running essays, stories, and poems by people who Resist this regime. People who fight hate with art. People who come together as a community of artists and thinkers and find ways to push back, create the world we want to live in, and inspire others to do so, too.

For Caitlin. For everybody.

Please consider backing us if you have the means.

Fight on, Space Unicorns.