Want fiction that explores self-ownership? Enter Arcane

There ain’t enough fiction that explores self-ownership in the mass market today. But that’s why I’ve gone niche with books like The Arcane Prophecy.

Yote Diamondback’s story isn’t for mainstream eyes. But that’s okay. I have no desire to enter the mainstream. In my experience, traditional publishing is for authors and writers fine with submitting themselves to the algorithmic beast, courtesy of their superiors.

If I approached a literary agent with The Arcane Prophecy, they’d rebuff me after the first few chapters. Self-ownership themes? Zero publicly-funded institutional reform? No supporting characters in the alphabet mob? No lovable loser pure underdog protagonist (even if Yote Diamondback is an underdog against her sister)?

Nah, the book would never reach online store shelves. But then again, I write for readers sick of having DEI nonsense shoved down their throats, and for those who don’t appreciate it when YA fantasy authors sanitize their words, both in the story and in the public eye.

It’s why I don’t mind dropping atomic F-bombs when writing about YA fantasy. There’s no reason when it’s how regular kids talk. It’s also why I didn’t mind including a fist-fight relatively early in The Arcane Prophecy.

Critics can claim “TC Marti glorifies foul language and violence” all they want. It’ll give my fire more fuel, so I’ll thank them in advance. They’re not my audience, anyway.

👉 Explore Chapters 1-3 of The Arcane Prophecy if you’re part of the tribe

Writing for libertarians who crave Harry Potter vibes

Yote Diamondback knows exactly what she is: an Elemental gifted in controlling the four classical elements. People like her don’t live in secret, and Elemental society’s not archaic. Hell, Elementals and their non-Elemental cousins, the Acrax, live side-by-side, even if they attend different schools.

The Acrax can venture onto Arcane, watch co-ed box thrashball games, and even work for the school in roles that don’t require elemental magic. Many Acrax even own businesses that cater to Arcane’s students, and it’s not uncommon for students in Arcane and those attending Acrax academies to intermingle and hang out.

Is race an issue in this series? Yes, but nowhere near a DEI, pro-reparations, and pro-civil rights angle. Instead, I’m railing against institutions that make the rules and call the shots. Institutions pushing a race-based agenda, which gets more prevalent as the series progresses.

Throw in the anarcho-capitalist themes, and you finally have a YA fantasy series with Harry Potter vibes that libertarians will devour. And what would those critics call it? Probably a “billionaire paradise,” or another slur, because they’d have no argument for the setting’s prosperity.

Go the alternate route and explore self-ownership

Mainstream literary trends promise false paradises and reform in issues like race, climate change, and even economic systems. They fantasize about collectivism, and how it’s a godsend to humankind, even if it requires coercion to uphold.

Ditto for communism, despite its alleged stateless endgame. There’s a reason communism’s loading screen freezes, then ultimately crashes.

Even if it attained its endgame, what happens when there aren’t enough people willing to work to meet basic human needs in specific sectors of the economy? Especially if they claim humans are selfish because of the environment they’ve been brought up in?

The one single truth that lingers

Humans pursue interests within systems. Output drops if you don’t directly reward people. That causes shortages to happen, and when shortages happen, coercion rears its ugly head again.

This is why it’s a bad idea to trust them to lead a violent revolution to overthrow the “bourgeois” and ultimately bring about a stateless society that abolishes property rights.

Fortunately, statelessness can occur in other ways, with no violent revolution required. That’s the underlying theme in The Arcane Prophecy. People protect their own property. Not the State. People voluntarily choose what they want to do with their hard-earned money. Not the State. And Elementals get to choose their own educational path. Not the State. Voluntary exchange aligns incentives, and decentralized decisions scale better.

Sounds foreign to the statist or the communist. But it makes a hell of a lot of sense to the anarcho-capitalist. Before I unleash that theme, check out the first three chapters of The Arcane Prophecy so you know what you’re getting into. Meet Yote Diamondback, her sibling rival, and see how she ends up in Arcane to begin with.

👉 Catch the first three chapters of The Arcane Prophecy today