I couldn't write safe stories and opted for books that bit

If I had to write safe stories, I’d have left the writing craft a long time ago. In today’s world, we have a choice. So I didn’t sell out.

Safe fiction plagues the market. While this “safe space” nonsense and “sensitivity” BS is backsliding, safety’s still king. But I’ll tell you this: the trend away from safe and sanitized is going to keep heading in my preferred direction.

And if you’re not on board with that, then too bad. You had your day, and the market is responding accordingly. As Ludwig von Mises reminded us in his Six Lessons, the consumer is the boss. Not the man shouting orders behind a desk in some corporate office, as Marx would love you to believe. Don’t believe me? Then look at Cracker Barrel.

Even if the market kept trending toward “safe and sanitized,” I wouldn’t budge. Why? Because an alternative must exist. One for sane, normal people who spit on performative “ethics” and see them for what they are: bowing down to a small minority who shouted like adult babies for a while there.

They’re still shouting. It’s just that regular people are sick of their crap, and rightfully so.

👉 Check out my work for fiction that bucks safe and sanitized

Write safe stories and benefit in the short game

Playing the short game never made sense. But so many authors did it. How many IG accounts did I see talk about “hating on fascism,” to throw out an example? I think BookBub promoted one. All while they probably had not the slightest clue of its definition. Hell, I’m sure they said, “Fascism is what Donald Trump supports,” or something along those lines.

Newsflash, kiddos: So did most presidents before him in one way, shape, or form. Hell, America’s flashed fascism and it still flashes fascism. Trump or no Trump. Even if I’ll agree fascism itself deserves to be hated on.

Why am I mentioning this? It’s because safe story authors knew what to tell their audience. I never took too deep of a dive, but if they queued up behind every leftist event out there for performative measures, it wouldn’t surprise me. Again, it’s from my sample, so yours may vary.

To them, it was all about conforming to distorted market demands. Market demands that the press, politicians, and activists distorted. When people started seeing through the BS, mainly after Trump’s re-election (one of the very few good things about Trump being in office), the market started correcting itself.

As for me? I did a happy dance, knowing that at least sanity would return. Or, sanity would return to normal people the Left intimidated into compliance. The extreme Left would double down, and they have. But they can cry all they want these days. Nobody’s handing them a coloring book in a padded room anymore.

I decided to write for normal people who refused hard-left and hard-right takes

When I wrote my military science fantasy, Wind Wielder, I knew I’d spit on the following issues:

Trusting the science
Corporate-government collusion
Indoctrination
Imperialism
Mainstream media

Of course, I had COVID in my mind. But if I wrote Wind Wielder today? The Iran War. Talking about how Fox News gives you the same type of commentary on the Iran War as MSNBC gave you on COVID.

The takeaway? Both sides are mouthpieces for their respective sides. Both of which make up “the regime.”

There’s nothing safe about the regime, regardless of who’s in charge. Hardcore liberal/progressives like Barack Obama and Joe Biden either started or engaged in proxy warfare. Obama with Libya and Syria, all while failing to keep out of Iraq for long and never ending the Afghan War.

Biden ended operations in Afghanistan, only to fight proxy wars in Russia and Gaza. As for Trump? Last year, Yemen was in the news. This year? Venezuela and Iran. Mainly Iran.

👉 Get unsafe fiction that the mainstream Left and Right would hate

Safe stories also plague the Right, not just the Left

Think about how many stories you read where patriotism, love of government, flag worship, and military worship were the key themes. I got a lot of these back in school, when I was naive enough to go along with it.

Case in point? Authors write safe stories all the time, regardless if they’re doused in an American flag or a rainbow flag. Corporations go the same route. Whatever’s “safe,” they’ll do with a smile and a bow.

That’s why, during the Age of Leftist Insanity, teams like the Cleveland Indians and Washington Redskins changed their names. Thankfully, we’re getting some sanity back, with Washington bringing back their Redskins-like uniforms with rumors of a spear logo embedded into the team’s identity. At some point, we may just get the Redskins name back.

Was I ahead of my time? I’m thinking so…

At some point, readers were going to demand more complex, thought-provoking fiction, and I wanted to pioneer the movement. If it meant going that route in the Age of Leftist Insanity, then so be it. Build in the short-term, and succeed long-term.

Especially with my penchant for writing in a shared universe. A shared universe that carries diverse casts without flaunting them as tokenism or virtue signaling. And one with a plethora of strong female protagonists without them falling into those “girl boss” archetypes.

Writing that’s more on-the-nose, and lets a reader look up and say, “This is like real life.” Good, then I did my job. So go ahead and check out my backlist not on Amazon, where algorithms and thousands of different products are shoved into your face.

Nah, head over The Rebel Lore Vault and view my library. A store that doesn’t cater to algos and won’t plaster carousels of products you may or may not care about in front of your face.

👉 Check out the library here