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AW's avatar

It is pretty easy to write climate fiction set in the present. It is pretty impossible to get it published because everyone seems to believe it has to be set in the future when all has failed. I have a climate fiction mystery, The Earthstar Solution, set in today time, that I couldn’t even get listed here in Climate Fiction Writers League. We are not going to get more present day cli-fi that inspires people to take action now without support for those stories. If I can do it, others can write them too, but the support has to be there. I always say… if we want things to change, we have to imagine it. Write about the change we need now. And then help by spreading the word about those type of books.

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Mark's avatar

Recently a friend said dystopia has been normalized, and I have to agree. Rather than indulge in speculative variations on the theme of doom and gloom, she wished for a Time Machine to go 50 years into the future to see how things actually turn out, since if there is one thing humans are good at it is muddling through impossible situations.

But do we really need more cli-fi? Sci-fi back in the day often assumed a post-apocalyptic world— usually nuclear war (still a distinct possibility!). Now the cli-fi sub genre has decided anthropogenic warming of the planet will be our Armageddon. Other variations on the end—of-the-world as we know it theme have robot overlords or zombie virus running amuck. William Gibson describes the “jackpot” scenario where all sorts of horrible possible outcomes converge.

Are there any possible visions of the future that are not dystopian, not utopian (which everyone agrees are no-where/impossible), but are feasible and practical? Perhaps a “eautopia” where we recognize our common denominator— water, which makes up most of our bodies and is essential to life as we know it. Anyone remember “Stranger in a Strange Land?” Maybe a modern day version with a happier ending. ,

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