Alexei Navalny: What was it all for?

Hi All,

As you no doubt already know, Russian dissident Alexei Navalny was declared dead by prison authorities yesterday. As of this morning, his team has confirmed they have received a death notice, but say they have not yet been allowed to see the body.

Cue the conspiracy theories. Already many, including my students, are convinced he was murdered at the behest of the Russian government or Putin personally. Which is possible. It’s also entirely possible that what the prison authorities are saying is exactly what happened: He suddenly collapsed and died from an embolism, with no additional help from poison, beatings, etc. He had apparently been growing increasingly frail, and Arctic penal colonies are notoriously bad for health, especially on top of the near-fatal poisoning in 2021. Perhaps one day we will know exactly what happened, but at the moment it’s mainly wild speculation.

Rather than speculating on Navalny’s precise cause of death, I thought I’d speculate on something very different. What, I’ve been asking myself ever since I saw the headlines yesterday morning, was it all for? What, exactly, did Navalny accomplish with all this?

Navalny had many gifts. He was handsome, charismatic, witty, intelligent, an excellent writer, and possessed more than enough courage for his convictions. But ultimately, what will his legacy be? Has he achieved what he set out to achieve; namely, the overthrow of Putin and the reform of the Russian government? 

A sober examination of the facts suggests that he achieved none of those aims, and may in fact have made matters worse by his head-on challenge to the system (more on that later). Meanwhile, he endangered his family, caused his brother to be sent to prison, and finally died without, as far as I know, leaving behind any significant body of work that will live beyond his current notoriety. Perhaps we will one day discover the manuscript to his great work of art or philosophical treatise, but one doubts it. One suspects that he was too busy trying to batter down the entire Russian government with his bare head to produce anything substantive.

As far as I can tell, Navalny got caught up in a fatal flaw we humans (especially of the male variety) are extremely prone to: a dominance struggle. I’ve been studying the psychology and neuroscience of violence as part of my research, and one of the most dangerous and destructive traps people and nations can fall into is a dominance struggle in which both sides are convinced they can and must win. Normally one side is deluded, but their certainty that victory is just around the corner causes them to go on fighting long after they should make a tactical withdrawal and rethink their strategy. Their aggression, meanwhile, triggers more aggression from the other side, leading to an escalation of violence and repression and/or a war of attrition (literal or figurative) in which everyone ultimately loses.

Of course, persistence is essential to achieving anything worthwhile. The trick is knowing the difference between persistence and pigheaded stubbornness that will destroy you and everything you’re striving for. Many of us, alas, have a very hard time drawing that line, and it seems that Navalny did as well. 

When he returned to Russia after recovering from the attempted poisoning in 2021, many people wondered why. He knew he would be probably be arrested on the spot, and indeed he was. (If you’re now fulminating against the barbarism of the Russian government and Russian society, consider the fates of similar characters in the West, such as Julian Assange, Chelsea Manning, and Edward Snowden. While they are all currently still alive, they have all faced lengthy prison sentences and, in Snowden’s case, the possibility of the death penalty). 

I’ve also been thinking about why Navalny returned. When he did it, I assumed it was because he was demonstrating the courage of his convictions and his commitment to Russia, and I have no doubt that was part of it. He could have remained in the West, but he’d probably have had to earn his bread by writing op-eds for Western publications explaining why Russia was evil and needed to be destroyed. Maybe he couldn’t stomach that. Maybe he also couldn’t stomach the thought of becoming just another cranky Russian emigre. Maybe he was addicted to the fame and adulation he was receiving, and was deluded enough to believe he could parlay it into actual power.

We’ll probably never know that either. What we can know is that these head-on dominance struggles rarely achieve what we want them to achieve. The most likely outcome from them is that everybody loses. To actually achieve real change, we often need to implement the wisdom of the serpent and the innocence of the dove (MT 10:16), rather than the bullheadedness of the, well, bull.

As it happens, we have another famous Russian, one who unquestionably left behind a substantive legacy, for thoughts on how one might do that. Lev Tolstoy’s concept of nonresistence to evil, developed most thoroughly in his treatise The Kingdom of God is Within You, which I am currently reading, gives us pointers on how we might go about creating good rather than succumbing to evil. It focuses mainly on not falling into a vengeance spiral (something to which we humans are also extremely prone), but I think it could also apply to these dominance struggles that are so deadly. We talk about fighting fire with fire, but too much of that can burn the whole world down (don’t be surprised if you see that line appear again elsewhere, because I’m definitely keeping it). 

These are all thoughts I’ve been contemplating as I work on Terminal Degree and consider how best to bring Rowena and Dima’s story to a (temporary) close. Dima is loosely based on a number of real-life prototypes, including Alexei Navalny. In fiction, though, we have the opportunity to run simulations and redo things that have gone wrong in real life. Perhaps the fictional Dima will learn from the real-life Alexei how to have less of the bull and more of the dove in his heart. At the moment, though, I can only conclude by wishing вечная память (eternal memory, an orthodox blessing) for Alexei Navalny. May he be at peace.

Sid Stark

Want to know what songs are fueling my writing process?

Hello!

Hope your 2024 is continuing to go well–January is such a long month, isn’t it? If you’ve been hit by the various storms that have been sweeping across North America, I hope they haven’t been too exciting. We’ve had thunderstorms, floods, deep freezes, and now flooding again, but so far we’ve at least avoided tornados (knock on wood).

I’m continuing to work on Terminal Degree, the last (planned) book in the Doctor Rowena Halley series. It’s currently looking like it’s going to be rather long, so I don’t have a good idea of when it will be finished, but I thought I’d share a little more of the creative process behind it.

But first, it’s the last weekend of the Strong Women promo, with dozens of free books, including mine! Check it out here.

As I’ve mentioned before, part of my creative process can include specific songs and playlists to either set the mood or provide ideas for plot and character. Total Immersionhad the songs of Florence + the Machine as a running thread throughout the story, for example, while the character Mel listens to the songs of Hayley Kiyoko.

When I started writing Total Immersion, I happened to be listening to “I Wish It Would Rain Down” by Phil Collins (there’s that wild weather again). To be honest, I haven’t quite worked out how the song is going to feature in the book yet, but I have a strong feeling that it needs to. The problem is that it’s a song about endings, and while Terminal Degree will have lots of endings in it, as you might guess from the title, it will also have lots of beginnings, especially for the complex romantic lives of the series’ main characters. So while the melancholy of “I Wish It Would Rain Down” is part of the mood I’m going for, it’s only one part of what is looking to be a long and complicated book.

Then–and I don’t even remember how or why–I went on a Gary Allan kick. I’ve included his songs in earlier books, specifically in relation to Rowena’s brother John, who is a fan. This time, I haven’t name-dropped Gary Allan (yet–the book is still far from finished), but I have included a side plot about John based on the song “Man to Man.” How this will turn out is still to be determined. 

Terminal Degree is supposed to end on a hopeful note (spoiler alert!), especially (further spoiler alert!) for the characters’ personal lives. A song I’ve had on repeat while working on scenes involving second-chance romance (because there’s going to be some of that, of course!) is “Bartender” by James Blunt. In fact, I’ve been binge-listening James Blunt for the past several weeks, as his music is full of themes that feature heavily in the stories, such as trauma, self-criticism, and regret. If that sounds too sad, it’s not! At least, I find James Blunt’s music delightful, with catchy tunes and unexpected moments of humor, and I’d like to think my books have glimmers of humor and hope as well.

What about you? Are you listening to anything you’d like to share right now? I’m always happy to get more listening recommendations!

Oh, and here’s that link to the Strong Women book giveaway again.

Happy reading!

Sid Stark

In which my heroine’s best friend accidentally steals a large sum of money

Hello! And Happy 2024!

I hope the new year is starting out well for you, wherever and however you are meeting it. Here it’s currently pouring rain. The pets are unhappy about it, but after the drought we had this fall, we probably need all the rain we can get. It was supposed to be sleet/freezing rain, but so far it’s just been regular old rain, albeit cold and in large quantities. Probably this is a good thing, although it’s not very wintry.

I’ve got another excerpt from Terminal Degree, which as it happens takes place at the beginning of January, but first, a couple of announcements/offers.

First of all, Jamison Hill‘s new novel, Something’s Wrong with Micah, is discounted to $2.99 this week. For those of you who don’t know, which I assume is many of you, Jamison Hill is an author who’s been largely bedbound for a number of years for somewhat mysterious reasons that probably involve Lyme disease. Despite this, he’s managed to do an impressive amount of writing (on his phone, I believe!) and publish a regular blog, a number of articles, and two books. 

I’m sharing the book both because I think it’s worth reading, and because Jamison’s experience could be where my character Mel is heading if she doesn’t get her mysterious health problems under control, something that’s part of the excerpt I’ll be sharing at the bottom of this email. (This isn’t a threat–I’m not planning to send Mel down that path–I don’t think–but just to show what the stakes are for her).

The other announcement/promo I want to share is the Strong Women book giveaway on Bookfunnel. It’s got dozens of books in a wide variety of genres, including mine :), but all featuring strong heroines. Check it out below!

And now, at long last, the promised excerpt from Terminal Degree! As a reminder, this is the planned last novel in the Doctor Rowena Halley series. So the pressure’s on to wrap things up! Frankly, I suspect I’m going to have to do a spinoff (maybe several spinoffs) to deal with all my loose ends, but I am at least trying to bring the main threads of Rowena’s story together here.

This excerpt is the end of the first chapter. Rowena and her friend Mel, she of the mysterious illness that has recently been diagnosed as Lyme disease, are spending New Year’s Eve together. They’re hoping for some peace and quiet before the start of the semester. But of course, their phones (the blessing and curse of modern existence!) interrupt their evening with some exciting/alarming notifications…

***

“Do you want anything to eat? Should we actually cook this feast we’ve planned?”

She made a face. “I’ve got to eat something, ‘cause I’ve got to take my next dose of doxycycline, and if I don’t chase it with something high-fat, I’ll barf like…well, you get the picture. But I don’t want to eat anything.”

“How much longer do you have to take it?” Mel had—finally—been diagnosed with Lyme disease at the end of last semester, after a year of increasingly bizarre symptoms that ranged from sudden bouts of the flu to half her face going paralyzed. She had started taking antibiotics over winter break. Since the treatment itself could be pretty debilitating, the hope was to get through the worst of it before the start of the next semester.

“I’ve got one more week of this round. But that’s just the first round. Some people get better after one round. Some people have to take antibiotics for years, and still never get better.”

“Oh,” I said. “So, um…how do you feel?”

She shrugged. “My joint pain’s almost gone, and I’m not twitching as much as I used to. My face looks better, too, don’t you think?”

I leaned across my small table that served as both a working desk and a dining room table for entertaining, and peered at her face through my right eye, and then my left. From up close, I could see that her dark blonde hair in its boyish pixie cut was developing gray hairs around the temple, her wide, expressive mouth had fine lines from too much smiling and too much sun all around it, and there were dark blotches from permanent sun damage across her cheekbones and the bridge of her nose. Her eyes, I noticed for the first time, were blue-gray with flecks of green and gold. We were so close, our breathing had synchronized.

I jerked back. “It looks perfectly symmetrical.”

“It wasn’t perfectly symmetrical before the Bell’s palsy, but thanks. It feels like it all works fine again, so that’s great. Some things are great.”

“But?”

“But I feel tired as shit, and every time I eat something, it feels like a poison bomb’s going off inside of me. It was like that before, but the doxy ain’t fuckin’ helping, I tell you what.”

“Maybe that will go away when you go off it, and you’ll just feel better,” I said. “Maybe a week from now, you’ll be done with this and you’ll be completely cured.”

She gave me a smile. It was a kind, condescending smile, the kind you give a little child who’s just said something ridiculously hopeful and doesn’t know not to believe her own words. She’d never given me a smile like that before.

I pulled back a little more. That smile said, “You think you know what I’m going through, but you don’t. I’m just too nice to point that out.”

Well, at least she didn’t say it out loud, I told myself.

“Let’s make supper,” I said. “Even if it doesn’t taste good, it’ll keep you from upchucking the pills that are going to cure you.”

“Yeah…is that your phone?”

Two loud pings had filled the apartment.

“I think it’s both our phones,” I said. We pulled out our phones. Indeed, mine had a message notification.

Darling Inna. Happy New Year! Wishing you joy and happiness. If all goes well, in 24 hours Mama and I will be with you in Atlanta!

The warmth that message washed over me insulated me from the chill coming from the other side of the table. It was only Mel’s muttered “Fuck, fuck, fuck” that brought me back to myself.

“What is it?”

She looked up from her phone. “Apparently I’ve just stolen a hundred grand.”

***

Golly! So, full disclosure: Mel’s problems are partly inspired by my own run-ins with scammers. When I wrote that chapter, I’d just been through several rounds of notifying the proper authorities after discovering that my identity had been stolen and used to file fraudulent unemployment claims. I have not been charged with stealing anything–yet–but it’s a sobering reminder of how easy it is to be a victim of fraud and identity theft. So I’m winding a narrative about scams and fraud throughout the book, with Mel on a quest to find her identity thief.

I’ve also added a third plotline to the story recently…but I think I’ll save that for next time. I hope you enjoyed the excerpt, and here are those links again:

Something’s Wrong with Micah

Strong Women Book Giveaway

As always, happy reading!

Sid

What if the love of Rowena’s life is an assassin? Plus the Smashwords End of Year Sale!

Hello, and Happy December!

Gosh, here we are, the end of the year barreling towards us like an oncoming train…hopefully it’s not that bad, but you get the picture. 

I’m proud to say that I’ve been making decent progress on Terminal Degree, the next book in the Doctor Rowena Halley series. Well, I was making decent progress until final exams slammed into us all like a train…gotta stop with the train similes. Anyway, progress has been made. It’s still a long way from finished, so I haven’t even set a release date yet, but I’ve got over 25,000 words of a first draft down, which is a good start. 

I thought I’d share a few of those words, but first, check out the Smashwords End of Year Sale, where you can get many, many books, including mine, for free! In fact, the four-book boxed set is currently being featured on the Mystery page 🙂

So do check that out, and here, as promised, is the excerpt from Terminal Degree. For a little background context, Dima and his mother have come to the US for medical treatment. The reunion between them and Rowena is fraught, and it gets even more fraught when Rowena discovers that Dima may be involved in some very questionable activities. This is the scene right after that, when Rowena goes to find Dima and ask him about the accusations she’s just heard. What will happen next? To be honest, I don’t actually know yet, since this is where I stopped in order to deal with a pile of final exams about the development of Russian literature and the consequences of the dissolution of the USSR. Hopefully by the time I get those graded, I’ll know what Dima’s up to. In the meantime, your guess is as good as mine…

***

After Frank hung up, I waited. And waited. And waited. An hour later, Dima still hadn’t come back.

Where are you? I texted.

I waited some more. Still nothing. It was now after 9:00pm. We should really be getting to bed.

I’ll just go check on him. He’d probably gone back to his apartment to take the call, and…what? Fallen asleep? Or maybe he was still on the phone, and I shouldn’t disturb him. Or maybe something terrible had happened to him…maybe whoever he was so concerned about had found him, and jumped him in the stairwell, and…and did I really want to go out into the darkness after him? What if the people after him were still there, waiting in the stairwell for me? What if going out there was the last thing I ever did? What if…

I shoved my feet into my shoes, my arms through the sleeves of my jacket, and my body out the door before I could come up with any more what ifs. Enough with the doom-mongering. Dima had probably fallen fast asleep on the couch after a very long and tiring day. I’d wake him up, we’d apologize to each other, and then we’d both head off to our respective beds, in preparation for another long and tiring day.

The parking lot was very dark. Most of the parking spaces were filled, with deep pools of shadow between and beneath the cars. The thin ring of longleaf pines that surrounded the complex seemed extra-tall and extra-deep, as if they had morphed into a hundred acres of trackless wilderness with the setting of the sun. A gust of wind blew through them, raising a sound from the needles like the whispering of secrets or the hissing of snakes. Clouds scudded across the sky, covering the slender crescent of the waxing moon and blotting out its faint light.

Walk! Just walk! My legs started carrying me past the dark cars and the darker wells of shadow underneath them. Nothing jumped out at me. My ankles tried to shrink in on themselves even so, away from the icy-hot grasp of ghostly hands they were sure were groping for them. Sweat trickled down my sides, and there was a strange, electric-shock-like crawling sensation up the back of my neck as the tiny, feeble hairs there tried to stand on end in a useless gesture of defense and protection.

I wonder if this is how Mel feels all the time? Part of her illness was a whole host of strange sensations, including the feeling of having a taser attached to the back of her neck and the power slowly being turned up.

I glanced behind me involuntarily. What had that sound been? Was someone coming up on me? Was there someone here in the parking lot with me, just out of sight?

It’s a dog, I told myself. Someone’s taking their dog out before bed. It’s probably that woman with the toy poodle who lives in the next building over. I squinted at the dark figure on the edge of my vision. No matter how much I strained my eyes, I couldn’t turn it into a woman and a toy poodle.

Are they coming this way? They’re coming this way! They’re coming right toward me! What should I do? Run? Back to my apartment? Or try to hide in the unlit stairwell ahead?

The dark figure seemed to be picking up speed. I broke into a half-jog. What was that sound? Like a goblin shriek…

“AAAAAGH!” Another figure, even bigger and darker than the one pursuing me, loomed out of the stairwell in front of me. Before I could turn and run, it grabbed my upper arms.

“AAA—“ I started to scream.

“Innochka! What’s the matter?”

“Dima! It’s you!”

“Yeah, it’s me. I came out looking for you, and you practically ran straight into my arms. Are you okay?” His grip tightened. “Is someone after you?”

I looked back. The goblin shrieks had resolved into the yapping of the toy poodle, who had dragged her owner over to greet her best friend, the mini-pinscher from the row of cottages along the edge of the complex. I could now make out the clear and unambiguous outlines of two rather small and unathletic women, who were standing and chatting in the middle of the parking lot while their dogs sniffed and circled each other.

“Only my own unbridled imagination.” I tried to say it lightly, but my voice cracked at the end of the sentence.

Dima looked around. “Even so, let’s get inside. You’re right to be worried about being outside alone after dark. Come on.” He turned and led me up the stairs to his apartment.

***

Yowza! Is Dima actually a hitman who’s a danger to everyone and anyone who gets in his way, including Rowena, or is it all a misunderstanding? I guess we’ll all (including me) find out soon!

And here are those links once again:

Smashwords End of Year Sale

Mystery Page

Sid Stark Page

Happy reading! 

Sid Stark

Special September Promos! @GooglePlay @BNBuzz

Hi All!

Happy September! How are we (almost) in autumn already? To be honest, it hasn’t felt much like autumn around here yet–in fact, I think we just had the hottest week of the year. But lightning is currently flashing and rain is currently lashing against my windows, so maybe this storm is heralding the onset of fall.

I wanted (in between increasingly louder peals of thunder) to let you know about a couple of deals and promos I’m participating in this September with Under Review, my latest release. It’s been out for about a month now, and a huge thank-you to everyone who’s left a review for it so far! Of course, if you haven’t left a review yet but you feel so moved, reviews on any and all platforms are still very much appreciated! 

Now, back to those deals and promos. First of all, Under Review is being featured this month in Barnes & Noble’s Top Indie Favorites collection. These books aren’t necessarily discounted, but it’s a hand-picked selection of indie books, many of which are under $5. You can check out the entire collection here and go straight to Under Reviewhere.

Second of all, I’ve currently got a series bundle promotion going on Google Play. This is a discount for the entire Doctor Rowena Halley series, ranging from 25% to 50% off, depending on how many books you get. The link is here. I do have to give a bit of a caveat emptor: this series bundle discount is a new thing that Google Play is trying out, and it seems a bit fiddly. When I go to the page, I only get a 5% discount, but when other people go to the page, they tell me they get a 50% discount. So if you got to the page and it’s not offering you 25-50% off for the series, reach out to Google Play or let me know and I will harass them about it some more 🙂

The storm that blew in while I was typing this was so intense that it caused my neighbor’s brush pile to go floating down the street, but we’re now back to blue skies just a few minutes later. Hopefully the rain did my gardens some good and didn’t destroy the project to redo my front walkway. I guess we’ll find out 🙂 Meanwhile, have a great day wherever you are, and happy reading!

Sid

Introducing a very special new member of the family! Plus free audiobooks :)

Hi All!Just wanted to give you a quick update and let you know about a deal I’m participating it. The audiobook of Campus Confidentialis currently free as part of the Indie Audiobook Deals promo, running this week! Check out all the deal here.

I’m still hard at work finishing up the audiobook of Under Review. In fact, I’m hoping it will be done this weekend! In the meantime, you can listen to most of it (for free!) on YouTube if you want to get a preview.

Oh, and remember how I promised some exciting and delightful news at the beginning of the month? Well, here it is. I have added another cat to the clowder!

Here she is exploring the backyard. That’s cat fencing you see behind her, so she is securely (we hope–she’s a bit of an escape artist) contained within the yard.

As is so often the case, she was not the cat I was initially intending to get. I wanted a kitten or kittens, preferably longhaired. But my attempts to get particular kittens kept falling through, and I ended up going to the shelter several times. Every time she was still there and was so sweet that I just couldn’t take it anymore and eventually brought her home. 

Of course, I promptly realized that she was the perfect cat and fate had known better than my conscious mind what I really needed. Her name is Estë, after the goddess in the Silmarillion who always wears gray. She appears to be part Siamese and is very small and kittenish, even though she’s probably about 4 years old.

I may still get that longhaired kitten at some point, but right now I’m pretty busy dealing with the clowder as it currently stands. However, shelters are overrun all over the country right now, so if you’re thinking of getting a cat, now is a great time!

Wishing you much kitty-filled joy in the coming weeks. And if you also feel moved to do some reading, here are the links again for the Indie Audiobook Deals sale and Smashwords Summer/Winter Sale, which is running until the end of the month.

Happy reading!

Sid Stark

Massive Smashwords sale, plus Under Review is on YouTube!

Hi All!

Just a quick update with some information on freebies (woohoo!). 

First of all, I’m participating in the Smashwords July Summer/Winter Sale. Use code SS100 at checkout to get a 100% discount on any or all of my ebooks. There are also a ton of other books, all with discount coupons available for 25-100% off. You can check out my author page here and the main sale page here.

Second of all, I now have episodes two and three of Under Review, Book 7 in the Doctor Rowena Halley Series,up on YouTube. As a reminder, Under Reviewis scheduled for release on August 11, and in the meantime I’m podcasting the audiobook on YouTube.

I’m hoping to have some delightful and exciting news the next time I email you, but for now, this is all I’ve got! Once again, here are those links:

Smashwords Summer/Winter Sale

Sid Stark Smashwords page (coupon code SS100)

Under Review on YouTube

If you’re anywhere near any of the heat domes and wildfires currently afflicting North America, stay safe and stay cool, and happy reading!

Sid Stark

Massive end-of-year sale on Smashwords!

Hi All!

Happy holidays, and if you’re in the path of the giant cold front that’s currently threatening to sweep across most of North America, I hope you’re staying warm! 

I myself am currently trying to recover from a hectic week of grading and other excitement. The good news is that I managed to get my final grades in with hours to spare. The even better news is, well, see below…

If you’re wondering what Smashwords is, it’s an ebook distributor. They recently merged with Draft2Digital, the distributor that handles my ebooks, and so all my ebooks are now on the Smashwords store.

This is exciting for authors because the Smashwords store offers the best royalties in the business. And they are holding a MASSIVE sale from now until January 1st, so now is the time to check them out! You can access the main storefront here and my personal page here.

Well, I’m sure we all have pre-holiday stuff to do, or maybe just relaxing for the weekend, so I’ll end it there. As always, happy reading!

Sid Stark

What happens when your heroine starts flirting with the dark side?

Hi All!

I hope you’re having a wonderful October, however that looks in your part of the world. At the moment here we have 70F weather and blue skies, so that’s pretty nice.

I thought I’d share a pivotal scene from Under Review with you, but first a quick announcement: you can get both Campus Confidential and Foreign Exchange, plus about 50 other books, for free right now in the Mystery and Thriller Giveaway on Bookfunnel. Link here.

https://books.bookfunnel.com/mystery-and-thriller-giveaway-mid-october/mga92b1oha

And now for the excerpt from Under Review! But first, a little background. It took me a while to get started on Under Review, in part because I wasn’t sure what it was supposed to be “about.” I don’t mean on the plot level, although the plot took a MAJOR turn from where I had initially intended it to go. I mean more on a thematic level. I don’t normally start off my books with any kind of a clear theme, but normally there has to be one percolating away subconsciously for a book to get started. 

Plus, the sudden expansion of the war in Ukraine from a frozen civil war in one corner of the country to a full-scale war that captured international attention meant I had to figure out what to do with that, since it’s been a recurring theme in these books since the beginning, especially in the side-quest books with Dima (link to a free copy of Summer Break, the first of the Dima novellas set in the Donbass, here). 

Things haven’t really resolved much vis-a-vis Ukraine since then, so it might take me a little while to write the last of the Dima novellas and get it and Under Review ready for release. In the meantime, though, I discovered that the themes of extremism, radicalization, and the dangers of ideals and ideology running through the book. I also carried on the plotline started in Total Immersionof Rowena being bad at heart.

This chapter contains all of that. It’s a discussion between Mel and Rowena about their various work woes, which morphs into an open acknowledgement of how close they are to becoming completely radicalized extremists. Rowena is also tormented by her emotional response to a recent article by Dima that could potentially put her in danger. So all in all, it’s a pretty heavy chapter, but might be of interest to those who want the “deeper meaning” of the book and the series.

Oh, and the line about “fucking corporate enlightenment and Zen you can buy at the dollar store” was first uttered in real life by someone very similar to Mel. I instantly knew she needed to say it in the book, and got permission to use it.

***

“Let me guess,” Mel said when I hauled myself into the Jeep. “Karen caught you.”

“Jeez, how’d you know?”

We both laughed. “Normally you go around with this, what’s the word I’m looking for, beatific expression on your face,” she said. “But right now you look like you want to chew nails so’s you can spit them out as bullets.”

“That is about how I feel,” I agreed. I outlined my conversation with Karen, dwelling at length about her warnings about the potential negative effect my injury would have on my candidacy for the tenure-track job, should it appear.

“Yeah, well, you know how these motherfuckers roll,” said Mel. “They want to work you death, and they get really pissed if you get cancer or something and interfere with their plans.”

“And what pisses me off most of all is that I got this injury here,” I said. “At Crimson. Doing my job. It’s a workplace injury. At least the first time, it was. And you could argue that the second time it was too. It certainly happened while I was here at Crimson. Saving, I should mention, Crimson’s ass from what could have turned into a really nasty incident. And now Karen is hinting that it could be grounds for termination! They talk about how we’re all one big caring family. And I guess some of the people here do care about us people. It’s just that most of them care about us more as commodities.”

“Yeah,” said Mel. “And instead of trying to help us out, they try to tell us we have to help ourselves by getting their fucking corporate enlightenment and Zen you can buy at the dollar store. They keep trying to get us to ‘have a good attitude’ and ‘think positive,’ and look what the result is.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Although maybe they’re right to push us towards meditation. Maybe we’re in the same situation as people in medieval China or whatever, forced to rely on mind control for our medical care because it’s the only thing we’ve got.”

“Also true,” I said.

“And hey, it’s cheap—at least if you avoid all the hucksters and shysters trying to sell you your soul back at $200 dollars a private session.”

“Man the barricades,” I said. “Oops. I meant…um, woman the barricades? What is it we’re supposed to be doing, anyway?”

“Nothing,” said Mel. “Abso-fucking-lutely nothing. We can’t even sit around looking pretty without getting shit for it.”

“We need to stop this conversation before we become radicalized beyond redemption,” I said.

“It sure makes you realize how people can become fucking jihadists and shit, don’t it?”

“Yes,” I said. “It does. Not that that’s helping my peace of mind right now.”

“Oh? There’s more than Karen and her bullshit eating you up right now?”

I told her about the article about Kavboyets and Security Solutions, and the (true) rumor going around that I was, or at least had been, involved with its author.

“Oooooooh shit,” said Mel. “The college isn’t going to be happy about that.”

“No,” I agreed. “One might be tempted to point out that if they didn’t want to get bad press for crawling into bed with Security Solutions, they shouldn’t have done it. But I doubt that argument will hold much weight with them.”

“Fuck to the no,” said Mel. “They’ll just shoot the shit out of the messenger.”

“And I’m afraid…I’m afraid…I’m afraid they’ll blame me for it, even though I had nothing to do with the article at all, and I’ll get in trouble for it. That would certainly be grounds for termination. And…I’m afraid of Kavboyets,” I admitted, my voice hardly above a whisper, barely audible against the rushing of the air through the open windows. The Jeep, most inconveniently for a vehicle in Georgia, didn’t have AC.

“I’m afraid they’ll take up their vendetta against Dima again, and they’ll go after him, and his mom…and me,” I said, looking down at the door handle because I was too frightened and ashamed by the words I was uttering to look Mel or even my own reflection in the face. “I’m afraid they’ll track me all the way here, and go after me to stop him. And…I’m angry. At Dima. I’m angry at him for putting me in this position. Again. And I’m angry at myself for being such a coward.”

“Mmmm.” Mel was silent for a moment as she pulled through an intersection. “Was that a bone of contention between you?” she asked once we were through. “You didn’t want him putting you at risk?”

“No,” I said. “I was always so proud of him, and—let’s be honest—so proud of myself for standing by him. I felt like we were both doing something important, something worth fighting for…worth dying for, if it came down to it. When they—the guys from Kavboyets—were holding that gun to my head, all I felt was rage. I swore to myself that this was a blood feud now, and I would show them they hadn’t stopped me, I would make them pay.

“But…I don’t know…I’m so tired. I’m tired of fighting noble rearguard actions that can’t be won. I don’t want any more blood feuds, or brave fights, or…anything like that. I just, for once, want things to be pleasant and easy. Or at least, I want a husband who loves me, and a couple of kids who are, you know, just normal, nice kids, and a house that’s a normal, nice house, and a job that isn’t always full of gut-wrenching misery and pays enough that I don’t have to calculate every single purchase to the penny every time I go to the grocery store. Is that too much to ask?”

“It shouldn’t be,” said Mel. “But somehow it is.”

“I know. And, you know, it makes me sick sometimes when I think about it. And the worst part is that Dima, and Alex, and my brother John—they all sold their souls for money in one way or another. They all signed up for things that involved doing really, really bad stuff that now they’ll have to live with for the rest of their lives, because they needed the money. And still none of them can really support a family. Not on just their paycheck. I mean, Dima’s all about truth and justice now, but when he was younger, he was in OMON. If you know what that is.”

“Russian riot police, right?” said Mel.

“Right. Not nice guys at all. And he did it mainly for the money. Alex and John both did ROTC, which we think is so great, but a lot of Russians consider to be horrible blood money. And they all ended up with way too much blood on their hands to ever wash clean. And they’re still broke, or at least, not rich.”

“Yeah,” said Mel. “It fucking sucks. Believe me, I know. Every day, I ask myself what it was all for, and if this fucking guilt will ever go away, and why the fuck I’m not at least bathing in one of those fucking golden bathtubs they supposedly found in Saddam’s palaces when they ‘liberated’ them. I mean, if I had to go in and wreck the shit out of Iraq, I should at least get something out of it other than a TBI and PTSD, right?”

“I don’t think you singlehandedly wrecked the shit out Iraq,” I said. “I think it was a group effort.”

“Yeah, and I don’t think you’re a coward,” said Mel. “I think you’re just asking some fucking important questions, like what the fuck we’re all doing here, and what kind of consequences our actions have, and whether it’s worth it. And if you ask me, Dima should have asked you before writing that article. It’s not just his life on the line there.”

“Yeah,” I said. “But he always has to do what he thinks is right, regardless of what it does to the rest of us.”

“You know how it is with men,” said Mel. “They want 110% from you, while only giving back 10% in return. And as the words are coming out of my mouth, that sounds like extremism even to me.”

“Like I said, getting radicalized is so easy,” I said. “As is getting co-opted by the totalitarian state. And a lot of the time, that seems like the only two options.”

“We need to make some better fucking options,” said Mel.

“Yeah,” I said. “We should get right on that.”

***

This book is meant to be the nadir of Rowena’s story arc, and it’s pretty dark in spots. And as it turns out, the people in her life do put her in a lot of danger. But, since this is fiction, rest assured that she and those around her do start a climb up towards redemption, and the book ends on a potentially very hopeful note. At least I think so. 

Whether you’re being co-opted by the totalitarian state, radicalized into an extremist, or just consumed by self-doubt, I hope you have a pleasant weekend with plenty of time for reading 🙂 Here’s that link again for the book giveaway.

Happy reading!

Sid