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Today in Labor History July 18, 1934: “The American Mercury” accepted Emma Goldman's article, "Communism: Bolshevist & Anarchist, A Comparison.” However, it was not until a year later that it was published, in a truncated form, as "There is No Communism in Russia." Goldman had been deported by the U.S. in 1919, during the Palmer raids, and sent to Russia, where she lived with her comrade, Alexander Berkman, for several years. She was initially supportive of the Bolsheviks, until Trotsky brutally crushed the Kronstadt rebellion, in 1921, slaughtering over 1,000 sailors and then executing over a thousand more. After this, she left the USSR and, in 1923, published a book about her experiences, “My Disillusionment in Russia.” H.L. Menken founded “The American Mercury,” in 1924, and published radical writers throughout the 1920s and ‘30s. A change of ownership in the 1940s led to a shift to the far right, including virulently antisemitic articles.
#workingclass #LaborHistory #anarchism #EmmaGoldman #russia #soviet #ussr #communism #kronstadt #rebellion #massacre #writer #author #writer #books #journalism #magazine @bookstadon
New #introduction for my new Mastodon home:
Hi, I'm Emily! I'm interested in the human side of the web—using it to connect, not consume.
Among other things, I'm...
— an #artist, #activist, #writer, educator, speaker
— #ActuallyAutistic #AUDHD (#Autistic with an #ADHD booster pack 
)
— seeking community (human-to-human stuff!)
— excited (and terrified!) to be here
I have an "okay enough" #website that would be *thrilled* to see you (it has BIG feelings, like me!): https://fromemily.com
#PennedPossibilities 729 — Tell us about one place your MC would love to either visit or revisit.
Oddly enough, none of the MCs have a place they'd want to visit or revisit. Most are young, focused whether they like it or not on their "studies." University is a thing. Another MC's life is so dismal, living seems rather pointless. A pair of MCs visit the Moon, but it is definitely not a place they'd have ever have dreamed of visiting, or want to. I mean, it's a dead world… or is it?
I'm considering the possibility that the devil-girl's mother and her mother's consort aren't really dead; they were secretly spies and got discovered in a hostile land. Strategically, there were no bodies at the funeral. No retcon necessary! It might turn out the her mother's consort (the man who fathered the devil-girl) is being held hostage in another country to prevent the nation the devil-girl lives in from invading (probably one of many). At the point I would actually pursue this plot line, the devil-girl would want to visit, even if not in her official capacity (which might start a war), to free the man. She might be pregnant, though…
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
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#RSdiscussion
#RSstory #RSReluctanceStory
#ScribesAndMakers 2025.07.18 — Show us the cover to yesterday's book, and tell us what you don't like about the cover.
The cover art features a woman with a knife and what looks like a wookiee. Whilst dressed nominally (and correctly) as a man, she looks like an anglo white Vogue model that would convince nobody she's a guy; she's supposed to be ethnically Japanese. There's a vast difference between a sheep dog and a wookiee. I dislike covers that are wrong in great detail, but the publisher sold through a big printing, without any advertising, using it, so I forgive them. Since there were virtually no returns, I suppose even the duped Star Wars fans loved the story.
I am not showing the cover as I did not publish it under my current nom de plume. Sorry.
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
#BoostingIsSharing and #CommentingIsCool
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#RSdiscussion
#WordWeavers 2025.07.18 — The home of your MC is on fire. They can retrieve one item. What is it and why?
The devil-girl would say, "Let it burn. I carry the only important things with me at all times, which are my ancient thaumaturgy primer and notebook. If you need help putting out the fire, I'll help."
Thorn Rose's family lives in a day angel-cultured home tree that resembles a grove of ancient ficus benjamina whose massive trunks have grown together into a city block-size mass, divided into a dozen "townhouses." As daemons living in a day angel neighborhood, the only place her family could rent belonged to a day angel who rebelled against the daemon-majority government a century ago. Though the former abode of a cultural hero, day angels won't live there in fear of becoming noticed by the government. If the tree went up in flames, the neighborhood would pitch in to put it out. Thorn Rose would frantically want to retrieve everything, but even her pictures of Streak with Rainy Days, or the model she calls Big Streak, could be replaced since she has access to the source of both. She wears the jewelry given her by Streak at all times (horn tips and a gold nose ring). Really, all she'd miss would be her notebooks, but she knows they aren't worth much if the knowledge isn't already in her head (which it probably is). Nevertheless, she'd make herself frantic, needing Streak to calm her down.
Day Angel Streak would think of saving his bed frame, built from the stake bed of the first cart he ever got to fly through the sky. It was a piece of crap given him by his uncle who wanted him to fail to fly it to convince him to stop making a nuisance of himself at the family warehouse—only Streak has an innate talent for levitating things behind him, even heavy and unwieldy lorries; he learned to "pull" that day, even as parts of the cart fell from the sky as he landed it. The boy made his bed frame from the wreckage, and even Thorn Rose likes it for what it meant to him.
Day Angel Bolt (where she's the MC) would go nuts trying to get her camera kit from her aerie. It's the only thing she values at the start of her story, and considering how dismal her life has become, perhaps more than life itself. I envision this would not end well.
Wintereyes (the wolf-raised woman forced to attend university) doesn't understand possessions at all. If Mother Wolf wasn't trapped in the fire, or anyone she could help save, she'd only be sad for the people or beasts who lost their shelter or livelihoods and try to comfort them in her quirky shy way.
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
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#PennedPossibilities 730 — 2nd Anniversary Edition: Share a blurb, summary, or tiny snippet explaining your WIP to everyone in the hashtag.
Congratulations, @floofpaldi Two years of prompts is pretty dang amazing! Since you were asking for a tiny snippet explaining my WIP, I actually got pulled to a steamy single paragraph that oddly puts the book into perspective (or so its author would claim). I decided that without permission, I'd not post that to the hashtag. 
This instead here's a blurb providing the gist (maybe) of a novelette I'm trying to get started, which is taking up my head space at the moment.
Bolt was framed for murder and forced to fly messages for the mob; she wonders often if going to prison might have been the better choice. She's blacked out her memories of bad things for a dozen years. She lives for the rare moments she grabs for her street photography—the capturing of the faces and the camaraderie of a normalcy her stupidity denied her. When a newspaper reporter breaks his camera and Bolt is hovering at the scene of a weird disaster, with a perspective to see more than she should, her quirky photos end up on the front page and seem a ticket away from a life of apathy toward friendship. When her mob boss wants her to shadow the unusual teenage woman she photographed walking out of the erratic star gate, she learns the secret of her blackouts. Boss Mead knows the teenager, whom Bolt soon realizes has whole different take on apathy, one that endangers her reporter friend, her horrible job, and likely the city itself.
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
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#WordWeavers 2025.07.17 — Your MC's boss has done a job performance appraisal, share a few details.
Hehehe. A "job performance appraisal," in not so many words, was the climatic scene in a short novel, before I rewrote it and added about 30% more content. Her actual boss (the main series antagonist) approves greatly of how the MC spent her last four years since running away, and knows a lot more about those years than the MC could have imagined. Despite the criminal activities the MC was involved in, what the boss sees is: She learned to fight smartly, became an effective thaumaturge, used her knowledge to help the individuals around her even if she didn't understand them (the MC is autistic), kept the people she was responsible for safe, and eventually guided a huge (albeit criminal) organization beyond a period of "disastrous mismanagement" with little loss of life while maintaining the peace. Temporarily taking over the "organization" included the ironic death of a woman that was trying to assassinate the main series antagonist; this might require a bonus!
The MC had thought the main series antagonist was evil before. Now, from her point of view, she's sure of it.
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
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#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2025.07.17 — How much can a reader learn about an author through their works?
This worries me greatly.
I don't think that a reader can learn a lot about an author's public, or even private persona, from their stories unless the author intends it to be so. Hints maybe, philosophy likely, but about them? Not much. However, what leaks into the text (my text, anyway) is what most people severely censor, what if's we wouldn't approach "for reals." Fighting and the other f-word used as a verb, because readers want exciting stories—especially in genre fiction—that are NOT about the normal everyday people they know, or are. If you write murder mysteries, erotic fantasy, or vigilante adventure you are going to have to imagine being those people to write their stories, but this doesn't mean you murder people in a locked room, have a blazing libido, or use a .356 magnum to kill the criminals the police can't or won't.
My worry is that readers will think they understand me through my stories, and since my stories are more spicy these days than ever before, my self-censor is throwing fits and hysterics. I'm not my characters. I'm simply living the Walter Mitty life like every other reader, only more in control—though I'm sure people who ban books will be happy to tar me as advocating whatever offended them. Seems these days who you have sex with is far more important than the gun you conceal in your pants.
That's my thought on the subject, anyway. Note: I am still writing.
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
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#RSdiscussion
#ScribesAndMakers 2025.07.17 — Tell us about a book you like despite its cover (don't show the cover yet.)
The elevator pitch is "Yentl in the future." Google Yentl. My novel†. An SF YA. Published years ago before I took the R.S. nom de plume.
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† I edited the post to be clear, Yentl is not my novel; I am simply not stating the title. Aren't the vagaries of English wonderful?
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
#BoostingIsSharing and #CommentingIsCool
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I'm trying to write my newsletter for Convergence of Connection's release next week, but I'm having such a hard time focusing today.
The brain weasels are loud, I didn't sleep great, and my heart's heavy with melancholy. I'm trying to push through it, but a thunderstorm's about to roll through, and I won't deny that sitting quietly and just...existing through that is appealing.
I didn't take my rest day yesterday. Maybe I should do that today... 
I've always envisioned Shallow Trenches, Open Skies starting with a prologue that was a totally different format and POV from the rest of the novel. But now that I'm outlining it, I'm not sure I need or even want the prologue.
But now's not the time to make that decision. I should write it first.
Today in Labor History July 17, 1794: The biggest rebel victory of the Whiskey Rebellion occurred on this date when a mob of 500 armed men, protesting a new excise tax on distilleries, clashed with troops from Fort Pitt after firing on a revenue collector and burning down his home. Many of the rebels were poor farmers, who made spirits with their excess grain, and war veterans, who believed they were still fighting against taxation without representation.
Within weeks, 13,000 uniformed militiamen were sent in to quash the rebellion, including Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton (whose buddies in the rum business were the major benefactors of the tax). Most of the rebels gave up and went home before the soldiers arrived. However, they did arrest 20 men, but most were acquitted due to mistaken identity. Only two men were convicted and sentenced to hang. However, Washington pardoned them. Furthermore, the authorities were unable to collect taxes on many of the distilleries in eastern Kentucky and Western Pennsylvania.
Nevertheless, Washington’s response was seen as successful because he demonstrated that the national government had both the will and ability to suppress popular resistance to its laws. Furthermore, it set a precedent for what types of protest the new government would tolerate. The rebels had believed the American Revolution had established the people as sovereign, with the right to change the government by force. In contrast, the Federalists in the government believed that the government was sovereign because it had been established with the consent of the people.
Susanna Rowson wrote a play called “The Volunteers” (1795) in which the militiamen were the heroes of the Whiskey Rebellion. She was also an early advocate for women’s education and an abolitionist. Her novel “Charlotte Temple” was the most popular American novel until Harriet Beecher Stowe’s “Uncle Tom’s cabin.” L. Neil Smith wrote an alternative historical fiction novel, “The Probability Broach,” (1980) in which the rebels win and execute Washington for treason. David Liss published “The Whiskey Rebels” (2008), another historical fiction piece about the rebellion.
#workingclass #LaborHistory #whiskey #rebellion #insurrection #uprising #taxes #books #fiction #historicalfiction #novel #writer #author @bookstadon
New Post From The SeerOfSouls Blog
Review: HOZO Design NeoRuler
https://www.seerofsouls.com/review-hozo-design-neoruler/
Associated Mastodon Account: @Cliff
https://www.europesays.com/2252462/ What does AI mean for the future of screenwriting in Hollywood? #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #BillyRay #ChatGPT #CloningActor #CottageIndustry #FilmIndustry #Hollywood #machine #people #screenwriter #studio #technology #Writer #WritersGuild #WritingCredit
Is there a way to show representation that's not offensive?
Yes. Very definitely. Always? Probably not. Without adding additional weight to the word "controversial," remembering what's controversial is relative to the reader's POV and ultimately beyond the author's control, I try not to weight, color, heat, or highlight such things any more than any other miscellaneous fact would be. Can't say I always succeed, or it may be impossible. Indeed, the character may have their own agenda to stir the pot. I think it's best to represent people as people, and let story context carry the burden. Throwing firebombs gets you the audience that enjoys fireworks, not the ones you hope will hear your message.
Do you consider other people's feelings when you're writing?
This question is one of my bugaboos. My internal censor feels like it's drinking far too much caffeine of late. Writing dryly and a matter-of-factly about women who don't feel shame (as one example) keeps grating against the gender roles and norms I was socialized with, which I know full well were made to control my behavior to the benefit of a society that really doesn't care other than I don't make trouble.
#WordWeavers 2025.07.16 — SC POV: What do you do to calm down when you’re angry?
[Bolt closes her eyes in obvious emotional pain. As tears gather in her eyelashes, the day angel wraps her upper body in her wings to hide as she talks:] My friend calls it anger management; 'parently I keep on inflicting "life lessons" on myself. As a dumb, stupid, ignorant fledgling, I didn't calm down; I acted out. Rarely listened, got myself into fun trouble that was still trouble all the same, flew with hunky guys who were no good, and generally made my family regret I'd been born. Haven't tried to contact 'em since I threw that brick through the Hauler Guild's window 'fer rejected me, and rolled that pretty van down a hill. Ya could say I got to the point of calming down by breaking things and people's trust in me.
Running from the law has the effect of ya losing the privilege to be protected by that same law. I… [coughs] Okay, bad things happened and I lost control of my life, including the bein' able to fight being controlled. Not a child no more. How did I calm down?
Turned it inward.
My friend calls it "apathy." A-pathy: means "not feelin'." Got to the point where I ceased remembering my life, worked through criminal things I had no choice but to do, and, well, felt so very little I'd've been happy ta have suddenly died. I lived to 27 years surprisingly fast feelin' surprisingly numb, most days (surprisingly) blacked out from memory.
Friends changed that. They pointed out the good things I also did, and helped me find new dreams beyond my restrictions. Now, surprisingly often, I find that I cry. [She has lowered her blue feathered wings as she's talked, and you see tears streaming down her cheeks.]
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
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#WordWeavers 2025.07.15 — How emotionally intelligent is your MC?
Referring to the definitions below: The devil-girl is very emotionally intelligent, or not emotionally intelligent at all.
She is intelligent enough to understand that her logical and mathematical intelligence doesn't cut it, which isn't at all helped by her being somewhat autistic. She knows she fails definition 1 below. However, she is very well trained, and has been trained from the age of five to be so, when she lost her family and ended up being raised by a guardian (a proxy for the main series antagonist)—until she ran away.
She could (and chooses to) convincingly act the part of definition number 2, including managing her own emotions no matter how infuriatingly stupid, stubborn, or vapid the vast majority of people she has had to deal with have turned out to be. Her internal dialogue is hilarious in this respect.
What she likes is being skilled, earning praise, and being challenged into learning something. What had been indoctrinated into her is that other people are like her, feel like her, and want normalacy like her (albeit differently), which is why she's unerringly willing to choose to "have the backs" of those she becomes responsible for. She's very skilled at putting herself in other's shoes.
Don't confuse this with empathy†. She occasionally toys with people, or acts with deadly logic. She doesn't tolerate continued stupidity for long. The "good" she has done thus far is by choice. Her choice. Forced to interact with people, she reframes the situation as being fun, or learning how to make it fun for herself.
emotional intelligence
noun
- Intelligence regarding the emotions, especially in the ability to monitor one's own or others' emotions.
- The ability, capacity, or skill to perceive, assess, and manage the emotions of oneself, of others, and of groups.
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† There's the empathy she demonstrates (the reader gets to decide) and the empathy she'll admit to (which is none). If you practice something long enough it becomes reflexive. She may or may not get this.
[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]
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This month, thanks to a workplace sabbatical, I've been able to get some focused writing done of a kind that's very hard to accomplish with a full-time job. I've written all my published works with my job, squeezing in writing on evenings, weekends, and holidays, so I know I can do that. But being able to start in the morning and keep writing, and not have to not stop for the day job, or focus on any "work" other than my ideas, has been utter bliss.
"Ask the next question"
Excellent Theodore Sturgeon reference, thank you. I sometimes refer to my fiction as similar to his, and those four words are great advice for any fiction author. Similar to the concept of "worsening;" when the narrative asks the next question whilst resolving the first, you pull the reader along intellectually not necessarily by something visceral like fear or worry does in worsening. Both good plot devices that can help when the plot is slumping.
I long ago attended a small seminar at Antioch featuring Theodore Sturgeon. Like many things I did when I was young, I did not value the opportunity enough; I have no notes or photographs, just the memory of being there.