What could’ve been. What should’ve been.
Fact-driven speculative fiction.
Contents: Damages, Home for Unwed Fathers, Fighting Words, Comedown, What Sane Man, Sweet Sixteen, Ballsy, Justified, It’s a Boy, Men Need Sex, How We Survived, The Knitting Group, The Mars Colonies, A PostTrans PostPandemic World, Unless, Alleviation, The Women’s Party, My Last Year.
Magenta 2022
If you’d like an ebook version, it’s available in Kindle, Kobo, NookBook, and iBook, but you can download it as an epub or pdf right here! For free. (And here’s why.)
(If you’d like the paperback version, best to purchase online–such as at amazon, barnesandnoble, bookdepository, bookshop, etc.–where you can get a deal on the shipping.)
(And if anyone feels inclined to write a review or some sort of reader response that I can post here, do send it to me!) (And thanks!)
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“Just reading it [‘What Sane Man’] was satisfying.” Anonymous, ovarit.com
“This [‘Men Need Sex’] is terrific!” An ovarite from ovarit.com
“OMG, I love it [‘Ballsy’]!” Amareldys, ovarit.com
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Here’s a premise on which I should’ve based a story for Fighting Words: by some biochemical quirk, the hormones we’ve been feeding cows inhibits testosterone in humans, so the more meat men eat, the weaker they become. Within a year, males lose their 30% physical strength advantage over women. Guess what.
And here’s another: Two married women at the same time get jobs outside the home, forcing their husbands to hire someone to do the cooking, cleaning, and childcare. Ten hours/day, 5 days/week, at $20/hr. It’s a lot, but the men have so-called breadwinner salaries. Turns out Emma is hired by Alyssa’s husband (on Alyssa’s recommendation) and Alyssa is hired by Emma’s husband (on Emma’s recommendation). The two are really enjoying their evenings off and their $52,000/yr incomes.
And another (this actually occurred to me long ago, but I never thought to turn it into a story until now): worldwide, women flood the military, soon comprising, say, 40% of the ranks (which will be perceived by men as a majority) (go figure). Then, as happened when they flooded the ranks of bank tellers, secretaries, and teachers, being a soldier will become devalued, it’ll lose its prestige, its glory, its funding, its media coverage. And when being a soldier has about as much appeal as being a waitress … The end of war. Ta-dah.
Other ideas welcome; I’ll post them here.
