I watched a (long) video last night that basically reviewed 50 years of dystopian movies and said we were stuck in a doom loop that was killing the future. Exactly so, my friend. Even better, they reviewed Tomorrowland, where the whole premise is “scaring” people about a horrible future in an attempt to “wake them up” to the problem and… Read More

I’ve watched the organized online hatred of women grow. At first, I was unaware of the hate groups in the fever swamps of 4Chan–then I believed they were just a few crackpots. Then Gamergate happened, and I realized those groups had metastasized into an electronic mob. It was about that time I started to experience it personally–increasingly virulent misogyny directed… Read More

Still true. Although, given I’ve started an entirely new penname (romance) since then, I’d add that publishing allows you to be someone else too.

There are some people who are proud of their ability to tell the “brutal truth.” But Truth isn’t brutal or kind–people are those things. So maybe the truth isn’t brutal–you are. Is that hard to hear? That’s because it’s not kind. The Truth: we have a veneer of social nicety that stands in for our better selves. Politeness is a… Read More

It’s the stock and trade for writers, so I’ve spent a lot of time studying it–what it is, how it works in the brain, how to tap into it, enhance it, access it (even when your emotional state says WAT? NO!). This isn’t just for my own work, but the future work of my children–as I was telling my two… Read More

As someone else pointed out, it’s the nature of dog whistles to fly under the radar of normal people. It’s Secret Code for Racists. And our President is using it. (For bonus points, he’s using terminology that originated with the Nazis within 24 hours of a swastika-burning Neo-Nazi party in Georgia.) If you support Trump, you cannot say “I don’t… Read More

I’ll write for the rest of my life… because humanity is an endless ocean to explore. As a reader, I give myself over to the writer, trusting them to guide me through the experience of the book. As a writer, I know readers have placed this trust in me. For some authors, writing is a purely mental exercise, a flexing… Read More

If you’re human, you have unconscious biases. Ferreting those out isn’t just the right thing to do to make the world a better place for your fellow humans, it also opens up your world and makes it richer. It’s not easy, but human-ing rarely is. I have some pretty strong opinions about equality and justice and the lack of those… Read More

In 2011, I started self-publishing my novels. In 2015, I hit a major milestone–funding my 3 boys’ college education with my book money. I think I floated for a full week after that (and it’s paying off in a real way now as they actually are leaving the nest). In 2014, I started a separate penname (sexy romance) with a… Read More

The Trump Era is a real-time tutorial in how our democracy actually works. One of the most striking things to me was realizing that the Voting Rights Act of 1965–the core of the Civil Rights movement–not only isn’t permanent (it has to be reauthorized periodically) but it was substantially weakened in 2013 by a Supreme Court decision that said states… Read More

I’m incredibly fortunate in ways I’m almost embarrassed to enumerate. I have my struggles too, and I usually talk about those because I think it’s empowering to share—to know we have a common humanity and can overcome the difficulties inherent in being human. But I’m constantly reminded of my fortune by the things I *don’t* have to worry about. Healthcare… Read More

To the students walking out to protest gun violence today: I am with you, young patriots. And I’ll be Marching for Your Lives on the 24th. To the governor of my state who just vetoed a gun licensing bill that passed both the House and Senate and has popular support in the state: shame on you. But the only real… Read More

The most radical thing you can do is eschew the things that society says you must want. Money. Status. Power. Beauty (if you’re a woman). It confuses people; frustrates them. THEM: Don’t you want the Thing? Me: No. THEM: But everyone wants the Thing. Me: The Thing is unimportant to me. THEM: Sure, sure. But how about the Thing Even… Read More

“You must be able to create in the middle of things, or else you will not create. You must learn to take whatever practical and psychological actions are necessary to combat the anticreating forces that surround you and live within you. There is always profound turbulence within or without — that is life — and it is in the middle… Read More

Heart to heart, mind to mind. Connection and communication are the entire point (also entertainment, but let me be honest: that’s just a ruse to get inside your head). The intimacy of my words reaching my readers, knowing they didn’t just skim their eyes over the inky scribbles on their screen but actually brought that world into theirs… it’s the… Read More

The market for indie ebooks continues to grow and grow, but the competition is like the Borg, assimilating everything in sight. “A tsunami of money is flowing to audio and video. Netflix unveiled a plan to spend $8 billion on original content in one year, while Apple plans to shell out $1 billion.’” As someone who traffics in text, I’m… Read More

“The human soul is hungry for beauty…We feel most alive in the presence of the Beautiful for it meets the needs of our soul. For a while the strains of struggle and endurance are relieved and our frailty is illuminated by a different light in which we come to glimpse behind the shudder of appearances to the sure form of… Read More

Instead of watching the State of the Uniom (typo trademarked by the White House), I am reading Nobody Knows My Name by James Baldwin. #Resist

Tesla was robbed! He was also a genius ahead of his time. For those of you who don’t know who Tesla is (not the car, the man), he invented AC motors and “wireless communication” (radio)–his work is literally the bedrock of our modern age. Yet, he died penniless and heartbroken when his favorite pigeon when to Pigeon Heaven. Tesla’s obsessive… Read More

If you’ve never read MLK Jr’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail, today is the day to fix that. “You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations.” If you look at MLK’s protests and Colin’s protests and see two… Read More

This is how broken our country is right now—finding a cure for Alzheimer’s is less important to the people in charge than giving tax cuts to their political donors. 1 — Alzheimer’s afflicts 5M people annually, causing unbelievable emotional and financial stress with this incredibly cruel disease. 2 — The GOP shoves through a tax cut to corporations like Pfizer,… Read More

ACTION and REACTION Trump’s inauguration and the Women’s March. “Grab ’em by the pussy” and the #MeToo Movement. A bigoted politician in VA tries to push through anti-transgender legislation and a transgender woman wins his seat in the next election. Action and Re-Action In my personal life, an insane amount of stress and my discovery of meditation. From that comes… Read More

ABOUT THOSE RESOLUTIONS… I don’t have any this year. My self-improvement plans are manifold and ongoing, but they’re not dependent on “gearing up” for change in the New Year or “muscling through” the tough spots. I’m probably the only person in the world who will *cancel* her gym membership on Jan 1st (I’ve decided to spend that money on yoga… Read More

Dear White Lady Who Commented on My Profile That Reporting Voting Records By Race Should Be Illegal Because It’s the Most Racist Thing Ever, Thank you. It’s really hard sometimes for me (a white person) to tell when someone is racist. When I accepted your friend request, you weren’t spewing racist garbage on your profile – you were a writer!… Read More

Celebrating the completion of my 8 week commitment to meditate every day. The amazing ladies of Mystic Lotus made beautiful henna art out of my hands. The butterfly on the backs symbolizing transformation, with the palms offering up joy and Om within the lotus and mandala, all representations of the meditation journey. The pure pleasure and art were magnified by… Read More

The first one of this series was our ground-breaking all-female-author SF anthology, Dark Beyond the Stars. I loved watching that thing soar up the charts (has my story CONTAINMENT). Subsequent issues were open to all SF authors with female-positive stories – not necessarily written by or about women, but that recognize women as fully formed human beings (you wouldn’t think… Read More

My first post after the election a year ago… still in shock. Already horrified at the hate crime spree. Just beginning to see the magnitude of the work ahead. “My language is my power, and I’m going to use it to create a world I can be proud of…” —me, a year ago That language has involved a lot of… Read More

Anger is pain, suppressed. Rage is pain, fermented. But anger is easier to face and embrace. So easy. Empathy, perspective, love, compassion, logic… All of these die on the sharp sword of our rage. We need to make it easier to express pain, especially for men. And boys. We need to not diminish pain as weakness (feminine!). We need to… Read More

“You should meditate for 20 min a day, unless you don’t have time. Then you should meditate for an hour.” Me, before starting a meditation practice: Ha ha, those funny meditation people! Me, after trying meditation for short 10 min periods: Wow, this stuff really works. Some day maybe I can do that 20 min a day thing. An hour’s… Read More

“People define reality situationally a lot of the time, and the further someone is from self-awareness and accountability, the more dramatic that can be from the outside.” – from my friend JC Andrijeski This applies to people in general, to characters in books, and to writers themselves. To write is to attempt to explain people, so writers generally are more… Read More

I do things with a high probability of failure built into them just for the learning experience. So, let’s talk about failure. I fail – all the time, in fact. I’m constantly daring, risking, and there’s a certain amount of failure that comes with that. I don’t like it, mind you. It’s painful. Monetary loss can hurt, personal pride hits… Read More

A lady in a lake gave me a sword. I know its power and its secrets. My mind says, “We can unlock *everything* with this!” And I agree. I can see it, and my ambition is already halfway down the path. My body says, “You’re not strong enough to wield that sword.” I ask my brain, “Are we afraid? Is… Read More

Do the thing you love. Connect with the people you love. Put these things at the top of your To Do List every day, color-coded an urgent red or sunny yellow or peaceful sea-green. This is what life is made of, and it’s more important than any “urgent” thing on your list. A day when you can’t spend an hour… Read More

Artists are under no obligation to self-censor. Neither are they obligated to share their thoughts on, well, anything. For some artists, their personal lives do not allow public disclosure on the politics of the day or injustice. Journalists are jailed in China for writing articles criticizing the government, so artists tend to let their works speak for themselves (or risk… Read More

800,000 young people. Dreamers. And Trump wants to deport them. The hurricanes are horrible, but at least I can blame the displacement of 30,000 people in Texas on natural forces beyond our control. Our Hurricane in Chief is a man-made destructive force we are entirely responsible for as a nation. #Resist “United States is the only home they’ve ever known…. Read More

CONNECTION An essential human need. Babies wither without it. Adults blossom with it. Just now, I witnessed the most adorable thing at the Panera. An older woman – at least 70 – and a 20-something man embraced after an effusive “Good morning!” They both have Panera aprons on. All smiles, they set to work, doing the things Panera employees do…. Read More

We all live in a box.* Your box could be small, suffocating, and filled with tiny, tiny aspirations. Your box could be the size of Montana, only with less buffalo and more WiFi. Society wants to hand you a one-size-fits-all box, circumscribed by your gender and skin color and sexual orientation… and other things you can’t choose. Or things you… Read More

HOW THE WORLD ENDS Maybe it’ll be rogue AI. Maybe nuclear holocaust. Perhaps a pandemic unleashed by ancient viruses in the melting arctic permafrost. Maybe we’ll just descend into chaos and anarchy and war (that’s the bright side?). My money’s on the asteroid. Not literally, of course. But I’m convinced that the chances of some piece of the Universe reaching… Read More

This writing thing is such an emotional thing. First, the euphoria of the new idea. Then the excitement as it unfolds. A little terror thrown in there because this idea wouldn’t be any good if it wasn’t a little risky. Maybe too much violence. Or some sexy sexy sex. Or you’re talking politics or oppression or heartbreak. Maybe it’s too… Read More

Random author-friend: Sue, how do you write so many books and get so much done? ME: Jedi Mind Tricks RAF: Seriously. I mean, sure you’re a robot from the future, but seriously?? How do you do it? ME: Meditation. Mindfulness. Immersion in my work. Tracking my progress. Starting where I am then moving forward. Rest. Play. Joy. RAF: I tried… Read More

If you think I’m the *first* writer in my family, you’d be wrong. My brother was writing novels, short stories and screenplays for TV fifteen years before me. The TV gig soured him on it, and he turned to music for his creative outlet, but when I picked up the pen, I nervously turned to him for encouragement. I got… Read More

America isn’t a set of borders. It’s not even the people currently living inside those borders. America is an ideal. Forged by brilliant minds, imperfect men, and messy politics at the country’s birth. Equality. Freedom of the Press. Separation of Church and State. The founders were familiar with tyranny and strove for a system that contained checks against it. The… Read More

“…men consider some of the jobs that will be most in demand — in health care, education and administration — to be unmanly or demeaning, or worry that they require emotional skills they don’t have.” Here’s a thought: let’s teach boys/men emotional skills. Here’s another: gender roles hurt EVERYONE. One more: how about we don’t undervalue/underpay “pink-collar” jobs (especially ones… Read More

A few months ago, I decided that I would always have fresh flowers on my desk. It wasn’t a “reward” and I’ve never been the “bring me flowers!” kind of person. It was part of the desire to beautify the space I inhabit 90% of my waking hours. Lately, I’ve taken to meditating before I begin writing for the day…. Read More

I was arrested by an elderly Scottish woman at the grocery store. She detained me with her exquisitely-lined face and cool hand on mine. Her sharp eyes and wisdom smile seized hold of my attention, bringing me to a full stop by the grapes. But it was that accent – the lilting Scotch-Irish brogue and turns-of-phrase – and the slips… Read More

Just got off the phone with the independent producer who’s optioned Debt Collector for Virtual Reality. 1 – I will never get tired of saying that. 2 – He says there’s forward movement with the property – that a former V.C. (venture capitalist) with his own VR production studio is interested in producing a “sizzle reel” of DC using some… Read More

A pride button for Pride Month? Well done, FB. Something you don’t know about me: No, I’m not gay. But when I was in 7th and 8th grade, I was “mistaken for gay” and bullied just about every day. Shoved into lockers. Taunted. No one would take the chance on even standing near me, much less being my friend. One… Read More

Wonder Woman – I can’t write a proper review of this because I’m too emotionally entangled in it. Even with all the hype and my high expectations, I’m *still* unexpectedly emotional about this film. Love for Diana. Fervent, fierce pride in the film. “What I do is not up to you.” Yes. A thousand yes’s. And the battlefield scene. And… Read More

My family spent the last week in Paris. We visited Notre Dame just a few days before the hammer-wielding terrorist attack there. We were in Paris during the London attacks. So let me tell you how I felt: GRIEF at the tragic loss of life, ANGER at the evil the terrorists were perpetrating, and STEELY RESOLVE to not let terror… Read More

Yesterday was magical. My book signing in a tiny Parisian bookshop, answering questions from a Parisian book blogger with the help of my French-speaking author assistant while signing books and bookplates (for ebooks) was a delightful dream I never even dared to have. Afterward, my family and I had a wonderful evening of dîner, wine, and lively, intellectual conversation at… Read More

I just converted a non-reader into a maybe-reader. Authors are always wondering how to “find” readers, but the true competition comes from stories in other forms. Netflix, movies, TV, games… all of these deliver the story experience in highly visual and interactive ways, and if you’re going to lure people into discovering the pleasures of long-form reading (novels or short… Read More

The House passage of the health bill yesterday, even with the Senate vowing it’s “dead on arrival,” continues to horrify me. They’re playing Trump supporters for fools, counting on them to never read below the headline and relying on the Senate to stop the worst of it so the House won’t pay the political price for dead voters. SCENE: Frat… Read More

“The Republican (heathcare) plan… rolls back protections for people with pre-existing conditions, could increase health care costs for an estimated 130 million Americans.” “premiums could reach as high as $25,700 per year for people in high-risk pools” But what counts as a pre-existing condition? Pregnancy… among about 50 other things (including medical complications from rape). So don’t be a Mom… Read More

To my transgender friends: I see you; I support you; I voted today to support transgender youth in my local schools. We have a local school board election that’s quickly become an epicenter in the Bathroom Culture Wars. It’s hit the national news. My kids are in these schools. I was on the school board of the K-8 school for… Read More

I’ve been saying for a while that automation is a threat – the kind of glacial threat that encroaches relentlessly and unstoppably. Immigrants are very much not the problem – in fact, net immigration has been *out* of the US (to Mexico) for a number of years, giving lie to the fear-mongering (we know it’s not based in fact, but… Read More

Just signed a renewal on the Virtual Reality option for Debt Collector. As it happens, the first season of my gritty, sexy future-noir/cyberpunk serial (Debt Collector) is free this week (sitting pretty at about #400 free on the kindle store) – which means the audiobook is super-cheap too. I’m not a superstar author. I’m not a household name. Yet, I… Read More

The president’s assault on the poor and vulnerable in our country continues. Trump’s budget proposal is just that – a proposal. But there are two important things to know about this: 1 – This is Trump’s vision for America, and it’s not just an attack on the poor, but much like the Immigration Ban, it’s an assault on the character… Read More

The day after finishing a novel is a torturous affair. (Having written 29 novels across 2 pennames, I’m very familiar with this process – for me. It’s different for everyone.) The elation has passed, leaving only the exhaustion. You’ve given every last measure to that work, and consequently, it won’t let you go. You keep replaying scenes in your head,… Read More

Worm Burner introduced us to Secret Hitler last year… because the kids are always fine-tuned to the world more than you think (and often more than *you* are). But today, this is epic: the Secret Hitler gamemakers have sent a copy of the game to every member of Congress. In the letter addressed to senators, the three explain that Hitler… Read More

Feeling a skosh better, a word which here means “slightly better than the nearly-dying state of yesterday.” In other news, “skosh” comes from the Japanese “sukoshi” which means “a tiny bit.” This word was adopted by US servicemen stationed in Japan after WWII (according to Merriam-Webster, who you should totally follow on twitter as they are manning the grammar-and-humor arm… Read More

Also the Locksmith is free…

Love is love is love. I feel like Valentine’s Day needs to be repurposed into an expansive Love Day. We don’t need a proclamation or a greeting card to do it – simply make it so in your own sphere. Love your neighbor. Love your enemy. Love the people in your life whose heart you know. Speak directly to it,… Read More

My Mindjack series has new covers! And I’ve decided to continue the series with a fourth book, LOCKED TIGHT (Mindjack Four). It’s the start of a new trilogy. See below for the rest of the covers, a sale on Open Minds ebook and audiobook, and a bit about the motivation for returning to these books. A bit darker, a bit… Read More

https://susankayequinn.com/2017/02/10559.html

I’m a huge advocate of Free Speech – as should be anyone in the US or who’s read the US Constitution. The correct response to hateful speech is social condemnation (which is not “censorship by the government” it’s “social repercussions for saying awful things”). I hear a lot of complaints from people with hateful (often sexist) views about their “free… Read More

Writing brings me a joy that’s… complicated. It’s hard work and yet can feel effortless. It summons up my deepest and sometimes darkest emotions, which sometimes means turbulent sleep and an emotional rawness in real life. But also catharsis and the ability to FEEL ALL THE THINGS. A simple trip to the grocery store is a wonder. Meeting someone new… Read More

“(Trump) will fail most of all because at the end of the day most Americans, including most of those who voted for him, are decent people who have no desire to live in an American version of Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey, or Viktor Orban’s Hungary, or Vladimir Putin’s Russia. There was nothing unanticipated in this first disturbing week of the Trump… Read More

I tell stories. Stories of people and hearts broken. Of hard choices and souls healed. I’ve always loved people more than technology or philosophy or science (although I love those things too – mostly because people make them). But being able to tell the story of people is one of the greatest gifts I’ve unlocked in this grand Easter Egg… Read More

This. Story. Mad sister-love for this woman. #WomensMarch THE STRONG MARCH FOR THOSE WHO CAN’T. The ones in the morgue or the abuse shelter or who would have hell to pay if they did. The ones who just have to tolerate that groping because she’s got mouths to feed and can’t afford to quit. The ones who are beaten down… Read More

https://susankayequinn.com/2017/01/10545.html

Full train on the way down to Chicago, pink hats and fresh faces and signage. #WomensMarchonChicago 60deg in Chicago in January. The weather gods are smiling on this March. Oh the signage… #WomensRightsareHumanRights #MarchonChicago This is what Democracy looks like. #MarchonChicago My feet are sore, but my heart is full. #MarchonChicago #250,000 I have never seen anything like this. The… Read More

Things I’ll be doing today while not giving oxygen or attention or clicks or views to the inauguration: WRITE – crafting narratives where people are valued, love is stronger than hate, and empathy for those different from yourself is thoroughly explored. READ – on Fridays I do “Donuts and Divinity” with my kids wherein we make a pilgrimage to Dunkin… Read More

“People needed to hear… what we’re fighting *for*.” GO RIGHT NOW & WATCH BLACKish (S3, Ep12, Lemons) Every American needs to watch that episode. BLACKish is a contemporary American comedy – I’ve been meaning to check it out for some time, but never quite got around to it. Then a friend texted me over the weekend and said I *had*… Read More

Storytelling as a weapon. “Weaponized narrative seeks to undermine an opponent’s civilization, identity, and will by generating complexity, confusion, and political and social schisms.” Fake news. Conspiracy theories. Professional trolls from other countries. Erratic leaders with weaponized twitter accounts. The methods are as old as propaganda and disinformation, but those weapons have new speed and ferocity and power in the… Read More

My grandfather arrived on a boat from Poland when he was only six years old. There are still Durlaks (my maiden name) in Poland, although the family connection has been lost. Even though I’ve never been there, I’ve long cheered Polish heroes for democracy – it’s one of my “second home” countries after my country-love for the US. So it… Read More

Five years ago, I published Open Minds (Mindjack #1): “Back then, it was the first (mind)readers who were different and paid the price for it. Grandma O’Donnell’s stories about the camps where the government held her dad and the other early (mind)readers still gave me the creeps….Even if I never changed, at least I wasn’t destined for an internment camp… Read More

One must have hope. And hope lies now, as it always has, in great moral leaders, enlightenment through intellectual and emotional understanding, and strength in the face of adversity. Just saw SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION for the first time last night. Such a powerful movie about hope (and the use of intellect to thwart evil). Story is the most powerful force in… Read More

There’s a reason most love stories involve healing hearts. Some people are more naturally open-hearted than others – this isn’t good or bad, it simply is. The diversity of the human condition is what makes humanity fascinating. But having an open heart means the slings and arrows of the world pierce you more easily, and the temptation is to withdraw,… Read More

THIS IS NOT NORMAL **300+ hate crimes in the week since the Election** “Post-election spate of hate crimes worse than post-9/11, experts say” http://www.usatoday.com/…/post-election-spate…/93681294/ **President-elect Trump appointing a white nationalist (Steve Bannon) as his Chief Political Strategist, co-equal to his Chief of Staff.** This is not normal. This is not even close to normal. For my at-risk friends (friends of… Read More

A little black girl was told by her classmates to go to the back of the bus. A grown woman was spit upon by her male neighbor and told “women are trash.” A teenage girl was grabbed by the p*ssy in her high school, and the boy who did it taunted her, saying he was free to do that now…. Read More

“Altman described the open-source nature as a way of hedging humanity’s bets against a single centralized artificial intelligence.” I’m sorry, but this seems like the recipe to produce strong AI, not *stop* it.

WARNING: philosophy ahead Kurzweil is a popular evangelist in the Singularity movement. I’ve read a couple of his books and his upbeat vision of the future accounts for much of the Singularity world that I write about, including the idea that humans will integrate with technology (via pleasant or unpleasant means) and ascend, or at least enhance their intelligence enough… Read More

https://susankayequinn.com/2015/08/10589.html