#good Americans

[thenewwei]

BAD AMERICANS: Two More Releases

I’m elated to announce the preorder release of two more stories from BAD AMERICANS as Kindle ebooks.

“Immigrants Unite!” aka “Cathy’s Story” is a spoken word tale narrated by 21 year old Taiwanese-American social work student Cathy Wei Quan. In a rhythmic and often hilarious poetic style, she tells the heartbreaking story of a Chinese undocumented immigrant named Emily who escapes to America for a better life only to face head on the rampant and open discrimination that Asian Americans experienced during the Covid pandemic.

https://www.amazon.com/Bad-Americans.../dp/B0DH5BMDQ6

Then, counteracting her story, Taylor Williams, a conservative financial analyst and former Lieutenant in the US Army, weaves “Corona Chaos,” a tight, harrowing tale of legal Ecuadorian immigrants in Corona, Queens, who are accosted by criminal elements, first by Mexican drug cartels and later by rioters during the BLM protests in Manhattan.

https://www.amazon.com/Bad-Americans-Corona.../dp/B0DZXSJX94

Both narratives counteract each other perfectly, contrasting in substance, tone and style. Yet, they are both compelling and masterfully told stories in their own right, contributing to the mosaic of the mixed American experience.

Once again, both are only $0.99 to preorder, deliverable to your free Kindle app on any device. “Immigrants Unite!” will be released on April 15, 2025 and “Corona Chaos” on May 15, 2025, but you can preorder them now.

Remember that this is a run up to the release of BAD AMERICANS: PART I, the ambitious frame novel filled with these pandemic-related stories, on September 15, 2025.

Yes, you will be able to get the whole book in hardcover and paperback from most places books are sold at that time! But you can read these individual tales for barely nothing before the release, and I believe it will be well worth it! Enjoy!

[destiel-news-channel]

[Image ID: The Destiel confession meme edited so that Dean answers 'At least two Capitol Rioters rejected Trump's pardon.' to Cas' 'I love you'. /End ID]

"Trump can shove his pardon up his ass,"

said Jason Riddle, who had been sentenced to 90 days in prison for two misdemeanor offences. Pamela Hemphill, a 71-year old woman, also refused her pardon with the words "The message is, if I took a pardon that what I did was OK. They were criminals. They broke the law. I broke the law. Pay the price." - source link

[starlight-bread-blog]

Me: I shouldn't disturb Neil Gaiman. I shouldn't send an ask unless I really have no way of getting the information otherwise. I'll check old interviews and all the articles that vaguely mention the subject. Of course it goes without saying that I'll read though the FAQ in its entirety. Only then, will I send an ask. However, I'd be very polite and praise his work, as anyone would. I'd also keep it short, because I don't want to waste his time. But I'd keep it very very respectful. I'd be sending a message to a very talented, amazing author that deals with god knows how many like me. Or I'd just stay in the dark and not send him an ask. Yeah, I'll do that.

My Dash:

[reasonsforhope]

"A tribal-led nonprofit is creating a network of native bison ranchers that are restoring ecosystems on the Great Plains, restoring native ranchers’ connections with their ancestral land, and restoring the native diet that their ancestors relied on.

Called the Tanka Fund, they coordinate donors and partners to help ranchers secure grazing land access, funds needed to install and repair fencing, increase their herd sizes, and access markets for bison meat across the country.

That’s the human part of the story. But as Dawn Sherman, executive director of the Tanka Fund, told Native Sun News, they’re “buffalo people” and these four-legged, 2,000 lbs. “cousins” are equal-part-protagonists.

The return of the bison means the return of the prairie, one of the three great grassland ecosystems on the planet, of which just 1% remains as it was when the Mayflower arrived.

“Bringing buffalo back to their ancestral homelands is essential to restoring the ecosystem. We know that the buffalo is a keystone species,” said Dawn Sherman, a member of the Lakota, Delaware, Shawnee, and Cree.

“Bringing the buffalo back to the land and to our people, helps restore the ecosystem and everything it supports from the animals to the plants to the people. It’s come full circle. That’s how we see it.”

As Sherman and the Tanka Fund help native ranchers grow their operations, everyone is well aware of the power of the bison to transform the environment: just as nations across Europe are, who are reintroducing wood bison to various ecosystems, for all the same reasons.

Sherman points out the variety of ways in which buffalo anchor the prairie ecosystem. The almost-extinct black-footed ferret, she points out, lived symbiotically with the bison, and with the latter gone, the former followed—nearly.

The long-billed curlew uses bison dung as a disguise to hide nests from predators. Deer, pronghorn antelope, and elk all rely on bison to plow through deep snows and uncover the grasses that these smaller animals can’t reach.

Everywhere the bison hurls its massive body, life springs in the beast’s wake. When bison roll about on the plains, it creates depressions known as wallows. These fill with rainwater and create enormous puddles where amphibians and insects thrive and reproduce. Certain plants evolved to grow in the wet conditions of the wallows which Native Americans harvested for food and medicine.

Native plants evolved under the trampling hooves of millions of bison, and that constant tamping down of the Earth is a key necessity in the spreading of native wildflower seed.

Indeed, Sherman says some of these native ranchers are bringing bison onto lands still visibly affected by the Dust Bowl, and already the animals are acting like a giant wooly cure-all for the land’s ills.

Since 2020, the Tanka Fund, in partnership with the Inter-Tribal Buffalo Council and the Nature Conservancy, has overseen the transfer of 2,300 bison from Nature Conservancy reserves to lands managed by ranchers within the Tanka Fund network.

“[T]he more animals that we can get the more of that prairie we can restore,” said Sherman. “We can help restore the land that has been plowed and has been leased out to cattle ranchers.”"

-Article via Good News Network, February 13, 2025. Video via Tanka Fund, July 17, 2024.

[auntierayeraye]

Fuck you, Neil Gaiman.

[good-americans]

Several people have asked about the timeline for the release of my pandemic novel BAD AMERICANS. As I've written in the past, BAD AMERICANS is a unique and dynamic book, a short story collection within a novel. Each story is told by a character in the novel. Each tale has a different style, structure and viewpoint.

While the stories often respond to another and play a role in the plot of the frame narrative, they also stand alone and can be enjoyed as single reads. Like its predecessor in THE HUMAN TRAGEDY, Good Americans (2013), each story confronts a different aspect of the American experience in an entertaining yet thought-provoking way. My hope is that the book as a whole reflects on mortality in our time, and what it means to be American (and human) today, whatever that might mean to you.

So of course, such a massive and ambitious literary project will have an unconventional publication.

Assuming it is released by the The New Wei, and everything goes according to plan:

Each story (short story, novelette or novella) will be released separately as a Kindle Ebook a month apart starting in March 2025.

Then the frame novel and first six short stories will be released in multiple formats, including hardcover, trade paperback and ebook (going to try for audio) in September 2025.

Followed by the next six short stories, and the second part in April 2026.

So here is the release schedule as it stands right now:

"On the Frontlines" (aka Andrea's Story, novelette)--March 15, 2025

"Immigrants Unite!" (aka Cathy's Story, spoken word poetic tale)--April 15, 2025

"Corona Chaos" (aka Taylor's Story, short story)--May 15, 2025

"Black Boy's Ballad" (aka Rashan's Story, novella)--June 15, 2025 (possibly pbk too)

"Mason Mayhem" (aka Ricard's Story, novelette)--July 15, 2025

"Love Liability" (aka Nalini's Story, novelette)--August 15, 2025

BAD AMERICANS PART I (novel with stories)--September 15, 2025

"Barcelona Blasphemy" (aka Lisa's Story, novelette)--October 15, 2025

"ISIS Crisis" (aka Khassan's Story, short story)--November 15, 2025

"A Model Citizen" (aka Hayley's Story, novelette)--December 15, 2025

"Cape Conundrum" (aka Pritesh's Story, novelette)--January 15, 2026

"The Manchurian Algerian" (aka Sylvania's Story, novelette)--February 15, 2026

"Dope Doppelganger Ditty" (aka Angela's Story, novella)--March 15, 2026 (possibly pbk too)

BAD AMERICANS PART II (novel with stories)--April 15, 2026

During this time, my plan is to do readings and speaking events throughout New York City and beyond to promote BAD AMERICANS.

And by the end, I'll need a vacation!

[fanboy-feminist]

There is something really, uh, telling, about how Jimmy Carter’s presidency was widely considered to be a “failure,” and he also is INARGUABLY the U.S. president who has done the most to promote human rights around the world.

It’s extremely telling, about the U.S. nation-state as a political project and institution, about the federal government as a structure, about the nature of imperialism.

To reference a friend of mine, he was the only U.S. President alive in our lifetime who could avoid the International Criminal Court.

[browsethestacks]

Arthouse Muppets

Art by Bruce McCorkindale

[oh-bother-stickers]

[ineffablehubbys]

ladies, gentlemen, everyone in between, may I present…

MR NEIL GAIMAN!!!!!

@neil-gaiman

[thenewwei]

11 years ago today, my first novel The Brotherhood was published. 5 years ago today, the second edition of The Brotherhood was published.

The Brotherhood remains my most popular book. I've been talking with some people in TV about making it into a limited TV series. If so, it would be as groundbreaking, if not more so, than the book: the first mystery/drama TV series with mostly Indian-American characters set in the USA, that I can think of.

Because of that, the project still remains an up-hill battle. Almost all American TV series with People of Color are comedies, and despite what they claim, very few industry insiders are interested in financing and screening content that's genuinely original and challenging. I'm looking to connect with more people in the TV/film industry, particularly of South Asian descent, who can make this happen: content acquirers, writers, directors, producers, actors, actresses, agents etc. If you know anyone who can help, please send them my way.

It's been 4 years since the publication of The Run and Hide, the second volume of The Brotherhood Chronicle. Despite getting the least acclaim and having won no awards, this remains my personal favorite book, and a darling for Desai diehards.

The Dance Towards Death was published 3 years ago, and it's won 13 literary honors in that time, my most acclaimed book so far.

In about a month, it will be the 10th anniversary of Good Americans, my most provocative book and a subject of divided opinion. Its anthology sequel, Bad Americans, is my longest and most ambitious book to date, a novel and short story collection in one. I'm working hard on it, and the polished manuscript should be ready to send out to agents etc. around January 2024.

I've stayed the course and maintained my literary independence for more than a decade. Let's see if I can do that and still convince a major publisher to bring Bad Americans out into the literary sphere and get it the wide acclamation and readership I believe it deserves.

The New Wei Literary Movement and its associated Salons are gaining traction. I've met many writers, artists, musicians, actors and filmmakers over the last six months and I hope we've inspired them to produce new dynamic projects.

I'm also working to interview provocative artists of many mediums and produce articles on them. Ultimately I plan to write a book on the wider literary/artistic scene, our tumultuous decade and The New Wei.

Then there are my travels: recently to Germany/Austria/Italy, across the USA and soon to Greece and Turkey too. I know a lot of people have been screaming for me to write a non-fiction book about all these crazy adventures, and that might finally happen.

In addition, there's plenty afoot at the library too: our annual Southeast Queens Author Festival at Cambria Heights Library on 9/30 at 1:30pm, dynamic planned panels for ALA in Baltimore and San Diego, a renovated Teen Center, new art installations, and plenty more.

Things have been busy in the best possible way, and I'm grateful for it.

[lolas-blrr]

need this so bad

[reasonsforhope]

"A century of gradual reforestation across the American East and Southeast has kept the region cooler than it otherwise would have become, a new study shows.

The pioneering study of progress shows how the last 25 years of accelerated reforestation around the world might significantly pay off in the second half of the 21st century.

Using a variety of calculative methods and estimations based on satellite and temperature data from weather stations, the authors determined that forests in the eastern United States cool the land surface by 1.8 – 3.6°F annually compared to nearby grasslands and croplands, with the strongest effect seen in summer, when cooling amounts to 3.6 – 9°F.

The younger the forest, the more this cooling effect was detected, with forest trees between 20 and 40 years old offering the coolest temperatures underneath.

“The reforestation has been remarkable and we have shown this has translated into the surrounding air temperature,” Mallory Barnes, an environmental scientist at Indiana University who led the research, told The Guardian.

“Moving forward, we need to think about tree planting not just as a way to absorb carbon dioxide but also the cooling effects in adapting for climate change, to help cities be resilient against these very hot temperatures.”

The cooling of the land surface affected the air near ground level as well, with a stepwise reduction in heat linked to reductions in near-surface air temps.

“Analyses of historical land cover and air temperature trends showed that the cooling benefits of reforestation extend across the landscape,” the authors write. “Locations surrounded by reforestation were up to 1.8°F cooler than neighboring locations that did not undergo land cover change, and areas dominated by regrowing forests were associated with cooling temperature trends in much of the Eastern United States.”

By the 1930s, forest cover loss in the eastern states like the Carolinas and Mississippi had stopped, as the descendants of European settlers moved in greater and greater numbers into cities and marginal agricultural land was abandoned.

The Civilian Conservation Corps undertook large replanting efforts of forests that had been cleared, and this is believed to be what is causing the lower average temperatures observed in the study data.

However, the authors note that other causes, like more sophisticated crop irrigation and increases in airborne pollutants that block incoming sunlight, may have also contributed to the lowering of temperatures over time. They also note that tree planting might not always produce this effect, such as in the boreal zone where increases in trees are linked with increases in humidity that way raise average temperatures."

-via Good News Network, February 20, 2024

[brotherhoodnovel]

The Brotherhood finally reached 100 ratings on Amazon.

[ghostlynightking]

TW: rape, sexual assault, child abuse

Archived version here, in case you hit the pay wall:

https://archive.is/HJtxW

[arlospace]

Season 3 American Roadtrip with baby Jesus?? Please?

Inspired by this post of the wonderfully confusing signs of rural America from @scottishmushroom

>Part 2 >Part 3