Hey there. It's been a minute since I've done any blogging about writing/craft since there has been a lot of excitement over my publication, so I decided I wanted to get back to why I had initially started blogging in the first place. A year and a half ago I threw myself into a rabbit hole - one that had a very lofty goal of using transgressive fiction to intentionally create social change. This is a massive task for something like a monograph, which I kind of want(ed) it to turn into. I started some initial leg work, like, tip of the iceburg stuff, that I wrote a beginning essay on, and presented on at a conference, but then research got set aside for life things and other writing endeavors. I was reminded of it when talking to a friend about narrative identity (future research for this topic) and decided I wanted to share with you the research I have already done. That being said, welcome to my research on creating social change - transgressive fiction's role in shaping past and future revolutions, baby!

Revolutions have, historically, been messy. They’ve come at the cost of economic efficiency, trauma, and precious lives, but still, many communities have taken their shots at revolution, hoping for a ‘better’ society. Chirot (2020) says revolutions are “Inspired by ideals that call for the building of a better society by deliberately and quickly changing, at a minimum, key political rules and institutions” (p. 5), and when a group of people agrees on these new ideals, that’s when a revolution may begin. Depending on who you ask, revolutions may be a violent overthrow of government or, maybe more simply, an instrument to combat oppression. Regardless, they require dedication and work in order to succeed. While not the first nor the last, The American Revolution is a world-famous example of this. Starting not even as a revolution, but just a desired reform of the American-British relationship, the tension rose between divided sides in America, turning the conflict into a civil war. Blanco Núñez explains how with American colonial protests turning into battles, outside countries eventually joined the fight against Britain, and it became as much a world war as it was America’s fight for independence (Blanco Núñez, 2018, p. xvii). In the end, the British negotiated a close to the war.
John Adams, a leader of the Revolutionary War, did not consider the armies and battles to be the revolution though. In a letter to Thomas Jefferson, Adams wrote:
 
"What do we mean by the Revolution? The war? That was no part of the Revolution. It was only an effect, and consequence of it. The revolution was in the minds of the people, and this was effected, from 1760 to 1775, in the course of fifteen years, before a drop of blood was drawn at Lexington. The records of thirteen legislatures, the pamphlets, newspapers, in all the colonies out to be consulted, during that period…" (Bergh et al., 1905, p. 347).
 
Adams believed writing to be what revolutionized America. It was the educating, the mobilizing, and the inspiring that stirred the people to build what Chirot (2020) called a better society; the bloodshed that resulted was just a consequence of that. Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum (2022) also notes how prose played part in the revolution. General Washington led troops across the Delaware River to attack Trenton in December of 1776 and before battling, the troops were read a passage from Thomas Paine’s pamphlet, The Crisis to inspire them. Writing, it seems, has long had the power to comfort and persuade people. In this paper, I examine characteristics of contemporary transgressive fiction, the process of how minds change, and literature that has made change, to argue how transgressive fiction can be used as a catalyst for future revolution.

Changing politics or institutions, something so ingrained in a culture, requires work and time because the social values that some want changed are typically built into systems over time; they are a part of culture, so to change any rules, laws, or codes of conduct, means changing the culture. Culture is defined as the behavior that a group of people learns socially, reflecting the traditions of that people that get passed on from generation to generation (Dirette, 2014; Hofstede, 1997; see also Nasir et al., 2006, as cited in How People Learn II: Learners, Contexts, and Cultures). As discussed in How People Learn II: Learners, Contexts, and Cultures, culture reflects the traditions of people that get passed on from generation to generation. It’s the rules that are understood and are expected to be followed by the group that people belong to. Challenging people to create new rules and systems, especially on a relatively short timeline, is difficult. This is oftentimes where revolting begins. The hope is that a revolution will work more quickly to spark the desired change. To revolt and to drastically change institutions or politics inherently involves transgression, which is the act of breaking a law or code of conduct, so while a revolution includes transgression, transgression does not automatically create a revolution.

Breaking social order can be powerful though, and writers have tried to use writing to instigate changes to their societies. One way is by using transgression to call out harmful norms despite backlash from the social majority. Christina Foust (2010) said, “…as scholars and practitioners have figured it, transgression's threat to social order runs deeper than violating the rules and expectations that govern what is normal” (p. 6). Transgression threatens the community because those actions show that social order is fluid rather than fixed like people think. While a multitude of varying definitions grasp at characterizing transgressive fiction, I will refer to Coco D’Hont’s (2020) definition: transgressive fiction is “A historically evolving type of fiction that takes on a specific form and level of importance during specific historical periods, changing along with the extra-textual sociopolitical shifts it explores” (p. 2). She argues that transgressive fiction is not just text that is shocking or has socially unacceptable behavior, but that it develops social ideologies, and crosses between boundaries. Her view, however, claims that transgressive texts simply reflect society. D’Hont (2020) thinks transgressive fiction has the “potential to disrupt seemingly stable ideas, norms and conventions” (p. 5) but that it has “an unclear relationship to social activism” (p. 4). While it does defy society, she does not think, like John Adams does, that it affects society enough to create a revolution. Foust (2010), however, thinks that “transgression typically translates into "resistance" because its actions oppose dominant powers that occupy preferred positions in hierarchies" (p. 11), and this resistance can turn into a revolution. This means that if a transgressive text is strategic, it should be able to influence a culture.

Culture, however, is not easy to transform. Culture is the way that individuals learn to exist among others. These mutual understandings get expressed through actions, expectations, and beliefs, and similarities that develop among the people who surround each other is what builds community. With culture at the heart of society, it’s necessary to acknowledge the role that it has in resistance, revolution, and transgression. Culture is reflected in the time period in which someone lives; it’s reflected in what people learn and how they learn (How People Learn II: Learners, Contexts, and Cultures, 2018) and that develops a group identity. McRaney says that an outsider who wants to impose different cultural practices on a group threatens the group’s identity (2022). That’s why many people choose not to adopt new cultural practices because once someone demonstrates behaviors outside of the community’s norms, the person becomes an outsider. Most people do not want to be outsiders. It’s also why changing culture requires specific strategies to effectively work. In her book, Extreme States: The Evolution of American Transgressive Fiction 1960-2000, D'Hont (2020) argues that American transgressive fiction analyzes transgression in its societal context and reflects transgressive dynamics that occur in society, but the writing itself isn’t transformational. To prove her point, she examines five transgressive texts, Fight Club, American Psycho, Hogg, The Monkey Wrench Gang, and Beloved. Four are largely known as transgressive for their shock value and aesthetic characteristics, and one particularly holds significance during a specific historical period and explores extra-textual sociopolitical shifts. She admits the novels push the boundaries of what’s considered socially acceptable, and exaggerate the reconstruction of American ideologies, but since the writing isn’t transformational, they do not lead to concrete revolution.

Over the course of her discussion of these five texts, D'Hont (2020) explores a variety of craft choices that these stories employ. I will highlight three of them. One that she brings up frequently across the texts is the use of the body (1) (2). For example, in Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk, men choose to physically fight each other to express dissatisfaction with their lives and masculinity. Bodily violation is common in transgressive literature, but it makes sense: our body is one of the only things that we will always own during our lifetime and the act of violating a body challenges that or takes it away. This act can symbolize multiple forms of loss that are relevant to a variety of American ideals, making it a strong example of transgression. Secondly, D’Hont (2020) also explores constructed hierarchies through the use of an “other.” In the novel Hogg by Samuel R. Delaney, for example, she describes the character Hogg who is portrayed as physically filthy and running a rape business. His character represents a sharp contrast to typically displayed American values. Thirdly, D’Hont’s (2020) book discusses how the novels explore societal complexities. This includes Edward Abbey’s The Monkey Wrench Gang’s philosophy on anarchism and social margins, and Toni Morrison’s Beloved’s redevelopment of the perception of race and gender, to name just a few. While these three craft choices demonstrate transgression’s role in shaping society, and call attention to situations by creating exaggerated, aesthetic systems where the authors reveal, destruct, interrogate, and reform “the ideological structures of their extra-textual content” (p. 16), D’Hont acknowledges that clear solutions are not typically given and so the stories do not end up impacting social change.

While it’s true that the books D’Hont (2020) discussed did not create revolutions, there are books that are recognized as having prompted change. Three of these books include: Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle. These books can all be considered transgressive because of their time-period importance and their defiance of extra-textual norms which shocked and upset people by exposing them to a part of American society that many were unaware of. These books did more, though. Silent Spring wrote about the hazard of pesticides entering the food chain and damaging the environment, which resulted in increased public awareness of nature’s vulnerability, the beginnings of environmentalism, and identifying which pesticides were dangerous (“The Story of Silent Spring”, 2015). Uncle Tom’s Cabin portrayed the evils of slavery and arguably impacted the Civil War by changing popular opinion. Its relatable story transformed slavery from an abstract concept to a real horror and moved society to enact antislavery laws (McNamara, 2020). The Jungle’s story of dreadful working conditions in the meat packaging industry reached President Roosevelt and resulted in the Meat Inspection Act of 1906, regulations on food and drugs, and the formation of the Food and Drug Administration (“Upton Sinclair's The Jungle”, n.d.). These books were able to transgress and transform, showing that it’s possible to use transgressive fiction as a way to revolutionize.
 
Considering stories that have not revolutionized America despite diving deep into complex, transgressive plots, and ones that have, and how fiction can create future revolutions, it’s necessary to consider social attitudes, norm perceptions, and how minds change. All that considered, the following ways are my initial thoughts on how writers can employ the techniques of transgressive fiction alongside the science behind how minds change to use the genre as a vehicle for social change.

Unlike the five books D’Hont explores, these three books identified a specific problem. D'Hont’s (2020) analysis said that in her discussed books, “The characters aim their actions at a faceless government but their inability to clearly define the shape of the “system” complicates their ability to overthrow it” (p. 74). McRaney (2022) describes how even if a society agrees on a moral (such as “mass shootings are a problem”), they may not agree on the interpretation of its facts, like what has caused the problem. These disagreements start to divide the society, even on a topic agreed upon, and then people struggle to update their beliefs, even when offered new information (p. 83). By Silent Spring, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and The Jungle aiming actions and criticisms at a clear system, whether it was companies creating pesticides or producing harmful meat, it was clear who society needed to take down. Critiquing social complexities is an important part of transgressive fiction. Using this characteristic of the genre to create change just requires writers to make some adjustments in order to be very clear so that readers' understandings of the topic, and their anger to propel change align. By making the conflict and opposition clear, it’s easy for readers to understand who to fight.

Additionally, effective craft choices in the three books that changed society include relatable characters, which aligns with culture and how it impacts our choices. As mentioned previously, communities are rooted in culture. To stay in our community, we must maintain its cultural beliefs and values or we risk being pushed out. Amidst our efforts to remain in our community and avoid being pushed out, many people adopt the group’s beliefs. The culture that then develops in the group becomes what’s known as group identity (Dovidio et al., 2009; McRaney, 2022; Tankard & Paluck, 2016). In David McRaney’s (2022) book, How Minds Change: The Surprising Science of Belief, Opinion, and Persuasion, McRaney compiles evidence for why minds make decisions based on group identity, why people keep the ideas that they do, and what changes their minds despite group identity. He spends time discussing the process of deep canvasing to explore a method that has worked in getting people to change their minds on typically controversial topics. In deep canvasing, a volunteer speaks to people at their homes with the goal of shifting their minds (for example, having conversations with people on gay marriage beliefs before an election where this is on the ballet). Laura Gardiner, the national mentoring coordinator for the LAB, explained that the first step in this process is having the volunteer build rapport with the homeowner. Then, the volunteer describes his or her own relation to the topic at hand. Finally, the majority of the mind-changing conversation should be based in the homeowner’s own story. The volunteer reflects feelings and asks probing questions that prompt the other individual to reflect. Reflection is incredibly important because providing facts isn’t what changes minds; rather, the person has, oftentimes, never thought about the causes of his or her beliefs before and then realizes what caused the original belief and reconsiders it. By facilitating a conversation that puts the listener in the driver’s seat of a controversial topic and forces them to consider what has caused this belief, the volunteers are able to show that other beliefs do exist. Similarly in storytelling, when writers offering readers a relatable character, writers speak to their readers’ sense of community and identity. For example, in Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote a narrative that engaged general readers in something they could relate to. She made her characters seem real, even drawing on factual incidents. By creating characters that readers feel are real mimics a sense of community. Writers then must provide readers opportunities to reconsider their own beliefs and the other possible beliefs that exist. When a reader reflects, writers are able to facilitate change. When Silent Spring wrote about the hazard of pesticides entering the food chain and damaging the environment, readers were exposed to a truth that existed in their own lives. Additionally, when Uncle Tom’s Cabin portrayed the evils of slavery, readers were confronted with another reality that they lived in.

The three change-making stories also incorporated positive contact, which is a way to expose people to their adversaries. Positive contact is another mind-change technique described by both McRaney (2022) and Dovidio et al. (2009). When people have positive contact with a group they oppose, the contact can help people learn and understand the group more. This breaks down initial misconceptions, and the new and positive interactions reshape people’s prior experiences and understandings. The positive experience can change people’s minds about the opposing group. Positive contact can be achieved in storytelling through serial writing. The three texts successful at creating change were published in short installments in magazines before full publication in book format. Shorter meant easier to read, and if it hooked readers’ attention, it spread their attention out over time. McRaney (2022) acknowledges that building rapport can sometimes take multiple times. Tankard and Paluck (2016) also explain how individuals’ attitudes tend to develop over a long time and may be tied to personal experience and beliefs and thus can take longer time to change. By publishing writing serially, the readers get multiple points of contact with the characters who, if done right, should give readers realistic insight into a world that will upset their values and cause them to make change.

It seems, then, that transgressive fiction should be a great avenue for social change, as its characteristics align well with ways that social change occurs.  In order to accomplish it though, it is very important for writers to be very intentional about the ways they craft their stories. One of the craft choices that is common to transgressive fiction that D’Hont points out is the violation of the body. This characteristic offers writers many ways to develop imagery, conflict, and plot, which can be used in the way they identify a specific problem for readers. D’Hont also acknowledges the way that transgressive fiction frequently uses the “other” character. This character-type, paired with identifying social complexities, can also be a part of writers addressing specific social problems, and also a way in which they create relatable characters. The “other” character can also get folded into the writer’s use of positive contact.

There is so much more research to be done in order to develop a very specific plan that could use transgressive fiction for social change; however, after my initial research, considering aesthetic characteristics of contemporary transgressive fiction, literary techniques that have seemingly accomplished social change before, and what causes minds to change, I am proposing some craft and structure that can help writers write transgressive fiction with the purpose of not just re-imagining social norms, but also acting as a key point in social activism. This includes: identifying and giving a name to the offender, using characters in a way that both builds rapport and a sense of community, causing the reader to reflect on his or her own thinking, and publishing the text as a series. Transgressive writers can use violating the body, the “other” in the social injustice situation, and the resulting social complexities to drive stories that use methods that change minds and culture. These are just some of the techniques that mirror past efforts in change, and if thoughtfully and effectively used, can most likely support future change. In Mack’s (2011) book How Literature Changes the Way We Think, he says, “The moment when art has come to have a ‘life of its own’ it clearly ceases to be mainly representational. It does no longer mirror the world but contributes to the plurality of the world by its unique form and power of animation” (p. 167). By incorporating elements that re-imagine social rules, create a new, real world for the reader, and force them to reflect on their own thinking, transgressive fiction can become its own life and support people in redesigning the one we exist in.
 
(Other possible techniques based on my reseach that may impact change but not yet discussed include:) 

• Consider and research intended audience
• Incorporate performance (in characters, form, etc.)
• (but) Make message clear
• Align writing with current movements
• Define important words
• Consider techniques to help reader reflect (2nd person POV, build your own adventure, etc.)
• Be careful with developing characters (and pay attention to intended audience when doing so)
• Speak to reader’s values/prior experiences

References
 
The American Crisis. (n.d.). United States: Library of Alexandria.

Bergh, A. E., Johnston, R. H., Jefferson, T. (1905). The writings of Thomas Jefferson. United
States: Issued under the auspices of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association of the
United States.

Blanco Núñez, J. M. (2018). The American Revolution: A World War. United
Kingdom: Smithsonian.

Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum. “American Revolution History & Time of the Revolutionary War.” Boston Tea Party Ships, Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum, 19 Aug. 2022, https://www.bostonteapartyship.com/american-revolution.

“Upton Sinclair's The Jungle: Muckraking the Meat-Packing Industry” Constitutional Rights Foundation, Constitutional Rights Foundation, https://www.crf-usa.org/bill-of-rights-in-action/bria-24-1-b-upton-sinclairs-the-jungle-muckraking-the-meat-packing-industry.html.

Chirot, D. (2020). Revolution as Tragedy. In You Say You Want a Revolution?: Radical
Idealism and Its Tragic Consequences (pp. 1–11). Princeton University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvp7d46f.4

D'Hont, C. (2020). Extreme States: The Evolution of American Transgressive Fiction 1960-
2000. United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis Group.

Dovidio, J.F., et al. (2009) “Commonality and the Complexity of ‘We’: Social Attitudes and Social Change.” Personality and Social Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868308326751.

Foust, C. R. (2010). Transgression as a mode of resistance rethinking social movement in an era of corporate globalization. Lexington Books.

How People Learn II: Learners, Contexts, and Cultures. (2018). United States: National
Academies Press.

Mack, M. (2011). How Literature Changes the Way We Think. United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Publishing.

McNamara, R. (2020). “Uncle Tom's Cabin Made Slavery a Personal Issue for Millions.” https://www.thoughtco.com/uncle-toms-cabin-help-start-civil-war-1773717.

McRaney, D. (2022). How Minds Change: The Surprising Science of Belief, Opinion, and
Persuasion. United States: Penguin Publishing Group.

“The Story of Silent Spring” NRDC, NRDC, 13 Aug. 2015, https://www.nrdc.org/stories/story-silent-spring.

Tankard, M.E., and Paluck, E.L. (2016). “Norm Perception as a Vehicle for Social Change.” Social Issues and Policy Review. https://doi.org/10.1111/sipr.12022.

We're getting to the end of the Raising Women giveaways!

Over two-hundred years old, paper dolls have been a cheap toy for a long time. Both nostalgic and "practical," I want to offer you a chance to bring back some memories and download this paper doll and fashion set for free! This paper doll set provides additional interactive elements to the Raising Women experience (you'll find many items from the book included in the set). Have fun dressing her up, placing her around your house (think of a cooler Elf on the Shelf), OR she makes the perfect bookmark!

Whatever your reason is, download the Raising Women paper doll today!
(Based on Raising Women by Shannon Waite, art by Alexandra-Jane -@ghostpainters_real).

In a previous post, "5 Ways to Create Visceral Images in Writing," I briefly talk about my experience with synesthesia. I knew when I wrote about it though that I'd eventually want to dive into it more, and talk about how it impacts the things I make. I'm going to get really nerdy now about how I experience synesthesia, and how I use it to make mix CDs.

Synesthesia is when someone experiences one of their senses through another (like tasting colors or seeing sounds). I have grapheme-color synesthesia. This is when someone associates a color with a symbol such as letters and/or numbers. For example, the letter e is a dark, navy blue for me. The number one is a very pale yellow, close to white. The name Justin is a blue (although can sometimes be a green depending on last name). I don’t know why these things are what they are, they just are (and the colors associated may be different for different people). I also have chromesthesia where I see colors when I hear sounds. I have minds-eye synesthesia though. This means that I only know the colors when I think about them; I don't actually see rooms full of colors when I hear or read things. Experiencing words and sounds with colors though does impact the words I choose when writing, or the songs I put on my mixes.
 
I’ve noticed that my synesthesia affects the things I read and write. I find that I especially love books or stories or poems that use words with strong colors, and when all of the words in the piece tend to lean toward a cohesive color scheme (like the story tends to use words with colors that create a black, red, and silver color scheme or a variety of navies and purples). This probably isn’t anything the writer’s thinking about when they do it, and even if they were thinking about it, they probably weren’t writing words that fit the same colors I see, BUT when it works for me, it really works for me.
 
In this post though, I'm going to focus more on my chromesthesia, and how I use it to make (really great) mix CDs.

Listen, I'm eighty years old and I don't have a smart phone, still use an iPod, and still listen to CDs. I also still make mixes (CDs, not to be confused with drinks), and I take great pride in the craft that goes into them. I'm going to clarify how I define a mix though because I consider mixes to be different than playlists.

Playlist - A playlist is a bunch of songs grouped together so they can be listened to at the same time. They can follow the same theme, they can just be what someone's into at the time, whatever. There's no rhyme or reason as to which songs get added to a playlist.
Mix - A mix is an art. A mix is very intentional, and songs on the mix are put on there because they convey a certain meaning. Additionally, mixes flow. I want listeners to finish a mix of mine and understand that it was a curated, seamless piece.
And I will clarify, a mix doesn't have to be on a CD - it's about the songs on it, the order they're in, etc. It's about the process of putting it together, not the format the songs are in/on.
 
My mixes, at minimum, take hours, although usually they take weeks, and often can take months to finish. It is a lot of work deciding on the songs that work thematically, and use sounds that work together. This is where my chromesthesia comes in. It's especially helpful paying attention to the songs' colors because the colors identify if the songs will flow from one to another. Like, it's really hard for me to feel confident about a mix that has bright red songs, sky blue songs, purple songs, and yellow songs. Don't get me wrong - usually, any one song has a few colors going on it, BUT there's a general color or vibe that it has, and the majority (if not all) of the other songs need to have overlapping color similarities in them for me to feel good about the mix.

Here's a mix I feel very confident in:
We Are Here
1. Just Saying - Jamie xx
2. Mind on Fire - Aisha Badru
3. She Burns - Foy Vance
4. First Day of My Life - Bright Eyes
5. Honey - Sir Sly
6. Meet Me At Our Spot - THE ANXIETY, WILLOW, Tyler Cole
7. Can't Help Falling Love (cover) - Twenty One Pilots
8. Sparks - Fleurie
9. Crystaline - JOME
10. Carry You - Novo Amor
11. Seaside - Haux
12. Just Saying - Jamie xx

We start with Jamie xx's "Just Saying" which has a dark feel to it - it's black with some dark greens and other-color highlights. It feels like a night in the forest. This transitions into "Mind on Fire" which is similarly breathy and dark - a perfect transition. It feels like they were meant to go together. The ending paces well into "She Burns." "She Burns" is a different color though - a light blue and light brown. It woks okay though because of the easy transition between the two, and because that brown isn't too far off from the black in the previous song. Now that "She Burns" has lightened the colors up a little, it makes it easier to move into the next Bright Eyes song, which is a yellow and brown. These browns feel a little classic, which is different than the moody breathy beginning, but the color changes (from darker to lighter) work with the lyric changes (as the lyrics in each song get more hopeful). Bright Eyes moves into Sir Sly's "Honey" which brings us back to some black shades, but also some yellow (which transitions nicely from First Day's browns and yellows). This song ends with some bright colors splashed on blacks and moves into "Meet Me At Our Spot" which has pops of bright colors. Our acoustic Twenty One Pilot's cover is then a brown and yellow shade, which helps the pops of yellow from the previous song transition. We're back to some darker hues in "Sparks", but again - those pops of brighter colors. That seems to be a large connector through most of these songs. "Crystalline" is a little more colorful. There are some subtle pinks and purples in it, but there is still an underlying shade of brown/black. "Carry You" is lighter. It's a light blue, but it has silver and yellow highlights in it. This moves into "Seaside" which is a beautiful light blue and silver. It's breathy though. We then end back with "Just Saying" which, isn't the same color, but breathy still.

I feel really good about this mix because many songs have primarily black bases, with pops of colors that are then mirrored in other songs without black bases. Many of the songs have an airy, breathy element to them, and we flow nicely between tempos.

Beside considering colors, I also have to consider pacing. You can't have too many slow songs in a row, or fast songs with competing beats. I also always make sure that I include a few songs that I knew the person I'm making the mix for likes. This is so, in case they don't know songs on the mix and start to zone out, I can bring them back in with things they like. I typically make sure song 3-ish is a song I know the person likes, and then another few spread throughout. I try to keep my mixes between 12-14 songs.

So to sum up, when I make mixes, I consider:

• Lyrics & the overall message/theme
• Songs the listener knows/likes
• Song colors
• Pacing/tempo

The worst is when there's a song that's perfect in meaning but you have to cut it because sound-wise it just. doesn't. work. Ugh. RIP to some songs that got cut for the betterment of the mix as a whole (although when I do this, the mix is usually a knockout after. It just sucks. I spend hours trying to find where to put it in the mix so it will work, and then I kill it anyway).

This is why making a mix is a very in-depth process (for me, anyway), and very different from a playlist (of which I have many! I listen to a lot of playlists at the gym where I just have songs on them that I want to listen to). My mixes are an art and, like I said, take up to months to finish. It's so satisfying to finish one though that hits just right and flows perfect. Not all of them are perfect. Sometimes I settle on a song or two that isn't hitting how it needs to, but I can't figure out what to replace it with. They can't all be knockouts I guess. Haha.
 
Anyway, this probably sounds wild, BUT I swear it’s a thing, and it’s an element of how I, personally, find writing and music that feel concise. In the near future, I'll be sharing the mix I made for Raising Women. It incorporates both plot elements and vibes and does so with some beautiful color transitions. If you've gotten to this point in me rambling about the weird colors I "see", then you might appreciate my mix for the book a little more.

Keep an eye out!

Ready to dive into a world where vulnerability meets edge? My upcoming interactive novel, Raising Women, is an immersive journey into the raw and real, and in addition to the book releasing in just over a month, I've got something else that's extra special for you.

Many women will remember cootie catchers (millennials will anyway. Maybe older or younger too? I'm not sure how much they did or didn't play this game). You'd write down colors and numbers and futures and ask your friends to pick, and then you'd all laugh at their tragic outcome. If someone was lucky, they might get rich. (Where are those girls at? I could borrow some money.)

In case you're out of the loop, cootie catchers are origami figures that are used as fortune tellers. The outer parts of the cootie catcher are typically labelled with colors or numbers that a player chooses from, and the fortune teller moves the little paper device, counting numbers based on what was chosen,and then land on the four inside flaps. One of those gets chosen and read aloud. There you go. That's your future, all predicted over the course of twenty seconds.

I'm excited to share that you can now download the exclusive cootie catcher inspired by the book for free! This cootie catcher will offer you predictions straight from the novel. The outer layer of the cootie catcher had a word related to the book, inside you get some numbers to choose from, then you finally get your fortune. This game is not just a trip down memory lane though — it’s a new way to engage with the heart of the story. With each fold and fortune, you’ll explore the darkly delightful twists and turns of your own journey.

Print this, cut it out, and enjoy!

And here are directions on how to put it together in case you forgot.

We're getting so close - just over a month away.
Pre-order here!

And check out the Raising Women site for downloads and other things.