Still on the Yellow Brick Road
As the year comes to a close, as the landscape, at least the political landscape, has shifted, is shifting in my country, as new books are written, as new promises are made, and not many (any?) broken, at least that I’m responsible for, it seems a good time to look back to the premise of this Substack that launched a year and a half ago and to peek ahead.
When I began this Substack at my publisher’s suggestion, two of my novels were being published—Burning Distance and The Far Side of the Desert. The novel Burning Distance came out in hardcover in 2023 and in paperback this past spring. The Far Side of the Desert was published this April and arrives in paperback April 2025. I have two new novels ready to find a home and readers. These novels were all written over the last decades, and the stories and struggles of the characters mirror times lived through and to an extent foreshadow the times ahead.
But no one can predict the future however prescient the imagination. The future is in part a product of what has come before, fueled by the imagination of what can be and held in each individual’s heart. The future begins with each and expands.
I resist the three or five or ten bits of advice and wisdom so prevalent on social media except to note that when love fuels the heart, it is a powerful guide and knows how to reach out to others. Hate negates. Hate is the absence of love and therefore can’t be obliterated with more hate. A wise woman, who shared wisdom from other wise men and women, once explained a simple guiding principle to me. Light overcomes darkness because darkness is only the absence of light. You can’t bring darkness into a room except by extinguishing the light. Why is light more powerful? Because it has a source—the sun, electricity—and darkness has no source. It is only the absence of light. For our lives and hearts, the source of light is Love.
So, in the spirit of moving forward by glancing backwards, I share below the essay that launched this Substack. I hope you’ll continue to enjoy and share the journey with me.
(launched August 2023)
A former journalist, I spend most of my writing time these days on fiction in a lifelong admiration for what literature can do. Good literature reveals characters and orders life into stories the reader can connect with and understand. We all live and remember our lives and the lives of others through the stories we tell and are told. History, politics, even religion are rendered through stories.
Because storytellers can be powerful members of society, the storytellers—usually the writers—are often the early persecuted, imprisoned and even killed in authoritarian societies as a result of the stories they tell. I’m a storyteller as are many of my friends and family who are journalists, fiction writers, dramatists and poets. We are fortunate to live in a country that, while stressed at the moment with the banning and censoring of books, still does not put its writers in prison or kill them, though the increasing pressure to ban books is alarming. Freedom of expression includes the freedom to have access to ideas. Imagination has always been the enemy of the tyrant because it can’t be controlled. I’ve spent time over the last many decades working on behalf of writers who don’t have the same protections and working with organizations that defend freedom of expression.
In my own novels—in particular my recently published novel Burning Distance and my next novel The Far Side of the Desert to be published March 2024—I’ve sought insight through narrative. Both books took a good deal of research into the factual context of the story and the inner journeys of characters. In naming this newsletter On The Yellow Brick Road, I pay tribute to L. Frank Baum’s iconic novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Interpretation is extensive on the many elements of this story and of the Yellow Brick Road in particular. According to commentary:
Collaboration, communication, innovation, positivity, nurturing, and fun are the six core values of Yellow Brick Road. The values emphasize team spirit, transparent two-way communication, support for new ideas, nurturing of bonds and relationships, a positive, solution-based mindset, and a fun learning environment.
Is that a mission statement? It sounds a bit like a gathering of strategic modelers at a conference. I’m not aiming for a didactic newsletter, but I think the values hold. I’d also like to have some fun and explore new thoughts and occasionally inspire.
Other commentary notes:
With the help of her newly-minted friends, Dorothy is able to melt the Wicked Witch of the West and save the citizens of Oz. No matter what the situation is, you should never allow that to get in the way of your morals.
With the help of new and old friends, I look forward to embarking on this path, alert to occasional wicked witches but mostly exploring ideas large and small. Thank you for coming along.
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