This year I’m dedicating myself to writing a short story collection, tentatively titled There’s No Point Worrying About That Now. We’ll talk about the title later. What matters (at least to me) is that I’ve decided to share the work behind each story here, as I write it.

And I’m doing it for three reasons.

First, I want to reclaim literature as labor rather than as a gift. Posting only the final version of a text hides what writing really is—something that often looks a lot like creative violence: tearing down, pushing through, changing shape. It’s a violence you accept, even seek out, and it almost always happens offstage. The aspirational author benefits from preserving the myth of the artist as innate talent, because it serves an industry that would rather sell personalities than books. Nobody wants to see themselves as a worker of thought. I do. That’s exactly what I’m interested in.

Second, this has to do with science fiction. I believe this genre, even more than any other, has a duty to make its sources visible. As part of my research process, I’ll be talking about essays, investigations, weak signals, and other materials that feed the writing. I want to push back against the idea that science fiction is detached from political reality, and present it instead as an exercise in responsible speculation. And I also know many readers will be able to use that information better than I can.

Third, this is a stance toward culture itself. In an era dominated by personal marketing, showing the imperfection, fragility, and friction of the journey becomes a form of confrontation. It also means eroding the aura of the author-as-celebrity that the publishing machine insists on manufacturing: figures turned (often through self-deception) into an aspirational ideal of leisure and well-being, tied to an alienating lifestyle—one that erases those who write from less privileged contexts and pressures them to admire someone else’s model. Speaking for myself: I’m not interested in becoming a brand.

All of this is to say: there’s art in the scraps, too. What doesn’t make it into the story is still alive. Maybe broken, maybe incoherent—but alive.

So starting with the next post, I’ll begin sharing the process behind each story in There’s No Point Worrying About That Now: the sources, the concerns, and the small decisions that will eventually give them shape. I don’t know if I’ll pull it off—but I can say I’m excited to share it with whoever stops by.

This year I’m dedicating myself to writing a short story collection, tentatively titled There’s No Point Worrying About That Now. We’ll talk about the title later. What matters (at least to me) is that I’ve decided to share the work behind each story here, as I write it.

And I’m doing it for three reasons.

First, I want to reclaim literature as labor rather than as a gift. Posting only the final version of a text hides what writing really is—something that often looks a lot like creative violence: tearing down, pushing through, changing shape. It’s a violence you accept, even seek out, and it almost always happens offstage. The aspirational author benefits from preserving the myth of the artist as innate talent, because it serves an industry that would rather sell personalities than books. Nobody wants to see themselves as a worker of thought. I do. That’s exactly what I’m interested in.

Second, this has to do with science fiction. I believe this genre, even more than any other, has a duty to make its sources visible. As part of my research process, I’ll be talking about essays, investigations, weak signals, and other materials that feed the writing. I want to push back against the idea that science fiction is detached from political reality, and present it instead as an exercise in responsible speculation. And I also know many readers will be able to use that information better than I can.

Third, this is a stance toward culture itself. In an era dominated by personal marketing, showing the imperfection, fragility, and friction of the journey becomes a form of confrontation. It also means eroding the aura of the author-as-celebrity that the publishing machine insists on manufacturing: figures turned (often through self-deception) into an aspirational ideal of leisure and well-being, tied to an alienating lifestyle—one that erases those who write from less privileged contexts and pressures them to admire someone else’s model. Speaking for myself: I’m not interested in becoming a brand.

All of this is to say: there’s art in the scraps, too. What doesn’t make it into the story is still alive. Maybe broken, maybe incoherent—but alive.

So starting with the next post, I’ll begin sharing the process behind each story in There’s No Point Worrying About That Now: the sources, the concerns, and the small decisions that will eventually give them shape. I don’t know if I’ll pull it off—but I can say I’m excited to share it with whoever stops by.