The Working with Brightflame

In this episode, Alan and Diane talk to teacher, author, Solarpunk, and witch, Brightflame. We discuss how Solarpunk relates to witchcraft, second world fantasy, inspiring art with questionable creators, your shadow self, the Reclaiming Tradition, Witch Camp, how to know if you're doing enough politically, writing a community of characters, stereotypes, and much more.

Winter Witchcamp: https://winterwitchcamp.org/ 

BrightFlame's website: https://brightflame.com

The Working: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/215591125-the-working

If you'd like to support us you can give us a one time donation at Kofi or you can subscribe to our Patreon.

Episode Transcript

Unknown (00:01):
If this goes on, don't panic, bringing Hope to the
world through speculativefiction you

Alan Bailey (00:43):
Hello and welcome to If this goes on, don't panic.
Today, we have author, teacherand activist bright flame with
us. Diane, how are things going?

Unknown (00:51):
I'm in recovery mode from November. Game of tomes was
very busy this year, but it isover now. It went really well.
We all had a really great time.Awesome. I got a lot of writing
work done as well. For a change,instead of just managing the
event, I've now edited both booktwo and book three of the toy

(01:11):
soldiers saga. So those will becoming out in 2025 Ah, very
excited about that. I had tostop doing my AUDIO BOOK
recording of the first book. Afew good elves, though, because
I got sick at the beginning ofthe month, and my voice is just
now recovering. So,

Alan Bailey (01:29):
ah, okay. I was wondering what was going on with
those because, well, you know,I've been waiting. I've been
waiting. Everybody's

Unknown (01:37):
been waiting. People probably feel like George RR
Martin fans by now? I'm sorry, Ipromise you, I'm trying to get
my shit together so, but yeah,2025, probably in the spring.
I'm hoping for March. Cross myfingers, right? So,

Alan Bailey (01:54):
I mean, you know, I mean, you're not 10 years late
or 15, or whatever Martin's upto at this point. So I think, I
think you got him. I thinkyou're good. Cool.

Unknown (02:03):
That's cool.
Thank you for forgiving me. Andwhat's going on in your life
right now, I haven't talked toyou. Oh gosh,

Alan Bailey (02:12):
yeah, you haven't. Let's see I got my black belt
since the last time I talked toyou, I think, yeah, thank you.
Thank you. And really, not much,you know, we recording this in
December. So it's like holidayseason. Well, Christian holiday
season. Yule

Unknown (02:28):
is coming up, pagan too. Okay, okay, yeah,

Alan Bailey (02:32):
yeah, yeah. And, you know, so, you know, I'm not
a Christian particularly, but wedo celebrate those holidays
nonetheless. And, you know, justbusy doing holiday stuff.
Basically, the only excitingthing I really have to say at
this point is I started FinalFantasy four. So in my great
Final Fantasy replay, cool,yeah, yeah, yeah, you just want

(02:54):
to get to our guest dive intolet's do it all right, let's do
it. Okay. I've been lookingforward to this. The book's
Good, let's do it. Okay,awesome, awesome. We will be
right back with bright flame.Okay, and we are back. Bright
flame writes, teaches and makesmagic towards a just
regenerative world. Her debutnovel, The working is available

(03:15):
now, and her short climatefiction is featured in solar
punk creatures bioluminescentand solar punk magazine, her
globally acclaimed workshops formagical in mainstream audiences
foster interconnection andresilience and help us explain
our notion of what is possible.She co founded the Center for
sustainable futures at ColumbiaUniversity that features her

(03:36):
workshops and non fiction. She'sa member of the climate fiction
writers League, the ScienceFiction and Fantasy Writers
Association, Brooklyn,speculative fiction writers and
broad universe. She lives onLenape territory, Turtle Island,
slash us with a human, a forest,a labyrinth, bees, turtles,

(03:57):
fungi, rocks and many other nonhumans, doodles, musings and
[e-mail] and that'sb, r, I, G, H, T, F, l, a, m,
e.com, all right. Welcome,right, flame. Thank

Unknown (04:12):
you. Thank you for having me on. I'm looking
forward to talking, and this isgoing to be fun, awesome.
I hope so too. I haven't said itto you yet, so marry me

Alan Bailey (04:25):
and marry me to you. So like one of the things
when you originally emailed measking to come on, one of the
things that fascinated me aboutyou is the whole the magic
thing, right? And I could tellthat you you practiced pagan
spirituality, and your book wasabout witches. And I'm like,
Wow, this reminds me of Diane somuch it's unbelievable. Like, we

(04:50):
probably need to bring thisperson on. And I immediately
messaged Diane, and was like,Hey, check this out. And Diane's
like, yes, yes, we have to dothis. Yeah. Don't

Unknown (05:00):
talk about it a lot on the show, but I have. It's not
like I haven't mentioned it. Icome from a pagan background as
well. I was a I guess, like Ihad a metaphysical store. I was
licensed to do marriages. I didit for some 20 years, right?
Lately, for a while, I haven'tbeen doing this within the

(05:22):
community, right? Sort of my ownpractice at home, but it is my
spirituality, right? I know thecommunity that bright flame
comes from. Reasonably, I speakthe language that she's speaking
in the book. We were both inbioluminescent, by the way. I
don't know why I wrote the storyabout talking to the goddess of
the aliens.

(05:44):
Oh, wonderful. I didn't realizethat. Thank you for putting
that.

Alan Bailey (05:49):
That's so funny. That's so funny. Well, if you
all start getting too cryptic inyour language, I'm gonna make
you all define some vocabularyfor me. So just a warning. Now,

Unknown (06:00):
hey, no problem. I bright flame obviously has
advocacy work as well as part ofwhat she does, clearly, right?
And I used to do the Pagan Prideorganizing around here. I am
used to explaining it, so, noproblem. Yeah,
I came back. I hadn't been toPagan Pride in a number of

(06:21):
years. But because my book isout, I went to to in my area
well, to Philly, Philadelphia,and another regional one. I hope
to go back to the New York onenext year as well. I haven't
been to that in a number ofyears.
I have not been out to your neckof the woods. I'm on the other
side of the continent. I'm from,BC, Canada, right? So getting to

(06:44):
New York is a hard prospect forme. I'd like to someday go do
that, yeah, but

Alan Bailey (06:49):
I've been in New York. There's too many people in
New York City. New York State islovely.

Unknown (06:55):
I grew up in New York City, and I'm only inched my way
away from there. I still have apretty large presence in New
York, even as I live in a forestat present, I can tell, I could

Alan Bailey (07:10):
tell, from your book, that you legitimately
lived in New York City. Youknow, the way that you discuss,
like traveling to PA and backand forth and that sort of
thing, and you have to catch thebust and the taxi, and it was,
it's not like a focus oranything, but just the way that
you're like, oh yeah, thisperson had to do this, and then
this to get to this point, it'sjust like, oh yeah, they
obviously have really done this.

Unknown (07:32):
It's neat that you observe that. No, yeah,

Alan Bailey (07:35):
I could. I could totally tell, totally tell. So
like, I think we should probablyjust like, start at the
beginning. You know, Have youalways been a science fiction
fantasy fan? Did something inparticular bring you into
science fiction fantasy genre,and like, what authors and books
have really influenced you? Huh?

Unknown (07:53):
Well, I've always preferred fiction over non
fiction, and ever since I wasyoung, I always wanted to have
written a novel, but it I reallydidn't grow into an actual
writing practice for quite awhile, but I knew that it would
be fiction and not a non fictionwitchcraft book. For instance,

(08:18):
even though I have a lot ofstudents over the years saying
to me, why don't you write abook with your flavor of the
craft, which you'll find in theworking but anyway, going back
to your question, so I was drawnto sci fi and fantasy, along
with general fiction, historicalfiction, even literary fiction,

(08:45):
a lot of diverse writers, bipocwriters through the years. But
when I was quite young, I wastaken with books Second World
Fantasy, books like Annemccaffrey's per and series, for
instance, and other books thateven second world were very anti

(09:09):
authoritarian. And then I beganseeking out books that were,
even if I didn't have a name forit yet, that were feminist women
centered strong woman characterswho didn't need the men or were
fighting against a patriarchalkind of system. So back in the

(09:33):
day, I was very taken withMarion Zimmer Bradley's books,
and I know these days there'sstuff about her her background
and her legacy. And, you know, Idon't know what's true. I'm not
going to even comment on that,but also, her books have been
very influential, and certainlywere to me as a young person,

(09:56):
and not just miss of Avalon,which is, you know, most which.
As I know have read miss ofAvalon, and they're like, Oh, of
course, Miss of Avalon, that'ssome foundational that turned me
into a witch, whatever. But itfor me, it was actually the dark
over books like sendera housethat spoke of a network of women

(10:22):
in guilds and communities thatwere an alternative to the
patriarchal society, on on ondark over the planet, and it was
like, wow, these guilds. Youcould travel from one to another
and be accepted like his family.You'd have community. You know,

(10:43):
there were always like mindedfolks around doing interesting
things, and you could travelfrom one to another. So being
part of such a network reallydrew me. So those were early
influences for me. But then, youknow, through the years, writers

(11:04):
like Louise Erdrich, LindaHogan, Gail sukiyama, Elizabeth
Berg, added to kind of thebreadth of the reading that I
did. And also, by the way, Ithink thing I haven't reread
them, so probably I haven'tpicked up a dark over novel

(11:28):
since I'm going to date myself.Yeah, I don't know, the 70s or
something, but they're kind ofsolar Punk in that guild setup
and the networking and theinterconnection

Alan Bailey (11:42):
going back to the your comments on Mary and Zimmer
Bradley, it's, it's difficult toknow how to deal with an artist
that has influenced youpositively but turns out to be a
bad person, right? Like, I know.I mean, there's many artists
like Led Zeppelin, for example,just off the top my head,

(12:03):
terrible people, unbelievablemusic, in my

Unknown (12:06):
opinion, terrible people stole all kinds of people
of color's music and claimed itas their own. They gave no
credit, no royalties,

Alan Bailey (12:15):
yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, yeah. And many things
beyond that, for sure, you knowwhat I mean, like just but
amazing musicians, you

Unknown (12:23):
know how I generally handle it? Is this okay? Right?
I don't know. Everybody's got tomake their own decisions on
this. The the world is stillstruggling with Harry Potter at
the moment. Oh god, yeah. So my,my attitude is okay. You know
what death of the author a book,to some extent, is like, it can
still influence you positively,even if the person is

(12:47):
complicated. And I realized thatthat's controversial, but like,
nobody's perfect, man, nobody isperfect. We all have dark sides.
Bright flame gets into that. Inher book, she talks about shadow
selves, right? All of us haveshadow cells, right? And we not
that they're all necessarily,like, quote, evil or whatever,

(13:09):
but your shadow self is the partof yourself that you don't
really want to admit exists, youknow, for whatever reason it
scares you, right? So, death ofthe author, but I won't support
them financially either right?Like I won't buy their books,
right? Because, right, they'regonna get royalties if I, if I
think their book, if I need itfor some reason, I will buy it

(13:31):
in the second hand store. And Isuppose that's, you know, that
may not work for everybody, butthat's what I
do. That's a good that's a goodway to to dice chop and dice the
situation. And also, I alwayslike to say when I'm in a
discussion that's going to getrecorded or whatever, like, this

(13:52):
is how I'm thinking at themoment, which likely will change
tomorrow or the next. Yeah, youknow, we all evolve
a good point. Just because I hadan opinion 10 years ago doesn't
mean I still have that opinion.And that's the problem with
media, right? Things getpreserved, and then they come
out, like 20 years later, andpeople are going, you said

(14:15):
something stupid when you were ateenager. And you're like, I was
a teenager. Duh?
Diane, I want to go back tosomething that you brought up
from my book about working withour shadow sides. These days,
I'm part of the reclaimingtradition of witchcraft, and
we're a dynamic, evolvingtradition, a non hierarchic

(14:38):
tradition, and one of the waysthat we evolve. We're quite the
anti racist, anti transphobic,anti you know, all all the
things that is antithetical tosolar public are antithetical to
reclaiming that's why I call usa solar punk tradition. I'm

(14:59):
starting to teach. That way aswell. But the term shadow, some
of my dear friends in reclaimingare starting to challenge the
word, because it can be a dingto bipoc people, right? It can
be a little bit racist to sayshadow or the dark side, meaning

(15:20):
the the the not as well likedside. So we're trying to re
language, you know, to come upwith different ways of talking
about it. I did leave shadow inthe book, because that's right,
what would be moreunderstandable to the general
public and other witches at themoment. But I also was like, I

(15:44):
don't know, should I changethat? That that's a hard one.
And also, our shadow selves arenot the part of us we don't like
and, you know, don't want to bepart of us. They're the hidden,
juicy parts of us that would begood to make friends with and to

(16:05):
come into relationship with.That's how I teach about that
kind of stuff.
Okay, I was given a TLDR,
right? Yeah, yeah, I know. Ijust wanted to point that out
for listeners, yeah, because youknow, it's an issue now, at
least in our community,
yeah, okay, I didn't even occurto me when I was last active

(16:30):
with the pagan community, and soI don't know, but I mean, I get
the there's also that liminalelement, right? Like, the thing
is, yeah, right, you okay, it'snot the bad part. It's the part
that scares you for whateverreason, right? But part of your
strength is in what scares you,right, right, right? You know, I

(16:55):
love the names that is that athing like, that's not something
I encountered before. Is that athing in reclaiming now, when
you name your shadow self, it'sone of
the things I've encountered noteverybody does, because the
other thing with reclaiming iswe all are our own authority, as
we say, and we all develop, kindof our own ways of working

(17:17):
within the umbrella ofreclaiming. And while we have
some core classes, you don'teven have to take them to call
yourselves a reclaiming witch,you just have to agree to our
consensus upon principles ofunity. I first encountered that,
probably at a witch camp, andprobably Starhawk was teaching

(17:42):
that path, if I remember Alan
one for your benefit, which campis a very large event that goes
on that I think, I meanreclaiming, it's their thing,
and it's huge, right? Like it'sreally influential in the pagan
community. So, yeah,

Alan Bailey (18:02):
can I ask a newbie question here you both saying
the reclaiming. What does thatmean? Exactly? It's

Unknown (18:07):
the name of a tradition, like a denomination
of a Christian church. Wow,okay, right. That's what we mean
by tradition. What's yourdenomination? Are you a Baptist
or a Lutheran, or are you wereCatholic, you know? Yeah,
yeah, okay, there's so manyflavors of witchcraft and

(18:27):
Wiccan, which is a separatething, and yeah, there's just so
many different paths and lots ofpeople making their own way in
some eclectic form.

Alan Bailey (18:41):
Well, I think, and I think we, we've touched on
this a little bit, but if maybewe could directly hit this
topic, like, how exactly doeswitchcraft fit in the solar
punk? Because you're not theonly person I know who's in the
witchcraft who's also in thesolar punk as well. It seems
like those things go togethervery well, like why and how

Unknown (19:03):
Greek first, and Alan, so
a bunch of different things. Letme see if I can grab some of the
threads that are crossing mymind. So which, which is work
with magic is our technology,right? Which for me, I the
shorthand of what magic is, issensing and shaping energy,

(19:26):
right? So it's a technology, andsolar punk is all about
technology aligned with nature.The other thing about witchcraft
is, at least in mine and manytraditions, is that, you know,
we connect with the Earth assacred and as part of the Earth.
We're interconnected with allthe living beings on the earth.

(19:50):
We have our ways ofcommunicating across that across
that network, and other ways ofknowing that are not the. Guess,
Western ways of knowing. So allthose things Jive for me with
with solar punk, bringing outthe non western ways of knowing

(20:11):
and interacting with the naturalworld. Magic as just another one
of the technologies that'saligned with that natural world
as we would want all technologyto be for solar, punk futures,
right? So there's that, andwitchcraft, at least. My

(20:32):
tradition is very collaborative.We're a non hierarchic
tradition, a feminist tradition.We work by consensus. Our
practice is, for instance, thatwhen we're teaching, reclaiming
classes and workshops, we alwayshave at least two of us teaching

(20:53):
so that we're modeling thatthere isn't only one way. So you
know that collaborative working,and we're an activist tradition,
as well as are many witchcrafttraditions you'll find
reclaiming folks out in thestreets, as well as in their

(21:13):
COVID home or wherever, youknow, And in the workplace,
where everybody works, you know,we're all over the place. I
liked that element in your bookthat your characters all came
from incredibly different walksof life, right? That is, and I
recognize them all right, like Ihave seen. I have met all of

(21:37):
these witches in some form oranother, right? And I really, I
liked that element, but the factthat they all come together at
the core, right, in terms oftheir ethos, and they all also
have their own issues that makefollowing that ethos
challenging, and they have tolook within to confront those

(21:58):
things and find the answers,right? I think that's, that's
very cool. Alan on that note,just a side thing. I would also
argue there's a core there's acouple of core things, Wicca,
witchcraft, Neopaganism, they'revery as you can hear, there are
many different ways to do it,right? There are. There's no one

(22:19):
way, right? But there's somecore ethos stuff that we tend to
hold to one of our most commonthings. It's not true to
everyone, but it's veryinfluential a lot of traditions.
Is something called the chargeof the goddess right now, I have
done a I wrote an exegesisarticle on this at one point,

(22:41):
right? Basically, my argumentwas, it's called a charge
because it's a directive, right?And the directive is, treat the
earth kindly, treat each other,kindly, open up to mysteries.
There's a lot more in it thanthat, but that's like and fight
back against oppression. That'sin there too. It's in the ethos,

(23:04):
fight back against oppression,right? So, of course, it aligns
with solar punk. Solar punks allabout the same kind of ethos,
right? It's, it's all about,let's re green the Earth. Let's,
you know, let's work togethercollaboratively. Let's throw off
the oppressors.
Thank you for bringing it backto the charge of the Goddess. I

(23:25):
never thought of it that way,how the charge is so solar punk.

Alan Bailey (23:31):
I love what's going on here. I love this.

Unknown (23:37):
You need to ask questions, because, see, like,
like I said. I figured thiswould happen brave flame and I
would speak enough of the samelanguage that we would be able
to communicate on that level,right? But brave Flame's goal
here, obviously, is to be anactivist through her fiction,
right? She wants to share theethos and maybe change people's

(24:00):
minds about things. So we needpeople who don't know the
language to ask the questions.

Alan Bailey (24:06):
I had a question asking something very similar to
this so bright flame, in youropinion, what is the place of
fiction in making societal

Unknown (24:15):
change? Well, you've got to be able to imagine that
future that you want to live in,right? You need to be able to
imagine the best, the mostdesired future that you want to
live in in order to have anyhope of getting there. So as we

(24:36):
are all sending out the creativejuices, right? Of, even if it's
not futuristic, even if it's itscurrent world, we might be
putting out visions of, well,that's still how we want to
carve the current world in a waythat it brings on a better

(24:58):
future. I. So we had to be ableto imagine it in order to have
any chance of getting there. Andthen the other part of it is
that we're designed fornarrative, right? We think we
change our beliefs in narrative,in story, not by hearing facts,

(25:23):
not by somebody trying to arguea point with us, but by reading,
listening to and or evencreating stories. We're
immersing ourselves in someother way. Regardless of the
genre, we become immersed in it,and it affects us, because it

(25:43):
changes our lived experience sowell. I'm part of the, as you
said in your intro, I'm part ofthe climate fiction writers
League, which I always want tosay, that superhero League.
Yeah, but you know, climatefiction isn't always solar punk.

(26:06):
It's not always hopeful. It canbe quite dystopic. But even
that, immersing people in story,in narrative about even what's
going on or what went onhistorically, in historical
fiction. It's affecting us. It'saffecting us as if we are

(26:27):
experiencing those things andjust becomes part of our of our
cumulative experience that shapeshapes our lives. So the more we
can put out solar, punk andsimilar kind of writing to get

(26:49):
people to think more in thisdirection, the better for the
world. I think

Alan Bailey (26:55):
that's actually a question I ask. I don't want to
say regularly, but to specificguests that we have on, because
I think it's important to seeeveryone's opinion on that, and
at least it's important for meto remind myself, Oh yeah, you
know what I mean. This, thethings that we are doing, the

(27:15):
things that we are creating, areimportant. Which kind of leads
me to another question. Thereare several points in your book
where the characters arequestioning if they've done
enough to make change in theirworld, right? That personally,
for me, is a question I've beenasking myself quite a bit

(27:37):
lately, especially since theelections. Like, how do you
personally define enough? Andwhat is enough for you who?

Unknown (27:48):
Okay, so a bunch of things, my writing and my
teaching are probably my biggestform of activism these days,
putting this stuff out to try toinfluence people, to try to seed
ideas and lift people. Because,for instance, writing solar punk

(28:09):
lifts me, you know, and talkingwith people about this kind of
thing lifts me. And I'm notalways optimistic and, you know,
hopeful, so I like to keep doingthat so I can also beat myself
up about I'm not doing enough,I'm not out on the streets. I'm

(28:31):
not doing this or doing that. SoI'm a firm believer in, first of
all, taking stock of what youare doing, and feeling pride in
whatever it is that you'redoing, you know and knowing what
part of what do you call itactivism, or just living you

(28:54):
know you're holding at themoment and and know that That
affects other people and how itaffects other people. So we'd
all, we all don't need to bedoing everything. So if I'm
doing some writing and teachingand I'm not out on the streets,
but some of my friends are outon the streets, right? Or some

(29:18):
of my friends are talking ininterfaith circles, which I
haven't done for a while, buthad been a fairly big part of
what I did. I was part of acouple of different interfaith
circles to make sure that myform of witchcraft was accepted

(29:38):
and understood as sacred as avalid tradition, you know, and
add to the conversation. So I'mnot doing that right now, but
other people I know are it's thewhole collective of you know,
what part are you holding? Whatpart can you hold? With ease? To

(30:00):
some extent, you know, and whenyou're ready to push yourself
out of that easeful situation,you know, that's great as well.
The other thing is, my practiceis about making sure I'm
grounded and centered. I have apersonal practice that it's kind

(30:21):
of sort of in the book, becausethere's a lot of techniques and
a lot of magical practice in thebook that are part of my my
spiritual path. But as long asyou're grounded and centered,
you have a sense of, okay, andnow what? And if you're not

(30:44):
grounded and centered, like, ifyou're like, Oh no, the world's
falling apart and and I don'tnot doing enough, and I'm going
to beat myself up, and I don'tknow, I should get out there. I
should do this, or that you'renot really in a place to take
the best next step for you, youknow, so making sure you're

(31:10):
grounded and centered andbreathing, and then just allow
inspiration to come in to know,Okay, where Am I needed? What am
I willing to do? And if itdoesn't
do you have to do it. That'sanother important thing, right?
Yeah, yeah. Like I, I spent 20years teaching witchcraft and

(31:39):
pagan spirituality. I had ametaphysical store. You know, I
had given my life completely tothe Goddess. I wrote a non
fiction witchcraft book. I had [e-mail] and I gave it
up because I was exhausted frominternal politicking, and I did

(32:06):
not have the strength to dealwith it anymore. And when my
store went under, I questionedeverything I went, is this
really what the goddess wants meto be doing? Right? You know,
since then, I found a littleniche where I teach writers to
express their writing, to findthe voice within them. Newbie

(32:28):
writers, I've created a safelittle community where people
who otherwise feel likeoutsiders often can come and
feel that they have a place,right? And I write my fiction
which looks like a fantasy, youknow, a typical D and D high
fantasy type thing, but it'sactually a lesson on the evils

(32:52):
of colonialism. I, you know, andI that's the part I'm doing
right now, right? And holdingfor my family, you know, I'm a
grandma now, right? So I get todo all of that. And you know,
for me, that has, you know,that's what I'm doing. When
there's a protest in town, Ijoin it. You know, when there's

(33:13):
a letter that needs to bewritten, I write it. And, you
know, will this change? I getthe feeling that it's gonna like
the, you know, it's time toshift, but I don't know where
yet, so I'll let myself beguided. I like how your
characters all do thesedifferent roles, too. I can't
wait to find out what happenswith Tal, especially because tal

(33:35):
is the one who is working fromwithin the enemy's ranks, right?
Yeah, you know, I cannot wait tosee what she does with that,
because that's valid, right?That is a valid path, working
within the ranks of the peoplewho are not carrying the light,

(33:56):
right, or the the wholeness willsay, so that we're not doing
this light and dark thing, like,you know the wholeness, who are
not being centered, who are notthinking about the Earth first,
right? She's, she's doing workfor the oil company, right? How
does she use that to do hercalling? Because I know she

(34:20):
will. I got faith in her. I gotfaith in the characters. I'm
about halfway through the novelright now, so

Alan Bailey (34:27):
I will tell you I have, like, I don't know, like,
30 pages left, and it's right asthat is coming to a head

Unknown (34:35):
as, of course it will, yep, yes, yes, Yep. Cool. I
can't wait to see how thatresolves.
Good. I want to hear what youyou know, what your thoughts
are. Want to see how itresolves.
No, it's a good point, right?Like all of the characters in
your novel, there's five women,right, plus an ancestor spirit,

(34:59):
right? Who. You are like themain characters, and they're all
about given fairly equal screentime, right? So we start from
from Betsy, probably becauseshe's the newest, right? So
she's kind of like our newperson's introduction into this
world, right? Which, which isreally kind of fun, right? And

(35:22):
all of them are very, verydifferent people, right? And
they all, you know, like we havefire who is living in, you know,
the the scummy areas of theworld that I come from, right?
And we've got, you know, Tal,who has this highly successful
business that is working withmulti million dollar clients,

(35:44):
and we've got everything inbetween, right? We got people
who are shy, we got people whoare aggressive, you know, like,
it's, it's, and all of themserve a role, right? Like,
that's, that's the cool thing.You recognize the elemental
balance for those of us who,who, you know who called What
element at the beginning of thenovel Alan is a key right?

(36:08):
Because that tells you whatelement those people are most
associated with, right? Andthose have different
associations of witchcraft andin paganism, and they serve
those roles, but you need allthe five elements to come
together to make the whole andif you don't have one of them,
as we saw when you know, okay,minor, Should I do a mild

(36:29):
spoiler? It's not really a bigspoiler, the fire thing. Well,
if
you're only halfway through, Iguess you can't spoil it too
much. So you know, fire. Who isthe you know, for obvious
reasons, the combative,confrontational, you know, sort
of, I'm somewhere between saleand fire, by the way, that's

(36:51):
kind of where I am, but theylike, she, you know, goes, I'm
not doing this for a while,right? Because she's, she's all
about like, you'll, you'll see,I bet you saw me in this
character, Alan, right? The I'mgonna take the trouble head on.
I'm gonna ball right through it,you know, right? And that serves

(37:13):
a purpose, right? But it doesn'talways serve the purpose.
Sometimes it's more harm thangood, right? And they're all
like that. They've all got theirelements where sometimes you
need one element and not theother. You know, more of a
balance of one thing thananother. And I love how bright
flame. I love how you've donethis with the characters, right?

(37:36):
You see that, that they onlywork when they work as a
cohesive that is nonhierarchical, that takes their
turns taking the lead, right?And you know, where their
strengths matter and their theirbest, when they help each other
with their weaknesses, that'sthat's awesome.
Thank you. Thank you for saying,you know, I had to say, I'm very

(37:56):
proud of myself for over theyears it took to write this
story for really listening totheir individual voices and
writing them as distinctcharacters, because I was warned
years ago when I first starteddrafting this like, oh, you're a
novice writer. There's no wayyou should be writing five

(38:19):
points of view. Oh, yeah, sleptin there. Novel
Your heart needs to write. Don'tlisten to that, of course, yeah,
yeah. And you did a great yeah.There's no question. They're all
very different people, and Ilike them all.

Alan Bailey (38:35):
Well, I have a very serious question and a very non
serious question. I'm gonna gowith the serious question,
first, as a writer, like, how,how did you manage to write all
five characters in a way thatrepresents a true community
without falling into the herotrope, you know, like the Chosen

(38:56):
One trope, because it almostseems like you're going to at
First, right? And I won't namenames about what happens to
spoil anything, but there's acertain character. He seems like
they're going to be that, right?They're

Unknown (39:06):
not, and then they are not things kind of, there you
go. There's a bit of a spoiler,but they're not
well. Part of it is becausethat's how I live my life and
and the reclaiming traditionthat's very influential in my
life is crafted that way. Ididn't set out, you know, I

(39:27):
don't even want to tell you howlong it's been, so I began the
book, but I didn't set out totry to write a hero's journey. I
always knew it would be a coven.I always knew there would be
five, because I was I didn'tknow if I'd make it overt or
not, and I didn't make it veryovert that there's the five

(39:48):
elements. So there'd be five inthe COVID. I always knew there
the interaction among them wouldbe really important, and that it
would be i. An ensemble cast, itwould be the group story. So the
COVID is almost, you know, thesixth or the seventh character,

(40:10):
in a way, because they do form awhole that's greater than each
individual. And I kind of justknew that would be the case, and
was writing from thatperspective, it took me a while
to get their voices as distinctas I did get them, which my

(40:31):
process for that was reallytalking with each of them,
asking, kind of in my witchyway, but in a way, a lot of
writers do you know. So who, whoare you? You know, what's your
background? Where do you comefrom? What's your story? What do
you want to share with me? Whatdo you want me to tell everybody

(40:52):
you know? And how, how do youcome together with these others
in the COVID Like, what's thatexperience for you? So, you
know, I would talk with them andcreate, listen to the to that
dialog. And then, I guess,through the years, I was hearing
their voices more and more andrealize, oh, so tal speaks in a

(41:17):
way that it sounds like she'susing semi colons. So when I'm
writing tols chapters, I'm goingto use semi colons. And the old
ones, who are the kind of thesixth character, the Ancient
Ones, the elders who are part ofthe story. Don't use
contractions, for instance,because I they're actually based

(41:43):
on an actual foremother fromway, way, way back, who I speak
with in my my ways, my trancejourneys, my connecting with my
ancestors. It's not somebody whoI know in a family tree. It's
somebody who comes through fromliterally millennia ago, like

(42:06):
the characters in the book. SoAnya in the story is really
based on that foremother ofmine, and some of the things
that she's offered to me. So,you know, so I can hear her and
I see her as well. So I all Ihad to do was capture that on

(42:27):
the page.

Alan Bailey (42:30):
That makes me think about another question I had for
you, and I want to do a smallpreamble here, you know, so our
podcast co host, Diane Kat andmyself, we're all basically
completely different in ourspiritual beliefs, right? You
know, Diane's a pagan, I'm asecular Buddhist, and cat is a

(42:53):
Christian, albeit a veryprogressive one. And I say that
so that you know that we areopen to these things, and
hopefully our audience as well,at least they ought to be if
they're listening to thispodcast at this point in time,
at least if they've beenlistening to us for any length
of time, right? Yeah, if they

Unknown (43:09):
haven't left yet, they're probably not gonna,

Alan Bailey (43:14):
yeah, exactly, exactly. So I'm really wondering
what your spiritual practicelooks like to you on a practical
level? It's

Unknown (43:22):
in the book. That's the short answer, because I really
you know a secondary thing,yeah, I wrote the novel to
change the world, right? I wrotethe novel with a question in
mind of, you know, there, thereare nefarious groups and
individuals who are working atodds with the health of the

(43:46):
planet and with justice for allliving beings. So there's an
entity with its clause in theweb of life really trying to rip
apart the web of life. What doyou do about that? So I wrote
with that in mind right from thebeginning, like, what do you do

(44:06):
about it? You know, how do youfind the working? What is the
working for that? But also, mysecondary thing was, I wanted to
embed witchcraft practice anddispel stereotypes about
witches. You know, have realwitches represented as just any
other character in a book mightbe, and also embed real magical

(44:33):
practice so that it would bebreadcrumbs for those who seek I
picture younger witches pickingmy book up, kind of how I picked
up, say, those dark over booksand others pick up, you know,
miss an Alan and all those booksfrom way back and grab on to

(44:55):
something. Say, Oh, I could trythat. So that's why I actually
have, um. I have exercises inthe book that the Coven do
together that people canactually do. You know, the
working is actually a realpractice. I'm going to be
offering more and more workshopsabout that, because I really do

(45:18):
believe that the more people,whether you're witch or not, the
more people who do somethinglike the working, which, for
those of you haven't read thebook, it's an energetic
practice, but it's it's a way ofbeing part of nature and and the

(45:41):
web of life, shall I say? It's away of brightening all that.
It's a way of helping to repairthe web of life. So the more
people who do that, the betterwe'll all be. So really, I did
embed a lot of my spiritualpractice in the book, there's
things,
one thing that, as a pagan, Ireally loved, right? I because I

(46:05):
know these exercises, I knowthese practices. I've done very
similar things. It doesn't lookexactly like that. But enough,
right? Because, of course, everytradition does things their own
way, right? But enough that Icould go, oh, yeah, okay, yeah.
I you know, I know exactly whatwe're doing here, right? A lot
of pagan practice is mysticalAlan. It's about your own

(46:30):
personal spiritual connection,right? It's not really about
like, we don't go to churches,right? And read from a book. We
don't do that. That's not theway we do it, right? We do sing
together, right, right? Wegenerally call those chats.
They're collective songs thatare designed to be fairly
simple, so anybody can pick itup and join in, right, like the

(46:50):
witches do in the book, right?But we also do a lot of
personal, you know,visualization and communion,
right, like the witches do wetalk about walking around in the
astral are Are we actually likeyou know? Is this an actual
hallucination? Not usually itcan be right. Are we aware that

(47:13):
this is the spiritual world asopposed to the physical world?
Yes, right. Do we really believethat the act of magic changes
the world now, there is acontroversial subject that you
will get no if you ask twowitches, you'll get three

(47:33):
different answers, right?Because we all have different
opinions on it, right? Is itjust a psychological practice
that we do to bolster our spiritand create a collective
conscious awareness that we canall strive for. Could be right?
Does it actually physically makechanges in energy that enact

(47:53):
things on the world that we cansee in physical and visual
reality? Sometimes I've hadexperiences where I've been at a
ritual, we've done something andthe lights came on, you know,
right? It's happened. I don'tknow how to explain that. I
don't know, you know, I can'tsay for sure it was us. But you

(48:15):
know, when anyone's doing aspiritual practice and they're
communicating with their deityor their power as they see it,
or their force, do they know fora fact that they're actually
reaching? No, we feel right, andwe trust
that's right. You said it sowell, Diane, I love how you

(48:36):
frame that. And you know, andthat brings to mind for me of
whether there, you know, I livein a world that I'm probably
rather naive about how much biasagainst witches and witchcraft
there might still be out there,because I'm so immersed in my

(48:59):
tradition and my communities.You know, when I'm in New York
City, for instance, I don'texperience any any issues like
that, but I've noticed some Idon't know hesitation at
bookstores, for instance, topick up my book that has a
pentacle on its cover. And Iwonder if it's that, you know,

(49:24):
or if it's just that with a, I'mwith a small press and, you
know, I'm not a big name author,you know, if it's only that. So
I wonder how much bias there isstill in the world, but it's
something that I wanted to beout there about my practice,
because I do feel like magic canhelp. Magic is just one tool,

(49:47):
just like other tools that wehave out there, and magical
activism is a real big part ofthe reclaiming tradition. Uh,
some of the stuff I embedded inthe novel is stuff we actually
do. If you think about theastral that, you know, Diane

(50:11):
expressed so well, it's anotherrealm. It's it's kind of what
quantum physics talks about,right? And all the multiverse,
you know this, there isn't justthis one physical world. So if
you can kind of step intoanother one, a world where

(50:34):
everything's pure energy andanything's possible, and what,
what exists in the physical hassome ties into the astral in
some form. So if you can sayaffect things on the astral that
you want to change in thephysical realm, maybe that helps

(50:57):
if you want to work some magicalactivism in the astral to affect
the world, for instance,politics and all the crap going
on, like the rise of fascism,not just in the US, but all
over. If you want to do somework on the astral around that

(51:19):
won't hurt. I think it wouldhelp. Yeah, and
at the very least, even ifyou're not, if you, if you can't
believe that, you're makingenergetic change, right, then
you're making personal change,right, and you're connecting to
other people who believe thesame things that you do, at
least mostly right? So you canunite your will, your intention,

(51:45):
your your resolve, right to dealwith the problem, and it doesn't
feel like you're alone, flappingin the wind,

Alan Bailey (51:52):
right? Yeah, interesting, interesting. I hate
to say it, but we have to wrapup. Believe it or not, an hour
just flew by. So I

Unknown (52:01):
am not surprised it went by so fast, I figured that
we would feed the case.
Yeah, yeah, all over the placetoo.

Alan Bailey (52:11):
That's how we do it here. That's how we do it here.
Bright flame, we're all

Unknown (52:15):
blame the fact that Alan and I are both ADHD poster
children. Absolutely
no. I love that. I love anorganic conversation like that,
and going off on tangents and

Alan Bailey (52:29):
no, well, we still have three more questions for
you. Two of them are very easyquestions. One is a hard
question. I might give you thehard question first, then get it
out way. Well, for a lot ofpeople, this is a hard question.
Maybe it won't be for you. I getthe feeling it won't. Really

Unknown (52:43):
can't wait to hear this. I actually get that
feeling

Alan Bailey (52:46):
too. It tends to be a hard question for horror
writers. I've noticed anyway,what is bringing you hope right
now?

Unknown (52:54):
Well, writing solar punk, as I said, and talking
about solar punk, and I'm goingto be doing some teaching, a
couple of upcoming witchy eventsabout solar punk witchcraft. And

(53:14):
I'm actually working on a nonfiction book on solar punk
witchcraft, so and finding somany people saying yes, yes,
that makes so much sense. I'm asolar punk witch too, you know.
So that lifts me. That keeps mehopeful. In addition to the

(53:34):
working being out in the world,which is set in the present day,
pretty much, I also writefuturistic solar punk that's
nothing like the working and soas I write more of that, that
really lifts me, because it goesback to the future I want to

(53:56):
live in. I'm basically writingthat future, and it goes back to
Excellent, yeah, it goes back toStarhawk and I taught together.
I forget what year or other weoffered this particular weekend
about storying the future. Andshe leads amazing trances or
visualizations, immersivejourneys. And this particular

(54:20):
one was to the future that wereally desired, and I began
writing it. So all the storiessaid in what I call the threads,
are that future. And so the moreI stay there, the more I try to
bring it forward and and sendthat out to the world that gives

(54:43):
me hope, and all the peopledoing similar things gives me
hope. Yeah, I will

Alan Bailey (54:49):
say, very quickly, I think the working is the first
solar punk novel I've read.Well, I shouldn't say novel. I
should say piece of fiction.That I've read that wasn't
science fiction, because I thinkevery other piece of slurpunk
I've read has been sciencefiction. I'm almost positive. So

(55:09):
it's been interesting for thatto see it from a more I guess I
would call it fantasy, a morefantasy side, you know, although
I don't know if I would callexactly fantasy either. I don't
know. No, no,

Unknown (55:21):
I wouldn't, even though, I mean, I kind of have
to write for marketing. To someextent, I've even resigned
myself to people calling iturban fantasy. But you know,
there's no vampires, there's nowerewolves, and there's no
stereotypic witches, the realpeople who practice real

(55:43):
witchcraft,
who are like the real witchesthat I have met and that I am,
you know, I can see me in thecharacters. So it's cool,
yeah? So it's fabulous because Ido, I do, push some things a
little farther into thefantastical, yes,

Alan Bailey (56:04):
yeah, yeah, I

Unknown (56:06):
love it, by the way. For the record, I absolutely
love it. I think it's absolutelyabsorbing. I've been spread the
word. It's absolutely holding myattention. It's fantastic. I
can't wait to see how it comesout. Like I said, I adore your
characters. I love that they'reall very three dimensional, four
dimensional, even, right, youknow. And they, they're, they're

(56:30):
likable, believable, even thoughyou can see all their flaws, you
know, right? And maybe becauseof them, because we all have
merits and flaws that we bringto the table, right? And we're
best when we support each otherin our weaknesses and, you know,
give each other the reins andour strengths, and they do that.
And it's pretty cool. It'spretty cool to watch.

(56:53):
Thank you. Diane,

Alan Bailey (56:54):
yeah, okay, last two questions, these are super
easy ones. Obviously you want topromote the working but is there
anything else that you wouldlike to put out there into the
world for people to look for orread?

Unknown (57:06):
Well, I I'm actually, I've collected those stories I
mentioned that take part in thethreads, as I call it, that
futuristic place that's based onthe world I want to create. I've
collected them into a mosaicnovel, and I'm trying to sell
that at the moment, sohopefully, and some of those

(57:27):
stories are out there, actually,in, you know, the anthologies,
magazines, and another one'scoming out roughly January, I
think, Susan K Quinn's brightgreen futures anthology I'm in
and nice one of my threadstories. Yeah, that's That's
wonderful. I want to lift that.Everyone should keep an eye out

(57:51):
for that bright green futuresanthology.
Awesome. Was your story inluminescence? Was that one of
your thread stories? I reallyenjoyed that one,
yes, but yeah, that may yeah inthat one is when the web went
down in bioluminescent, right?And in solar punk magazine is

(58:15):
maybe we are all witches. Andthere's a fun thing in that one.
It refers back to the working ina fun way. So I actually you can
read that for free on mywebsite. I have a link to that
one. There's a couple of mythread stories that I link to in

(58:35):
my website that you can read forfree, and I'll be putting more
content on my my very messywebsite, I need to redo it in
some year.

Alan Bailey (58:47):
Oh, boy, I feel that. Yeah, we could talk about
that after we're off, becauseDiane and I have to talk about
that with the podcast as well.So

Unknown (58:56):
our website's kind of a shit show right now.
If any listeners or witches oror want to learn more about
witchcraft, we have a witch campcoming up that's hybrid, and I'm
going to be teaching withanother person the doing the

(59:18):
online path that's about solarpunk. You could find out about
that on my website. Also, that'swinter witch camp coming up in
February.
That's awesome. Make sure Alangets the link and we can put it
in the show notes when we postthe episode. Okay,
great, yeah. And I'll also beteaching at the sacred space

(59:39):
conference in March, doingsomething similar, but much
shorter than what I'll be doingit at which camp, awesome.

Alan Bailey (59:49):
Cool off. The Ping. Susan, she did tell me that
she's putting out an anthology.So Susan K Quinn is has been on
the podcast. Well, she's doneone of our columns. For us for a
couple years now, so and I'vehung out with her like in real
life few times too. So we'repals. Yeah,

Unknown (01:00:07):
you're in Pittsburgh. So many reclaiming witches are
in Pittsburgh. I'm jealous ofall the community out there. And
then Susan and you are outthere, a lot of solar punk
action. Yeah,

Alan Bailey (01:00:19):
we actually have our own solar punk, I guess it
would be a convention orsomething. It's just, it's like
brand it's but second year, it'slast year 2024. Was the second
year of it. So it's like brandnew. It was pretty cool. I went
the first year and hung out, andI had to skip this last year. I
forget why. I think I was doingsomething else at the time, but,

(01:00:41):
yeah, there's lots of cool stuffin Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh is
actually a really cool city, anda lot of people think of it like
it's, I don't know, 1885 andeverything's still covered with
smoke and grime and whatever.You know what I mean. But it's
not, it's not like that at all.Anyway, last thing is, where can
everybody find you online? Iknow I mentioned your website up

(01:01:05):
front at the beginning, but whydon't you mention that again,
and anywhere else that you're

Unknown (01:01:09):
online? Yeah, brightflame.com and I have all
my socials in there, but I guessI'm trying to be active all over
the place. You know, to keepkeep the buzz up my book and
talk to other people interestedin solar punk and doing this
kind of work. So I'm onInstagram at bright flame dot

(01:01:31):
two. There's too many brightflames out there for some
reason. Well, reasons I knowthat we won't go into So, yeah,
bright flame dot two onInstagram at bright flame on
blue sky. I'm in wandering dotshop on mastodon. At bright
flame wandering dot shop is theSci Fi fantasy instance on

(01:01:57):
mastodon. Really great solarpunk conversations on mastodon.
I've met real interesting peoplethere. Oh, so yeah, and I
actually started a YouTubechannel to start putting out
various videos about solar punkabout my book, and I'm behind

(01:02:21):
and putting the latest one up,but all that you can find on my
website. Awesome, awesome.
I just went to look for you onblue sky, and I found you there.
So if you find sable Aradiafollowing you, that's me.
Great. I will follow you back.

Alan Bailey (01:02:40):
Fantastic, fantastic. I love it. Thank you
so much for coming on. It's beena super interesting
conversation. I still can'tbelieve an hour flew by, that
fast,

Unknown (01:02:47):
absolute joy. Thank you so much.
Well, thank you. Thank you somuch for inviting me on. This
has been wonderful.

Alan Bailey (01:02:55):
Wow, no problem. Thank you. And that was our
conversation with bright flamebefore we continue. Don't
forget, you can support us bytelling your friends about us on
social media, or you could alsorate and review us. Check us out
on patreon.com/if, this goes onand we'd be able to appreciate
any help, if you're able tocontribute, we also have a

(01:03:19):
coffee that's k, O, f, i, so I'mgonna keep that super short
tonight. Diane thoughts,opinions.

Unknown (01:03:27):
Oh, she was great. I really enjoyed that conversation
for Yeah, well, this is why Iwas, you know, this is why I had
to do it, even though was like,Oh, this really is cutting
short, and I don't know the timeis tight, but you're right. I
got, I got to do this so, and,no, that's great. I feel like

(01:03:49):
I've made a real connection tosomeone who's very like she
said, aligned, right? We sharecommon interests, common goals,
you know, I really liked her. Ithink we could be friends. You
know, that was and her bookreally is awesome. I really love
the characters a lot. She readit for the characterization
alone. There

Alan Bailey (01:04:09):
was so much I wanted to talk about the book
that we just never got to Iguess that happens every
podcast. I don't even know Imentioned it anymore. But what I
definitely wanted to talk abouther style a little bit too,
because I really felt like, andI feel like this about solar
Punk in general, and this issomething I want to, I want to
ask a solar punk person about.But solar punk, to me, often

(01:04:30):
comes off as almost non fiction.Even though it's clearly
fiction, there's still something

Unknown (01:04:36):
there's often very grounded in reality.

Alan Bailey (01:04:39):
Yes, yes, because it's like, it's not like, you go
into this, I don't know, horroror science fiction or whatever,
world, and all these problemsare gone. They're still present
there, and they're actually,much of the time, the main
focus, right? And so it's like,it's almost, it's that, but it's
also like the writing. Style, Ifeel like it's often very

(01:05:01):
straightforward. You know what Imean? Hemingway esque, if you
will. You know, like shortersentences, straightforward
writing. You know what I mean?

Unknown (01:05:12):
People aren't interested in creating pretty
phrases. They're interested intelling the story. And they want
to ground people in people youcan believe in right characters
that are human, you know?

Alan Bailey (01:05:24):
Yeah, yeah, very, very hard science fiction esque,
if you will. Yeah, valid, yeah.And I do, I do think it's
probably one of the main typesof modern, hard SF, you know
what I mean? I at least I feelthat way, right? And then
there's the whole fantasybranch, which we've talked about

(01:05:44):
for the first time tonight. So,

Unknown (01:05:47):
you know, it's, I think, actually, you know, yeah,
solar punk, but also lunar punk,right? You know, it's, it's also
very lunar Punk in itspresentation and ethos, which
and not just because, you knowthe characters happen to be
witches, in a practice ofwitchcraft that a modern witch

(01:06:11):
in our time would, you knowclearly does recognize, Right?
It's more like the whole I wantto use the term that I can't use
because I know it has a veryspecific meaning, but I want to
use the term magical, really,right? Is there another term for

(01:06:34):
that that isn't appropriative?

Alan Bailey (01:06:36):
Oh, no, that's an excellent question, but I can
see the parallels that you'redrawing there for sure,

Unknown (01:06:42):
for sure, right, right? Like, at some points you're
you're you, like, I thought,okay, now I knew what was going
on. Because, like I said, thisis a practice that I recognize.
This is a spirituality that ismine and that I know, right? So
for me, it was a very simplething to follow in many ways,

(01:07:04):
but I could, I got the feeling alot of times, because they cross
over from the physical to theastral right. And sometimes
there is a catalyst for that.They do a ritual, they do
meditation, and they go right.But sometimes it just happens
right. And I found myselfwondering, would someone who is

(01:07:24):
not familiar with that form ofspirituality find that difficult
to follow? Did you?

Alan Bailey (01:07:30):
I don't think so cool. Let me add some caveats in
here, right? I didn't find itsuper hard to follow. There were
some there were different timeswhen I understood that I was
missing context, right? Like, Ihad a pretty good idea what x
what they were doing in like, xand y situations, right? But I

(01:07:52):
knew that I was definitelymissing some social context or
something there, right? Now, thecaveats being, I'm a very
eclectic person, and I've readall kinds of weird stuff, so
maybe that helps them, right?Also, it's my job to figure out
things that I don't understandand explain it. So I'm good at

(01:08:15):
figuring out things I don'tunderstand. This. Maybe that was
part of it too. You know what? Imean? That's what

Unknown (01:08:20):
I wanted to know, right? Because, okay, so I tell
people, right? You know who are,just like starting to get their
work out there, right? I tellthem, your reader is smart,
right? Especially when you'rewriting science fiction or
fantasy speculative fiction,people are smart. They want to

(01:08:40):
figure it out. You don't have tohit them over the head with a
club to explain it to them,right? They will generally
figure it out, right? And Iwanted to know if that was
holding up with something that Iknew about. And good. I'm glad
it is, because there's a lot inthere that's really, really
cool. And I wanted, I wanted toknow, can she cross into the

(01:09:04):
mainstream more? Can she? Isthis a time when people are
ready to hear this, right? Canshe break past just talking with
other witches, right? And ifyou're following, then I think,
oh, yeah, totally. And that'sawesome,

Alan Bailey (01:09:18):
yeah, yeah, absolutely, yeah, yeah. I think
I followed everything that wasimportant, and now I still have
like, 20 or 30 pages left,because I'm and I'm gonna out
myself a little bit here. Iactually thought the interview
was on Friday, so Right. And forlisteners who don't know what
day it is, because this is kindof out of time, it's Wednesday,

(01:09:39):
so I was, like, planning andhaving a few more days to read
it, so I didn't quite finish it,but, but, yeah, everything I've
read so far I've totally beenable to follow, if not from just
context clues, then from justhaving read fantasy kind of
stuff, or because some of itperfect, you know, delves into
that enough where I'm like, ohyeah, this is like, weird
monster thing and, oh yeah, Iget this. Just another

(01:10:00):
dimension, sort of, yeah, I getthis, you know, I mean, like, it
just I was able to assemble thepieces.

Unknown (01:10:06):
It was good. It's good for, like, that's I needed. I
wanted to know that because forme, I had the context, right?
So, yeah, so if for someone whodidn't have the context, I
wanted to know, was it comingthrough? I'm glad it is, because
I think it's wonderful, and Iwant people, yeah,

Alan Bailey (01:10:21):
awesome. Awesome, yeah, yeah, no, definitely.
Okay. What are you reading rightnow? Aside from the working, Hi,
I'm

Unknown (01:10:27):
going through a reread of the auxin series, which is,
oh, I'll know that one. Well,they're the books that
influenced, or, you know, spawnthe movie Master and Commander.

Alan Bailey (01:10:39):
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know you like
those ones. Yeah,

Unknown (01:10:43):
I really do. I kind of like that high seas adventure
kind of stuff. And I'm rereadingthem, mostly because I've been
editing my toy soldier novels,and I felt because it had been a
while since I had touch basewith that, with them, for
various reasons that I had, Iwanted to get back into that
high seas feel, because it'svery important to my books,

(01:11:04):
right, so, but I just like theseries for its own sake too,
another series wherecharacterization is really
strong, right? Like, thecharacters make the books worth
reading, and their friendshipand how they interact, right?
Like, it's interesting, because,just like, it's interesting,
yeah, actually, just like withbright flange book, neither one

(01:11:26):
of them is the main character,they're both the main character.
And you could totally read theseries as either one of them
being the main character, and itwould still make sense. Awesome,

Alan Bailey (01:11:35):
cool, cool. What are you in? Well, speaking of
high sea adventures, I'm readingmovie Dick Right now, sweet,
yeah, which I have actuallyfound to be quite hilarious. To
be honest with you, I

Unknown (01:11:48):
thought it was hilarious too, in places. Yeah,
you

Alan Bailey (01:11:52):
know, I'm only like seven chapters in So, and
apparently the chapters can bequite short. I mean, I realize
I'm kind of taking it a littlebit out of its original context
in it being funny. But theobservations that Ishmael has of
Queequeg when they first meetand stuff, I don't know, they're

(01:12:13):
hilarious to me. You know what Imean? Because he goes out of his
way to be like, not racist, andnot all this stuff. You know
what I mean. But still, he makesthese observations. I feel like
it should be like, like, itshould be like a television
show, like friends or somethinglike that, right? Like, I really
feel like that's that thosefirst section of chapters are,

(01:12:34):
like, straight out of asituational comedy, you know,
right? So I've been enjoyingthat, and I'm also about to pick
up. As soon as I finish thewatching myself, I'm gonna pick
up Jubilee by Stephen KStanford, which is a flame three
Press book, which I will bereviewing. And it's like a I'll
just read the back real quick.It was meant to be a simple in

(01:12:56):
and out mission. Jubilee is alawless artificial world
existing within its own paralleluniverse, a seething cesspool of
vice ruled by an eccentric AI,or so they say, detectives, Cole
and Danny were sent to theJubilee on a hastily organized
mission to recover the body of aleading conservative politician,
someone, it seems, has been anaughty boy, but the corpse has

(01:13:17):
been switched in. The imperiledpartners find themselves drawn
together. They might be fallingin love, or they might be saving
the galaxy. Either way, theauthorities will not be pleased.
So it sounds fun. It does

Unknown (01:13:30):
sound fun. That's cool. Let me know. That sounds like my
cup of tea, actually, yeah,

Alan Bailey (01:13:36):
yeah. It's um, it seems, it seems super fun. I'm
looking forward to it as a veryleisurely read. Sweet.

Unknown (01:13:45):
Yeah. Well, let me know. Let me know how it is.

Alan Bailey (01:13:49):
I will. I will. I guess, uh, we ready to wrap it
up in Yeah, I

Unknown (01:13:52):
think we pretty much better. I heard your alarm go
off there. You'll probably cutthat out of the final recording.
But, yeah, yeah, it beats. Youhave elsewhere to be so thanks
for setting this up. Alan, asalways, I had a great time. I
hope you're well, yeah,

Alan Bailey (01:14:07):
yeah, thanks. That's it for us. We are keeping
hope alive one episode at atime. You
If this goes on, don't panic. Isedited by and produced by Alan
Bailey. Our theme music is byFather flamethrower. Additional

(01:14:28):
music is by Christophersnitroski, and the outro music
by sable Aradia, Intro by DaveRobinson. A special thanks to
our guest, bright flame. Thanksfor supporting us, and we'll see
you again soon. You I believe

Unknown (01:14:48):
in unicorns into
planetary letting go. Mycatapult. I believe in unicorns.