The Story Behind the Story with S.D. Miller of Nova Scotia, Canada.

 

Let’s welcome another newcomer to the Scribbler.

 

 

Scott’s stories are sure to please. He was introduced to the Scribbler by one of our popular guests and we are happy to have him join us this week.

Read on my friends.

 

S.D. Miller is an author and educator from Nova Scotia, Canada. His non-fiction writing has been featured in EdSurge and his debut novel, Nekonikon Punk: Ctrl Break garnered critical acclaim, winning Best Sci/fi Action Adventure of 2024 from Indies Today. His stories balance action and social commentary inviting readers to explore technology, power, and resistance.

 

Title: Nekonikon Punk Trilogy

Synopsis:

Nekonikon Punk is a near-future science fiction series where corporations formed townships that ended up seceding from the USA, establishing their own city-states along the Pacific coast. When originally forming the townships, people were promised jobs, comfortable homes, and a good quality of life, so they flocked there in response to the cost-of-living crisis. However, after a war called The Great Secession, these city-states became increasingly authoritarian as they competed with each other, and within their own territories, for ever more power. Nekonikon is one such city-state.



The story picks up long after the war is over and Nekonikon is established. The main character is a young guard-in-training named Juan who wants nothing more than to protect what he holds dear. As graduation nears he is exposed more and more to the corruption of his home and finds himself sympathizing with the oppressed, especially a rebel punk band known as Corpslayer.



From there we launch into a fast-paced adventure, following a colourful cast of characters with competing philosophies on morality, power, and personhood.

The Story Behind the Story:

Anger and frustration at our current world order.

Ha ha, it’s true! I find it frustrating to see how the middle class has dissolved over the past 40 years, and there is an ever-increasing wealth gap between the haves and have-nots. I’m not against people being wealthy, but there is no excuse for a person to have more money than their grandchildren could ever spend existing in the same world where children die every day of malnutrition. Of course this has always been the case to a degree, but with the post-COVID cost-of-living crisis we are facing worse conditions than any time in my memory. Canadians are carrying more personal debt than ever before just trying to make ends meet and food banks across the country are struggling to keep up with demand.  This is heading nowhere good.

As an educator, I worry about young people and wonder what their futures will look like. And, when I’m honest with myself, I don’t see things getting better for them. How will they ever afford a home? What will the climate be like? Who will pay for their social assistance when they are older?

The more I think about it, the more my scenario of corporations sweeping in and creating old-fashioned townships seems inevitable. It’s not hard to imagine some tech bros deciding that they know better how to run a society than elected governments. So, they invest their money (which is more than some nations have) and establish their own working towns, providing people with homes and jobs. Then slowly, as costs rise, they creep back the benefits ever more or require more of your personal information in order to continue living there. They would eventually tire of paying taxes to state and national governments who they see as doing nothing but interfering with their prosperity. A secession movement also seems likely, and it would be supported by their loyal denizens.

Power corrupts and eventually these places would morph into authoritarian states. Once I had this history in my head, I decided it would be a great jumping off point to create a narrative about resistance and the importance of freedom and self-determination.

I chose cyberpunk as a genre because it hit a number of themes I wanted to explore. For example, one of the main characters is an aboriginal woman calling herself Penny Fame. For her, the battle didn’t begin with the Great Secession, it began with the colonial settlers taking her people’s land in the 1850s in the Rogue River Wars. She refuses to acknowledge Nekonikon as a legitimate state and refers to it as the original pronunciation Necanicum. The idea of history echoing itself is one of the themes and we can see through Penny how colonial patterns are not all that different from capitalist patterns.

The Nekonikon Punk series needs to be three books because ultimately I have a hopeful message I want to convey. But to get there, I need to take the reader through the dystopian realities of such a system in order to arrive at what I think is an optimistic vision of the future. Books one and two are finished, and I hope to have the third book finished by next spring. I also have plans to write a prequel called “The Great Secession” once the trilogy is complete.

Website: Please go HERE.

Scribbler: 

Where is your favourite spot to write? – At my desk in the basement. No one bothers me except my cat, and it allows for long periods of focus once I’m in the zone.

Are you messy or neat?- Very neat.

Your beverage of choice?- black coffee in the AM, water in the afternoon, Forty Creek whiskey for the nights.




An Excerpt from Nekonikon Punk: Ctrl+Break: A conversation between Penny and Juan:

“So why bother? You told me sometimes you don’t even do it for payment.”

Looking down at her drink, Penny gave a rueful chuckle. “Yeah, Mela hates it when we do that.” She finished her Tecumtum’s Revenge in a gulp. Nodding to his empty glass, “Another?”

“One more…if you answer my question.”

She was silent for a few seconds, then pointed to her RRW tattoo. “You know what this stands for? Rogue River Warrior. You know what that is?

“Ahh, no. I can’t say I do.” Something about her tone made his chest tighten.

She stood, walked to the other side of the bar, and started fixing the drinks, “It’s where my people are from, south of here. Many generations ago, the Americans spread further and further west, eventually settling all around these parts.” She paused, staring blankly into the glass. “When they found gold in the mountains, they decided it was worth more than my ancestors.”

“What happened?” His chest was tighter.

“What always happens.” She slid him his drink and cupped her own in her hands looking down at it as she spoke. “My people fought, held out in the mountains for quite some time, but the industrial machines of colonialism wore them down. The earth went bad.”

She looked up from her glass, “Do you know that I can’t even tell you exactly which people were my ancestors? Too many groups were moved together to an area further north. The people jumbled together, over the years we lost our land, our languages…” she met his eyes, “…our history.”

“Penny, I…” She had struck a chord deep within his chest. He didn’t have the words.

“I know. It’s OK, we’re good.” She sat next to him and patted his leg. “If we weren’t good, I wouldn’t bother telling you this.” She looked him in the eye and smiled before looking back down at her glass. “You asked why we bother. Because it’s the same today. The Americans displaced my people, moved us to a region useless to them. Then when they wanted that land, they moved us again and again, further north.” Anger rose in her voice. “Eventually they stopped, but only because the megacorps wanted the land.” She looked at Juan, this time with steel in her eyes, “Necanicum was my home first…” She pointed to her RRW tattoo, “…and I’ll be damned if they move me without a fight.”

Juan nodded. He reflected on one of Wagner’s lessons, “The state monopoly on violence.”

Penny’s interest piqued, “You’ve read Weber?”

Confused, Juan shook his head, “Who? No, just what you said made me think about one of Wagner’s lessons. That the state’s monopoly on violence was the greatest modern invention.”

“You might be surprised, but I don’t entirely disagree.” Her demeanor changed, she was lively and engaged. “A legitimate state should have a monopoly on violence. It gets us away from family blood feuds, revenge killings, all that kind of stuff.”

“Never thought I’d get you to agree with Wagner.”

“I agree with Weber, who actually created that argument. Not Wagner who uses it for propaganda.” She sipped and took Juan’s silence as an invitation to elaborate. “Nekonikon is not a legitimate state. The Five are essentially figureheads controlled by dictatorial megacorps. They exist to hold us down– you included– for their own benefit. All the while, they hand out scraps and feed lies to their faithful. Those of us who aren’t loyal end up here in the Row. And I don’t need to tell you how their guards treat us down here, do I?”

Juan’s face flushed with shame. He had seen it with his own eyes. Participated in it with his own fists.

Noting his reaction, Penny gave him some time to think before continuing, “You ever hear of the veil of ignorance?”

“Ahem, ah nope. I don’t think so.”

“It’s a thought experiment. One that helps a person envision an ideal society. It asks you to think of a world in which you would want to live. But there’s a catch. You have to envision the society with ignorance as to what role you will have in that world. Maybe you will be a CEO, maybe a prisoner in a jail, maybe a guard in the security force, or maybe even a punk rocker. With that veil of ignorance, would you create Nekonikon or something different?”

Juan didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. They sat in silence as they finished their drinks.

After some time, Penny patted his leg again, “You should sleep here. Tred and Kara will have their patterns ready in the morning and then we can continue our training. The couch in the green room is all yours.”

“Thanks Penny.” He remained seated as she stood up and made her way to the back rooms, halting halfway when he called out, “Penny?”

Looking over her shoulder, “Yeah Juan?”

“Umm, I-I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

She nodded to herself. “I know. I see you.”

His eyes welled up, “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight Juan.”

Buy it HERE.

Thank you for sharing that intriguing excerpt and for being our guest. We wish you the best of luck and success with your writing.

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