Erin Roberts is a writer of speculative fiction across formats: her short fiction has appeared in publications including Asimov’s Science Fiction, Clarkesworld, Podcastle, and The Dark; her interactive fiction has been published in Sub-Q Magazine, and her non-fiction essays and reviews have appeared on http://Tor.com and in Cascadia Subduction Zone, People of Colo(u)r Destroy Fantasy, and Strange Horizons, among others. Erin is a graduate of the Odyssey Writers Workshop, holds an MFA from the Stonecoast program at the University of Southern Maine, and has been the recipient of grants and awards from the Maryland State Arts Council, Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, and the Speculative Literature Foundation. You can follow her on Twitter at @nirele and read more about her work at http://writingwonder.com.
We are touched and encouraged to see an overwhelming response from writers from the Sino diaspora as well as BIPOC creators in various parts of the world. And such diverse and daring takes of wuxia and xianxia, from contemporary to the far reaches of space!
“Leaping Crane don’t want me to tell you this,” Poppy continued, “but I’m the most dangerous thing in the West. We’ll get you to your brother safe before you know it.”
Many trans and marginalised people in our world can do the exact same things that everyone else has done to overcome challenges and find happiness, only for others to come in and do what they want as Ren Woxing did, and probably, when asked why, they would simply say Xiang Wentian: to ask the heavens. And perhaps we the readers, who are told this story from Linghu Chong’s point of view, should do more to question the actions of people before blindly following along to cause harm.
Before the Occupation, righteousness might have meant taking overt stands against the distant invaders of their ancestral homelands through donating money, labour, or expertise to Chinese wartime efforts. Yet during the Occupation, such behaviour would get one killed or suspected of treason; one might find it better to remain discreet and fade into the background, or leave for safer shores. Could one uphold justice and righteousness quietly, subtly, and effectively within such a world of harshness and deprivation?
