I’ve never been a fan of doom-and-gloom fiction, and as the real world stress piles on I find myself wanting good endings in my escapism more and more. The heroes can — and should — struggle to get to that ending, of course. It’s always darkest before the dawn, right? But, that dawn must come. Some of the heroes can be lost along the way through treachery or noble sacrifice, but at the end of the day I want them to drive back the darkness.
How about you? How do you like your stories to end? Are there any tropes you look forward to, or want to avoid? I’ll admit to being a sucker for redemptive arcs, both in villains and in fallen heroes. I also enjoy when the proverbial cavalry comes riding in, especially if there’s a time earlier in the story when the cavalry failed to make it in time somewhere. Even if you know it’s going to turn out all right in the end for the final battle, that incident earlier on sows enough doubt to keep the tension ratcheted up.
Sci-Fi Anthology That’s Full of Hope!
Since we’re on the subject, we’ve got an anthology that fits this theme I’m looking for these days. If Science Fiction is your thing, you can’t go wrong with Tomorrow’s Hope! The story I included was a finalist for the Jim Baen Memorial Fiction Award a few years back. In it, a group of astronauts are trapped on a sinking airship in the skies of Venus. It’ll take all of them working together to make it back home!
Tomorrow’s Hope: A journey of exploration and hope builds on the themes reminiscent of classic Science Fiction written by the greats of the 1960’s. Inspired by the works of Ben Bova, Isaac Asimov, Kurt Vonnegut, Robert Heinlein, Robert Silverberg, and more, we dive into worlds that could be just around the corner.
With Essays by Arlan Andrews, Les Johnson, and stories by Bart Kemper, Benjamin Tyler Smith, Charli Cox, Gustavo Bondoni, Jetse de Vries, Michael Anthony Dioguardi, Sarina Dorie, Malorie Cooper, and William Joseph Roberts, you are sure to enjoy this collection.
Three Ravens Partnering With The Shepherd’s Men
During release week of Michael Gants’ latest JTF-13 novel Wavesong, we donated a dollar from every sale to the Shepherd’s Men organization, to help in the their mission to raise awareness of and share the burden for warriors in need of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual support as a result of Traumatic Brain Injuries (TBI) and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Since then, we’ve decided that we will do that for all new releases going forward. During release week for any of our books, know that any purchase you make will benefit a great organization geared towards helping veterans get the help they need, when they need it.
You can also donate directly to the Shepherd’s Men here: https://www.shepherdsmen.com
