Here’s the blurb:
On Rightside/Wrongside, women are in charge and men
live behind a 200-mile Border Fence. Their only interactions are for sex, which
women control with force and long-entrenched law. Mothers raise daughters, and
fathers know nothing of them. Women send sons across the Fence to their fathers
and never know if they live or die. New Rightside president Alanna Olaffson
believes, along with her countrywomen, that female empowerment is a good thing,
a necessary thing, right up to the time it goes frighteningly wrong.
And an excerpt:
The old man
dozed over his paperback. Even in a busy week his job was boring as hell. What
made it worthwhile, besides the status and the pay bag, was the free bed. Old
Willie lived right in the Transfer Cabin, backed up against the Border Fence in
Cody, and that suited him fine. He took his meals at a bar down the street -
had a few good friends there - and spent most of his free time nodding over a
book or stoking his small stove.
It was a nice
quiet life, a safe life. Nobody bothered the man in the Transfer Cabin. Yeah,
it suited him fine.
The bell
rang, startling him out of his doze. It wasn’t a simple ring, for boxed goods
or vehicles through the big Door, but the four-note flourish they used for a
baby. It sounded again, signaling two to transfer. “It never rains but it
pours,” he mumbled, and limped over to answer the bell.
When the
ready light flashed on, Old Willie pulled out the heavy metal Drawer set into
the back wall of the cabin. He smiled down at the two sleeping babies.
“Welcome to
Wrongside,” he said softly.
Rightside/Wrongside began 14 years ago as the glimmer
of an idea about the societal interactions between women and men. I’m old
enough to remember when fathers worked, cut the grass, and drove the car while
women stayed home, had babies, and cooked dinner every night. What would it be
like, I wondered, if those 1950s roles were reversed? In fact, how would
society work if women and men were so alienated from each other that they lived
in separate countries? What would happen…?
Sci-fi requires a lot of worldbuilding. How did you go about creating the physical and political setting?
Rightside and Wrongside are on a planet that had been
colonized from Earth 71 years earlier. I wasn’t interested in seeing how odd
and alien I could make the planet, so it mostly looks like ours. The flora and
fauna were named by the colonists after the Earth plants and animals they most
resembled. I dropped alien hints once in awhile, though. There are two moons.
Each day has 27 hours, and each month has 34 days. Puppies have blue fur.
I wanted the language to have evolved a bit in 71 years, and figured the easiest way to do that was to change their exclamations and curse words. For instance, instead of saying ‘my own damn country,’ the men say ‘my own Yong country.’ Instead of saying ‘thank God,’ the women say ‘thank Milina.’ You can probably guess those are proper names, but you’ll have to read the book to find out who they are.
I'm fascinated by the map you included. How did that come about?
I’ve had a map of the planet in my head for years, and
just before publication I asked my friend Susan Dexter, an artist and fantasy
author, to draw it for me. There are locations on the map that are not used in
the book, and that’s because at least two sequels are coming: Oceanside
and Mountainside.
Now let’s hear about you:
I took a winding road to the writing life, but here I
am. As a teenager I was too shy and backward to admit to anyone that I wanted
to be a writer, so I followed my sister into dental hygiene. Ten years later
the road took its first bend when I had the opportunity to work for my local
newspaper as a lifestyles editor. I climbed the (very short) ladder available
to me there and eventually became wire editor, features editor, and columnist.
When I left the paper I took my writing skills with me to work for other
newspapers and for magazines. The most fun I ever had as a magazine writer was
working for the True magazines. Remember those? True Love, True
Story, True Romance – I wrote for them all, until they folded. Sigh.
The next bend in the road took me to nonfiction, and I became a book indexer. Twenty years later I still index on a limited basis. I eventually had one middle-grade novel and two nonfiction books published, plus three indie books written with writers’ group friends. Rightside/Wrongside is my newest (and best) effort.
My husband and I live in Ohio, and our activities include gardening, canning, hiking, traveling, camping, and motorcycling. I’ve had a motorcycle license since 1985, and presently ride a three-wheeler because of bad knees.
Visit me at
Cathy Hester Seckman - Home (cathyseckman.com)
Purchase links for RIGHTSIDE/WRONGSIDE, a book that is sure to stretch your imagination and provide plenty of food for thought:
Rightside/Wrongside
a book by Cathy Hester Seckman bookshop.org)
Amazon.com:
Rightside/Wrongside eBook : Seckman, Cathy Hester : Kindle Store
Rightside/Wrongside by Cathy Hester Seckman | eBook | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)
An intriguing concept. Adding to my TBR
ReplyDeleteThe story sounds very good. Best of luck with it!
ReplyDelete