The Wisdom in Fiction Project

For thousands of years, in all human cultures, stories have not only been a way of entertaining people but also a way of passing on wisdom. All the great spiritual traditions have stories or parables to illustrate their teachings and even today these are passed down in written form and sometimes made into films. Story telling is a powerful way to help us remember or become aware of wisdom.

A novel, a film or a television show can reach billions of people. What if such popular fiction retained its function as a way of passing on wisdom? What if books that did this were the ones that became block busters? Wouldn’t that have a positive affect on the world? And wouldn’t this be a great way of passing wisdom on to those who would never seek it out and to young people in particular?

I think so, and that’s why the Wisdom in Fiction project. In my writing, I’m putting the wisdom back into popular fiction. The wisdom in my stories is not dogma nor something added in for the sake of it, it is an integral part of the story, for example, if I have meditation instructions in there it’s because a character needs them in order to fulfil a task. The wisdom is hidden in analogy, or character enquiry, or the dictates of necessity in the story. I write fantasy because by stepping out of our own reality, it’s easier to challenge the preconceptions that limit our hearts and minds.

If you like this idea, then you can help out. My motivation for everything I write is to bring benefit to all beings, and for my writing to reach all beings (or even a million or a 100 of them) my work needs to be seen far and wide and I can’t do that on my own. Though it does entail it, the ultimate point is not to promote the author, but to benefit people by introducing them to ideas that they may otherwise never meet.

In publishing, the more books you sell, the more people buy. Once a book hits the Amazon top 100 sales ranking, it’s in the spotlight. Millions of readers who would otherwise never hear of it will see it and many will buy it. So getting a book there is the best way to help get these stories to the world, and it’s do-able if a bunch of people all buy the book on the same day (in the same hour is even better, because the rankings are calculated hourly.) Of course, the book has to be good, otherwise none of this will work. I can assure you that my books are good and written in a popular idiom. Having a literary agent – she’s trying to sell my novel ‘Lethal Inheritance’ to publishers while I’m publishing shorter works independently – is proof of the quality.

If you like the idea of putting wisdom back into popular fiction, here’s how you can help.

• Subscribe to the Wisdom in Fiction newsletter & I will give you a copy of my short story, ‘The Drorgon Slayer’s Choice,’ for free.

• This will allow you to evaluate the quality of my writing, (note that the short stories are light on wisdom due to the constraints of length. Longer works will have more in them.)The newsletter will come out only when there is a new release or a special offer or other important news, no more often than once in a calendar month and usually less.
• If you like the story, you could write a quick review or give a star rating for Goodreads, Smashwords and Amazon.
• Every time a new work comes out, I’ll offer it at a special pre-launch low price to people who subscribe to the Wisdom in Fiction newsletter. In return, I’ll ask you to purchase the book on Amazon on a certain day. If a large number of people buy it on that date, we have some chance of propelling it up the Amazon sales ranking which will help make the book visible to people who would otherwise not see it.

• Spread the word about this project to people you think will be interested. Send them here.
• Tell anyone who you think will be interested about my books, particularly teens and younger adults. Information about the books is on the Catapult Press website along with purchase links.
• Like me on Facebook  and follow me on Twitter. You can also be my fan on Goodreads. The higher the numbers of fans and followers the more inclined people are to think that something must be good.

 

If you want to support this project by subscribing to the Wisdom in Fiction newsletter, send a blank email with the subject line: “Subscribe to Wisdom in Fiction” to: tahlianewland@gmail.com

 Thank you for your support. Together we can change the world for the better. I would love to hear of, or from, other authors who also have a wisdom (not dogma) aspect to their fiction, so if you can put me onto any please leave a comment here.

 

What do you think of this idea?

 

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