One of the aspects of writing a novel set in the near future is that the fictional world is seriously tested by real life. I started writing my upcoming novel, “It’s Always 9/11”, in 2017, finishing my final manuscript in the spring of 2020. Needless to say, that span of time wrought a lot of crises and changes. Since the book’s completion, while I’ve been preoccupied with the publishing process, the crises and changes have only accelerated.

In many ways—the stress of mysterious illness; the vulnerability of a fearful public to authoritarian creep; the emergence of Portland as a protest center—”It’s Always 9/11” is eerily prescient. In other ways, events have unfolded and consciousness altered in ways not addressed by the book: the Black Lives Matter movement; the identity-based consciousness that has infused our culture.

“It’s Always 9/11” may have predicted some headlines, but it is not ripped from the headlines.

When you write a book—at least when I write a book— it’s not unlike developing a sophisticated video game. I define a group of variables—characters, situations, settings. As they come to life the story develops, consequential to those variables. Our real ex-President, Donald Trump, was a racist and authoritarian wannabe. My fictional President, Rupert Kaspar, provides universal health care and outlaws fracking. He is not a racist. To the contrary, he sprinkles his speeches with all kinds of inclusive cliches. As my character Teddy notes, “he oppresses everyone equally”.

But he is no authoritarian wannabe. Kaspar’s lack of racism, his technocratic slickness, make him a very effective authoritarian. There’s no overt vulgarities to attack. There’s no simplistic way to define or denigrate “the other”. Resistance becomes an act of character rather than identity. The question becomes not whether the good guys beat the bad guys but what price a disparate group of people are willing to pay for freedom.