Summer is coming! Summer is coming!

I remember writing, "Beach! Beach! Beach! Summer! Summer! Summer!" over and over again on lined notebook paper like an incantation. I was the age when other kids were scrawling the names of their crushes with similar intensity, but there I was in English class willing a better future forward with all my might. Maybe this was my origin as a writer of optimistic science fiction.

That much anticipated summer beach trip lasted about a week on the nearby Oregon Coast. According to photographic evidence, all I did there was take pictures of seagulls. Still, it provided months of inspiration and distraction for a sun-streaked, summer-loving idealist.

These days, I'm at home in cityscapes under brooding cold skies with skeptics. I don't always feel much in common with that younger, sunny beach-lover, but when I do something that feels right (going vegan, working with animals, writing) I can feel my 16-year-old self smiling.

This summer, my story "Watch Out, Red Crusher!" will be included in the anthology Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers edited by Sarena Ulibarri of World Weaver Press. All smiles!

It's a collection of 17 optimistic science fiction stories that imagine a future founded on renewable energies. I'm looking forward to the June 5 publication, holding the book in my hands and reading all the stories.

From the book description (the bold is mine -- that's "Watch Out, Red Crusher!"):

In these pages you’ll find a guerilla art installation in Milan, a murder mystery set in a weather manipulation facility, and a world where you are judged by the glow of your solar nanite implants. From an opal mine in Australia to the seed vault at Svalbard, from a wheat farm in Kansas to a crocodile ranch in Malaysia, these are stories of adaptation, ingenuity, and optimism for the future of our world and others.

 Dear friends:

• Pre-order Glass and Gardens for just .99 on Kindle. 
• Pre-order a paperback edition for  $10.95 from World Weaver Press.
• Add Glass and Gardens to your Goodreads To-Read Shelf. 

I have plans to re-read Sunvault: Stories of Solarpunk and Eco-Speculation, an anthology  from Upper Rubber Boot, and join in a Solarpunk Twitter Chat.

I'm also really looking forward to Ulibarri's English translation of a Brazilian anthology of science fiction stories set in sustainable future worlds.

Right now, there are many exciting conversations about possible futures happening in optimistic science fiction — your choice of beautiful words: afrofuturism, ecofeminism, ecolit, ecopunk, hopepunk or solarpunk.

It's so satisfying to be a part of them. This is why I write! To engage in a conversation about better futures. (See also my blog post at Wide Open Writing, Writing Prompt: 365 Days of Utopia).

Sometimes I wonder at my own enthusiasm for the future. I don't have much investment. No children. I won't see much of it. It makes more sense for me to be mindful of the present moment, I tell myself.

But still, my heart rushes forward. I'm filled with my mother's relentless optimism. I hear her laugh, loud and abrupt, like an exclamation point, and then I'm writing:

Summer! Summer! Solarpunk summer!