It is said that Alexander the Great’s conquests were inspired by the copy of the “Iliad” that he kept under his pillow. Stories drive culture one reader at a time. They inspire them with a sense of what is possible and what they can become if they achieve great things like the characters in their favorite books, movies, and shows.
For entirely too long, American patriots have neglected the importance of storytelling. Why? Ours is a nation that was born of great deeds and great stories: the Boston Tea Party, the Midnight Ride of Paul Revere, the Signing of the Declaration of Independence, Washington Crossing the Delaware, and the Winter at Valley Forge. We took those stories for granted, confident that each new generation would see their value and what our forefathers were fighting for. We failed to update them, leaving the market open for entirely new stories and new storytellers.
Those who wanted to use the political process to radically transform our nation laid the groundwork for their revolution by telling of a nation illegitimate since its founding on a foundation of slavery and the conquest of innocents. In its place, they offered visions of utopia to those willing to become fighters, revolutionaries, and change agents ready to topple our corrupt system.
Not even children are immune. Storytellers equip children with visions of what they can become if they reject the traditions of the past. Men dressed as women have even informed toddlers how they could radically transform their bodies just like we can radically transform America. Those drag queens were, after all, offering a story hour.
Neither America nor our children will benefit from radical transformation. What we need is care, improvement, and protection from the challenges and dangers to come. For that, we still need stories. Not stories of some mythical golden age and matchless heroes, but a warts-and-all history that reminds the audience that our founding ideal of government of the people, by the people, and for the people is a noble one. That our Founders were wise when they warned us of the dangers of unchecked power and we are fortunate to have inherited from them a system of checks and balances.
If we fail to bring those stories, we will be at the mercy of those who were raised on a warts-only version of American history. People who would radically transform it all at once with riots and revolution, only to find ourselves ruled by merciless technocrats who assure us that the Hell they created is Utopia.
Andrew Breitbart was right when he reminded us that politics is downstream of culture. The good news is that it’s never been easier to create great stories. So, rather than wishing for somebody to get around to creating great culture, I did it myself out of two thoughts that kept coming together in my mind: AI is better than any human being at rule-based games such as chess and Go. Persuasion is an art form that has a number of clear rules. What happens when AI masters persuasion the way it has dominated those games?
It would produce a computer algorithm that can know your hopes, dreams, and deepest desires better than even your friends and family do. It can use that knowledge to persuade you to do whatever its owner wants you to do.
With that thought in mind, Jerry Neville, the terrifying villain at the center of a thriller novel, appeared to me: a man in possession of a shortcut to satisfy his desires, not just for power but for something else he’s convinced he’s always been unjustly denied: the love of a beautiful woman.
The Kingmaker series was born.
Now that I had my villain, I added a dangerous wildcard: Mei Hua Chang, a honeypot spy. She’s a femme fatale whose sex appeal is only exceeded by her cunning.
As the plans of the evil genius unfold, he is opposed by our heroes: ordinary Americans. We have a team of independent journalists who are simply enterprising young people with some growing up to do. We have the wise old billionairess that funds their operation. We have the war-weary marine sniper who becomes a boxing coach and priest who guides a young student in need of redemption. And of course, we have our damsel in distress, a beautiful young actress with the ambition to become a doctor who is caught in the villain’s web of artificial seduction.
With the characters in place, I had to set them in our world. That required me to think deeply about what challenges await our heroes: Not just the technologies of addiction such as AI-girlfriends, ever more tempting junk foods, and online gambling; but also lawfare, election integrity, illegal immigration, the importance of art and culture, and genuine criminal justice.
Stories are about transformation and the hero’s journey. As they grapple with these challenges, we learn what regular people like ourselves can become if we fight for a great cause and if we develop ourselves into the kind of people capable of fighting for that cause.
Unlike Alexander, we are not fighting for conquest. We are fighting to preserve the ideal of government of the people, by the people, and for the people. We are fighting for the noble but imperfect. If we are to recruit Americans for that battle, we can only do it if we tell and spread great stories.
