Climate change. The issue everyone is aware of but very few people ever mention outside of a political debate. C.D. Tavenor and other indie authors have started a project to change that. The World’s Revolution: A Climate Crisis Anthology was started with the goal to ‘inspire to explore the intersection of the human condition and the climate crisis… with a little bit of science fiction and fantasy thrown into the mix.” Quote taken directly from their Kickstarter that is set to finish next Thursday, March 4th at 5:30 pm EST. 

Their goal is only $2,000 which will go towards paying all the contributing authors fair pay for the first volume titled GAIA AWAKENS.

C.D. Tavenor, a fantasy author/editor by night and a public interest environmental attorney by day, with a dozen books under his belt was kind enough to sit down with us here at VeL publishing to talk about this project.

Tell us about The World’s Revolution and what it’s about? What role do you play in it all?

The World’s Revolution is a climate fiction project with a SciFi/Fantasy twist. I’m the project lead, which essentially means I first came up with the idea and somehow managed to convince a few other authors to pursue this crazy concept with me.

The World’s Revolution is a soon-to-open Climate Fiction market aiming to pay authors at least $0.01 per word. We launched on Kickstarter at the beginning of February! We’re excited to give authors the opportunity to translate their personal experience of the climate crisis into a compelling fiction narrative. We’re asking authors to consider: “What if the world began to fight back against the main cause of climate change… us?”

Plus, we’re designing the project so every story is technically in the “same” setting. It’s going to be a challenge to link stories together from a multitude of authors, but it’s going to create a unifying and cohesive anthology.

When’s the deadline and when can people start submitting?

The Kickstarter closes March 4; following the end of the Kickstarter, we’ll officially open the World’s Revolution’s submission window, taking submissions on a rolling basis.

What drew you to this?

Climate change and its impacts to present and future generations drives my career and much of my writing. I’ve wanted to design some sort of annual publication for a few years now, and given my interest in climate fiction, it was the perfect concept.

Climate change isn’t talked about often in literature, let alone having a whole anthology based around it. What made you decide to go this route to bring awareness to the topic?

I believe in the power of story to change the hearts and minds of readers. When we’re faced with the daunting scale of the climate crisis, the little things matter. Inclusion of climate change in fiction matters. By launching the World’s Revolution, we’re all-in on the idea that our project can impact people’s perceptions of the climate crisis. If we can push people to act in the real world as a response to our stories, then our job has been successful.

As mentioned before, your initial goal is only $2,000 USD. If that is funded, what would further success with this project look like to you?

In the long run, we would love to see The World’s Revolution become a market capable of paying $0.08 per word, the professional rate making stories eligible for SFWA.

Running a Kickstarter is a unique experience of both dread and excitement, with a great potential for even personal growth. What was the best thing you learned during this?

You can never do TOO MUCH Kickstarter marketing. Get creative. Make new connections. Badger your friends and family.

Now, what’s the worst?

The answer to the last question is the answer to this question.

Back to the Kickstart itself. What made you decide on the SciFi/Fantasy twist for this project?

I’m leaving a lot of those details up to writers to create, but the simple answer is… the Earth is fighting back against the causes of climate change, and in some cases, it uses people, creating environmental superheroes in the process.

Think Captain Planet!

What’s your plans for this anthology in the future?

We’ve got a lot of ideas! Nothing is set in stone yet, but we definitely want to make the anthology an annual project, and we might explore opening the setting for novels, novellas, and more!

There are so many amazing Kickstarters going at any one moment. Too much for one person to back but if you had someone out there on the fence about your project. What would you say to them to give them a good reason to support The World’s Revolution?

Because the book you receive for supporting the Kickstarter will be written by authors paid for their work, bringing into the world one more place where climate writers can tell stories inspired to cause people to act on the crisis.

That’s a good enough reason for us and the lowest pledge is only $5 USD which comes with a digital edition of book 1. The Kickstarter’s set to end in a little over a week’s time. What do you and your group plan to do once it’s over?

Once the Kickstarter ends on March 4, the submission window opens and we get to read everyone’s awesome stories!

For those that still aren’t sure about the genre or topic, they’ve released a free sneak peak to give writers and readers a lot a taste. Nothing beats free. If interested, click the link. Can’t donate? If you can, sharing this project would help just as much. The World Revolution project can be found on Twitter and Facebook as well as their website. 

C.D. Tavenor can be found on Twitter, Goodreads, and Amazon.