Books like Hidden Wyndham

I love to read (full stop). And especially, I love to read Plato in English and in Greek, by myself and with others. I studied Plato for my doctorate in Philosophy at the University of Cambridge (in England) because in his dialogues, one finds all the dimensions of philosophy coming together. Why does thinking about how to live lead not only to ethics and political philosophy, but also epistemology (what we can know), aesthetics (what is beautiful), and metaphysics (what is the nature of reality)? Having read Plato with third graders, graduate students, business leaders, and retirees, I find that people of all kinds respond to his works. 

Hi! My name is Ben Berman Ghan, and I’m the author of the short story collection What We See in the Smoke and the novella Visitation Seeds. I’ve spent pretty much every day of my life since 2015 thinking about short fiction, writing it, or editing it. In many ways, the traditions and strengths of the genre of SF are owed to the short fiction writers and the magazines that have published them over the years — magazines that I keep on reading to this day. There is something electric to me about the short story, the concentrated fervor of an SF writer having to concentrate all that imagination and emotion into something tight and sharp. 

Ever since I can remember, I have been fascinated by scary movies, creature features, and books that tell tales of the strange and supernatural. Years later, my own books explored those things that scare us, from monsters of the deep and the ways we die to the mythology of blood. Research for those books led me into realms that explained why we fear the things we do. Many of those fears are found in horror novels, which provide an endless source of fright, release, and entertainment within their haunting pages. I can’t think of any other genre of writing that takes its readers on such a joyously terrifying ride.

I’ve been obsessed with sci-fi romance since I was a kid watching the Klingon wedding of Worf and Jadzia Dax in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. I love the idea of mashing these two distinct genres together. While sci-fi and romance both explore the human condition, sci-fi goes wide while romance is intimate. I think this makes the crossover of these two genres work especially well. My foremost inspiration for sci-fi romance is Lois McMaster Bujold, who offers a masterclass in how to deftly weave compelling romance into a sci-fi setting without sacrificing any action or political intrigue.

I have always been drawn to YA novels – big feelings conveyed across shorter word counts, intense experiences, other worlds, characters finding their way in the world. For a long time in these books and across a range of genres, women and girls could only hope to be on the sidelines of these big stories. They were the maiden in the tower, the prospective bride or love interest of the hero. We’re incredibly lucky to live in a time where a wide range of female experiences can be found in our YA books, and these are always stories I seek to read and to tell. 

I respond to the darkness and the darkness responds to me. Before writing anything creative, I was studying to be a sociologist. I didn’t get there but all those peculiarities that criminology, deviant behavior, and symbolic interactionism (don’t get me started on Foucault or else we’ll be here all day) stuck with me. I won’t say I don’t care about characters but I’m more interested in stories that examine a character in relation to their status and situation within society. So yeah, lots of poverty, loneliness, and identity issues.

I’ve been a soldier, designer, educator, farmer, and remain a philosopher and writer. I defy the classification of being either practical or theoretic. I have worked on environmental issues for over thirty years, including urban, post-conflict, and climate change projects in Australia, the Americas, Asia, and Europe. I have written over twenty books on design, cities, conflict, and politics. I am driven to understand the complexity of the world in which I live and, thereafter, act based on the knowledge gained–my book list reflects this passion for knowledge, and my life evidences a commitment to act.

I am passionate about words and reading, and I love books that examine and record the chaos and mayhem of human existence. When I think about why I don’t want to die, it’s mainly because I can't bear the thought of missing out on what happens next. I feel privileged to be alive during this strange, fraught time of epochal change and to be able to use my skills as a writer to record not just the facts of what happens but how it feels to witness it all, the sensibility of our time, the recording of which is, I believe, the essence of great literature.

I’ve always been a bit of a daydreamer and drawn to books that look through a window into the "other world." These novels, often dubbed dystopian, are reflections or exaggerations of our own world, and this always appealed to me. Like the question, "What if?”. The premise of “What if we lived in a world where you had to pay for words?” inspired my first novel, The Qwerty Man. Although I love fiction, I’m more of a nonfiction reader these days and interested in Buddhism (as an education, not religion), geography, and history. I’ve also written travel guidebooks for Lonely Planet and a children’s travel poetry book called Rhyme Travels.

I am an academic and a passionate reader of women’s fiction. My job title, Reader in Contemporary Women’s Writing, is also, fortunately, my hobby. I love to think about how women’s writing explores women’s lives today. I chose the theme of dystopian fiction because The Handmaid’s Tale has been so central to my work. Still, other potential topics that came to mind were motherhood, home and domestic labour, reproductive politics, and feminist protest. It strikes me now that each of the books on my list also cover these topics. This is the element of my work I love – drawing out the connections and political convictions that make today’s women’s writing so powerful.