A new dystopian thriller currently playing in cinemas, Alex Garland’s Civil War, makes provocative speculation on the horrors of a second internal military conflict in the US. It’s a tense, gripping work, well worth watching, and my full review of the film can be read here. However, whilst Garland portrays the President in a vaguely Trumpian manner, the specific issues that might trigger a modern US civil war are deliberately sidestepped. Garland’s priority is to show a hellish conflict to be avoided at all costs.
Garland allows all viewers a way in by uniting Texas and California in the story, as the “Western Forces” leading an insurrection against the US government. With Texas and California sitting on opposite ends of the political spectrum in real life, this union ensures no one in the audience feels got at, regardless of their political views. It’s a smart move and works well for the film.
However, my 2021 novel Peaceful Quiet Lives is set in the aftermath of a second American civil war, in which two politically polarised nations on the North American continent live side by side in an uneasy peace. A satirical dystopian romantic drama, Peaceful Quiet Lives features secret lovers who find themselves at odds with the political powers of both nations. Unlike Civil War, it does not duck the political issues.
I wrote the first draft of this novel in 2018, during Trump’s first term, as I watched the so-called culture wars unfolding in America. Admittedly, I was watching from the UK. Some people have dismissed my book on that basis, suggesting I lack the cultural insight or objectivity to write about this because I’m British. I’m not sure that’s true, and to those who say this, I’d urge them to read my novel first, before judging it.
At any rate, these culture wars, whether social, political, racial, or religious, have been a division in America simmering all my life. In one sense, they are nothing remarkable in a Western democracy. However, in recent years, these divisions have become a lot more exacerbated. A militant tendency in the language and behaviour of both sides is remarkably similar. This militancy, fuelled by fear-driven social media, television news, and opportunistic politicians, has stirred up serious unpleasantness. The events of 6th January 2021, for example.
Although Peaceful Quiet Lives explores some of these divisive topics, it is not a political statement. My novel has no left or right political agenda. However, the central idea — regarding two extreme authoritarian states being two sides of the same militant coin — I thought would make an intriguing backdrop for a doomed romance. I also wanted the novel to be a satire of the worst fears of both sides in the US culture wars.
The first half of the novel plays on fears that the US could turn into an authoritarian right wing religious theocracy. This section explores (among other things) a world in which women’s rights are severely curtailed. For example, sex outside of marriage can result in public flogging or imprisonment. Abortions carry the death penalty for all those involved, and churches have far more political power. Some of what I wrote here in 2018 isn’t that far from recent developments.
The second half sends up fears that the US is headed for an authoritarian left wing state. This section takes place in a world where taxes are higher based on sex and race (white men are taxed more for being white and male), and Incel culture has become a serious terrorist threat. In addition, sexual consent has become a bureaucracy where a man can be charged with rape, even if his partner insists it wasn’t rape, if the correct online consent forms aren’t filled in at the time.
The novel isn’t so much intended as a warning against both scenarios, neither is it an attempt to lash out in despair at the current problems in America, but rather it is an exercise in absurdity. I hope the tragic lunacy of such a future is inherent within the text, and that as a result, perhaps the fears of both sides will be eased, just a little.
Such grandiose ambitions aside, I hope people enjoy the novel as simply a damn good read. I’ll admit this novel exists outside my usual horror-thriller mystery oeuvre, but I’ve explored dystopian tales elsewhere (mostly in short story form — here, for instance), so I expect I’ll dabble in it again, from time to time. I do hope you’ll give Peaceful Quiet Lives a go, even though it’s got something in it to offend everyone (by design).
By the way, the title derives from New Testament verses urging people to live a quiet life and mind one another’s business (in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4). The title is ironic since events in the lives of my protagonists are neither peaceful nor quiet. Nor are they left alone to get on with their private lives.
If you’re interested in reading a sample, the first six chapters of Peaceful Quiet Lives can be read on Medium (here’s chapter one). Otherwise, the full novel is available on Kindle or paperback from Amazon (here in the UK, here in the US). It’s a very different beast to Alex Garland’s Civil War, which is more concerned with the visceral horrors of actual war, but I hope you’ll consider Peaceful Quiet Lives interesting in its own right.
(Originally published on Medium.)
Simon Dillon Books 