Naturally, many feel anxious about the future. In fact, this pessimism has given rise to climate anxiety: what psychologists describe as a sense of fear, worry, or mental distress linked to climate change.
An EdWeek Research Center survey revealed 37% of teenagers feel anxious when contemplating climate change and its effects, and more than a third are afraid.
Authors Jan Lee and Steve Willis, however, are hoping to change that. They’re penning a series of optimistic climate fiction – or “cli-fi” – novels that emphasise hope and human ingenuity instead. Their work serves as a positive counterbalance to the dystopian narratives the genre is usually known for.
“Instead of succumbing to doom and gloom, we want to help readers envision a future where people have successfully addressed climate change – and where Asia leads the way,” Lee said, adding that doing this through fiction was more entertaining and engaging than reading dry technical reports.
Willis added: “To me, optimism means serious determination and grit. It’s not just flowers and fluffy bunnies. Optimism is choosing to get up and do something, no matter what. It’s finding other solutions when other options just don’t work. It’s about not giving into despair, because if you do so, there’s nothing else left.”
Their first novel, “Fairhaven: A Novel of Climate Optimism”, is the story of Grace Chan, a mixed-race influencer from Penang, who is about to become president of the newly formed Ocean Independent State in 2036.
While suffering a near-death incident, her life flashes before her eyes, showing readers the intriguing events that led to the current state of the world.
Readers learn how Grace and her colleagues take pivotal steps in addressing global climate challenges through practical solutions such as coastal adaptation and Arctic refreezing.
The 362-page book, published by Habitat Press, was one of the winners of the Green Stories Prize 2023.
Willis, who has lived in Malaysia for 18 years, is a chemical engineer from the UK. He has been working on large scale industrial projects dealing with climate-focused solutions for years.
He said the novel started from “No More Fairytales”, an anthology of climate stories originally printed for the 27th Conference to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP27) in 2022. Willis, who contributed five stories, decided to combine them into a longer narrative.
To do this, he contacted Lee, an award-winning science fiction winner and editor-in-chief of The Apostrophe, the quarterly magazine of the Hong Kong Writers Circle.
As Lee was residing in Hong Kong, the two collaborated via Linkedin: amazingly, they only met in person for the first time during the launch of the novel last year!
Lee and Willis revealed there are five books planned for the “Fairhaven” series. They are currently working on the first sequel, which Lee hints will be about a new threat to thwart the climate team in Malaysia, with a solution coming from an unexpected source.
Willis hopes the stories could someday be adapted into a Netflix television series, mentioning “Black Mirror”, the hit show featuring dark technological futures. The “Fairhaven” books could be “Green Mirror” instead, he quipped!
Also in the works is “Defying Futility – The Fairhaven Stories”, a standalone companion to the novel, to be launched in March. This alternate history anthology contains 13 stories, with heartwarming tales of how some of history’s most well-known disasters could have gone differently.
Both Lee and Willis agree that while the climate crisis seems daunting, it is not insurmountable. Many practical solutions are relatively straightforward but need to be conducted on a large, sustainable scale.
“The novel illustrates how it’s not just politicians or global organisations that can play a role in handling the climate crisis. If you’re working in a company, you need to ask, how can my company become a climate solution?
“We need to imagine big things, and be prepared to do big things,” Willis concluded.
Fairhaven and other books in the series can be purchased from Kommune.