Don’t lose hope. I know animal advocacy work can be heartbreaking and discouraging (so many animals are suffering, how do we save them all?), but your work is vital. You are literally saving lives.I have three dedications at the beginning of my new novel, Persimmon Takes On Humanity, one of which is to you, my fellow animal activists:
For all the remarkable people out there who are working tirelessly to make the world a more compassionate place. You inspire me.
You inspire me every day with your acts of bravery fighting on behalf of other animals. I know the work can be depressing. Often it feels like we’re battling insurmountable odds to make the world a kinder place. That’s exactly what the characters go through in my novel. The story follows a clever raccoon, Persimmon, and her team as they attempt three massive rescue missions of the animals trapped in a factory farm, a fur farm, and a circus, and since the book is meant to be educational as well as entertaining, it was my job to make sure I depicted what the animals in these facilities endure as accurately as possible.
In order to do that, I did months of research on each of these industries, and the constant barrage of animal abuse I witnessed shook me to the core. Some of the most disturbing content was the undercover investigation videos. I’d sit and watch footage of circus workers beating the animals to force them to do unnatural and painful tricks, and I would get sick to my stomach and furious. I wanted to jump through the screen, knock the bullhook out of those trainers’ hands and rush those poor elephants, tigers and other animals to safety. Clearly, I couldn’t jump through the screen, but what I could do was expose the truth through a powerful story.
So that’s what I did with Persimmon Takes On Humanity, and as I wrote the book, I used this upsetting content to put me in the mindset of these battered animals. I had a photo on the side
of my computer screen of a poor fox in a fur farm who had chewed his leg to the bone after having gone insane from the cramped conditions of his cage. I had the videos of the elephants being hit with bullhooks playing on a loop. Yes, I cried as I wrote, but I was telling their story and that’s what kept me going.
When I wrote the chapters for the rescue missions themselves, I felt elated, and I think as you (my fellow animal advocates) read this book, you’re going to feel just as ecstatic and reinvigorated in your own activism. After reading about the hell that animals go through in factory farms, fur farms, and circuses, you’ll cheer as Persimmon and her team of furry critters rush in to save other animals from this human brutality.
That’s not to say that the team is able to save every single animal or that there aren’t dangerous consequences to their missions, but they give it their all. They see injustice in the world and they risk everything to make it right. And that’s what we do as activists. We give everything we have to save these animals’ lives. And it’s a struggle every day. It’s frustrating, even debilitating at times. But it’s essential work and we are compelled to do it by some deep sense of decency.
So thank you to all the animal advocates out there for inspiring me. It gives me hope to know that there are so many dedicated people working together for this important cause. In return, I hope Persimmon Takes On Humanity inspires you.
Christopher Locke is an avid animal advocate who enjoyed a fruitful career in the television industry for more than a decade before pursuing his passion project, Persimmon Takes On Humanity, which is the first book in The
Enlightenment Adventures. Visit him online at Christopher-Locke.com, on Facebook.com/LockeAuthor and on Twitter @LockeAuthor.