Into the Breach…
Dear Friends,
Welcome to May’s Substack.
I hope you’ll enjoy this month’s blog Into the Breach…. The audio version is available by clicking the link in the blog or clicking the link here for all podcasts. https://joanneleedomackerman.substack.com/podcast
Book News shares information, appearances, awards, and interviews on my latest novels Burning Distance and The Far Side of the Desert, including appearance and a book signing at the upcoming ThrillerFest in New York City in early May and at the American Writers Museum in Chicago in June.
The Writer at Risk section this month focuses on a young Cuban poet Duannis Dabel León Taboada sentenced to 14-years in prison for participating in a protest against the government.
The Books to Check Out section features new novel 2084 by Elliot Ackerman and James Stavridis, the final book of their trilogy, and Brian J. Morra’s The Able Archers, a fictionalized rendering of a lesser known Bay-of-Pigs moment in 1983.
In the Scene section you’ll find a photo relating to text from my novel Burning Distance. Words of the Month share a couple of words you may not use but might like to know.
Thank you to everyone who has come to bookstores, libraries, book clubs and online for my new novels Burning Distance and The Far Side of the Desert. Also available are my novel The Dark Path to the River and short story collection No Marble Angels. Word of mouth sells books so thank you for spreading the word!
If you’d like to have me speak at a venue or with a book club, click here. Thank you too for reading and sharing this free monthly Substack On the Yellow Brick Road. I hope you’ll stay in touch!
Into the Breach…
Or is it “Once more unto the breach…” whatever the breach may be.
“Breach”— a crack, a rift, a rupture.
Why would one rush into the crack, the rift, the rupture?
To repair it before it gets bigger and more threatening?
Or is it to put oneself between it and what is ruptured?
Or the original meaning is perhaps to further the crack, assure the rupture and claim victory?
The famous reference is from Shakespeare’s Henry V when King Henry, in the midst of the Battle of Agincourt during the Hundred Years War in 1415, is portrayed as issuing the call. The English soldiers faced overwhelming odds — England’s 6000-10,000 soldiers were confronting 20,000-30,000 French soldiers, two to five times larger force. But the English longbowmen were fighting mounted knights and crossbowmen. Was it superior equipment, strategy, or God who gave the English the victory? The debate continues six hundred years later and remains on occasion still a rallying sentiment with less lethal consequence between English and French.
Today “Once more unto the breach” echoes according to one’s circumstances. It can play out with a breach repaired, a conflict resolved, or the breach opened further and war continuing.
Response to this call will resonate according to one’s geography and circumstance, experience and ontological point of view.
I hope you’ll share your thoughts in the Comments section at the end of this Substack.
From Henry V, spoken by King Henry:
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Upcoming Events and Talks:
Friday, May 8, 2026
8:00 am EDT
Panel: “FIRST, THIRD OR OMNISCIENT? The Power of POV” with Jaima Fixsen, Joanne Leedom-Ackerman, Deborah Levison, Michael Rigg, Teddy Wayne, and J. Luke Bennecke (moderator)
Thrillerfest XXI
Beekman Room
New York Hilton Midtown
New York, NYFriday, May 8, 2026
9:45 am EDT
Author Meet & Greet and Book Signing
Thrillerfest XXI
Murray Hill East & West
New York Hilton Midtown
New York, NYSaturday, June 6, 2026
4:00 pm CDT
American Writers Festival
In conversation with Brian Morra, author of The Able Archers and The Righteous Arrows
American Writers Museum
180 N Michigan Ave
Chicago, IL
I’m honored that The Far Side of the Desert (Oceanview Publishing) was named a finalist in the Suspense category for the 2025 National Indie Excellence Awards. The novel was also awarded the 2025 Bronze medal in the Suspense/Thriller category by the Independent Publishers Association (IPPY) Book Awards.
Published in 2024, The Far Side of the Desert was released in paperback April, 2025. I hope you’ll order, read and enjoy. If you’ve already read the hardcover, I hope you’ll buy the paperback and give to friends!
“A thoroughly enjoyable read. I hesitate to call The Far Side of the Desert a page turner, but only because it’s so much more, with characters that will stay with you long after you finish.”
—James Grippando, New York Times best-selling novelist of Grave Danger and Code 6
Burning Distance (Oceanview Publishing, 2023 and paperback in 2024) was honored by the 2024 American Book Fest International Book Awards as a Finalist in the Best Mystery/Suspense and Thriller/Adventure categories.
“Running the gamut of emotions from fear to love, this plot surges along as unpredictable as a riptide. Romance and thriller readers will both find plenty of mischief and mayhem.”
—Steve Berry, New York Times best-selling author of The Omega Factor
Thanks to Monica Hadley and Writers Voices for the recent interview about The Far Side of the Desert. You can listen here.
Selected recordings of past events and interviews:
Interview with Monica Hadley, Writers Voices
Strategies for Living Podcast: Finding Resilience Through Story
Interview with Janeane Bernstein on NPR’s KUCI, Get the Funk Out!
Book Launch for Akram Aylisli's People and Trees with Plamen Press
Why Baldwin Matters Series, The Alan Cheuse International Writers Center
Malaprop’s Bookstore and Café in Asheville, NC
Kinokuniya Bookstore in New York City with Salil Tripathi
Baum on Books on WSHU Public Radio
Interview with Anna Roins of Authorlink
Interview with Deborah Kalb
For more podcasts, videos and interviews, click here
Duannis Dabel León Taboada (Cuba)
(Sources include PEN International and OAS Inter-American Commission on Human Rights)
Twenty-two-year-old Cuban poet Duannis Dabel León Taboada is currently serving a fourteen-year prison sentence on charges of “sedition” for his participation, along with thousands of others, in the July 11, 2021 protest against the Cuban government.
Detained at Combinado del Este prison in Havana, León Taboada is said to have endured violence, poor conditions and a lack of proper medical care.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has issued Resolution 5/2026 urging “precautionary measures in favor of Duannis Dabel León Taboada and Yenisey Taboada Ortiz in Cuba, in the belief that they face a serious, urgent risk of suffering irreparable harm to their rights to life, personal integrity, and health.”
The request notes that “as long as León Taboada is in State custody in the conditions described in the request, the risks he faces are likely to persist and get worse over time. The IACHR is concerned about the lack of information regarding immediate medical care or other interventions that might improve the beneficiary’s deteriorating health.”
PEN International has shared this poem by Duannis Dabel León Taboada:
This clash of thoughts
dims the senses
and the soul’s future breath.
It’s your choice to grow your awareness.
To save the fragile weight
of temptation’s delicate hold,
the bend within the crystal lens
a brittle glass of our modern age.
We are what no eye can grasp.
Root yourself to save life’s core.
“Awakening”, from the Despertar Tetralogy, in the unpublished collection Poemas by Duannis León Taboada, currently being edited by Veril (Observatorio de Derechos Culturales).
To Take Action for Duannis Dabel León Taboada:
Call on the Cuban authorities to release Duannis Dabel León Taboa immediately and unconditionally and to guarantee his safety.
Contact your Ministry of Foreign Affairs and diplomatic representatives in Cuba, urging them to raise case in bilateral and multilateral forums.
Send appeals to:
President Sr. Miguel Díaz-Canel
Email: despacho@presidencia.gob.cu
Minister of Foreign Affairs (Minrex) Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla
Email: dm@minrex.gob.cu or dm-sec@minrex.gob.cu
Facebook: @CubaMINREX
Social Media
Raise awareness about his case online. Use the hashtags #DuannisLeónTaboada, #WorldPoetryDay, and #WPD26, tagging @peninternational.bsky.social and @penamericas.bsky.social (Bluesky), @peninternational and @peninternational.lac (Instagram), and facebook.com/peninternational (Facebook).
Bluesky:
#WorldPoetryDay: A poet should never be imprisoned for raising his voice. Cuban authorities must release #DuannisLeónTaboada immediately and ensure his safety and access to medical care. Stand with him today. #WPD26
Facebook/Instagram:
#WorldPoetryDay: Imprisoned for speaking out, Cuban poet Duannis León Taboada is serving 14 years behind bars. His case reflects the repression faced by writers and artists in Cuba. Authorities must release him immediately and ensure his safety and access to medical care.
Stand in solidarity today—every voice matters. #WPD26
After more than five years in prison, Dr. Hany Babu, an associate professor of language and linguistics at Delhi University, has been granted bail by the Bombay High Court. Arrested in July 2020, he was charged, along with other noted Dalit and Adivasi rights activists, for allegedly inciting caste-based violence through speeches at a rally in December 2017. He languished in prison without a hearing for bail and without a trial for five years. Bail was granted on the grounds of prolonged pre-trial detention with a warning that “justice delayed should not become justice denied.”
(Details of Dr. Hany Babu case can be found in the Writers in Risk profile October 2025 Substack)
After more than five years in prison, Amanda Echanis, Philippine poet, writer, and activist has been cleared of a charge of illegal possession of firearms and explosives. She was arrested at her home where she was caring for her one-month-old child and detained without evidence. The court has found that the prosecution failed to establish its case. Her case has raised questions of evidence planting and violations of due process. The delays kept her in prolonged pre-trial detention, taking away her right of a speedy trial and five years of her freedom.
(Details of Amanda Echanis can be found in the Writers at Risk profile in April 2025 Substack.)
An attack on a writer, the shutting down of a publishing house, the torching of a newspaper reduce the space in the world where ideas can flow. Freedom of expression is vital to writers and to readers but is challenged daily around the world. Listed here are organizations whose work on human rights and in particular issues of freedom of expression I’ve been engaged with directly and indirectly over the years. Some of the organizations have broader agendas, but all have contributed to keeping space open for the individual voice.
PEN International (with its 147 centers in over 100 countries)
PEN American Center
English PEN
PEN/Faulkner Foundation
Human Rights Watch
Amnesty International
Amnesty International USA
International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX)
Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)
Article 19
Index on Censorship
Poets and Writers
Authors Guild
International Center for Journalists
Highlighted this month are two novels, one from the future and one from the past, both with military determination and human calculation and existence as we know it or might know it in the balance.
The final novel 2084 in Elliot Ackerman’s and James Stavridis’s speculative trilogy focuses on a planet riven by climate conflicts. Because Elliot is my son, I herald his novels but in this space quote the posted review.
Brian J. Morra’s The Able Archers offers a fictionalized version of a real event in history in 1983 when the Soviet Union and the United States were on the brink of nuclear war but for the wisdom of a few good men on both sides.
“In their novel 2034, decorated military officers and award-winning authors Elliot Ackerman and Admiral James Stavridis imagined a war between the US and China. In their follow-up novel, 2054, they envisioned a breakdown in American politics fueled by a radical advance in AI. Now they make their boldest, most astonishing, and arguably most necessary leap—imagining the consequences of a climate war.
”By the year 2084, the world is divided into the equatorial countries that bear the brunt of the climate crisis—led by Nigeria, Brazil, and Indonesia—and wealthier countries like China and the US, beset by their own problems after a series of civil wars. Tensions between the two sets of countries have reached a breaking point, until finally the so-called Reparationist nations of the equator decide that only military force can bring them justice.
”A fascinating and disturbingly plausible extrapolation from current realities, 2084, like other classics of the genre such as Kim Stanley Robinson’s The Ministry for the Future and Neal Stephenson’s Termination Shock, deploys a global cast of characters, all protecting their interests as the fate of human civilization hangs in the balance. Individuals often seem small in the face of the forces that drive global change, but in the end human agency proves surprisingly decisive. Big doors can swing on small hinges. We have it within ourselves to write a different destiny, if only we can imagine it.”
“Gripping…Ackerman and Stavridis stage a harrowing global conflict that pits military might against an appetite for justice… equal parts haunting and entertaining.” Publishers Weekly, starred review
From 2084:
Like nature, geopolitics abhors a vacuum . . .
The war between the United States and China in 2034 devastated each nation, upending a fragile world order based on their competition. By mid-century, both were trying to claw their way back to superpower status. Neither nation succeeded; by 2054, civil conflict consumed the United States, stalling its forward momentum, while in China, a demographic time bomb detonated, and the fundamental imbalance between an unnaturally high number of males and a far smaller female population triggered a sociological collapse. Into that vacuum stepped two dynamic new powers: India and Japan. Those countries, rejuvenated by the advent of artificial intelligence and robotics, assumed positions of primacy. But it wasn’t only India and Japan that benefited. Nations like Brazil, Indonesia, and Nigeria—with huge populations and dynamic leaders—brought the Global South to prominence. By the end of the 2050s, the balance of power in the world had shifted.
In the decade that followed, a new and powerful force began to make itself felt. It was not a nation—far from it. Instead, it was the earth itself, a huge and tortured ecosystem that had never recovered from ecological abuses inflicted in prior decades when the global community—vibrating between populist movements and economic excess—walked away from efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Massive storms, unlike those ever seen in recorded history, battered the planet in the 2060s and ’70s. A traditional “hurricane season” that once lasted between August and October had become a quaint and nostalgic temporal boundary that no longer applied as storms came in unpredictable waves throughout the year. Sea levels rose globally, swamping hundreds of major cities, especially the megacities of Southeast Asia. Superstorms washed away coastlines, hiving off entire landmasses in the Global North and South. Wildfires and droughts struck in those midlatitude nations clustered near the equator. By the late 2070s, an uninhabitable band circled the middle of the planet. Nations in this ever-widening band—Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and others—saw a massive and sudden drop in the viability of their statehood as their populations became suddenly unable to sustain basic economic activity. By the 2080s, this march of catastrophic events, each more terrible than the last, consumed the globe and threatened all of humanity.
Brian J. Morra’s The Able Archers narrates a harrowing moment in U.S.-Soviet history when the world was on the brink of nuclear war though few in the public understood the danger at the time. The moment has never received the same public attention as the American/Soviet stand-off in the Bay of Pigs but was potentially as existential.
It was 1983. Tension between the two countries was already fraught when the Soviets shot down a Korean passenger airliner by accident though they insisted they thought it was a covert spying aircraft for the Americans. Rather than admit their mistake, they held to their fear that the Americans were planning a first strike on the Soviet Union. The Americans, led by President Ronald Raegan who had called the Soviet Union an evil empire, were also deeply suspicious of the Soviets. The Soviets were watching NATO’s long-planned exercises as a cover for its own first strike preparations. At the same time the U.S. watched the Soviets taking preparatory steps to launch nuclear warheads and became convinced the Soviets were lining up for a first strike. Both understood that whoever struck first would be the victor though no one would really be a victor in mutual destruction.
The tension escalated, and but for the wisdom of a few lower-ranked and mid-level intelligence officers on both sides who met and talked in the no-man’s land between East and West Berlin and were willing to trust each other, the crisis was averted.
Brian Morra has crafted a novel, profiling the characters on both sides with attendant personal stories and reflections, weaving together a docu-novel from an incident he knew well as an airman and intelligence officer at the time and in the place.
The title The Able Archers refers to the NATO exercises launched at the time and also to the group of U.S. and Soviet officers who named themselves the Able Archers as they averted Armageddon.
From The Able Archers:
1979-1980
I hate killing people.
I’m not sure how my boss feels about it. I doubt he even thinks about killing anymore. He’s second-in-command of a special activities unit, based out of the US Embassy in Tokyo, Japan. Units like ours handle the nasty sideshows of the Cold War.
During my final year of college, I went through the CIA hiring process and was selected for initial training. Unfortunately, at the final stage, my group of career trainees was told that due to budget cuts, we’d have to wait a full year to enter CIA training. Bad luck for us.
I couldn’t wait a year—I had to go to work. I had no interest in returning to my hometown in southern Virginia, and one of the CIA officers recommended that I go into the military and try to become an intelligence officer in one of the services. He explained that after four or five years of military intelligence experience, I’d be able to transition to CIA. This was just a few years after the end of the Vietnam War, and going into the military wasn’t exactly a popular career choice for my generation of college students. But I wanted a career in the national security business, and the military seemed like the best way in.
The only service I considered was the Air Force. I don’t like the water, so applying to the Navy was out. I couldn’t see myself in the Army or Marine Corps—I’m not keen on sleeping outside in the cold rain. Plus, my male relatives were in the Air Force in World War II, and that seemed to mean something to me at the time. So, I joined the Air Force after I graduated from college and went to Officers Training School to earn my commission as a second lieutenant. Then I went to the air intelligence school in Denver. From there I went on to a couple of different courses at the CIA’s training center, affectionately known as “the Farm.”
I was talking about my boss, wasn’t I? He’s an Air Force major, but he hasn’t worked in the regular Air Force for years. Instead, he’s been assigned to covert intelligence units like the one I’m in now.
He’s a huge, red-haired guy with massive arms, shoulders, and neck. His personality matches his size—outrageous and larger than life. His eyes light up and glow when he smiles or when something intrigues him. They burn red when something pisses him off, or when he’s contemplating violence, which usually happens when something pisses him off.
Image and passage of text from my novel Burning Distance:
I look at the children on the grass with a crowd of ducks at their feet. If it is Adnan Kamil Houston I’ve seen in the park, we could be in danger. “Let’s get the children home,” I say. “Jad . . . Raja . . .” They come running towards me dropping bread crumbs with Omar and the ducks in pursuit. As we move out of the park, I ask Adil, “Do you think Dennis was a spy?”
Over the years I’ve accumulated a running list of words I haven’t known from two main sources: WordDaily and WordGenius and from the books I read.
Terpsichore
[turp-sik-uh-ree]
Part of speech: Noun
1. Classical Mythology. the Muse of dancing and choral song.
2. (lowercase) choreography; the art of dancing.
Example:
By November of 2012, “Gangnam Style” was well on its way to a billion views on YouTube (a milestone that was hit a month later). Today “Gangnam Style” has more than 3.3 billion views and counting, and we’re still trying to master his equestrian terpsichorean style.
Logomachy
/lōˈɡäməkē/
Part of speech: Noun
1. a dispute over or about words
2. a controversy marked by verbiage
Examples:
“We are today solid enough, balanced enough, sure enough of ourselves not to be impressed either by logomachy* or gesticulations...”
“A similar logomachy has marked the course of Milton’s champions; words like sharp swords have been wielded by ignorance, and have injured the poet’s true fame.”
I’ve spoken at bookstores, university classes, book luncheons and in-person and zoom book clubs and look forward to more ahead. I enjoy giving readings and addressing audiences in many venues and moderating discussions on a wide range of topics and most of all meeting readers.
Click here for a list of future and past public events.
Or fill out the speaking request form to schedule an event.
I like engaging with readers so if you are in a Reading Group or Book Club and read one of my books, I’m glad to be in touch by email, zoom, or when possible in person. I can also suggest discussion topics.
Fill out the reading group form here to schedule a meeting.
