"Visionary Fiction" Now Officially on Wikipedia

This news is so big, I had to reblog it from our Visionary Fiction Alliance blogsite where it originally appeared. Visionary Fiction , the genre or category of my novels, is coming into its own and being recognized on bigger levels. It has now passed through the gate-keeping at Wikipedia and is officially listed therein. Thank you Vic Smith, fellow member of the VFA. for your professional, thorough, well-written article for Wikipedia, as well as this announcement article of our acceptance!

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Exciting news for all Visionary Fiction authors, readers and lurkers:

As of August 2014 a entry entitled "Visionary fiction" has been published on Wikipedia at:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visionary_fiction

This feat of sweat and scholarship was engineered by VFA member and author Victor E. Smith and reviewed, edited and critiqued by VFA steering committee members Jodine Turner, Margaret Duarte, Eleni Papanou and Sandy Nathan. The fundamental concepts are drawn from the writing of VF pioneers Carl Jung, Flo Keyes, Edward J. Ahearn, Monty Joynes and Hal Zina Bennett, among others, as then discussed, massaged, and rephrased on this site since its inception and on sister sites like Fiction for a New Age, many of which are cited and linked within the article.

Our intense cogitation over the past couple of years, right down to the shortest comment, led happily to a reasonable consensus on the definition and characteristics of Visionary Fiction. With the results of this arduous process now condensed on Wikipedia, the VF community finally has a worldwide portal through which to communicate who we are, what and why we write, and how to find us and our work. And since Wikipedia allows anyone to add to or comment on its published material, we can be sure that the description of our genre will evolve and remain up-to-date as we expand into our future, certain to be dynamic.

Visionary Fiction author Monty Joynes, recently featured in a post on this site, wrote this to the author after reading the Wiki entry: "Great and important job... Even the literary academics will appreciate what you have done.  I feel that your work provides a kind of 'breakthrough' for the understanding of our collective literature... the recognition has been a long time coming.  Thanks to you, my books and others will find new readers."

For further enticement to visit the page, here are the major headings for material covered in the article:

• Definitions
• Characteristics of Visionary Fiction
•  Distinguishing Visionary Fiction from other Genres
• VF Publishing and Marketing
• Scholarship
•  Awards and Community

Reaching this milestone has truly been a cooperative effort, and using this entry now to full effect remains a group activity. Tweet, Tumblr, Facebook, reblog this post the link to the article at every opportunity. When someone asks, "What is Visionary fiction?" give them the quickie, then tell them to look it up on Wikipedia. Explaining our genre has just gotten a lot simpler. Get the word out to readers, writers, publishers, agents--oh, heck, to anyone on this planet who wants a shot of growth in consciousness.

Think Big! Coming Soon!

PS as a Wikipedia author/editor: I found the mechanics and protocols of Wikipedia's editing system daunting at first, even though I consider myself quite tech-savvy. My first submission was turned down quite peremptorily, largely because of a novice mistake in citing references. If you want to add or edit the article--and all are encouraged to do so--take the time to look up Wikipedia's guidelines for contributing and formatting before jumping in too deep. Had I followed this advice, the announcement might have come a couple months ago--sigh!

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Victor E. Smith regards himself as a generalist. From childhood on a communal farm in Pennsylvania, to adolescence in a Catholic seminary, into adulthood with occupations that ranged from counselor and teacher to entrepreneur and corporate computer trainer, Vic remains astounded, often stunned, by both the wonders and terrors of human existence. Such awe has always compelled him to write: poetry, journalling, in publications about business and education, and now in novel form. A lifelong proponent of human spiritual evolution, he has focused on paranormal phenomena and their manifestations. Travel to the settings he writes about, no matter how remote, is to his research what fingerprints are to a detective. THE ANATHEMAS, A Novel of Reincarnation and Restitution, aged literally through decades of experience and revision, is his first novel. A prequel and a sequel are well underway.