§ The map · Michigan
Michigan was admitted to the Union in 1837.
Fought Ohio over Toledo, lost, and was handed the Upper Peninsula as consolation.
Asked how many people in the other party support political violence, Michigan residents put the figure at 55%. Asked the same people whether they themselves support it, the answer comes back at 14.6%. The distance between what is believed and what is true is 40.4 points, across 3,980 respondents in Michigan.
A country that misreads itself by this much does not need a villain to come apart. That is the premise of the trilogy, and it is not a metaphor.
Ratification votes and dates from the United States Senate Manual. Statehood dates from the National Archives. Where sources disagree, this map follows the Senate Manual and says so.
America's Political Pulse, Polarization Research Lab. Weekly from September 2022 to March 2026. 162,000 respondents nationally.
Answer the same question yourself — six seats, from the world down to you, and then you see where every other reader landed.
All fifty-one cards on the map
Divided Houses, Book One of the Union Trilogy