22 April 2013
Travelling Fantasy Roundtable : Part 14 : The Difference Between Fantasy and Science Fiction
Part 14 of the Travelling Fantasy Round Table, our roaming discussion on aspects of fantasy literature, is up at Valjeanne Jeffer's blog. This month we're talking about the difference between fantasy and science fiction.
15 April 2013
Bioshock: Infinite (no spoilers)
Bioshock was an amazingly atmospheric game, dark and claustrophobic and twisted and wonderful. Combined with a strong storyline, and solid, inventive gameplay, it's no wonder it attracted a big fanbase. I'd say Bioshock: Infinite surpasses the original in terms of atmosphere, has an equally compelling storyline, and I found I enjoyed the gameplay a little more (there was a lot of changing up of what you needed to do, and whizzing around on those skylines was a huge amount of fun).
On the negative side, this is most definitely a story on rails. Once or twice you have an impression that you might be making significant choices, but this is a skyline with only one destination (and, sadly, one which I found a touch on the predictable side both concerning Elizabeth's nature, and Booker's future). Still, the story, which revolves around a Pinkerton detective named Booker DeWitt sent to retrieve a powerful girl named Elizabeth is very engrossing.
The game world itself it uncomfortable to experience. A glorious city in the sky - full of over-the-top patriotism, strict gender roles, racism, indoctrination and a leader who happily positions himself as god of his own realm. Aspects of that worldbuilding, and the lack of choice in the storyline - particularly some of the people you end up fighting against and slaughtering - makes for some uncomfortable gameplay. Bad enough to be killing off every policeperson in the repressive state, but there's also little choice in who else you end up killing (I say policeperson because, oddly, despite being a strongly patriarchal city, there were a lot of female soldiers).
Elizabeth is an interesting conundrum. She's a young girl, full of book learning, who has been kept in a tower and subjected to cruel experiments. The story is the classic "older cynical man 'shepherds' naive young woman to face tough realities and the question of whether she should kill". When you first find her, the game goes out of its way to reassure you that you don't have to worry about Elizabeth during combat - "she can take care of herself". By this, the game means she can hide behind the nearest solid object, make eeping noises, and occasionally toss you ammo or materialise items. The only person she attempts to fight is Booker himself, and she's more than effective dealing with him on both occasions that she needs to.
Of course, this is a gameplay choice - making the player the active one - but I think I would have rated the game even higher if Elizabeth picked up a gun and shot things as well and we got to switch back and forth between playing Booker and playing Elizabeth. I didn't think much of her shying away from killing while Booker slaughtered thousands while rescuing her.
I preferred the original Bioshock's Little Sisters, who, while still being rescued (or not), gave the impression they would defend themselves against more than the player character. Still, Bioshock: Infinite is several steps up from a game like Ico, where you literally had to lead the girl around by the hand, and she would curl up into a ball if you let her go. (Ico is another beautifully atmospheric game with a strong story, but questionable girl action.) B: I is well recommended, but also made me glad for games like Dragon Age, and doubly happy that the upcoming Torment game is going to let you play the main character as female.
On the negative side, this is most definitely a story on rails. Once or twice you have an impression that you might be making significant choices, but this is a skyline with only one destination (and, sadly, one which I found a touch on the predictable side both concerning Elizabeth's nature, and Booker's future). Still, the story, which revolves around a Pinkerton detective named Booker DeWitt sent to retrieve a powerful girl named Elizabeth is very engrossing.
The game world itself it uncomfortable to experience. A glorious city in the sky - full of over-the-top patriotism, strict gender roles, racism, indoctrination and a leader who happily positions himself as god of his own realm. Aspects of that worldbuilding, and the lack of choice in the storyline - particularly some of the people you end up fighting against and slaughtering - makes for some uncomfortable gameplay. Bad enough to be killing off every policeperson in the repressive state, but there's also little choice in who else you end up killing (I say policeperson because, oddly, despite being a strongly patriarchal city, there were a lot of female soldiers).
Elizabeth is an interesting conundrum. She's a young girl, full of book learning, who has been kept in a tower and subjected to cruel experiments. The story is the classic "older cynical man 'shepherds' naive young woman to face tough realities and the question of whether she should kill". When you first find her, the game goes out of its way to reassure you that you don't have to worry about Elizabeth during combat - "she can take care of herself". By this, the game means she can hide behind the nearest solid object, make eeping noises, and occasionally toss you ammo or materialise items. The only person she attempts to fight is Booker himself, and she's more than effective dealing with him on both occasions that she needs to.
Of course, this is a gameplay choice - making the player the active one - but I think I would have rated the game even higher if Elizabeth picked up a gun and shot things as well and we got to switch back and forth between playing Booker and playing Elizabeth. I didn't think much of her shying away from killing while Booker slaughtered thousands while rescuing her.
I preferred the original Bioshock's Little Sisters, who, while still being rescued (or not), gave the impression they would defend themselves against more than the player character. Still, Bioshock: Infinite is several steps up from a game like Ico, where you literally had to lead the girl around by the hand, and she would curl up into a ball if you let her go. (Ico is another beautifully atmospheric game with a strong story, but questionable girl action.) B: I is well recommended, but also made me glad for games like Dragon Age, and doubly happy that the upcoming Torment game is going to let you play the main character as female.
13 April 2013
Managing the self-publisher's chip
When I'm asked about self-publishing vs trade publishing, I'll list strengths and weaknesses of both options, and strongly recommend Kristine Kathryn Rusch's "Business Rusch" series of blog posts. Rusch is a hybrid author and has invaluable information on traps and issues which face both trade and self-published writers. Even if you're intending to only follow a trade publishing path, reading Rusch (and her commenters) on issues with various contract clauses can potentially save you an infinite amount of grief.
But one thing Rusch doesn't cover in great detail is disdain.
Yes, attitudes towards self-publishing are changing, and self-publishers can put out books and try to gain an audience. A tiny minority are stunningly successful (in the millions of dollars territory), a solid number are able to become full-time writers, and a far larger body hover around my level - enough that it's a viable second income, but not enough to give up the day job (rather like many trade published writers). And there's plenty of people self-publishing who don't sell at all - either because they don't write very well, write in an extremely niche area, package their books poorly, or are just unlucky. Self-publishing is no more a guaranteed path to success than that old saw: "If you write a good enough book, and keep submitting it, it will get published".
Even successful self-published books are often treated as "not good, just successful", and one thing most self-publishers have in common is the need to deal with scorn, hostility, derisive comments and - worst of all - complete indifference.
Many self-publishers have come from submitting their books to trade publishing and receiving either form rejections or frustrating "almosts". Years of it. Decades. And going into self-publishing, they will face not only the apparently insurmountable task of interesting readers in their books, but also people who state "I don't read self-published books at all", or "I only read self-published books by trade published authors" and forums which (burned by a flood of over-the-top self-promotion) have strict "don't mention your books" rules. And that's not even starting on the direct mocking.
Any person facing a long negative experience is likely to build up at least a small chip on their shoulder. This past week demonstrated that even enormous success will not necessarily remove that chip. Hugh Howey - one of the most successful self-publishers out there, with a major movie deal, a print-only book deal, and promotion which includes airport placement (ie. someone who is more successful than the vast majority of trade published writers) - posted a now-deleted blog entry entitled "The Bitch from Worldcon".
The blog post demonstrated two things: Howey has no comprehension of offensively gendered language, and Howey is carrying around an enormous 'self-publisher's chip'. The story involves Howey playing incognito at a recent science fiction and fantasy convention, listening to a very rude person dismiss self-publishing, and gloating to himself (and later to his blog readers) over the secret knowledge of his own success, while indulging in a little power fantasy of, basically, rubbing his detractor's face in it.
Enormous success obviously hasn't made the resentment go away. And the negativity toward self-publishing and self-publishers isn't going to go away either. It's now just couched in terms which include "outliers" and "popular but bad" and "cult-like mentality" or "self-publishing is really really really hard and most of you will fail at it". If you label yourself a self-publisher, the attitudes toward the group as a whole will shower down upon you, no matter your opinion of trade publishing, or the quality of your writing.
I'm not immune to self-publisher's chip. It bugs me when people make statements about the quality of my books without having read them. And I'm strongly aware of not being "part of the conversation" in the SFF world. One of my clearest memories as a writer will always be the 2010 Aurealis Awards. Sitting in a big auditorium full of people, watching my book's cover flash up on screen as a finalist for Best Fantasy Novel. It was an amazing feeling. And then I thought: "The only people in this entire room who have read that book are the judges."
Strategies for managing self-publisher's chip will vary from writer to writer, depending on the particular negativity being faced at the time. I can only share the methods I use to keep that chip in check:
1. Focus on the good bits
I might not be a bestselling self-publisher, but in many ways I'm an incredibly fortunate one. I've had some external validation thanks to those (highly discerning!) Aurealis judges, which in the worst moments I can point to and say: "See! See! Not rubbish!"
I have a small core of readers who have liked my work enough to consider themselves fans. And they tell other people they should look at my books. Or they just send me an email saying how much they liked them. And that is an astonishingly wonderful thing.
I do read my negative reviews, but I save them up, get them over with like a dose of medicine, and move on. Spending energy on negative reviews of your book is like stabbing yourself in the knee.
2. Care less about other people's decisions
Self-publishing is a wonderful option, but I don't evangelise it, and I accept that readers might use it as a criteria to winnow down the millions of books available to them. Ultimately, it matters very little if a particular individual avoids self-publishing.
It's incredibly hard to do this when you're just starting out, and no-one is reading you. It makes you feel like you'll never be read, that you're unfairly penalised, that it's all hopeless. It will be even harder if your writing isn't quite there yet, and you've rushed to self-publishing perhaps before you're ready for a critical audience. If nothing else, you can fall back on an "Hey, at least I have nice copies of my books on my bookshelf" attitude.
3. Don't try to be part of the conversation
This is probably the hardest one for me. I like talking about SFF, and I'd certainly like to see my books considered part of the conversation in discussions of the genre, but one of the first lessons self-publishers learn is "don't talk about your own books outside your own blog". I sometimes stray on this one - I'll see someone posting or tweeting: "I'm looking for SFF examples of X". "There's hardly any SFF which does X, please someone give me examples!" And eventually, against my better judgment, I'll be drawn in, and respond with two of three examples, including a book of my own which does precisely what the person is looking for. And it seems like every time I do this, the person asking for examples will meticulously thank every single person for their suggestions - except for that pushy self-publisher, of course.
That's my chip in action.
4. Think long term
Self-publishing inverts the trade publishing model where pre-release buzz is built up, there's a mass burst of publicity on release, and the book has to sell sufficiently in its first year (or months) to keep the author's career alive. If I judged my likely success on my first few months after release (where I sold only a handful of books), then I'd be an abject failure. Except for the rare instant successes, self-publishers aren't really in a position to judge their careers for at least a couple of years. And you never know if your next book might be your break out book, which in turn will juice your sluggishly selling backlist.
When I started I had an idea of a "five year plan". My first book went live in October 2010, so I won't really be able to judge how I'm going till October 2015, but the view from April 2013 is pretty good.
5. Next book?
Disinterest and occasional outbreaks of vitriol toward self-publishers are far easier for me to deal with than the immense negativity I suffered submitting books which never went anywhere, because it's balanced by lots of lovely positives. And the biggest positive is the knowledge that there are readers out there waiting for my next book.
And so in conclusion I seem to be saying much the same as what most of the self-publishing advice posts say: The best thing to do is put your head down and write!
But one thing Rusch doesn't cover in great detail is disdain.
Yes, attitudes towards self-publishing are changing, and self-publishers can put out books and try to gain an audience. A tiny minority are stunningly successful (in the millions of dollars territory), a solid number are able to become full-time writers, and a far larger body hover around my level - enough that it's a viable second income, but not enough to give up the day job (rather like many trade published writers). And there's plenty of people self-publishing who don't sell at all - either because they don't write very well, write in an extremely niche area, package their books poorly, or are just unlucky. Self-publishing is no more a guaranteed path to success than that old saw: "If you write a good enough book, and keep submitting it, it will get published".
Even successful self-published books are often treated as "not good, just successful", and one thing most self-publishers have in common is the need to deal with scorn, hostility, derisive comments and - worst of all - complete indifference.
Many self-publishers have come from submitting their books to trade publishing and receiving either form rejections or frustrating "almosts". Years of it. Decades. And going into self-publishing, they will face not only the apparently insurmountable task of interesting readers in their books, but also people who state "I don't read self-published books at all", or "I only read self-published books by trade published authors" and forums which (burned by a flood of over-the-top self-promotion) have strict "don't mention your books" rules. And that's not even starting on the direct mocking.
Any person facing a long negative experience is likely to build up at least a small chip on their shoulder. This past week demonstrated that even enormous success will not necessarily remove that chip. Hugh Howey - one of the most successful self-publishers out there, with a major movie deal, a print-only book deal, and promotion which includes airport placement (ie. someone who is more successful than the vast majority of trade published writers) - posted a now-deleted blog entry entitled "The Bitch from Worldcon".
The blog post demonstrated two things: Howey has no comprehension of offensively gendered language, and Howey is carrying around an enormous 'self-publisher's chip'. The story involves Howey playing incognito at a recent science fiction and fantasy convention, listening to a very rude person dismiss self-publishing, and gloating to himself (and later to his blog readers) over the secret knowledge of his own success, while indulging in a little power fantasy of, basically, rubbing his detractor's face in it.
Enormous success obviously hasn't made the resentment go away. And the negativity toward self-publishing and self-publishers isn't going to go away either. It's now just couched in terms which include "outliers" and "popular but bad" and "cult-like mentality" or "self-publishing is really really really hard and most of you will fail at it". If you label yourself a self-publisher, the attitudes toward the group as a whole will shower down upon you, no matter your opinion of trade publishing, or the quality of your writing.
I'm not immune to self-publisher's chip. It bugs me when people make statements about the quality of my books without having read them. And I'm strongly aware of not being "part of the conversation" in the SFF world. One of my clearest memories as a writer will always be the 2010 Aurealis Awards. Sitting in a big auditorium full of people, watching my book's cover flash up on screen as a finalist for Best Fantasy Novel. It was an amazing feeling. And then I thought: "The only people in this entire room who have read that book are the judges."
Strategies for managing self-publisher's chip will vary from writer to writer, depending on the particular negativity being faced at the time. I can only share the methods I use to keep that chip in check:
1. Focus on the good bits
I might not be a bestselling self-publisher, but in many ways I'm an incredibly fortunate one. I've had some external validation thanks to those (highly discerning!) Aurealis judges, which in the worst moments I can point to and say: "See! See! Not rubbish!"
I have a small core of readers who have liked my work enough to consider themselves fans. And they tell other people they should look at my books. Or they just send me an email saying how much they liked them. And that is an astonishingly wonderful thing.
I do read my negative reviews, but I save them up, get them over with like a dose of medicine, and move on. Spending energy on negative reviews of your book is like stabbing yourself in the knee.
2. Care less about other people's decisions
Self-publishing is a wonderful option, but I don't evangelise it, and I accept that readers might use it as a criteria to winnow down the millions of books available to them. Ultimately, it matters very little if a particular individual avoids self-publishing.
It's incredibly hard to do this when you're just starting out, and no-one is reading you. It makes you feel like you'll never be read, that you're unfairly penalised, that it's all hopeless. It will be even harder if your writing isn't quite there yet, and you've rushed to self-publishing perhaps before you're ready for a critical audience. If nothing else, you can fall back on an "Hey, at least I have nice copies of my books on my bookshelf" attitude.
3. Don't try to be part of the conversation
This is probably the hardest one for me. I like talking about SFF, and I'd certainly like to see my books considered part of the conversation in discussions of the genre, but one of the first lessons self-publishers learn is "don't talk about your own books outside your own blog". I sometimes stray on this one - I'll see someone posting or tweeting: "I'm looking for SFF examples of X". "There's hardly any SFF which does X, please someone give me examples!" And eventually, against my better judgment, I'll be drawn in, and respond with two of three examples, including a book of my own which does precisely what the person is looking for. And it seems like every time I do this, the person asking for examples will meticulously thank every single person for their suggestions - except for that pushy self-publisher, of course.
That's my chip in action.
4. Think long term
Self-publishing inverts the trade publishing model where pre-release buzz is built up, there's a mass burst of publicity on release, and the book has to sell sufficiently in its first year (or months) to keep the author's career alive. If I judged my likely success on my first few months after release (where I sold only a handful of books), then I'd be an abject failure. Except for the rare instant successes, self-publishers aren't really in a position to judge their careers for at least a couple of years. And you never know if your next book might be your break out book, which in turn will juice your sluggishly selling backlist.
When I started I had an idea of a "five year plan". My first book went live in October 2010, so I won't really be able to judge how I'm going till October 2015, but the view from April 2013 is pretty good.
5. Next book?
Disinterest and occasional outbreaks of vitriol toward self-publishers are far easier for me to deal with than the immense negativity I suffered submitting books which never went anywhere, because it's balanced by lots of lovely positives. And the biggest positive is the knowledge that there are readers out there waiting for my next book.
And so in conclusion I seem to be saying much the same as what most of the self-publishing advice posts say: The best thing to do is put your head down and write!
06 April 2013
It's got magic in it...the Clarke Awards and 'technical fantasy'
I usually don't have much to say about awards shortlists beyond: yep, that's a list of books this particular subset of readers thought were in some manner 'best'. But reading this post by Tom Pollock did cause a few synapses to fire. Pollock references Liz Williams' article regarding the reasons this year's Arthur C Clarke Award is an all-male shortlist, and highlights one paragraph in particular:This leads us into the wider conversation as to why, despite having a significantly enlarged entry this year (a 36 per cent increase on the 60 books submitted in 2012) we received disproportionately fewer from women, of which many were technically fantasy.Now the criteria for the Clarke Awards aren't the most detailed I've seen, and the relevant section reads:
The Arthur C. Clarke Award is given for the best science fiction novel first published in the United Kingdom during the previous year
It's no surprise that the Clarke Awards would lean toward this definition to mean "hard science fiction", or "focused on extrapolation of a scientific principle or concept", or at least "in the spirit of Arthur C Clarke" books, but where do we draw the line in fantasy elements?
One of Clarke's best-known novels is Childhood's End, where aliens which resemble bat-winged demons basically take over Earth and uplift humanity, then watch with interest as the new humans evolve into a telepathic hive-mind. The story culminates with Earth dissolving into light.
Now, I call my Touchstone Trilogy "science fantasy", primarily because it features worldgates and "psychic space ninjas". And it's full of my extrapolations of nanotech and a 'connected' society. I think of And All the Stars as science fantasy too, though I don't think there are any more fantasy elements in it than in Childhood's End. But I don't think it's focused enough on a scientific principle or concept, being more caught up in questions of friendship.
Champion of the Rose, however, is.
I've only seen one review which mentions that Champion of the Rose reads as science fiction. I mean, it has tons of magic, and Actual Gods, and a possessive rose bush, but it's fundamentally a Genetic Manipulation Gone Horribly Wrong story. The race called the Fair in Champ uses magic to create genetically modified plants and animals - alterations they term "beyond the blood". It's strongly indicated that their race probably became "the Fair" by modifying themselves, and they now have extremely strong laws forbidding genetic modification of any of their people - and the plot is driven by what is suggested is a genetically modified member of the Fair.It's in the worldbuilding that I do most of my extrapolation. There's little world hunger, because the Fair chose to gift the other races with several useful crops that keep most kingdoms above subsistence level. Food preservation is greatly enhanced by genetically modified cloves. There's easily available birth control. It's a book about how 'easy' genetic manipulation impacts on a pre-industrial world.
Now, I don't think I ever went far enough with my extrapolation to make Champ an award-worthy novel (and I seriously doubt I qualify for the Clarke Awards, though I've no idea how self-published books which are merely 'available' in Britain count in these matters, and it would be several years too late anyway). But I'm a little saddened by the implication that many books among this year's possibilities (whether written by men or women) were automatically discounted by the judges as "technically fantasy".
How much magic does it take to stop something from being science fiction?
05 April 2013
Hunting Released
I'll slowly add links as they become available, but Hunting is now officially released. You can find it at:Smashwords (special half-price coupon for my early-bird readers - HV62Z - valid till 12 April).
Amazon US | Amazon UK
Kobo
Apple (this link is to the Australia ibookstore, but you can change the country code in the link to your country)
Other retailers (takes between 3 days and 3 months, depending on the retailer - B&N is usually the slowest).
The TPB version takes between a day and three months to trickle out to retailers. I'll add links as they become available.
CreateSpace
Amazon US
Yay! Hope you like it!
21 March 2013
Aurealis 2012
Science Fiction Novel
Suited by Jo Anderton (Angry Robot)
The Last City by Nina D’Aleo (Momentum)
And All The Stars by Andrea K Host (self-‐published)
The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf by Ambelin Kwaymullina (Walker Books)
Confusion of Princes by Garth Nix (Allen & Unwin)
The Rook by Daniel O’Malley (Harper Collins)
Young Adult Novel
Dead, Actually by Kaz Delaney (Allen & Unwin)
And All The Stars by Andrea K. Host (self-‐published)
The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf by Amberlin Kwaymullina (Walker Books)
Sea Hearts by Margo Lanagan (Allen & Unwin)
Into That Forest by Louis Nowra (Allen & Unwin)
Always great to wake up to a massive compliment! Big congratulations to all the other finalists.
28 February 2013
Travelling Fantasy Roundtable : Part 12 : Technology in Fantasy
Welcome to Part 12 of the Travelling Fantasy Round Table, a
roaming discussion on aspects of fantasy literature!
Today, Carole
McDonnell, Valjeanne Jeffers,
Theresa Crater, Sylvia Kelso and Warren Rochelle join me in discussing
technology in fantasy.
Andrea K Höst
Have you ever played Civilization?
You start with a group of settlers, and you end up in space.
Along the way you build an Empire, clawing your way up a hierarchical
technology tree where Pottery leads to Masonry, and Bronze Working leads to
Iron Working, and you don't get to skip a step. You also never go backwards,
never have your Great Library burn down, never have barbarians banding together
to crush your Empire, and you never lose half your clever construction techniques.Nor do you ever discover anti-gravity stones which allow you to construct floating cities and give every person fast, inexpensive and wide-ranging travel abilities.
I've discussed previously in my Impacts of Magic series, that it's rare to see magic used to significantly alter this hierarchical development of technology, and through technology to significantly change social and cultural development. Often magic is depicted as inimical to technology, causing more advanced examples to fail when in its presence. It is rare to the point of almost never to have a healing mage show up and start teaching non-mages that there's different blood types, the basics of immunology, and the importance of sterilisation.
One series which does seem to marry technology to magic is Terry Pratchett's Discworld - from the Hex computer to cameras - but this appears to be a parallel technology tree rather than advancements in practical science. Other worlds have magic assisting technology (see all of Final Fantasy), but the injection of magic into a world of technology, or technology into a world of magic, rarely seems to massively alter the technology tree. We simply get "the Industrial Age + Magic" or "Feudalism + Magic" or "Faerie + Computers" without the complete revolution which that injection of other should surely bring.
Instead magic is often depicted as stultifying and backward instead of an instrument of revelation and advancement.
Magic in our world belongs to the charlatan. Rational science disproves magic, reveals its smoke and mirrors. Instead of partners in advancement, they are foes. Thus, to the fantasy author, it is only natural to make magic an enemy of scientific advancement. Science, with its need for comprehension and proof, with its systematic testing and extrapolation, should hate "explanationless" magic. Would science want a magic which can shortcut scientific testing, point out the correct result, and leave science to merely test and prove it?
Even in the genre of 'modern magic', urban fantasy, we rarely see any significant shift of this world's technology tree. We might get a werewolf working for, say, customs, sniffing out drugs, but we rarely get technology which has undergone a paradigm shift because magic is real. The closest we seem to come is a 'steampunk sensibility' (which appears to use clockwork technology with more than an element of magic about it) or the kind of World Behind story found in Gaiman's Neverwhere or Rowling's Potter books – magic is present but separate.
But perhaps the reason for the rarity of magic altering the technology tree is simply the sheer difficulty in mapping the result. How big a change would that anti-gravity stone bring about? Think of the impact on the Age of Expansion. Trade. Wars. At what point would mapping all those changes start to distract from the story and become an exercise in overwhelming worldbuilding, leaving the reader struggling to understand the rules?
Andrea K Höst was born in Sweden but raised in Australia.
She writes fantasy and science fantasy, and enjoys creating stories which give
her female characters something more to do than wait for rescue.
Carole McDonnell
There are two fallacies often found in fantasies where
technology is concerned.
The first is that magic is purely fantastical. Of course,
some magic is. Demons, faes, and gods abound in much fantasy. But for the most
part, magic is a kind of technology in its own right, an art and lore that can
be learned from wizened teachers or from ancient books. For instance, in
Shakespeare's Tempest, Prospero has his wonderfully researched and studied
Book.
The second fallacy is that some fantasies show the same
pattern of civilization as Earth's. The Bronze Age, then the Age of Steel,
animal technology, the Industrial Revolution/Steam Age, the age of
electricity/radio/telegraph, the computer age/DNA technology/laser technology,
and the space age, etc. But this particular sequence seems wrong to me. One
culture might be more knowledgable about one type of technology than another. Or,
one culture might have a technology that is considered magical or superstitious
or "impossible" or "godly" in another culture. Also, some
aspects of a certain technology might be explored in one culture but not
explored in another. In addition, certain technologies are lauded, then
forgotten, then rediscovered.
For instance, the Chinese had "gun" powder for
many years but the Europeans invented the gun before the Chinese did. Some
western cultures used "leeches" medically in the past and have begun
using them again. Some so-called "primitive" cultures understood the
nature of homeopathy (like curing like) before the sophisticated Europeans
discovered the cowpox/smallpox connection. Other so-called "tribal"
cultures understood how to use flies and centipedes for crime detection before
European civilization got the idea. (Flies are often used by some African tribes
to determine whose murderous-but-newly-washed dagger still retained the
victim's blood and centipedes were used in ancient Korea to check if the blood
on a dagger was human or animal.)
Thus it is possible for the technology of a particular world
to NOT fall into the western model.
In my novel, The Constant Tower, the characters are
warriors. Some would say the setting is "Bronze Age/medieval." But
one tribe has solar panels because they understand the nature of light, and the
studiers of this world understand music and the effect of "unheard
sounds" in ways that would be considered miraculous by some of Earth's
less "civilized tribes" or might seem merely fantastical to those
with a western mindset.
Carole McDonnell is a writer of ethnic fiction, speculative
fiction, and Christian fiction. Her works have appeared in many anthologies and
at various online sites. Her novel, Wind Follower, was published by Wildeside
Books. Her forthcoming novel is called The Constant Tower. http://carolemcdonnell.blogspot.com/
Valjeanne Jeffers
Technology and fantasy: put them together and you have a delicious
synergy that's not quite SF, not quite fantasy. Some of my favorite authors
have skirted the divider between fantasy and science fiction. Octavia Butler,
for example, while she is almost always described as a science fiction author
blended the two quite brilliantly in books like Wild Seed and Clay's Ark. Nalo
Hopkinson also combined them with sheer genius in her novels Brown Girl in The
Ring and Midnight Robber.The existence of technology in fantasy often results in the co-existence of “science and sorcery,” as Charles Saunders (creator of Sword and Soul) has described my Immortal series. In my novels you have werewolves and vampires—totally in control of their preternatural abilities and using said abilities to protect their universe; but still such characters are most often found in fantasy or horror genres. Yet, the Immortal series also has time travel, aliens... and technology to support its futuristic setting. Such as in the excerpt from Immortal book 1:
Karla walked across the wooden floor of her living area into
a kitchenette. A press of her fingers on the first sphere of a triangular pod
started coffee brewing.
She filled a cup with chicory, walked back into the living
area and pushed the second button on her remote, activating a blue panel beside
the window. Jazz music filled the apartment. Like her bedroom console the unit
kept time, transmitted holographic images and played tapes. Using the third
button, she opened the curtains.
Thus, the Immortal novels have been described as both
fantasy and science fiction novels. Use a little science and one still can be
considered a Fantasy writer. Use a bit more and you've inched into the science
fiction genre. An excerpt from Colony: A Space Opera (my novel in progress)
illustrates this point:
She was born 20 years after Planet Earth's decline. The same
year IST began building the probes: lightweight spacecrafts that humans could
live in for years, if need be, and that moved fast enough to break the sound
barrier—traveling millions of miles within weeks.
In 2065, global warning had accelerated. The final stage in
Earth's destruction had begun. Temperatures of 150 degrees scorched the planet.
Tidal waves, monsoons and cyclones tore it apart. Those who could afford it
moved underground. Food became the world's most valued resource. The rest were
herded under the domes.
Scientists scurried to genetically reproduce fruits and
vegetables—with horrible side effects. Money still ruled the world. But money
was gradually becoming worthless. That's when the government saw the writing on
the wall and created IST and the probes: spacecrafts designed for one purpose,
to seek out planets capable of sustaining human life.
When a writer uses technology in fantasy, the lines between
the genres are even more gloriously buried. Thus, what may be described as
science fiction by one reader/writer can just as easily be characterized as
fantasy by the next. The only real rule here is to make one's technology
believable; credible; plausible. Although it doesn’t yet exist—in a kind kind
of literary sleight of hand.
Pulling this off, just gives me one more reason to
absolutely love speculative fiction...even if no will ever be able to figure
out whether I'm a science fiction or fantasy writer yet. In fact, I think I
prefer it that way.
Valjeanne Jeffers is a graduate of Spelman College and the
author of the SF/fantasy novels: Immortal, Immortal II: The Time of Legend,
Immortal III: Stealer of Souls, the steampunk novels: Immortal IV: Collision of
Worlds and The Switch II: Clockwork (includes books 1 and 2), and the space
opera Colony.
Valjeanne's fiction has appeared in Steamfunk!, Griots: A
Sword and Soul Anthology, LuneWing, PurpleMag, Genesis Science Fiction
Magazine, Pembroke Magazine, Possibilties, 31 Days of Steamy Mocha, and Griots
II: Sisters of the Spear (in press). She works as an editor for Mocha Memoirs
Press and is also co-owner of Q and V Affordable editing.
Theresa Crater
I recently reread Bram Stoker’s Dracula for my Speculative
Fiction workshop. While my writing students bemoaned the fact that Stoker does
all the things they are advised not to do in their writing, I noticed Stoker’s
love of technology.
The vampire is deeply rooted in old ways. His castle sits on
a precipice, difficult for attackers to penetrate—and for Harker to escape
from. His house is lit by multiple candles and furnished with old and moldy
brocades. He uses centuries-old methods of travel for the most part—carriages
and boats—yet maintains an interest in the trains in London, in particular
their schedules.
But our group of heroes out to kill the Count rely on new-fangled
machinery. Mina practices her shorthand, which her fiancé Harker relies on to
send her secret message—although Dracula intercepts the letter. She types
manically to escape her fears, but this useful skill allows her to compile a
complete history of all the group knows about vampires and the Count’s doings.
Dr. Seward records his diary on the phonograph, a technology that still
mystifies me.
Our intrepid group also relies on a new mental
“technology”—they hypnotize Mina after she’s been bitten to gain access to the
vampire’s consciousness. Mesmerism was a new-fangled idea created by Anton
Mesmer in the early 19thcentury, but which gained popular fascination during
the spiritualist phase of Victorian society. If not technology, it certainly is
a new way of looking at human consciousness.
Stoker sprinkled his novel with the gadgets his readers were
finding popping up in their world. I don’t think he intended this contrast, but
it’s there.
Theresa Crater has published two contemporary fantasies, Beneath
the Hallowed Hill & Under the Stone Paw and several short stories, most
recently “White Moon” in Riding the Moon and “Bringing the Waters” in The
Aether Age: Helios. She’s also published poetry and a baker’s dozen of literary
criticism. Currently, she teaches writing and British lit in Denver. Born in
North Carolina, she now lives in Colorado with her Egyptologist partner and
their two cats. Visit her website at http://theresacrater.com.
Sylvia Kelso
Technically, you should excuse the pun,“technology” is any
form of applied science/knowledge, from a hand-axe to a nuclear bomb. For a
fantasy writer “technology” becomes a most pressing question in the planning or
first-paragraph stages of a novel or a world-building. The level of
“technology” you factor in, whether by planned outline or draft-impulse, will
decide almost everything about your invented societies, and quite a lot about
the actual world.A classic if rather hypothetical example is Middle-earth. Whatever Tolkien pre-invented in The Silmarilion, the pre-Industrial nature of Middle-earth was decided at the moment early in the first chapter, that he made hobbits mighty hunters with hand-thrown stones. He might have let them “take a gun out” like a Heyer Regency hero, given that Bilbo was the picture of a wealthy early 20th Century middle-class English male. Whether conscious or unconscious, or possibly prompted by the equally spontaneous choice of a children’s story genre, denying Bilbo the weapons of his Real-Earth period affected every further page of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
The nexus of Tolkien’s personal stand-points behind this
choice does generate fascinating contradictions. While the Shire’s weapons are
limited to stones, staves and bows, Minas Tirith has swords and spears, and
magic defends Lorien. But evil, paradoxically but inevitably, introduces to
Middle-earth the very technological level that Tolkien most loathed. Isengard
and Mordor are copybook unregulated high industrial complexes, complete with
waste, pollution, desolation, wheels and hammers, and “‘mind[s] of metal and
wheels.’” (The Two Towers, Ch. 4)
But The Hobbit’s original gunpowder ban does not allow these
fearsome lairs to spew out steam engines, aircraft, big guns, mechanical
soldiers or machine-guns or mustard-gas, not even rifles and muskets. The Orcs
seem to have been bio-engineered – which would not require all this mechanical
paraphernalia –and they, like everybody else, fight with sword, bow and spear.
Even the mighty Grond only uses muscle-power. The sole exception to this
pre-industrial ban is the “blasting fire” by which the Orcs manage to
infiltrate the stream-way at Helm’s Deep. Everywhere else, evil as
industrialism can affect Middle-earth only through its environmental damage.
Other fantasies happily introduce later forms of real world
“technology” in secondary worlds. Martha Wells’ Ile Rien series begins with a
just-pre-Industrial society using pistol and arquebus, then moves to a faux
Edwardian/Victorian period that still uses pistols, and in the second series,
uses magic to present WWI and later technology like airships. Here, as with
Naomi Novik’s Napoleonic War dragons, the tech. level is pre-set to industrial.
But if less strikingly than with The Lord of the Rings, much of the available
real-world technology, from cine cameras to machine guns, is again not
admitted.
More dissonant cases exemplify what has been touted as
“science fantasy” – where “science” – ie actually some form of very modern tech
– is juxtaposed with an earlier technological level. A really striking example,
and one of my favourites, is Barbara Hambly’s Windrose trilogy, whose second
title epitomizes the type: The Silicon Mage. Though the cover appears pure
fantasy, in fact, an impressive apparatus of spells, spell diagrams, sigils,
and simple wizardly capabilities is connected to and through computers, to work
in both primary and secondary worlds, with astonishing discrepancy and more
amazing lack of fuss – now THAT is a real fantasy-tech.
There is, of course, an older wholly invented technology,
the matrix science of Darkover, but though that otherwise pre-industrial world
and its societies beg to be classified as fantasy, the origins of Darkovan
“humanity” from a space diaspora make a strong claim that the whole world and
series be called SF.
Which opens the other question about“Technology in Fantasy”
– namely, if fantasy, apart from contemporary urban primary world stuff, starts
to introduce really current tech. like gene-engineering, nanotech, and less
realized forms such as cyborgs, even if the actual society is (apparently)
pre-industrial, has the form then become SF?
SF is usually seen as the genre of the future, however often
overtaken. Modern fantasy, to use a paradox, is usually seen as the genre of
“the past.” How close can such a fictional “past” come to the “present,” or
with imaginary tech, to a future, without sliding over the generic boundary?
Whatever the writer’s intent, or the bookshelf label, if the savvy specfic
reader perceives the conventions, icons and protocols in the text as SF, why
isn’t it SF?
The generic SF/fantasy boundary concerned me deeply while I
was struggling with the SF theory chapter of my PhD. Past/future-time,
science/magic as unreality’s ennabling device, evidence of change, progress; I
canvassed those and a number more of the abundant definitions. In the process I
suddenly found myself, like Octavia Butler’s heroine in Exogenesis, conducting
an experiment “in the field.” Once the opening paragraph of Amberlight arrived,
the conscious project was to see how nearly I could make a text walk the
tightrope, marked by Hambly’s Silicon Mage,between fantasy and SF.
Hence, the McGuffin in Amberlight, the “qherrique” which
turned up as opening donnée, became the basis for a thought experiment in
gender-role reversals, as well as the key to society’s shape. Only women could
“work” the mysterious – substance, entity, animal, vegetable, mineral? The
society became a matriarchy. Qherrique’s most crucial quality was its psychic
effects, coveted by every other society, making Amberlight-the-city unthinkably
rich. But qherrique had a bouquet of other attributes – pizo-electric,
photo-synthetic, it could be worked like a mix of pearl and stone to drive
machines, to power tools, to produce guns. Light-guns and horseless vehicles.
Is this fantasy, or is it SF?
It charmed me immensely when I sent the novel in ms to
Andrea (Hosth), asking outright, Do you read this as fantasy or as SF? And she
responded that she couldn’t decide. The indecision reappeared among reviewers
when I finally got the novel into print. It was political fantasy, it was high
fantasy, it was a sub-genre of feminist SF: a whole grab-bag of answers turned
up. Leading, perhaps, to the most interesting general conclusion – that the
level and type of technology a writer consciously or haphazardly bestows on a specfic novel will
not merely dictate the shape of that world and its societies, but even the
genre in which the work will belong - or,
if as with Amberlight, Loki or Coyote was around at the moment of inception,
not.
Sylvia Kelso lives in North Queensland,Australia
Sylvia Kelso lives in North Queensland,
Warren Rochelle
Fairies don’t really need machines, do they? Not the ones in
my novels Harvest of Changelings, and its sequel, The Called. Elemental
beings—Fires, Airs, Waters, and Earths—they have magical powers to use and
manipulate these elements, with extra abilities for their particular element.
Fires, for example, are best suited for heating things, so there is no need for
electrical stoves. Instead, Fires, heat up stones, and in war, create
fireballs. Airs are the most gifted telepathically and the winds answer to
their call. Waters can call the rain and raise waves. The garden of an Earth is
fertile, verdant, and productive; Earths can awaken volcanoes, make
earthquakes. Machinery as we know it Here never developed There.But the magic of this Faerie uses machines—at least it does Here. When Hazel, one of my four main characters, and one of the changelings, is called to return to Faerie, her gateway is not a wardrobe or a door in the side of the hill, rather it is a computer. Hazel has on her computer, Worldmaker, a program that allows the user to construct his or her own world from the ground up, to its people and civilization, its climate, its history. And it is through this portal that Hazel, accompanied by her loyal Siamese, Alexander, enters Faerie. As the dragon she encounters explains, “It was your machine . . . and your game. The machine knocked at the door and the game opened the door to this place; the machine answered a call from this place. It can talk to other machines, yes? Create invisible links of energy, of electricity? Such a link was made to here, which is beyond dreams . . .” (Harvest of Changelings 69). The computer, as a pegasus tells Hazel later, is “a dream-gate” (154).
In The Golden Boy, a novel-in-progress, I explore this link between machine and magic. In this novel the world is dominated by the Columbian Empire and the New World and a rational, science-privileging super-church, which is in opposition to the Old World and those who would also embrace magic and those who use magic, and those who are, the fey. Fairies, who are again Elementals, are iron-sensitive. The only way they can touch a car without pain is to touch one sealed in a plastic coating. Magic and machine in this universe are ways for one to fight the other.
So what? Is this just another take on the famous quote by
Arthur C. Clarke, one of his Three Laws, “Any sufficiently advanced technology
is indistinguishable from magic”? On reflection, no; rather I find myself doing
something perhaps connected, but still different. Machines give us the power of
magic: they can enhance speed and allow us to travel over great distances in a
short amount of time—seven-league boots and aircraft. The magical can call down
the lightning; laser rifles and cannons harness light for war. Software such as
Hazel’s Worldmaker and the software that creates virtual realities allow us to
enter the hills, go through the wardrobe. Through television and film, through
computer monitors, we enter, and for a time, live in any number of alternate
worlds. Technology, then, allows us to explore just the kind of world my
changelings find in Faerie, the kind of world the heroes in The Golden Boy are
trying to save.
Magic, in the literature of the fantastic, in counterpoint,
allows the reader to contemplate a world without the mechanical. It reminds us
that we can—really we can, despite what my students tell me—survive without the
machine. It reminds us that the Morlocks and the Eloi are possible. Magic warns
of the possibility of the Borg.
Technology then, is magical; it is fantastical. Technology
allows us to create a magic of the mind, and magic reminds us that it is the
mind that we can find real magic. Any sufficiently advanced technology really
is indistinguishable from magic.
Warren Rochelle has taught English at the University of Mary
Washington since 2000. His short story, "The Golden Boy” (published in The
Silver Gryphon) was a Finalist for the 2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for Best
Short Story and his novels include The Wild Boy (2001), Harvest of Changelings
(2007), and The Called (2010. He also published a critical work on Le Guin and
has academic articles in various journals and essay collections. Most recently,
his story, “The Boy on McGee Street,”was published in Queer Fish 2 (Pink
Narcissus Press, 2012). http://warrenrochelle.com
24 February 2013
Rescheduling
Hunting is now definitely bumped to a March release.
Hunting was the fifth book I wrote (after the various Talismans books and Lammersgach, which I have no intention of releasing because LOL). It was the first book I put through a writing workshop, and I had lots of useful feedback and positive comments, and I'd also gone through to tighten the writing several times after its completion, so though there were some things I wanted to clarify with the worldbuilding, I figured four months was plenty to finalise it.
Hoo boy.
The plot's still solid, but two secondary characters and a sub-plot needed to go. And a quarter of what was left needed complete rewriting. [There's some particularly unconvincing dialogue.] So, delays.
I've set the release date for 7 March 22 March 31 March 4 April. I'll bump it again if I'm not satisfied, but I'm cautiously optimistic.
Not doing it just to torture you guys, promise. My schedule is a victim of my own evolution as a writer. ;)
Hunting was the fifth book I wrote (after the various Talismans books and Lammersgach, which I have no intention of releasing because LOL). It was the first book I put through a writing workshop, and I had lots of useful feedback and positive comments, and I'd also gone through to tighten the writing several times after its completion, so though there were some things I wanted to clarify with the worldbuilding, I figured four months was plenty to finalise it.
Hoo boy.
The plot's still solid, but two secondary characters and a sub-plot needed to go. And a quarter of what was left needed complete rewriting. [There's some particularly unconvincing dialogue.] So, delays.
I've set the release date for
Not doing it just to torture you guys, promise. My schedule is a victim of my own evolution as a writer. ;)
02 February 2013
Bones of the Fair cover drafts
I've been experimenting with cover layouts using the not-quite-final art for Bones of the Fair (the art is about 90% done, but is still in draft* - it's another of Julie Dillon's pieces). The various textures and fancy-work are all screen grabs of stock art I won't buy until I've decided on a final version, so it's fairly low quality with fragments of watermarks all over the place.
Happy for any recommendations or criticisms!
*Aristide and Aspen's hair colours are currently reversed. The third figure is Gentian, the new palace gardener.
Happy for any recommendations or criticisms!
*Aristide and Aspen's hair colours are currently reversed. The third figure is Gentian, the new palace gardener.
17 January 2013
10,000
I've been very belatedly adding up my numbers, and it seems that at the end of 2012 I hit 10,000 books sold.
To celebrate, I'm going to give away a copy of whatever book the winner chooses! [Up to and including the doorstop hardcover edition of The Touchstone Trilogy.] (If you happen to have all my released books, then an e- and/or pb copy of Hunting.)
Entries can be done using the rafflecopter below.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
To celebrate, I'm going to give away a copy of whatever book the winner chooses! [Up to and including the doorstop hardcover edition of The Touchstone Trilogy.] (If you happen to have all my released books, then an e- and/or pb copy of Hunting.)
Entries can be done using the rafflecopter below.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
04 January 2013
Web Comics of the moment
I read quite a few web comics, and have also been experimenting with the paid e-comic services such as Comixology and JManga, since I rarely buy the physical ones any more due to the immense amount of space they end up taking*. JManga turned out to be not worth the money for me, both because their selection is full of sub-genres of manga I'm not interested in, but mainly because 90% of it is region-locked against icky Australians.
But the web comics are there for everyone. It's always fascinating to watch them grow from their clunky, learning-to-draw beginnings (or swish, polished beginnings), so here's my current bookmarks for those who are looking to read online:
Along with all these, I've been quite taken by Korean web comics lately. Korean manga/manwha I've encountered in the past hasn't been to my taste, but the web comics seem to be an entirely different kettle of fish. [The web comics have a hit-based income, so they fall into more of a grey area than reading pirated scanlations of paperborn work - just make sure to visit the original pages of new issues before reading any scanlations. Still would be nice if there was a donation structure - I often donate to the Western web comics, but there's no mechanism for these except clicking at the moment.]
My two favourites are:
Tower of God. A tower (where each level is basically a continent) which is said to grant wishes if you reach the top. Much competition involved in getting there. This is primarily the story of Baam, a boy born in darkness who wants only company. With so many characters - plenty of interesting females - you're sure to hit on one you really like. This is immensely detailed and multi-layered and fascinating.
Kubera. Called "a story without villains" (which, given the wholesale slaughter, I'd say was debatable), it revolves around a girl named Kubera Leez, who has the 'name of a god' (and all the potential power that goes along with it). She's entirely ignorant of that, though, and starts as a fairly standard 'inflated ditz who is strong' type, but is maturing interestingly (and the flashes of her tortured future self are interesting). But the array of characters (gods, suras, humans, human mages, mixed-breeds) around her are fascinating, and most particularly Asha, the one-armed uber-mage who saves Kubera's life...but perhaps only to fulfil her plans for revenge.
So that's it for my current web comic roster. Anything interesting to recommend back?
----
* I have an entire bookcase of comics from back when I was collecting mainly Vertigo comics. I really should do something with them - I know that my complete collection of the original Star Wars series is worth a fair bit.
But the web comics are there for everyone. It's always fascinating to watch them grow from their clunky, learning-to-draw beginnings (or swish, polished beginnings), so here's my current bookmarks for those who are looking to read online:
- Candi. Comic book artist in college. You'd be surprised the number of web comics with this self-same concept! This is 90% non SFF, but with a telepathic flying ferret and Vendetta Squirrels.
- Ctrl+Alt+Delete. Hey, I have to read at least _one_ gamer web comic.
- Oglaf. Severely, severely, totally NSFW. But very funny. [Loved this artist's previous work, Platinum Grit, and hope she finishes it one day.]
- Goblins. Funny, D&D from the POV of the monsters.
- Gunnerkrigg Court. While I think this story has lost some momentum in the latest book, it is still a very intriguing magic and strange tech story.
- Plume. Slowly releasing as a web comic, but also coming out in paper format (thanks to Kickstarter). Stylish Old West and Artifacts of the Indiana Jones variety, with revenge theme.
- the adventures of superhero girl. It's tough trying to make it as a superhero in the shadow of your over-powered older brother. [On hiatus at the moment, but presumably coming back eventually.]
- Runewriters. Relatively recent, featuring a shapechanging runewriter, a deaf girl and a very grumpy magician.
- Minor Acts of Heroism. The super-powered children of super-heroes.
- Not a Villain. Post-apocalyptic plus virtual world game story. One of my favourites of the moment. Artist makes a joke of her relatively unpolished style by giving her character drawing skills which...need improvement.
- Blue Milk Special. The cynic's version of Star Wars.
- Shadowbinders. Another relatively young comic: an alternate world steampunk and magic story.
Along with all these, I've been quite taken by Korean web comics lately. Korean manga/manwha I've encountered in the past hasn't been to my taste, but the web comics seem to be an entirely different kettle of fish. [The web comics have a hit-based income, so they fall into more of a grey area than reading pirated scanlations of paperborn work - just make sure to visit the original pages of new issues before reading any scanlations. Still would be nice if there was a donation structure - I often donate to the Western web comics, but there's no mechanism for these except clicking at the moment.]
My two favourites are:
Tower of God. A tower (where each level is basically a continent) which is said to grant wishes if you reach the top. Much competition involved in getting there. This is primarily the story of Baam, a boy born in darkness who wants only company. With so many characters - plenty of interesting females - you're sure to hit on one you really like. This is immensely detailed and multi-layered and fascinating.
Kubera. Called "a story without villains" (which, given the wholesale slaughter, I'd say was debatable), it revolves around a girl named Kubera Leez, who has the 'name of a god' (and all the potential power that goes along with it). She's entirely ignorant of that, though, and starts as a fairly standard 'inflated ditz who is strong' type, but is maturing interestingly (and the flashes of her tortured future self are interesting). But the array of characters (gods, suras, humans, human mages, mixed-breeds) around her are fascinating, and most particularly Asha, the one-armed uber-mage who saves Kubera's life...but perhaps only to fulfil her plans for revenge.
So that's it for my current web comic roster. Anything interesting to recommend back?
----
* I have an entire bookcase of comics from back when I was collecting mainly Vertigo comics. I really should do something with them - I know that my complete collection of the original Star Wars series is worth a fair bit.
01 January 2013
The season of compliments...
This is the season of best of 2012 wrap ups and award short lists. I woke this morning to lovely compliments from Ana at The Book Smugglers and Lexie from Poisoned Rationality naming And All the Stars among their favourites of the year.
This afternoon I see the Cybils have announced their short lists, and And All the Stars has made it on the YA Science Fiction and Fantasy list! [I'm not sure if Kate M reads this blog, but I certainly owe her some big thanks for the nomination.] Picture me stunned - I'm certainly in some illustrious company on that list!
A lovely way to start the year. ;)
This afternoon I see the Cybils have announced their short lists, and And All the Stars has made it on the YA Science Fiction and Fantasy list! [I'm not sure if Kate M reads this blog, but I certainly owe her some big thanks for the nomination.] Picture me stunned - I'm certainly in some illustrious company on that list!
A lovely way to start the year. ;)
31 December 2012
Travelling Fantasy Roundtable : Part 10 : Food in Fantasy
Part
10 of the Travelling Fantasy Round Table, our roaming discussion on aspects of
fantasy literature, is up at Sylvia Kelso's blog.
This month we're talking about food in fantasy.
26 December 2012
The Hobbit
The dinner scene at the start could have been shortened at little, but otherwise I think this worked very well. Indeed, having watched it, I wonder if it would have been possible to film it as a single movie. Or, I expect it would have been possible, but it would have been close to a 'training montage' of a movie. This is very much a loving, lingering homage but that just means plenty of the visual spectacle which is half the reason I watch such movies.
Radagast's rabbits were way awesome.
Jackson chose to include a few visible dwarvish women in the crowds escaping from the Dwarven city, and there is a very powerful scene from Galadriel, but I think I'm going to continue with my theory that Fili and Kili are actually what female dwarves look like, just to balance the overwhelming levels of Y chromosome.
Radagast's rabbits were way awesome.
Jackson chose to include a few visible dwarvish women in the crowds escaping from the Dwarven city, and there is a very powerful scene from Galadriel, but I think I'm going to continue with my theory that Fili and Kili are actually what female dwarves look like, just to balance the overwhelming levels of Y chromosome.
24 December 2012
Time for Grinching
What's a year without a good, therapeutic session of complaining talking about things which have irked, which have bugged, which have FINGERSDOWNTHECHALKBOARD bothered me? These are the things I could have done without this year:
For example, Redshirts costs just over $11 in the US Kindle store, and over $17 in the same store, if you're Australian. Publishers (and other manufacturers, such as game companies) are aware that Australians got stuck paying much more back in the 80s when the Australian dollar was worth 60c US and everything was physical, not electronically transmitted. Once those factors changed, the prices were artificially jacked up because there was an opportunity for money to be made.
I buy 90% of my books in e-form. If I hit an artificially inflated price, I usually just lose interest in the book and go buy something else. [The highest e-book novel price I've encountered was $27. I've heard tell of much higher.]
The Scalzi example above is an interesting one, because he gets quite shirty with people who complain about the prices and availability of his books when he posts about them on his blog. His stance being that he needs to maximise his income and selling by region is one of the ways to do it, so don't complain to him.
Yeah, perfectly justifiable attitude, but, well, I guess I'm no loss to him as a reader.
This year Amazon upped by ante by giving favourable royalties to those in Select (in all its newer stores, those in Select get 70% royalty, and the rest of us get 35%).
I hate exclusivity so, even though I don't sell particularly well on the other retailers, I won't go near Select. But it annoys the heck out of me because (either coincidentally or as a result), my sales momentum dropped considerably when it came in. I've never again sold in the numbers I managed just prior to Select.
Extra-infuriating was the fact that most of the really over-the-top "bullying" accusations of the year revolved around politely-worded, even-handed reviews which happened to discuss the poor depiction of women.
There's other things which annoyed me over the year (the Australian media's campaign against Julia Gillard for a start), but these are the big ones, so that's it for my Christmas Eve grinch.
What brought out the bah-humbug in you this year?
Special Australian Prices
Things cost more in Australia. It's not because of shipping. It's not taxes. It's not the exchange rate. It's Because.
For example, Redshirts costs just over $11 in the US Kindle store, and over $17 in the same store, if you're Australian. Publishers (and other manufacturers, such as game companies) are aware that Australians got stuck paying much more back in the 80s when the Australian dollar was worth 60c US and everything was physical, not electronically transmitted. Once those factors changed, the prices were artificially jacked up because there was an opportunity for money to be made. I buy 90% of my books in e-form. If I hit an artificially inflated price, I usually just lose interest in the book and go buy something else. [The highest e-book novel price I've encountered was $27. I've heard tell of much higher.]
Special Australian Release Dates
From The Hobbit (released a week later than the rest of the world) to Doctor Who, to entire series of television, to e-books with Australian release dates of Never.The Scalzi example above is an interesting one, because he gets quite shirty with people who complain about the prices and availability of his books when he posts about them on his blog. His stance being that he needs to maximise his income and selling by region is one of the ways to do it, so don't complain to him.
Yeah, perfectly justifiable attitude, but, well, I guess I'm no loss to him as a reader.
KDP Select
KDP Select, which Amazon brought in at the end of last year, offers self-publishers advantages (most importantly better treatment by its algorithms) in exchange for exclusivity. It instantly divided the self-publishing community, and continues to be a large point of contention.This year Amazon upped by ante by giving favourable royalties to those in Select (in all its newer stores, those in Select get 70% royalty, and the rest of us get 35%).
I hate exclusivity so, even though I don't sell particularly well on the other retailers, I won't go near Select. But it annoys the heck out of me because (either coincidentally or as a result), my sales momentum dropped considerably when it came in. I've never again sold in the numbers I managed just prior to Select.
"Bullying"
The thing which annoyed me most about all the reviewer bullying dramas this past year is the complete incomprehension of the word "bullying". Bullying is not having a different opinion from a crowd or an individual. Bullying is not saying you didn't like something. Even if you express that opinion harshly, or with funny pictures.Extra-infuriating was the fact that most of the really over-the-top "bullying" accusations of the year revolved around politely-worded, even-handed reviews which happened to discuss the poor depiction of women.
There's other things which annoyed me over the year (the Australian media's campaign against Julia Gillard for a start), but these are the big ones, so that's it for my Christmas Eve grinch.
What brought out the bah-humbug in you this year?
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