Interview with Science Fiction Writer Matthew Alan Thyer

Posted on February 3, 2014 by Cora

It’s time for our irregular series “Interviews with international indie writers” again. Today I welcome science fiction author Matthew Alan Thyer to my blog. Matthew has been kind enough to answer some questions for me.

Matthew Alan Thyer1. Tell us a bit about yourself.

These days I’m a card carrying member of the middle aged. A stay-at-home dad. Husband. And, most notably for the purposes of this interview, a new author. A big transition is coming my Family’s way, my wife Tess just accepted a new position that will move us from my native homelands in Colorado to the east coast. Although I’m currently half way through my next book and neck deep in moving boxes, I’m actually looking forward to the new environment and the new challenges and experiences that will come with living in the DC area. So, at this point in my life, I think you could safely say that I am an optimistic person.

2. For how long have you been writing and why did you start?

As a hobby, I have been writing for a long time. I’m not sure I could put a date on it. Telling stories used to be a way for me work things out. Also, journaling kept my pen busy when I had time to fill working as a wilderness guard, when I was younger, or when I was deployed. But until recently, writing was never more than a past time.

In the spring of 2012 I had the first of many seizures. At the time I was working for a large software corporation in the Pacific North West. “Overworking” would be a more apt description. What followed was a long and difficult tale of recovery. I had to come back to health and ultimately, I know I am a very lucky fellow. I had the support of my family and friends, and especially of my wonderful wife Tess.

Eventually, when I got the seizures under control, it felt like I had some spare time on my hands and a desire to try something new. And for the first time in my adult life I was able to search for my earthworm. By July of 2013 I had several stories outlined and was steadily tapping away at the keys. And that’s when I made the transition to being an author.

Since then I have not looked back. Each and every time I get to write I feel a sense of contentment that is unrivaled in my adult experience. I would tell stories even if I never sold any, stacking manuscripts up on the table Jack London style.

The Big Red Buckle by Matthew Alan Thyer3. Tell us a bit about your books, The Big Red Buckle and Joulupukki.

The Big Red Buckle is the first in a series I’ve been working on that are designed to be shorter length reads (novelette to novella). The unifying theme of this hard science fiction series is “sports in space”. This book is the story two Martians who are the first native-born colonists to compete in the solar system’s premier endurance race, The Grand Martian Traverse. “The Big Red Buckle” is the prize. Competitors run and soar, using foot launched aircraft, about 1,500 kilometers between two shield volcanos on the surface of a partially terraformed Mars.

Joulupukki is a YA short story that I wrote in response to an online writing challenge in December. The idea was that we were supposed to write a 2,000 word story about the Holiday. I suppose I went a little further back into history to build the framework for my holiday than many other challengers did, but I’m very happy with the result. Again, this turned into a series, number two is nearly done.

4. The theme of your series is “sports in space”, which is a pretty unique subject for an SF series. So how did you come up with the idea?

I hate to admit this, but I really don’t know how the idea got going or where it came from. The truth is, more often than not, this is the case. Something overheard or a passing conversation is the seed for a story, but the story itself only emerges seasons later when it has had enough time to sprout underground.

As far as I can tell, “sports in space” is unique within both genres (Sci-Fi and sports fiction). There are some sports I’m really enamored with (like paragliding and distance running), but then I’ve got outlines for sports I know almost nothing about (like rugby and solar car racing). The stories have been fun to work on and I hope that others find them compelling and entertaining reads.

Number two in the series is titled “Up Slope” and I’m targeting April for its release. It is about scientists living on Europa who ride fat-tired trikes in their spare time. I’m having a lot of fun with this manuscript because it is less about the competitive elements of the bicycle and more about the utility of the sport. I’ll save the spoilers, but rest assured there is plenty happening and trikes bridge a functional gap for the scientists in a moment of turmoil.

5. Are you a sports person yourself, either as a fan or active participant? What sports do you like?

Oh yes, long distance running has been a life long influence. I got my P3 paragliding certification years ago too, but ended up giving up soaring when my youngest son came along. I’ve always been a pretty active guy.

6. Sports are a subject which is often neglected in the science fiction genre to the point that you get entire worlds or even galaxies where no one seems to care about sports at all. Given the huge amount of attention sports receive in the real world, this is flat out unrealistic. So which science fiction works handle sports right in your opinion?

Kim Stanley Robinson touches upon sports and leisure activities in his seminal Mars Trilogy. One of my favorite descriptions is of Nirgal’s around Mars foot race. I love this narrative because Nirgal does this because of the pleasure it brings him, no other reason. KSR does an admirable treatment of the topic when he imagines how a single person might circumnavigate thousands of kilometers at a time without support, and his marriage of Paleolithic survival methods to future materials technology is compelling to say the least. But at the root of the endeavor is Nirgal’s pleasure in this activity. He loves it, the runner’s high, the proximity to the landscape, the challenges, physical and mental, that he must confront with each advancing step.

I’m sure there will be readers who say “What about Ender’s Game?” And yeah, Orson Scott Card’s descriptions of competitive war simulations in zero gravity has all the trappings of a “game”, but the stakes are different. Not a single child at Command School participates because they love it. Not even Ender. There is no poetry of motion, not flow state obtained. None of these kids are polishing skills that will take them to the Olympics. The activity is utilitarian at its core and this denies how much pleasure you can get playing frisbee in the first meaningful spring warm up, in bare feet, on a recently defrosted lawn.

7. Worldbuilding is crucial for science fiction. So how did you approach the worldbuilding for your series?

I dove in. I have outlines, time lines, and plenty of character treatments, but ultimately I like to let the world emerge on its own. The first story I played with in this world has a working title “Orbital Courier”. It follows a rather solitary man who maintains one of many networked orbital sling ships that move goods, materials and labor throughout the solar system aboard hollowed out asteroids that have bootstrapped propulsion systems attached. This story opened up a plethora of implied technologies and settings.

I wrote a number of additional “test pieces” in a variety of locations. Each one linked back to the original. And I kept on discovering more about the future I was writing about.

Finally, my wife and I have conversations about this world as if it’s a real place and time. We exchange articles that suggest new, interesting plot twists. When the seedlings are ready they get transplanted to stories.

Joulupukki by Matthew Alan Thyer8. Your short story Joulupukki draws on the traditions of the Sami people of Lapland, which is quite an unusual background for a science fiction story. So how did you get the idea?

So take a close look at my face and you’ll see an epicanthic fold over both my eyes. My oldest son has expressed a strong interest in knowing and understanding his own heritage. Often I think some of this is his desire to fill a void with a cultural legacy lacking in his contemporary reality. Years ago I began following the thread of our shared genetic and cultural history and with the aid of some genetic testing I discovered that we share a common ancestry with the Sami.

It is a distant and tenuous connection to be sure, but that realization sparked an interest in the cultural heritage of Lapland. Joulupukki is a traditional Yule hunt held near the winter solstice. The protagonist in my story, Birki, is a young man who, as fate would have it, shares some common traits with my oldest boy. Birki is growing up in a place where myth is of cultural importance, and the power to make myth manifest exists. The challenge is making the stories matter despite that god like power over matter.

The next in that series is “Jojk” and it is about done. Keep an eye open for its impending release. I’m writing these as if they were comic books, each one has to end with a cliffhanger. Make the reader want more. Soon.

9. Have you ever been traditionally published or did you ever pursue traditional publishing? And if so, what were your experiences?

I have article publishing experience, all non-fiction, but when I started writing fiction for publication none of that seemed to translate within this new publishing context. Beginning last July I started collecting rejection notices. Often these were just form letters that seemed to indicate no one read my samples. Worse, I’d write and wait for months before I got back a couple of paragraphs of generalities that could have been sent to anyone.

It never occurred to me that I would not be successful writer; if I invest myself fully in the effort I know, deep down, that eventually I’ll find my readers. The rejection letters never said to me “Don’t be a writer.” Rather they seemed to be saying, “Do it yourself.” I’ve never been the kind of person to wait on someone else’s permission or approval to do something, anything.

And I know I have a lot to learn. The business side of writing is simultaneously a distraction and an interest of mine. When I’m wrapped up in copy-edits or distribution questions I’m not writing, that’s bad. But, because those questions of business ultimately get made on the edge between producer and consumer, I feel like I’m a lot more in touch with my readers than I ever would have been had I taken the “big ink” route. I hear back from readers. They tell me when I’m making mistakes and also tell me what they like. Readers are a component of the rocket fuel that propels future stories.

That said, at this point in my publishing career I would gladly accept the help of a traditional press. My writing time is constrained enough as-is and having that kind of leverage would sure take some weight off my wagon. But there are two caveats. First, I know how valuable that link to the reader is and I just don’t see it happening for a lot of traditional writers. They may not even know its missing, or if they have it, they spend a lot of time cultivating it (see John Scalzi and his blog). So if I ever signed a contract, I’d make certain that I could still respond to readers in a meaningful way. Which means being able to write what I want, when I want.

Second, I’ve already got this ball rolling. Sure, mine is imperfect, but it is rolling. I’ve found an illustrator who does brilliant, unique and eye-catching work. I’m searching for an editor who has both an interest in my work and can help me put the polish on future works for a reasonable price. I’m already building a team and I know they’re the right people for the job.

10. According to your author bio, you’ve lived a really exciting life? So how did those experience influence your fiction?

I think I’ve had an unconventional life, but let me tell you there is very little about capacity management at a large software corporation that I’d consider “exciting”. That said, some of my past experiences have informed what I write. For instance, because I spent hundreds of hours learning how to pilot soaring aircraft, and subsequently soaring everything from butter smooth marine air to rodeo thermals in Eastern Washington and Oregon, I have a fair appreciation of what might go into the sport. Also, it is an ongoing interest of mine so I watch video and pay attention to some of the people who are opening up the sport.

Proximity helps, and while I am fabricating fictions, they are stories grounded in experience.

11. According to your website, you will be attending this year’s WorldCon in London (so will I BTW). Is this your first WorldCon and/or your first visit to London? And are you excited?

I am very excited to make appearances at a growing list of conventions. I just got back from Legendary ConFusion in Detroit and not only did I have an awesome time I learned a ton and met many awesome people.

That said, my wife and I are in a transitional period. She just accepted a new job and will be over seas for the next six months. I would very much like to go to London this year, so I’m holding onto that candle. But at the moment, I’m just not certain how I’m going to make it happen. I’ve got to figure out the finances and have a viable childcare plan in place before I can board the aircraft (or ride Heathrow’s PRT).

London would be my first WorldCon and that would be very exciting. I’m sure it would be a lot like walking into an Ancient Egyptian tomb, just a treasure trove of information and experience. For this reason I’m doing my best to make it a priority.

12. As a WorldCon member you’re also able to nominate and vote for the Hugo awards. So what’s your choice for the best novel of 2013? And are there any other works, writer, artists or editors you believe deserve some Hugo recognition?

Kim Stanley Robinson’s Shaman came out last year and I certainly enjoyed the read. I’m not certain if it really fits though, it is more of a hard anthropology fiction. So maybe, since anthropology is a science.

If The Human Division made it on the ballot (John Scalzi) I would not be displeased. In many ways the later books in the Old Man’s War series are much better than the first few. It would also be interesting to see any one of the episodes from the collected series on the ballot (I’m guessing here, but they felt novelette in length) because it might force the question that I’ve never felt was answered last year in Texas around Mary Robinette Kowal’s contribution.

Finally, if it were my ballot I’d nominate Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter’s The Long War. I read all of these last year and of them all “War” was my favorite. A really interesting departure for Pratchett which does not get mired down in the dystopic. In the baseline Earth there is still deprivation and scarcity, but the story seems to overcome the sadness.

13. Is there anything else you’d like to tell our readers?

Sure! I want to thank them for giving my stories a try.

Thanks for answering my questions, Matthew. Hope to see you in London in August.

Visit Matthew’s blog at Feet for Brains, follow him on Twitter at @feetforbrains, Facebook or Goodreads.

Matthew’s books The Big Red Buckle and Joulupukki are available at Amazon.

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Indie Speculative Fiction of the Month: January 2014

Posted on January 31, 2014 by Cora

Indie Speculative Fiction of the Month

Welcome to “Indie Speculative Fiction of the Month”, a new feature on this blog.

So what is “Indie Speculative Fiction of the Month”? It’s a round-up of speculative fiction by indie authors newly published this month, though for the debut edition some December books snuck in as well. The books are arranged in alphabetical order by author. So far, all the links only go to Amazon.com, though I may add other retailer for future editions.

We have a broad spectrum of books, ranging from modern fairy tales via historical fantasy, epic fantasy, paranormal romance, urban fantasy, dystopian SF and space opera all the way to hard science fiction. There are books for all age ranges, from a collection of bedtime stories for young children to some very dark and adult works. I know all of the authors at least vaguely and have read other works by several of them. However, I haven’t read the books themselves, so Caveat emptor.

And now on to the books: Continue reading →

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Still Snowy and Frosty Linkdump

Posted on January 30, 2014 by Cora

I’m not sure whether this hit the news abroad at all, but the German TV station ARD did an exclusive TV interview with NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. I only stumbled across the interview by accident, because I was waiting for the literary program Druckfrisch to begin, since ARD did not do much to promote it and hid the interview in a graveyard slot at 11 PM, the same graveyard slot usually occupied by Druckfrisch, which is a scandal in itself. However, you can watch the whole thing, in English even, at their website.

Over at Pegasus Pulp, I talk about the novella form and why it is ideal for certain genres and subgenres.

Jo Walton has an interesting post about swearing in science fiction and fantasy at Tor.com. I find her observations quite interesting, especially since I never really noticed that swearing became more common in SF novels between the 1980s and 1990s, though that was exactly the time I started reading SF in English.

But then, Germans are not all that sensitive towards swearing, especially not in my generation and so the controversy in the 1980s about tough cop Horst Schimanski (played by Götz George) saying “Scheiße” on German TV seemed very silly to me at the time and seems even sillier in retrospect, since Dietmar Schönherr had already said it on Raumpatrouille Orion back in 1966, albeit used as an adjective. It’s also used in adjective form in Salto Mortale, a German TV drama about a family of circus artists which ran from 1969 to 1972. The momentous occasion of Schimanski uttering “Scheiße” on German TV can be viewed on YouTube here. It happens at 3:28, though just watch the whole beginning, because it’s a marvelous bit of characterisation without any dialogue, until Schimanski yells “Du Idiot, hör’ auf mit der Scheiße” (You idiot, stop that shit!) a little over three minutes in (unfortunately, the moment is somewhat marred by a racist remark a little later, which is more shocking today than “Scheiße” and yet went entirely unremarked in 1981). This is the first line he ever said BTW as a new character in the venerable crime drama Tatort. Nowadays, it’s hard to imagine what a breath of fresh air Schimanski was in the staid atmosphere of German TV of the pre-private TV era. I pretty much fell in love with him at first sight, because he was the coolest German cop I’d ever seen. Even cooler is that actor Götz George wanted Schimanski to be gay and played him that way in the early episodes, but was shot down by the TV bosses, because while uttering “Scheiße” might have been barely acceptable back in 1981, a gay cop was not. To this day, I wonder what would have happened if George had gotten his way.

Come to think of it, I did wonder about the “swearing of oaths” that was so common in many English language novels of the late 1980s and before, because I interpreted it as swearing an oath before a court and wondered why on Earth everybody felt the need to sweat oaths all the time. The meaning of “oath” for “vulgarism” doesn’t exist in German, so I didn’t get what was meant. And of course, I adapted the neutered fake swearing (“darned” for “damned”, “heck” for “hell”) from the Marvel Comics of the period for myself, because I mistook it for “authentic American slang” and the idea of anybody, even the sort of people outraged at Horst Schimanski saying “Scheiße”, being troubled by “damned” or “hell” was totally inconceivable to me.

At Vulture, writer/critic Lev Grossman and writer Adam Sternbergh talk about genre fiction and theories of nerd-dom. What I liked best about this dialogue is the acknowledgement just how broad the overall field of SFFH geeky interests really is and also the discussion about crossgenre works and genre hybrids, which also jives with my personal theory that we are seeing more and more works mixing elements of two or more genres.

Australian SF writer Patty Jansen has some ideas on what science fiction needs to do to stay relevant. I agree with her, since it always makes me cringe when a young reader asks for science fiction recommendations and someone suggests the Heinlein juveniles or Isaac Asimov. Now don’t get me wrong, I still like Asimov (Heinlein not so much, but then I never did). But it’s not a good entry point into the genre for a young reader.

In Russia, they still take literature seriously and so an argument about poetry versus prose came to a lethal end in the Siberian town of Irbit. Poetry won BTW, by stabbing prose to death. Meanwhile, in September a man was shot, but thankfully survived, in the South Russian city of Rostov-on-Don because of an argument about philosopher Immanuel Kant, who – though German – was born in the West Russian city of Kaliningrad, then known as Königsberg.

Bremen has a beautiful Renaissance townhall (you can see a photo here) with a famous wine cellar, now a gourmet restaurant. Among many other treasures, the wine cellar also contains Germany’s oldest barrel of wine, dating from 1653. The wine is not for sale and very few people alive have ever tasted it, including some international wine journalists back in 1996 and an American GI who was given a bottle by the cellar master in 1945 (he visited Bremen for the 50th anniversary of the end of WWII, pointed at the barrel and said, “I got a bottle of that”, which stunned everybody present). However, now a Chinese billionaire has offered 150000 Euro for just one bottle of Ratskeller wine, 1653 vintage. Normally, this offer should be a no brainer, since the barrel is still largely full and especially since Bremen is chronically short of money. However, the market square and town hall are a UNESCO world heritage site and therefore the question is whether selling a bottle of wine a historical barrel in the wine cellar of the town hall would violate the sanctity of the world heritage site.

Want to learn Low German (which is a separate language BTW and not a dialect)? Radio Bremen has a free online course for you. Furthermore, Radio Bremen also has a whole Low German page, where you can listen to the daily Low German radio news as well as audio dramas and other Low German programs.

American folk singer and songwriter Pete Seeger died Monday aged 94. Here is a wonderful appreciation from the German cultural TV program Kulturzeit. Watch out for Pete Seeger singing the Moorsoldatenlied as well as the German folk song “Die Gedanken sind frei” (Thoughts are free).

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Interview with Science Fiction Writer Edward M. Grant

Posted on January 28, 2014 by Cora

Today I welcome science fiction author Edward M. Grant to my blog. Edward has been kind enough to answer a few questions for me.

Petrina by Edward M. Grant1.   Tell us a bit about yourself.

I grew up in Britain and studied Physics at Oxford, but emigrated to Canada some years ago. By day, I work in satellite communications, which keeps me very busy, but I’ve been self-publishing my writing for a couple of years now as time permits.

2.   For how long have you been writing and why did you start?

As long as I remember. While clearing out my old bedroom in my parents’ house when I emigrated, I found a book of stories I wrote when I was nine, some of which were quite entertaining despite their many flaws. As a boy, I was more likely to be found in a library than playing football, so progressing to writing stories like the ones I enjoyed reading came
naturally.

I joined a fairly serious hard SF writers’ group in the 90s, and many of the other members went on to at least moderate success, but sending a paper manuscript of a short story across the Atlantic and waiting a couple of months to find out whether the magazine had accepted it (nope) grew old fast. Then I didn’t write many stories for ten years or so, until Amazon and Smashwords made self-publishing easy, and magazines began accepting submissions over the Internet.

In fact, I’ve now self-published revised versions of about half the stories I wrote for that group.

Fade to Grey by Edward M. Grant3.   Tell us a bit about your books.

I primarily write science fiction, though I dabble in horror. I’ve mostly been writing shorter stories (4-15,000 words), but, the more I write, the longer the stories seem to become.

Probably my favourite so far is ‘Fade To Grey’, a 15,000 word novelette. For years, I’ve been wondering why we can’t see any aliens in the galaxy, and, in this story, it’s because alien luddites destroyed all life on their planet. Their ancient planetary defence system then destroys a passing human ship, and a maintenance bot, the ship’s synthetic intelligence computer, and the last surviving passenger try to bring the planet back to life.

One of the Amazon reviews suggested I should rewrite it as a novel. I’ll have to think about that, as I’m sure there’s enough left untold in the story to make it work.

Spaceweasels by Edward M. Grant4.   You write two series, the Dirk Beretta series and the Area 52 series. So who is Dirk Beretta and what is Area 52?

Dirk Beretta was the poster boy for the Space Marines, but quit after the battle of Din Bin Foo, where many of his friends were killed by Space Weasels, who then cooked and ate them with a nice Merlot. In the current series, he’s in a love/hate relationship with the rich girlfriend he rescued from a fate worse than marinating in the Space Weasels’ kitchens, and keeps running into trouble while he looks for another job that suits his destructive skills.

It’s either a parody of or homage to the kind of pulpy science fiction I used to read as a kid, and I’m still not quite sure which. I invented him for a writing example on a web forum and never intended to do anything more, but he wanted me to write a complete story about him. Then more ideas kept coming, so I’ve released three stories and I’ve written most of the fourth, which has time-travelled into ancient Egyptian steam-punk. It’s currently a novella, but may end up as a novel.

In Area 52, a young man who reports to the British Army for his National Service in the 1950s finds himself working as a guard for a base outside a tiny Yorkshire village. Except, unknown to him, hidden beneath the Nissen huts is a cut-price version of America’s semi-mythical Area 51, where the British government keeps all the strange creatures and objects they’ve found around the Empire over the last few centuries.

Having finished the second story on something of a cliff-hanger, I was going to write the third, but decided I should really combine them into a novel. Hopefully I’ll finish that this year, and release it to close that initial story arc.

There are also my 2070 stories, which are more of a shared world than a series. They’re more serious, set in the next few centuries (hence the name), and attempt to make the science and technology as realistic as possible. The human race is expanding across the solar system, Earth is a wasteland after WWIII, the Battle of Armageddon may or may not have happened, there’s little government left, and most societies fear outsiders because one person with a grudge can destroy an entire town or space habitat.

5.   Most of your published works are short fiction. Now as a short fiction writer myself, I believe that the e-books are ideal for stand-alone short stories which would never be viable in print form. But at least in my experience, short stories also sell much worse than novels. So what do you think the future holds for short fiction in e-book form?

Oddly enough, I seem to be one of the few people who’ve found their short stories sell better than novels, though I suspect that’s largely due to low sales of my one published novel.

One of the best things about self-publishing is that stories can be the length they need to be, without having to pad or cut to keep a publisher happy. I grew up reading many 40-60,000 word novels, but they’ve almost disappeared from book store shelves because publishers think all readers want longer ones. With the fast pace of modern life, I’d often rather buy a shorter story I can finish in the time I have available, than a novel I’d have to read over several days or weeks. So I think short fiction has a much brighter future now than it did in trade publishing.

6.   Worldbuilding is crucial for science fiction. So how did you approach the worldbuilding for your books?

For different projects, I’ve tried the ‘plan everything in advance’ method, the ‘make it up as I go along’ method, and a number of stages in between. Planning allows you to make the world consistent, but runs the risk that you spend all the time creating the world, and not enough thinking about the stories to tell in it (or writing them). Making it up is faster, but risks building a world that makes no sense.

I made up the Dirk Beretta world as I went along, but the more I write, the more throwaway background details I can expand on in future stories. Because it’s pure space opera, I can get away with a lot.

Some of Area 52 was inspired by war stories I heard as a kid from men who had been in the forces in WWII, or during the National Service era when almost everyone had to serve for two years. Most of them either seemed to have been fighting for their lives, or, like Ron at the beginning of the story, bored to death with little of any value to do. I also read a lot of wacky UFO and conspiracy books as a kid, and thought how much more fun the world would be if the Bermuda Triangle really was a vortex to another universe, Area 51 had aliens in the freezer, and the Moon was hollow and full of UFOs. So it was more a matter of deciding what wouldn’t go in than what would, and doing my best to research the military of the time to make it as accurate as I can; I still need to work more on that.

The 2070 stories are approaching hard SF, so that’s more complex and requires more research; the basic premise came from a role-playing game I developed at school, and, while that’s massively mutated over the years, I now have a couple of megabytes of notes about the history, the people and the places. I spent much of the time working through the consequences of some of the changes that seem likely to occur in the next few decades, such as dramatic genetic modification and life extension, 3D printing eliminating many jobs, and the economics of a space-faring culture with technology only a few decades ahead of us. I find a lot of SF worlds make no sense if you think about the economics for long, and I’m trying to avoid that problem.

7.   Unlike many science fiction writers (interviewer raises hand), you studied physics and are actually a scientist. How does your physics background influence your SF?

It’s very useful for the 2070 stories, because they are harder SF. When, say, I need to work out how large the Big Momma space freighter has to be to carry enough fuel to travel between two asteroids in two weeks, or how fast it would accelerate, I can sit down and go through the numbers. It’s less useful for the space opera stories, because I keep thinking
that the things I’m writing could never actually happen!

8.   Have you ever been traditionally published or did you ever pursue traditional publishing? And if so, what were your experiences?

I wrote some non-fiction articles for a science and technology magazine in the 90s, but that’s the only time I’ve seen my name on a book store shelf. I still submit some of my stories to magazines like Asimov’s and Analog, but I’ve yet to make a sale. ‘Robo-Zombie’ made the finalists for a print anthology recently, but not the final cut, and I’m sending that story out to some magazines before self-publishing it.

I think it makes sense for shorts, where turnaround time is fast, pay is good, and rights typically revert in a year or so, but I don’t intend to submit any novels. I would if more publishers were willing to do print-only deals, but when they’ll take a year or two to get a novel into print, and expect a non-compete clause preventing me from writing anything similar, I’d rather just publish it myself.

9.   You’re not just a writer, but you’ve also worked on several indie films. Did your filmmaking experience influence your writing in any way?

I learned a lot about telling a story from editing indie movies. You have far less control as a movie editor with a bunch of tapes on your desk than as a fiction writer, but pacing and smooth editing is even more important than in books. Hopefully that’s come over into my writing.

I also co-wrote an indie vampire movie that was produced, and wrote about a dozen scripts that weren’t. I’m starting to work on turning those into novels.

Then, of course, there’s ‘Horror Movie’, and ‘Horror Movie 2: The Sequel’, two horror novels I’ve been trying to finish since 2010, based on a somewhat exaggerated version of my experiences working on indie movie sets.

10.   According to your author bio, you’ve lived a really exciting life and travelled all over the world. So how did those experience influence your fiction?

It may contribute to having so many ‘homeless’ characters in my stories, who spend their lives travelling from one place to another; many of my characters live in space, and have nothing resembling a home to go to. I’ve travelled so much that my nightmares tend to consist of being stuck in an airport, or trying to get the rental car returned before I miss my flight. Usually while being hunted by zombies.

It’s also given me a chance to try things and visit places that I can incorporate into stories. ‘Take The Plunge,’ one of my favourite unpublished short stories, is set in New Zealand; I wrote the first draft while I was travelling around the country on a bus, inspired by their massive industry of extreme sports for tourists. Gregory Benford actually critiqued it for me, then I submitted it unsuccessfully to the major magazines, but I want to write a novelization of one of the throwaway ideas in the story before I self-publish it.

The earthquakes and rocket launches have also come in handy, for when I need to describe one.

11.   It’s currently awards nomination time in the science fiction world, so what would be your pick for the best novel of 2013? And are there any other works, writer, artists or editors you believe deserve some Hugo recognition?

I’m probably not a good person to suggest anything, because I was so busy in my day job last year that I read very little SF released in 2013. I need to catch up this year!

12.   Is there anything else you’d like to tell our readers?

I’d like to say thanks to everyone who’s bought one of my books, and hopefully you found them interesting, or at least entertaining. There should be plenty more to come.

Thanks a lot for answering my questions, Edward.

You can visit Edward on the web at www.edwardmgrant.com and buy his books at Amazon, Smashwords, Barnes and Noble, Sony, Diesel and Kobo.

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More Snow in the Forest

Posted on January 27, 2014 by Cora

We had even more snow last night as well as temperatures of minus 10 degrees Celsius. And guess when the main heater decided to have a hiccup. Luckily, the service technician is coming in tomorrow.

Apart from the cold, the weather was lovely and so we took the chance to go hiking at Westermark Forest near the town of Syke, a place that has been featured before on this blog, most recently here.

Of course, I also took my camera along, so have some photos of snowy winter woods: Continue reading →

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Snow 2014 by Day

Posted on January 24, 2014 by Cora

And this is what the snow looks like by daylight, when I went out to shovel the driveway free.

Snowy street

My street, all covered in snow.

Snowy street

The other side of the street

Snowy meadow

The meadow and oaktree next to the house

Snowy garden

The terrace and backgarden

We’re supposed to be getting even more snow on Sunday, since we’re right at the borderline between freezing dry and warm and humid air.

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Night Snow 2014

Posted on January 24, 2014 by Cora

The icy wind blowing in from Eastern Europe has mostly been bringing me headaches (I’m very sensitive to air pressure changes) and shivers, but tonight it also brought us this:

Snow

First snow of the winter, as viewed from my front door.

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Science fiction and Romance Linkdump

Posted on January 22, 2014 by Cora

First of all, science fiction writer, terminal cancer patient and regular reader of this blog Jay Lake has the chance to take part in a clinical trial for a new cancer treatment, which will hopefully help both Jay and other cancer patients. However, there are a lot of associated costs, so friends of Jay have started a fundraiser to help him cover those costs. If you have a bit of money to spare, please consider donating.

I have been interviewed by SF writer Edward Lake (no relation to Jay Lake, as far as I know), author of the Mamluks Saga. We talk about science fiction, the Shattered Empire saga and the connection between Theodor W. Adorno and Lois McMaster Bujold. What, you mean other people don’t quote Adorno when talking about science fiction? Damn.

Over at the Pegasus Pulp blog, I also have some neat promotional images created via a site called Photofunia.

At The World in Satin Bag, Shaun Duke responds to the current debate about “masculine” writing initiated by Paul S. Kemp and points out that no human behaviours are gendered per se. Bonus points for mentioning the fascinating Zula, as played by Grace Jones in the Arnold Schwarzenegger Conan movies from the early 1980s. Indeed, May Day, the character Grace Jones played in A View to Kill, Roger Moore’s last outing as James Bond, is quite similar to Zula and probably the least traditionally feminine of the many Bond women. Nonetheless, May Day is memorable, whereas the “good girl” character played by Tanya Roberts is instantly forgettable.

At The Booksmugglers, Kameron Hurley has a great essay on heteronormativity in science fiction and other stories and how the pervasive heteronormativity of the world she grew up in made it very difficult to imagine anything else.

Foz Meadows, who coincidentally would be another great pick for the best fan writer Hugo, has a fascinating post on gender in digital spaces and the “fake geek girl” meme. Turns out that approximately half of all players of MMORPGs play characters of a different gender and that those who engage in the sort of behaviour in MMORPGs that “fake geek girls” are often accused of, i.e. using their feminine wiles to trick men and scam them out of something, are mostly male players playing female avatars. Meanwhile, many women prefer to play as male characters, because they are tired of the harrassment and sexist crap they get when playing as women.

At Wonk-O-Mance, romance writer Ruthie Knox has a great post about how she was made to remove some of the more realistic and less idealized bits from her novels by editorial fiat. It’s a fascinating post and explains the reasoning behind many of the more infuriating bits of romance novels such as the rigid gender roles and the madonna/whore or virgin/slut complex still peddled by way too many books or the fact that no women ever seems to have any bodyhair in a romance novel or that if condoms are mentioned at all (big if, because there still are way too many supposedly contemporary romances where characters are blissfully having unprotected sex, as if STDs didn’t exist) the hero is always carrying a condom around in his wallet or jeans pocket just in case, whereas the heroine never has one (because that would make her a slut). Apparently, the editors are pushing for many of those things, because they believe that readers want them. Well, this reader would rather see a bit of realism in her romance novels.

If like me, you have enjoyed Jeannie Lin’s historical romances set in Tang Dynasty China, you will be disappointed to hear that Jeannie Lin’s upcoming novel The Jade Temptress will not be published in print, because sales are allegedly too low. Courtney Milan weighs in as well and explains exactly why print sales of historical romances are low across the board and why Jeannie Lin’s publisher Harlequin is unfair in blaming the low sales on the unusual setting.

Whatever you may think of them, the Harlequin/Mills & Boon line of historical romances is actually one of the very few mainstream romance publishers where you occasionally find something other than the same old regency romance, high on dukes and spicy sex and low on historical accuracy. Not that Harlequin/Mills & Boon doesn’t offer regencies and lots of them, but in the past few years I’ve also seen historicals set in the American West, the Roman Empire, Restoration England and – in the case of Jeannie Lin’s novels – Tang Dynasty China among their offerings. And indeed an uncommon setting makes me far more likely to pick up a historical romance, whereas with regencies I mostly stick to trusted authors like Carla Kelly. Doubly so, if it’s a non-European/US set historical romance with characters of colour and a non-whitewashed cover, because we see so very few of those. Jeannie Lin’s novels fit the bill perfectly and they’re excellent besides, which is why it’s so frustrating that they supposedly don’t sell.

Buzzfeed of all places has a great profile of V.C. Andrews, writer of gothic novels which thrilled teenagers of the 1980s, as well as of Andrew Neiderman, the ghost writer who penned the many new V.C. Andrews novels that appeared after her death. Fascinating that the publisher tried to hide the fact that V.C. Andrews had died and even managed to get away with it.

V.C. Andrews was already dead by the time I discovered her books on my cousin’s bookshelf during a visit to the US in 1988. I remember that one of the latter books in the Casteel series carried a note stating that V.C. Andrews had died, but that she had left behind several completed manuscripts, which would now be published. It was sometime during the Dawn series, that I started to wonder just how many unpublished manuscripts V.C. Andrews had managed to write before her death. It was either during the Dawn or the Ruby series that I saw a note in one of the books that the Andrews family had hired another writer to continue the series based on V.C. Andrews’ notes. Partway through the Dawn series I was rapidly losing interest in the Andrews novels anyway, probably because I was outgrowing them. I did read the Ruby series, but only because the Lousiana setting intrigued me. I never read another V.C. Andrews after Tarnished Gold, last in the Ruby series. They’re best read as a teenager.

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The Latest on the current Genre Debates

Posted on January 20, 2014 by Cora

Two debates are currently raging across the online SFF sphere, namely the debate about the appropriateness of awards eligibility posts (see my previous posts here and here) as well as the debate about “masculine stories” initiated by Paul S. Kemp (see my post here).

Let’s start with the masculinity debate:

At Dreamwidth, Ithiliana responds to me responding to Paul S. Kemp and points out that gender debates have been with us since the beginnings of SFF fandom and that we’re still not much further than we were approx. ninety years ago. Ithiliana also makes a very important point, namely that all responses to Paul S. Kemp so far are still stuck in the same straight, white, cisgendered, able-bodied paradigm with all the attendant problems.

Kameron Hurley (who is one of my picks for best fan writer BTW) has a great post in which she explains how gender-switching the stereotypical lone wolf hypermasculine action hero shows how problematic such characters really are and that in order to be fully human, people should embrace both their traditionally masculine and feminine traits regardless of gender.

At The Bathroom Monologues, John Wiswell breaks down Paul S. Kemp’s characteristics for masculine characters bit by bit and concludes that nothing is exclusively masculine. Bonus points for pointing out how harmful the stereotypes of men having their emotions in check are to young boys who are emotionally crippled by being told to “man up”.

Teresa Frohock responds to Paul S. Kemp by pointing out that she wrote a character who ticks all the boxes of a manly man according to Kemp. Unfortunately, that character is a woman – oops. Teresa Frohock also points out that rigid gender stereotypes and honour culture hurt both men and women.

At Fangirl, Lex wonders what Paul S. Kemp’s views on gender mean for the future of the Star Wars novels, since Kemp is still under contract for further Star Wars novels.

This post is very illuminating, since it sheds light on where Kemp, a writer whose name was vaguely and whose work not at all familiar to me, is coming from. Apparently, one of his Star Wars novels has no significant female characters at all, while another fridges the lone woman, so that the men can escape (whatever happend to women and children first, as extrolled as a manly virtue by Kemp?). And there is even more problematic stuff.

Fangirl also points out that Paul S. Kemp’s ideal of hyper-masculinity as virtue does not really fit into the Star Wars universe as it’s been portrayed in the films and many of the novels. Because for all its gender issues such as the fact that in all of the Star Wars films men vastly outnumber women or that the original trilogy fails the Bechdel test with flying colours, Star Wars doesn’t really present hyper-masculine and ultra-feminine characters. Luke, Anakin, Obi Wan, Lando, Qui Gon Jin, etc… are not the sort of manly man Kemp prefers. Han Solo comes closest and he is hardly Conan either. As for the women, I have been suspecting for a while that the fact that Leia was so damn awesome was a lucky accident, but none of the few Star Wars women are wilting flowers.

Now I have never read any of Paul S. Kemp’s novels and I gave up on the Star Wars novels years ago. And a large part of the reason why I gave up on the Star Wars novels (and indeed rarely bother with tie-ins in general, even if I love the franchise) was that the Star Wars universe presented in the novels was not the Star Wars universe I had fallen in love with. For starters, most of the writers focussed far too much on the Jedi, while none of them seemed to get that the Jedi aren’t a good thing nor are they really portrayed as one in the films. Indeed, Kemp’s “masculine virtues” as practiced by the Jedi order, e.g. stoicness, having one’s emotions in check, an emphasis on honour, contribute to the downfall of the Old Republic and are directly responsible for the fall of Anakin, since none of the Jedi are willing or able to recognise how the conflict between the (impossible) demands of the Jedi order and Anakin’s feelings for his mother and Padme are tearing him apart, until he goes totally off the rails and becomes Darth Vader. Anakin practically begs for help at several points during Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith and is blown off with Jedi platitudes.

***

Meanwhile, the debate about awards eligibility posts is still raging as well. But first of all, if you are a Hugo nominator and have problems deciding whom to nominate in the art categories, the Hugo Award eligible artists tumblr might help.

Larry Nolen declares genre awards irrelevant in general at the OF Blog, since only very few people bother to nominate and vote and the financial advantage is likely to be small to non-existent, particularly in the short fiction and fan categories. And besides, writers and publishers don’t behave in nearly such an undignified way regarding nominations for the literary awards that really matter according to Larry Nolen, namely the Booker Prize or the National Book Award.

Reading through this post, I couldn’t help but be struck by the privilege on display. Because apparently, Larry Nolen cannot even fathom that for many women or writers of colour or international writers or GLBT writers, being nominated for a genre award, even if it’s in a fan category, is an affirmation that they belong here and are part of the genre, that their books and stories and other contributions to the genre are welcomed and recognised. Never mind that he does underestimate the impact winning a Hugo even in the short fiction categories can have on a writer’s career. Because editors are a lot more willing to look at your work, when you are a Hugo or a Campbell winner. Especially, if you aren’t a straight white cisgendered man.

On a similar note, Martin Lewis at Everything Nice explains in great detail why he considers awards eligibility posts selfish, destructive and counter-productive. The post is a bit of a mess, but apparently awards eligiblity posts disenfranchise readers (How? People posting lists for their eligible works doesn’t force me to vote for them and indeed some of the writers I will be nominating have not made any posts) and don’t help diversity of shortlists, because people should be nominating based on the literary merit of the work in question and not because the author ticks a certain demographic box. I do agree that nominations should be based on literary merit, but if the only works of literary merit are written by straight white men, there is something wrong. Though to be fair to Martin Lewis, his own recommendations for awards worthy works include at least two women as well as an artist of colour.

At Jenny’s Library, Jenny Gadget has a thoughtful response to Martin Lewis and explains how writers talking about their own works on the internet helped her find speculative fiction that she could enjoy, often books by female authors that were not on any of the officially approved “best of the genre” lists, books that were not reviewed and pushed by booksellers and the genre press. She also points out how awards eligibility lists by women and writers of colour and other marginalised writers are less about genuinely expecting to be nominated or believing their own work to be one of the five or six best works of the year and more about pointing out, “Hey, we exist, too, and it would be nice if you could remember and maybe read our work instead of erasing us.” Post found via Radish Reviews, a great site operated by Natalie Luhrs who would coincidentally also be a good pick for best fanwriter.

Jenny’s post really resonated with me, because my own journey as a speculative fiction reader and fan was very similar down to having books I found hugely problematic recommended to me over and over again before stumbling into a vast realm of SFF books by mostly female authors which were neither discussed nor mentioned at all.

Coffeeandink also weighs in and points out that it’s easy for straight white men to say that awards eligibility posts are tacky and that the market a.k.a readers will automatically find and nominate the best and most worthy works, when it’s known that works by men are more reviewed and generally given more attention.

Take this post by Jaime Lee Moyer, who wrote a wonderful Edwardian set fantasy novel called Delia’s Shadow, for example. Jaime Lee Moyer points out how there are many great books written by women, but when you check out “Year’s best” lists, it’s always the same handful of male names. Indeed, I quickly gave up looking at “Year’s best” lists for SFF, unless the list was compiled by a woman or to be found at a notable women-friend site, because how many times do I need to see Doctor Sleep or A Memory of Light or The Ocean at the End of the Lane or NOS4A2 extolled as the best books of the year? I already know about those books. However, it would be nice to find some new to me books on those lists.

While on the subject of A Memory of Light, apparently there are attempts to nominate the entire 15-book Wheel of Time series for a best novel Hugo. Leigh Butler at Tor.com is pleased (understandable, considering who the publisher is), Damien Walter at the Guardian less so. I’m inclined to agree with Damien Walter on this one. Whatever one thinks of the literary merits of the Wheel of Time series (I can’t comment, because I’ve never read the series), if there is one speculative property that does not need the attention boost of a Hugo nomination, it is Wheel of Time. Yet the series is familiar to a whole lot of people and may well end up on the shortlist. Which would put me as a Hugo voter in an unpleasant situation, because I honestly have no idea how to vote on Wheel of Time and there is no way I am reading a whole series of 15 very thick books I have very little interest in.

If there were no recommendation and awards eligibility lists, we would probably see even more examples of people nominating the familiar, simply because it is familiar. And is this really what we want?

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First Gender Debate of the Year – Hurray!

Posted on January 14, 2014 by Cora

It seems we’re having the first gender debate of the year, though this time around we are not talking about women writers for once, but about masculine writing.

The first volley was fired by Paul S. Kemp, author of several Forgotten Realms and Star Wars Extended Universe novels as well as of the original sword & sorcery novels The Hammer and the Blade and A Discourse in Steel, when he wrote a blogpost called “Why I write masculine stories”.

My eyes were already rolling so hard I could barely focus, when I first clicked on the link. But the truth is that the post isn’t quite as bad as the title makes it sound. Okay, so Paul S. Kemp has a rather old-fashioned idea of masculinity and there is a weird derailing into the subject of “Women and children first” in case of shipwrecks (which coincidentally applies only in very specific circumstances*). But if Paul S. Kemp wants to write about manly men, then more power to him. However, that doesn’t mean I have to read it.

Besides, I’d like to point out that some of the characteristics of “manly men” that Kemp lists, such as “drinks a lot”, “womanizing” and “answer violence with violence” don’t necessarily strike me as honourable. Nor do I think that being stoic in the face of pain and having your emotions in check are all that admirable qualities. Never mind that none of the characteristics that Kemp lists are exclusively masculine, not even the womanizing. I mean, there are lesbian womanizers. Not to mention promiscuous heterosexual women.

Liz Bourke and Deb E. Howell both point out that the list of typically masculine behaviours Kemp gives could just as well apply to women.

Sam Sykes also points out that the characteristics Paul S. Kemp lists are not in fact traditionally masculine and that gender roles and characteristics are not nearly as clear-cut in general.

At Lawyers, Guns and Money, B. Spencer points out that ninety-nine percent of men are not bad-asses either and that denigrating women won’t turn them into bad-asses.

Chuck Wendig responds by pointing out the harm that traditional and clear-cut views of gender can do to men desperately trying to suppress their emotions. He also writes about how his non-stereotypically feminine heroine Miriam Black was called “a man with the serial numbers filed off”.

Now I hate, hate, hate the complaints that a tough woman character is “a man with boobs” (transphobia right there) or “a man with the serial numbers filed off”. Because guess what? Women aren’t all the same. And several of those characters later denounced as “men with boobs” were female characters I could identify with and found inspirational growing up. Isaac Asimov’s wonderful Dr. Susan Calvin, a character who is often called “unrealistic” and “really just a man with boobs” was one of my heroines as a teenager, a much needed antidote against my boyfriend obsessed classmates, a character who I identified with and who showed me that it was possible not to care about stuff like men and relationships and still live a great life.

Indeed, I’ve lately noticed a lot of backlash against tough heroines and the media that features them (mostly urban fantasy novels by female authors) from both men and women. Instead, we are supposed to admire more stereotypically feminine heroines, women who – to quote one post by a man I cannot locate now – “wield a diaper bag instead of a sword”. Yeah right, because all women are mothers.

Now I actually believe that we should have a broad variety of characters both male and female. I want to see both heroic and cowardly characters of either gender, stoic and emotional characters of either gender, motherly types and leather-clas arsekickers.

However, a big part of my heart will always belong to the leather-clad amazon, because those were the female characters I’ve always loved. Nor is the leather-clad arsekicker merely a product of a modern urban fantasy genre. I had very vivid fantasies of sexy leather-clad and weapon-wielding women kicking the shit out of monsters and demons, often connected to pop songs of the 1980s. Where did I get those images from? I guess where everybody else got them from, namely from Emma Peel, patron saint of all leather-clad arsekickers. And this is why calling today’s leather-clad urban fantasy heroines “male fantasies” (even though most of them are written by women) hurts me. Because I wanted to be those women long before anybody decided to write books about them.

Finally, here is an older (from May 2013) post from Amanda Hocking’s blog, in which she talks about how she deliberately tried to distance herself from anything “girly” as a teenager, because she had internalized the idea that anything stereotypically feminine was automatically inferior. This post really struck a chord with me, because this rejection of anything feminine is a problem that many geek girls have (I don’t even exclude myself there, though I grew out of it) and it’s incredibly harmful.

People of whatever gender are more than just a collection of characteristics.

*Even aboard the Titanic, plenty of men, both passengers and crewmembers, did survive, while many female and minor steerage passengers drowned. However, many male first and second class passengers really did let women and children have lifeboat seats without complaints probably due to the way they were raised. During the sinking of the Empress of Ireland in 1914, only about five percent of the children onboard and thirteen percent of the women were saved, compared to nearly thirty percent of male passengers and almost sixty percent of crewmembers. Meanwhile, male passengers and crewmembers were far more likely to survive the MS Estonia sinking in 1994, while most women and youngsters died, even if they made it off the ship.

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