Guest Post: One Percent is Not a Solution

My friend Sheila emailed this to me, asking if I would put it on my blog. Please share it. 

One Percent is Not a Solution

Sheila Kelly

I checked the current population of the US this morning, which the internet says is 327,700,000. Three percent (the mostly frequently touted mortality rate of Covid-19) of that is 9,831,000, but it's possible that it's as low as 1%, which would be 3,277,000. I think it's safe to say that if this highly infectious virus spreads unchecked, somewhere between three and ten million people in this country will die.

About three million people die every year in the US anyway, so the best-case scenario is that we'll double the average annual death rate -- if nothing else factors in. If the virus doesn't mutate. If our healthcare system is not overwhelmed by the number of cases and more people die because they couldn't get care. If the people who initially survive the virus don't relapse or experience complications that shorten their lives. In other words, if we're very, very insanely lucky, only three million will die.

Who are these three million? Some of your elected officials will have you believe they're the elderly, as we're the most vulnerable. I suppose we've had a chance to live longer than most, so it seems justifiable that we can be sacrificed. But then, we'll also be murdering people with pre-existing conditions or suppressed immune systems (and, I assure you, not all of them are old people.) A good portion of the dead will be neither old nor vulnerable; that's just the way this plague works. So, let's say three million random people can die for the greater good.

If someone rounded up three million citizens in this country and executed them, we would call it a holocaust. Even if they were old, or not as healthy as others. I can think of no cause that would make our government do that.

Or I didn't, until I woke up this morning.

Here's an alternative plan: let's just kill everyone who is infected right now. At this point that would cost only, what, a hundred thousand lives? Peanuts compared to three million, really. We don't really need that senator, or those congressmen, or those celebrities who are infected, right? By summer the US would be virus-free, and the economy back on track. It's just as heartless, yes, but the numbers are better. And that seems to be the only thing that matters to the government right now. The numbers.

Just one problem with both plans: We are not numbers. We are human beings. We are all important.

"Whoever destroys a soul, it is considered as if he destroyed an entire world. And whoever saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world." -- Jerusalem Talmud, Sanhedrin 4:1 (22a)

My wish today is that we don't kill anyone on purpose. That we put the value of all lives above the numbers. That we do what we must to save as many as we can. That is the only decent solution.

Guest Post: The Metaphysics of Science Fiction

I occasionally offer my blog to fellow creative travelers and today it is my great pleasure to hand over this space to Lancelot Shaubert. 

I first met Lance through the Writer Unboxed community and attended several writing retreats with him in the past few years. He is a bright, driven, passionate artist in all senses of the word. A writer, a musician, a filmmaker, Lance is someone whose vision includes collaboration and connection. I am honored to know him. Honored to be named a mentor by him. Honored to be part of his anthology.

Lance sent this to me when I was experiencing a low moment - feeling as if my creative work was at a dead end and not reaching or touching an audience. I didn't know until reading this how profoundly my story had moved Lance. He saw in it elements I did not consciously intend, but as all art is a construction between artist and audience, I am honored by what he sees in it. 

I leave you his thoughtful piece to consider.

The Metaphysics of Sci-Fi
Lancelot Shaubert

Since the meaning of anything is first and foremost the meaning of everything, sci-fi stories can carry a heavy metaphysical burden by virtue of containing lots of things: big things, small things, multiple planets full of things and so forth. When it comes to awakening the metaphysical import of science fiction inside of me, no living author has done so both through their craft and friendship more than LJ Cohen.

It seems every time we get together, she and I end up talking about meaning and philosophy and metaphysics. Time and again, both in those talks and through her work, she proves that sci-fi carries that burden better than any fiction genre other than fantasy. Take her most recent short “Perpetual Silence” from the Of Gods and Globes anthology I edited this summer. For starters, I cry every time I read her story. No exaggeration. I cry every time I read her story for the amount it says in so little, the weight it carries with such honesty and curiosity and melancholy: this is a story that gets the essence of nostalgia, of Sehnsucht.

Spoiler alert for those of you that care about such things (though I tend to think spoilers enhance rather than detract from the reading experience), but her story features a young woman researcher creating an instantaneous comms link in the distant heavens through a satellite. It’s like internet for deep space, a phone call to the other end of the galaxy. Strictly speaking, this should be impossible, but they figure it out. Problem: this instantaneous communication works like a virus and erases all lag from all communication between satellites. It’s inconvenient to the scientist long-term and she terminates her team’s life’s work in an instant of code. Why?

“She’d called the universe. The universe had called back.” She sought the ultimate consciousness behind infinite being and total reality and that consciousness responded. It scared her enough that she shuttered the program.

Think about that: she discovered and verified prayer. The story’s a metaphysical and astronomical argument for prayer. And for why we don’t pray: we’re actually scared of an answer, scared of the grounds of all reality, of the necessary and sufficient cause of being having... well... a mind of its own.

It’s not the only time an author asks such questions in a sci-fi story.

Star Wars quite famously proffered a sort of gnostic dualism as the grounds of its magic system. Dune dealt with the nature of prophecy to affect not only space, but timelines, and what time means for one’s identity. Firefly asks classic existentialist questions over and again: particularly the "Out of Gas" episode where they ask why does a screwdriver exist? Why is there such a thing as a screwdriver when there should be nothing? When a screwdriver and none of the material or efficient causes of a screwdriver can possibly contain the cause of a screwdriver’s being, moment to moment?

Heady questions from space cowboys...

The Martian, of course, asked if raw conscious courage can trump mindless matter. The Foundation (poorly, I think) asks questions based on the Hegelian picture of history (bolstered poorly by the Wellsian picture of history and mythology), questions that Sanderson picks back up in Elantris and... in a way... stumbles through to something like a more holistic picture.

The Man in the High Castle more than any asked if America would ever create true art, a true work of beauty (one that delights in making intimate the great distance between two things while preserving said distance) when we Americans obsess on the one hand with our hyper utilitarian purgation of art and on the other hand with profiting off of commodities and frauds?

If art, in other words, makes a new culture by preserving our own special uniqueness via a singular intimate encounter with what’s us and no one else, then we ought not (1) worry about profits first, for art is not advertisement, nor (2) worry about how many copies of our work exist, for art is about preserving that beatific distance in an intimate encounter and not about the proliferation of our namesake, nor (3) the efficacious or tangible or systematic affect of our work on the immediate society, for art is about the seventh generation and not about us and therefore the virtue it forms in us is far more important and far-reaching than whatever system it could tweak or technology it could inspire.

Though, strictly speaking, the Elon Musks of today are a few generations removed from the scifi of yesterdecade.

And then there’s Station Eleven, a sci-fi book written by a literary author (whatever that means) who typically writes for The Millions. Emily St. John Mandel builds a whole book out of graphic novel meta references and quotes from Star Trek claiming things like SURVIVAL IS INSUFFICIENT as well as songs and skits from a rag tag traveling orchestra and theater company — all of this points to the value of science fiction and dreaming of the future in a post apocalyptic world mostly killed off by the flu.

She ends the book with the first set of folks taking off in the first plane since the plague, dreaming of the first ships sailing in the dark since the crisis, and drawing a clean line between the sci-fi of today and the best parts of that science fiction vision which motivated The New World mythos, Columbus and all...

Whether or not the metaphysics of the 17th century was true — or whether or not the Manifest Destiny it upheld is just or beautiful or good — is a question for another day, but no one can deny that the idea of Manifest Destiny showed up first in 17th century science fiction. After all, the metaphysicians and fictioneers of that time were only following in a literary tradition solidified by Dante — an author only willfully stupid readers would claim had no metaphysical impetus behind his description of that great reversal of gravity the protagonist of Inferno experiences while passing down the frozen demon’s belly button.

____

Lancelot Schaubert has sold hundreds of stories, articles, and poems to markets like TOR (Macmillan), The New Haven Review, McSweeney’s, The World Series Edition of Poker Pro, The Poet’s Market, Writer’s Digest, and many similar venues. 

To grab a free copy of chapter one of his best written work (slated for 2019) and his best song, click here. 

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Guest Post: Some Doors Will Open, but Not All: Traditional Publishing with a Small Press

Some Doors Will Open, but Not All: Traditional Publishing with a Small Press

KJ Kabza

I've known LJ Cohen since 2008, when we met in a local writing workshop and later became part of the same critique group. Since then, our approaches to our careers have taken somewhat different paths, since (happily) authors now have many publication options and ways to make a profit.

LJ mostly self-published novels. I tend to traditionally publish short stories, selling my work for flat fees in anthologies and magazines. Recently, my career got a big shot in the arm with another move in traditional publishing, the publication in January of my first print short fiction collection: THE RAMSHEAD ALGORITHM AND OTHER STORIES. Hooray!

 "Kabza's stories [are]... powerful work that is wholly original, delightfully strange, and emotionally resonant." —LJ Cohen, blurbing my book, because she is awesome

I've dabbled in self-publishing before with two ebook-only short fiction collections, IN PIECES and UNDER STARS, but unlike LJ, I lack the fortitude to make self-publishing my primary career tactic. So I was excited to see the difference that having a real publishing house behind me would make.

Well... I did see a difference. And doors did open. But my publisher, Pink Narcissus Press, is very, very small—only five people, who each have varying degrees of part-time involvement—and if you publish with a small press, be warned that not all of those Magic Traditional Publishing Doors will swing open for you.

Here are some doors that DID open, working with Pink Narcissus:

• Greater chance of gorgeous cover art (and interior illustrations). My editor, Michael Takeda, dealt with finding and paying an artist, which I know almost nothing about.
• Access to better production quality. Pink Narcissus has vastly more experience in font selection, layout, ISBN registration, actual book printing, and so on than I do, and that experience is reflected in the finished product.
• More outlets, reviewers, and bloggers hearing pitches for my book. My publisher wrote the review pitch we used, and with my editor's help, I could query far more places than I ever could have on my own.
• Coverage by major review outlets. RAMSHEAD got good reviews in Booklist, RT Book Reviews, and Publishers Weekly, which are all outlets that are (to say the least) wary of reviewing self-published work.

However, here are some doors that did NOT open:

• No possibility of coverage on several big review platforms. Many outlets were explicit about saying that they only covered books published by a "big 5" publisher.
• Almost impossible to organize a blog tour. For the same reason as above.
• Separate, harder process for asking Barnes & Noble stores to stock physical copies. I had to follow a procedure for small press books outlined via the B&N website, which is not a procedure that "big 5" books have to follow—meaning that the odds of B&N stores carrying RAMSHEAD are much slimmer.
• No placement in Books-A-Million stores. Pink Narcissus, like many small presses, prints their copies on demand, and Books-A-Million does not accept POD titles.
• Some stores are only willing to sell RAMSHEAD under certain conditions. Two local bookstores are currently selling copies of RAMSHEAD on consignment, which is great—they're selling it!—but not quite as great as being an author with a big publishing house whose books are more likely to be ordered from a bookstore by a distributor.

Of course, these are only the circumstances that surrounded THE RAMSHEAD ALGORITHM AND OTHER STORIES in particular. Other small presses may be able to step up (or have to step down) in different areas. And in RAMSHEAD's case, there are other variables at play: it contains both science fiction and fantasy (and some reviewers aren't interested in things outside one or the other), and it's a collection of short stories (and many outlets only want to review novels).

Still, I've learned a lot. The launch of RAMSHEAD was a rough road, but at least I have a few data points now. I know where the doors are.

So if, next time, all those other doors DO swing open for me, I'll be ready to sprint on straight through.

—KJ

Thank you, KJ, for your post. I'm a big fan of your work and have been since that writing workshop so many years ago! And to my readers here - if you are looking for short fiction that is magical, unsettling at times, and always unique, please go read KJ's work.

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Where to find me - virtually (part 3)

And we're still working hard!

The blog tour in support of DREADNOUGHT AND SHUTTLE continues. If you've missed any of my guest posts, you can find part 1 here and part 2 here.

I've estimated that I've written close to 20,000 words of non-fiction for these posts in the past month or so. It's definitely been a challenge to keep it interesting and keep it from being the same old same old answers. Remember, stay tuned because there will be a test scavenger hunt where the prize is some of my recent ceramics goodies.

From my last show - some recent work

I'll start out this group of posts with one I wrote for The Scriptors, a group of Indie Writers I'm a part of. In the post, I shared some real numbers of books sold and earnings from DREADNOUGHT's launch and from my first 4 years as an author-publisher. There isn't a lot of hard data on earning - we tend to hear the stories of the superstar outliers, but not a whole lot from average-Joe-writer.

~~~~~

Rick Wayne is a writer whose work I adore and who I've become friends with through the magic of google plus. He and I share a lot of the same ethos when it comes to writing and sometime later in the year, we will be working on a co-written novel. There aren't many people I think I could relax my control-freak ways with to embark on a project like this. Rick is in that very short list. He invited me to his blog where I talked about my strengths and weaknesses as a writer.

Rick writes kick ass genre-blending specfic/cyberpunk/thriller . . . it's good shit. Just read it. Okay?

~~~~~

Justine Graykin is another fellow 'broad' from Broad Universe. I met her at either Arisia or Boskone a few years back and was immediately captivated by how well she read her work aloud. And it was hard not to notice the large dragon she had wrapped around her neck and shoulders! She gave me space on her blog to talk about my philosophy and the themes that emerge in my writing.

~~~~~

Susan Spann is a writer, lawyer, and keeper of an amazing home reef (Calling it a fish tank does not do it justice!) Her Shinobi mystery series is a favorite of mine and combines ancient Japan, mysteries, and a buddy-cop-like partnership between a ninja and a Portuguese Jesuit. If you want to see some of the strange and off-beat things I've had to research for the Halcyone Space books, take a look!.

~~~~~

And last, but certainly not least in today's round up is my guest post on Tamara Jones's blog. I initially 'met' Tamara over twelve years ago on an online writing message board called Forward Motion for Writers. Since then, we've become friends. Not only is she a wonderful writer, she's also a skilled quilter. And she can kill off characters like nobody's business. Stop by her blog, where I chat about networking for writers.

~~~~~

That's all for this group of posts! Stay tuned for the final round up and announcement of the scavenger hunt.

#SFWApro

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Guest Post: Sandra Ulbrich Almazan and the Season Avatars series

Today I have turned over my blog to Sandra Ulbrich Almazan, a fellow SFF writer and Broad Universe member. But not only is she a member of Broad Universe, she is one of its founders and I also learned from reading her official bio, that she appeared on Jeopardy! (Which is most cool!)

I recently read book 1 of the series and enjoyed the unique world building and mix of magic and religion that inform the story. 

Book 3 of Sandra's Season Avatars fantasy series, CHAOS SEASON has recently been published and she has allowed me to post a small snippet for your reading pleasure. Enjoy!

Jenna strode forward until she stood in the center of the lawn. Back on the farm, she used to pull off her boots so she could feel the earth with her feet. Noblewomen, however, wore boots with lots of little buttons that took forever to undo. Jenna had to squat and press her palms into the lawn to connect with the seeds.

These seeds were unlike any she’d ever worked with. They were light, with a leaf-like wing attached to the seed pod. The shape reminded her of a maple seed, but the color was as white as death. Maybe they were the seeds she’d seen earlier. How did they get here so quickly? Despite the hard seed pods protecting the seeds, the new plants inside seemed to sense her magic. She didn’t even have to focus on the seeds before they germinated. Each new plant drew upon its seed pod and wing so fiercely for nourishment they they crumbled to dust. These plants were hungry, hungry as animals, and just as willing to seek out their food.

Jenna didn’t like that at all.

There’s something not right about these plants. I shouldn’t encourage them to grow….

“Hold, two of them!” a man shouted. “Two of the harpies who attacked the most talented, most wondrous Sal-thaath!”

Further shouts answered him. Jenna didn’t speak Selathen, but she did know their word for “Avatar,” and that was the only word she could pick out. They had to be talking about her and Kay. Even if they were here for Ysabel, they wouldn’t mind giving Jenna and Kay to Sal-thaath, the boy who’d attacked Gwen, as well. Jenna had no other plants she could use as weapons, and she couldn’t count on Kay to defend them. It was up to her and the strange plants to stop the Selathens.

Summer, help me, I beg you. Help me make these plants grow faster than weeds.

Each sprout sank a tiny root into the dirt and stretched down deep. At the same time, the seed leaves opened, drinking in faint sunlight shining through the drizzle. The roots spread out and grabbed other plants next to them. The grass turned yellow and brittle, but the new plants shot up tall and thick, sending out heart-shaped leaves—and fine needle-like barbs covering their stalks. Jenna retreated before her own defenses attacked her. But the deathbush—the best name she could give this strange plant—continued to grow supernaturally fast even without her magic. In heartbeats, the stalks towered over her, each shoot half as thick as her waist. The Selathens would think twice about chopping the deathbush down. The spines would prevent them from getting too close. The only problem was the sidewalk to the front wasn’t blocked. Ysabel’s father charged down the path toward Jenna.

Before she could react, Kay stepped forward, her hand raised and her eyes paler than normal. Jenna shivered as a chill enveloped her for a couple of heartbeats. The sidewalk glimmered with a thin sheen of ice. Ysabel’s father slipped, fell, and slid into a deathbush.

Chaos Season

Jenna Dorshay t’Reve isn’t your typical farmer’s daughter. Blessed with plant magic, she’s been impatiently waiting to take her place as Summer Avatar of Challen. All she and her sister Season Avatars have to do is tame a Chaos Season, a magical weather storm sent to Challen by a wrathful demigoddess. They’ve done this many times in other lives, but now dangerous plants resistant to Jenna’s magic make Chaos Season worse. Even the assistance of the War Avatar, father of Jenna’s child, may not be enough to stop the plants. Before Jenna can conquer the deathbushes and tame Chaos Season, she must fully link with the other Avatars in her quartet, but to do so means revealing a secret that can tear them apart.
You can find CHAOS SEASON in all the usual places.
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
iTunes
Kobo
 

About Sandra

Sandra Ulbrich Almazan started reading at the age of three and only stops when absolutely required to. Although she hasn’t been writing quite that long, she did compose a very simple play in German during middle school. Her science fiction novella Move Over Ms. L. (an early version of Lyon’s Legacy) earned an Honorable Mention in the 2001 UPC Science Fiction Awards, and her short story “A Reptile at the Reunion” was published in the anthology Firestorm of Dragons. Other works include the science fiction Catalyst Chronicles series, the fantasy Season Avatars series, SF Women A-Z: A Reader’s Guide, and several science fiction and fantasy short stories. She is a founding member of Broad Universe, which promotes science fiction, fantasy, and horror written by women. Her undergraduate degree is in molecular biology/English, and she has a Master of Technical and Scientific Communication degree. She currently works for an enzyme company; she’s also been a technical writer and a part-time copyeditor for a local newspaper. Some of her other accomplishments are losing on Jeopardy! and taking a stuffed orca to three continents. She lives in the Chicago area with her husband, Eugene; and son, Alex. In her rare moments of free time, she enjoys archery, crocheting, listening to classic rock (particularly the Beatles), trooping as a Jawa with the Midwest Garrison of the 501st Legion, and watching improv comedy.

Sandra can be found online at the following links:
website
blog
Twitter
Facebook
Goodreads
Instagram

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Where to find me - virtually (part 2)

Dev and I are still hard at work!

The blog tour in support of DREADNOUGHT AND SHUTTLE continues! I've been hither and yon and my fellow bloggers continue to host my rambling - for which I am grateful. If you've missed any of the guest posts (and you definitely shouldn't miss any of them . . . there will be a test later. Okay, not actually a test, but a scavenger hunt. With prizes), you can find part 1 here.

Masha DuToit, whose fantasy/magical realism novels CROOKS AND STRAIGHTS and WOLF LOGIC  rocked my world in 2015, (seriously - have you read them yet? Why not????) invited me over to her blog for a lovely interview. Want to know what book I hated and why? Head on over.

Randee Dawn is an absolutely lovely human being and talented writer who I have met through Broad Universe. Randee's brand new agent is shopping her fabulous urban fantasy book. I know it's fabulous because I got to read it last summer. All you mere mortals will have to wait until some lucky publisher snatches it up. Here's my guest post about integrating my medical/rehabilitation background with my writing life.

Spec Fic writer, geek dad, and fellow-in-the-trenches indie publisher, Ryan Toxopeus, was kind enough to interview me on his blog also. He asked me some wonderful and thought provoking questions - it's definitely not your generic author interview! His fantasy books are still on my TBR list. My only excuse is that I've been reading mainly SF these days. 

Another fellow Broad Universe broad (EJ Frost) hosted me to talk more about writing injuries and disabilities realistically - a topic that is near and dear to my heart from my physical therapy past. My main point? Don't use an injury or disability as a plot device, especially not to engender false sympathy for a character or to motivate one either.

Another day, another interview! Phew! I know you're all dying to know everything there is to know about me and this interview gets us at least part of the way there! Thank you to Melanie Tomlin for allowing me space on her blog.

Hey - look - it's another of my Broad Universe colleagues! This time Sandra Ulbrich Almazan, fellow  SF&F writer, who invited me to her internet home to talk about the importance of speculative fiction. You can read about why I think it is subversive and wonderful. And what I wanted to be when I grew up.

And last for this round up, but certainly NOT least, a post on Karen Conlin's blog about how it feels to work with an editor. Karen has edited three of my novels in the past two years and I lovingly say she is brutal in all the right ways.


Stay tuned for more posts next week!

And a reminder, if you are new to the novels of Halcyone Space, you can start with where it all began. DERELICT (book 1) is only 0.99 for kindle. 

A group of teens stranded on a sentient spaceship must work together or risk being killed when the ship's AI wakes believing it's still fighting the war that damaged it decades ago.

#SFWApro

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Guest Post: Evoking emotions in writing

 

Evoking emotions in writing (aka – why Val doesn't write poetry)

Today, I turn my blog over to fellow writer and all-around lovely human, Val Griswold-Ford. I first met Val online at Forward Motion for Writers. Then we realized we lived about an hour and change from one another. We've become friends and critique buddies over the years. I've enjoyed her Carter's Cove stories from the first time I read her advent serials. And yes, I want to move there.

Take it away, Val!

_________________________________

First, Lisa, thank you for letting me come over and talk! For those who follow Lisa, you know she writes lovely poetry, [thank you, Val!] a talent which I am insanely jealous of, because I love poetry, but the honest truth is that I suck at it. I can write paragraphs that can flow and be lyrical, that can jump off the page, but my poetry just lies there, limp and uncaring and flat, like a fish gone far too long to be salvaged. [Hey, Val, that's a pretty vivid metaphor - you know, as in poetry. . ..] But I love poetry, and I think that anyone who can write it has magic.

Good poetry evokes emotions, not just in the reader, but in the poet as well, and to be a successful writer of anything, you have to feel it. Otherwise, you're a typewriter or word processor – you're throwing words on a page that lie as flat as the long-dead fish I referenced earlier. Emotions mean life, and life is what brings readers into a story.

I hate writing rules, so I'm not going to be giving you a bunch of technical tips and tricks on how to get emotions into your writing. The only two rules that mean anything is BICFOK (Butt In Chair, Fingers On Keyboard), and care about what you're writing about, as far as I'm concerned. You have to love your story, your world, your characters. If you don't, it shows. The readers can tell.

I adore Carter's Cove, the setting for my newest series that starts with Winter's Secrets. I really, really want to make it real and move into it, even though I hate winter and loathe snow, and it's set on the coast of Maine. Why? Because the town is a living, breathing character, as much as Molly and Schrodinger are. It's been a bit of a challenge to write, because I don't see pictures in my mind, so I have spacial issues. But it's something I've been able to work around, and it's very important to me that my readers can see who and what I'm talking about, while still being able to connect with the characters on their own.

For me (and remember, I hate rules, so this is for me only, YMMV), the key to evoking emotions is to engage my senses. [Yup. That's one of the major parts of writing poetry, too.] And not just the ones we always remember (sight and sound). What does the air feel like against your character's skin? What does he or she smell? Taste? These little things build upon one another, until your reader is standing there beside your character, the cold winter wind bringing the scents of tea and salt water to their noses, the sounds of horses' hooves on the cobblestones as they pull a sleigh full of singing children behind them. If you're really good, your reader will now be reaching for a blanket, because they're cold, even though they're reading your book on the hottest afternoon in June so far. That's a master stroke, right there.

To find more about Molly, Schrodinger, and Carter's Cove, check out Winter's Secrets on Amazon. You can also see their adventures on my blog, www.vg-ford.com, and follow me on Patreon, where I'm offering stories under Valerie Ford. Thank you again, Lisa!

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Guest Post: Getting Older and Bolder

Today I am delighted to host fellow writer and 'woman of a certain age' Samantha Bryant, author of Going Through The Change: A Menopausal Superhero Novel. I read this darkly comic novel a few months ago when I was dealing with a family medical crisis and really appreciated both the wry humor as well as the originality of the story. Please welcome Samantha to Once in a Blue Muse!

Getting Older and Bolder

Last year we had a lot of staff turnover at my school, and I realized I was officially “getting old.” I could tell because all the new teachers (mostly fresh out of college) looked like children to me. There was one that I honestly thought might be one of our eighth graders.

Was it really so long ago that I was that fresh-face young woman? Apparently, yes. I’m not very gray yet, but the students are much more likely to slip and call me Mom than they used to be. 

Sorry, Samantha, but I have you beat in the salt and pepper hair contest. - ljc

I’m getting curmudgeonly, too. It shows in an impatience with over-dramatic situations and narcissism. I get impatient, too, with how all the female heroes in my books, comics, television shows, and movies are somewhere between thirteen and thirty.

When I’m feeling very cynical, I see it as a reflection of our society’s obsession with youth, especially when it comes to women. By the time you gain enough experience to know what you’re doing, large segments of the population are ready to write you off as over the hill.

When I’m feeling more sanguine, I can see it as wish-fulfillment. We glorify youth in our fiction because we miss it and know that we could do it so much better now than we did when we had it. Youth is wasted on the young, as they say.

Still, as I approach being described as a “woman of a certain age,” I long to see more heroes that I can empathize with: grown women with families, careers, experience, and history. Not finding many, I wrote my own. Like Toni Morrison said, “If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.”

So, I wrote Going Through the Change: A Menopausal Superhero Novel. The main characters are all women, ranging in age from thirty-two to sixty-seven, all living fully independent, adult lives. Three are mothers. One is also a grandmother. Two are married. One used to be. Two are serious career women. One has never worked outside the home. They’ve all got history, experience, and problems of their own. I love these women. They were a delight to write, so much so that I’ve already written them two additional short stories, a novella and a sequel (all upcoming releases). 

More about Linda? She was my favorite of your characters. Can I persuade you to write a whole story about her?? Pretty please?? - ljc

So whether you’re going through the change yourself, you’ve been there and done that, or that’s still on the horizon for you, I hope you can find a woman hero you can believe in in my book. These aren’t your father’s superheroes. I wrote them for us.

Going Through the Change is going through a change in price for a couple of days in early August. On August 5^th and 6^th you can get the Kindle edition for free on Amazon. Check it out at: http://bitly.com/face-the-change

Samantha Bryant is a middle school Spanish teacher by day and a mom and novelist by night. That makes her a superhero all the time. Her debut novel, Going Through the Change: A Menopausal Superhero Novel is now for sale by Curiosity Quills. You can find her online on her blog,  Twitter, on Facebook, on Amazon, on Goodreads, on the Curiosity Quills page, or on Google+.

Thank you so much for coming by the blog for today's post, Samantha! And I agree - it's refreshing and important for women in middle age and beyond to see themselves represented in fiction and as the heroes.

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Sightings in the Wild

I've been busy, here and there, hither and yon. Which is to say, there are four guest posts of mine out there on the great wide web from the past few weeks.

Why is a raven like a writing desk? Guest post for fellow word-smith, Julianne Douglas, writer of historical fiction, on how my poetry informs my fiction.  (From my intro to the post:)

Having been a poet for a far longer time than I have been a writer of fiction, I maintain that poetry - or at least the tools of poetry - underlies all effective writing. Not only that, but in writing speculative fiction, those tools can enhance world building and reader immersion in fundamental and crucial ways.

The poetic tools I'm going to focus on are specificity, musicality, and comparisons. All three can heighten the reading experience of your novel, especially novels of speculative fiction.

Interview on Addicted to Words, by crit partner and YA writer, Candie Campbell.

In which I answer questions about my favorite characters, books (mine and others), and show off some of my pottery.

My post on The Scriptors blog, Ithaka Rising: By the numbers, where I detail the sales/earnings in the first few weeks of my newest release. 

And, last, but not least, a long and detailed post for Susan Spann's blog, Spann of Time on the tasks involved in being a writer-publisher. Susan is both a writer (her Shinobi Mystery series is EXCELLENT) and an intellectual property lawyer, who runs the excellent twitter chat #publaw. (From my intro to the post:)

. . . I have just published my 5^th novel. One of my books has sold nearly 10,000 copies and spent much of last summer on the Amazon best seller lists. So am I a breakout success? That entirely depends on what you consider a success.

By the ‘can you support your family on your art’ metric, no. But very few writers can reach that high bar. I measure my success on a very different metric: Have I learned to put out a product that is indistinguishable from what you would find from any small or large publisher? Yes. Do those books sell in the open marketplace? Yes. Do those books get favorably compared to traditionally published books in similar genres? Yes.

Plenty of news and views of yours truly, along with some (I hope) useful information about the world of indie-publishing and the writing life. 

#SFWApro

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Interviews, Giveaways & Readercon, Oh My

Busy as a bee. . .
Photo by atramos, used under CC license

I've been here and there on the internet for the past few weeks, including a Q&A with Lynn Viehl (where I answer the question: If you could step into a time machine and visit any SF universe (including your own), what would you choose as your destination, and why?) and a guest post on Julianne Douglas' blog on the connections between writing poetry and writing speculative fiction. Julianne is running a giveaway of an eBook and signed paperback copy of ITHAKA RISING, so head over there and leave a comment for your chance to win.

To pique your interest, here is the opening to my guest post on using poetry tools in fiction:
 

Why is a raven like a writing desk?

. . . or how is writing poetry related to writing science fiction?

According to Lewis Carroll, there actually isn't a true answer to his nonsensical riddle from Alice in Wonderland, but I do have an answer to my question.

Having been a poet for a far longer time than I have been a writer of fiction, I maintain that poetry - or at least the tools of poetry - underlies all effective writing. Not only that, but in writing speculative fiction, those tools can enhance world building and reader immersion in fundamental and crucial ways.

The poetic tools I'm going to focus on are specificity, musicality, and comparisons. All three can heighten the reading experience of your novel, especially novels of speculative fiction.

If you're active on GoodReads, DERELICT (Halcyone Space, book 1) was chosen for one of July's group read picks on the Space Opera group! I have an author interview posted there and will be participating in reader Q&A.

This Thursday is the start of Readercon, where I'm going to be taking part in panels, reading, and signing. If you're in the Boston area, it's a great con, full of thought-provoking panels and great discussions about all things SF/F/H.

Here's my Readercon schedule: (You can also find me at the Broad Universe table in the dealer's room.)

Thursday July 09

9:00 PM    EM    Reading: Lisa Cohen. LJ Cohen. Lisa Cohen reads From ITHAKA RISING

Friday July 10

3:00 PM    IN    How to Read Poetry. Kythryne Aisling, Michael Cisco, LJ Cohen, C.S.E. Cooney, Samuel Delany, Elaine Isaak. Those who have never read poetry for pleasure often aren't sure how or where to start; even a short poem can look arcane and daunting. This workshop will explain how to get the most out of poetry on the page, from humorous doggerel to more complex works.

6:00 PM    E    Autographs. LJ Cohen, A. J. Odasso.

Saturday July 11

9:00 AM    G    Zombies as a Crisis of the Ecosystem: A Holistic Perspective. John Benson, Gwendolyn Clare, LJ Cohen, Meriah Crawford, Catt Kingsgrave. Zombie plagues, like all pandemics, are ecosystem crises. What aspects of the human ecosystem make it possible for such a plague to spread? (Long distance air travel, say, or science fiction conventions.) What would its effects be on agriculture, infrastructure, labor availability, public health (aside from the plague itself), telecommunications, and other elements of human civilization? Where most disaster novels zoom in on the struggles of a few people to survive such a crisis, we will zoom out and consider large-scale, long-term questions.

 

3:00 PM    G    Beautiful and Terrible as the Morn: Celebrating Spec Fic's Older Women. Beth Bernobich, LJ Cohen, Kelley Eskridge, Eileen Gunn, Diane Weinstein. In a 2014 blog post, Kari Sperring wrote, "Most women who are now over about 40 have been told their whole lives to be good, to keep their heads down, to keep on working away quietly and to wait their turn. And now, within sff, at the point when their male contemporaries are celebrated, these same women are being told, No, it's too late for you, you don't matter enough; that space is needed. Get out of the way." Judith Tarr concurred in a post on Book View Café, saying, "Our culture makes a cult of youth.... But males as they age manage to stay visible, and even manage to keep matinee-idol status—and if they’re writers, they become literary lions. Females simply drop off the radar." Women over 40 have been shaping the genre since its beginning, as readers, writers, editors, agents, publishers, artists, critics, and more. This panel will celebrate the past, recent, and forthcoming work of older women, and help to put it back on everyone's radar.

Sunday July 12

9:00 AM    F    Wish Fulfillment for Happy Adults. John Benson, LJ Cohen, Betsy Mitchell, Sheila Williams, Ann Tonsor Zeddies. Wish fulfillment for teenagers and wish fulfillment for adults with happy stable lives are necessarily going to be different. Speculative stories are great for navigating the trickiness of coming-of-age, but there's precious little for those who are already of age and have started to prioritize comfort over adventure. Female readers in particular often turn to romance novels for stories about familes and love and kindness, and to mysteries for stories about grown women with agency and purpose. Can speculative fiction draw in those readers by fulfilling different sorts of wishes?

#SFWApro

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More thoughts on the privilege and responsibility of being a writer

Because even in 1966, we knew representation was important. (Art by Makintosh, used with attribution http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/star-trek-the-original-series/images/5821021/title/star-trek-tos-fan-art-fanart )

I participate in blogging for a writer's collective called The Scriptors, and my most recent blogpost there was on the writer's privilege and responsibility to reflect the diversity of the world around them. Here is the beginning of the post and I invite you to read its entirety on The Scriptors site.

I was planning on writing an amusing post about the subjectivity of reviews and why you don’t ever want to be *that* writer. And then the Ferguson Grand Jury decision came out. My husband and I watched the live feed of the official statement, and then of the protests, the police response, and the violent aftermath.

I am heartsick.

We have so far to go to achieve a fair and just society and I am just one small voice; a writer with little platform and less power. What can I do to change what is so broken in our world?

I am under no illusion that I have the ability to persuade those who believe differently than I do. I vote in every election, but the reality is, our choices are often between less bad and more bad. If I gave away every dollar I had to fund social justice causes, I would be destitute and nothing would change.

And yet. . . and yet I cannot do nothing.

I know there is a lot of discussion and controversy around issues of diversity, especially with white writers writing about characters of color. Daniel Jose Older wrote a cogent piece on "12 Fundamentals of Writing the Other" that is a great starting point for all writers trying to get it right. I urge you to read it.

Another excellent resource is this blogpost by Jim C. Hines, complete with a list of links for further examination. In the post, this line jumped out at me"

"It’s the difference between “I want to include you in my stories” and “I want to tell your stories.”"

He's speaking about the distinction between diversity and appropriation, issues that writers with societal privilege and power need to grapple with in writing characters that reflect the cultural composition of the wider world we all inhabit.

I strongly believe in the philosophy behind the "We Need Diverse Books" campaign: that representation is important. It is crucial. We learn about the world through the characters we inhabit in our reading and viewing, especially when we are young. I remember wondering why none of the heroes in the SF books I devoured as a kid were girls. I wonder what other messages I absorbed while I was reading that I'm not so acutely aware of.

And as important is seeing oneself in fiction is for people in the minority, it is also important for people in the majority to see the 'other'. We know that reading enhances empathy. What messages get transmitted when either we see only one kind of person in our fiction, or see the 'other' as token, or stereotype, or fetish? I believe that these implicit messages are very powerful and shape our society in ways we haven't yet fully appreciated.

Look at the impact of the original Star Trek series. Nichelle Nichols, the actress who played Uhura, talks about how she had been planning on leaving the show after the first season, until she met Martin Luther King, Jr, who told her how vital her role was in inspiring a generation. She recounts that he told her: "I [couldn't] leave the show. We talked a long time about what it all meant and what images on television tell us about ourselves."

Whoopie Goldberg also credits Nichols' Uhura with inspiring her to believe she could be anything she wanted to be. And astronaut Mae Jemison, the first African American astronaut to go into space credits seeing Nichols as Uhura as her inspiration. (Cool trivia: Jemison also appeared in Star Trek: The Next Generation.)

And this was due to a supporting role on a show that only saw three seasons on TV, yet went on to have an enormous cultural impact.

I am conscious, every time I sit at the computer to write, that what I write carries a message. Even if I set out to simply write entertaining stories about fantasy worlds or the future, everything has a message. If I people my universes only with reflections of myself and my life experiences, then I send a message that anything else is trivial.

That cannot be further from the truth.

Guest Post: Deviation, a Scifi book by A.J. Maguire

Wow - this cover is amazing!

Hey Blog readers - this is Lisa. Today I am thrilled to host writer, friend, and all around awesome person, A.J. (Aimee) Maguire. Aimee and I have been reading one another's work for crit for years now and it's been a real pleasure seeing her work get out into the world.

I had the privilege of beta reading Deviation, at an earlier phase of its development, and I'm very excited to read it now that it's complete. The story deals with issues of gender politics in a way that should be more prevalent in SF, but isn't. And yet Aimee managed to write a story that isn't a polemic against the patriarchy, but a thought provoking adventure in a unique SF world. In today's guest post, she talks a little about how she did that. 

Welcome, Aimee, and thank you for writing this guest piece for the blog.

Treading the Line

My new release Deviation just received its first review and one of the comments that the reviewer made was that the “philosophical and scientific topics” I explore in the book could have easily become a soap-box. To my relief, the reviewer expressed that there was no soap-box apparent in the book and that I had managed to convey this world without coming down on either side of things too heavy-handed. 

I admit that I was terrified I was going to press some “hot buttons” with Deviation. The world I created was very male-dominated, had women tightly subjugated and in robes – not to mention scarce – and had the potential to aggravate someone into thinking I was making some political statement. 

And who knows, maybe I’ll get a Reader out there who decides that’s just what I did and makes a big hullaballoo about it.

For right now, I’m going to rest assured that at least one reader/reviewer didn’t see it that way. I know there are some books out there whose sole intent is to make some kind of point like that, but I’m not that kind of writer.

So how does an author convey a realistic world without appearing to show their own biases, especially if they know that the subject matter is sensitive?

Well … 

I’ll tell you what I did, but it’s sort of a non-answer. 

I concentrated on the characters on the page. My story isn’t about the politics of the world I created, or the science that peppers the pages; it’s about the characters. 

Specifically, it’s about two women who are taken from their home and their desperate struggle to get back. Yes, the politics block their way sometimes (or most of the time, as it were) but the focus isn’t so much on how or why those politics got there. Rather, the focus is on the character’s reactions to being stuck. 

If you’re one of those writers who likes to make political satires or use their work as a means to expose the world as we know it, then more power to you. I have nothing against that, I just don’t write that way.

I’m talking to the other writers out there, the ones who find themselves in the nail-biting position I was in while writing Deviation. Concentrate on your characters and how they react to the world and everything should fall into place. 

Thanks, Aimee! If you have any questions for her about this, any of her other books, or anything else about Deviation, please ask away in comments.

A.J. (Aimee Jean) Maguire
A.J. Maguire is a consumer of stories. She thoroughly believes that stories are the bedrock of humanity, and that the answer to every question in life can be found in the tales that we tell. She also believes that spiders are the spawn of Satan and that her cat might just be the reincarnation of Dionysus.

If, of course, a Greek god were capable of being reincarnated.

Her writing runs the gamut between science fiction, fantasy, and (soon-to-be) historical fiction. She even has a semi-horror/ghost story in the works that she intends to release as a serialized novel during the Fall of 2014. Maguire focuses on complex female protagonists who are capable of laughter even amid tragedy, or sometimes in spite of tragedy.

Maguire is passionate about her craft and constantly working to improve. She'll probably keep telling stories long into her old age (which is still several decades off) and believes that being an author is the single greatest, most wonderful gift she has been given -- apart from her son. She looks forward to every story and hopes to release many more novels in the years to come.

Buy Links:
Amazon Home Page : http://www.amazon.com/A.-J.-Maguire/e/B004K5RHSY
Barnes& Noble Page: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/c/a.-j.-maguire
AJMaguire Website : http://www.ajmaguire.com/ 

Signs of the elusive "LJ" spotted in the wild

"Track that" by gosheshe, used under cc license

This past week, two guest posts of mine were published on the web. The first, appeared on Monday, May 6th on CJ Brightley's blog. CJ is a fellow author I have gotten to know on Google Plus. The post was on "Deciding What's Important"--where I talk about how I have navigated the often difficult landscape of publishing by making conscious choices and staying true to my goals and beliefs.

From the post:

Back then, [when I was just beginning to write] I bought into the myth of the muse and spent long swaths of time waiting for inspiration to strike, then attempting to capture whatever I felt I had been granted. In those days, I looked at revision as somehow sullying the process. The work I created reflected my immaturity. Fortunately, it will never see the light of day, having been destroyed in a house fire several years ago.

When I started to shift from art-as-hobby to art-as-profession, I also began to understand that inspiration was only a small part (perhaps even the least part) of the process. To use a musical analogy, I had to practice my scales in order to create beautiful music. The ‘scales’ were writing exercises and the discipline of regular work and multiple revisions.

 You can read the entire post here. 

The second post was published at Romance University. The post is named (with irony) The Secret to Marketing Success (is there is no secret.) From the article:

The statistics tell us that the vast majority of traditionally published books never earn out their advances. And advances for mid-list writers have gone down in recent years. What that confirms for me is that no one knows which books are going to catch the brass ring. Anyone who says they do is lying.

No one knows.

That includes agents, editors, marketing folks, sales forces, and book stores. But here’s the interesting thing: Authors operate as if there is a secret code and someone has the key. I see this at play in both traditionally published and indie published authors. They start blogs, pay for blog tours and giveaways, banner advertisements, join twitter and create facebook pages, tweet as their characters, pray for reviews (and sometimes pay for them), get sucked into hours on social media, and generally do all the things that pull them away from what they love best – writing.

You can read it in its entirety here. 

Thank you to CJ and the folks at RU for hosting me.

And stay tuned in the coming weeks for my #1000postparty in celebration of 1000 blogposts here at Once in a Blue Muse, as well as for the upcoming June 2nd release of my SF/Space Opera, DERELICT!