March 2008

World in the Satin Bag

Interview w/ Paul Genesse

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Thanks to Paul for the interview. You can find out more about him on his personal website and be sure to check out his novel The Golden Cord, which will be out on April 16th! This is a whopper of an interview, by the way. So hold on to your seats and here goes! Thanks for doing this interview with me. First, could you tell us a little about yourself? When did you first gain an interest in writing fantasy? I think it was the toy castle that sent me over the edge. Soon after that gift I told my parents that I wanted to be a writer. I was four years old. Even then dragons and castles were my thing. I remember being terrified of The Hobbit movie (cartoon) on TV when I was five or six and hiding under the couch cushion when the goblins were chasing the dwarves. I’ve always wanted to be a writer, but I pursued my other passion and became a Registered Nurse. I’ve been a nurse since 1996 and work in a cardiac unit in Salt Lake City. I’m never going to quit being a nurse and will always be a writer and a nurse. Luckily, I’ve found two things that I love to do and both of them feed my soul. The Golden Cord is the first novel in a series. Could you tell us a little about this first book and then a bit about the other books you’re working on, are done with, etc.? Do you have other projects in mind for the future? All five books in The Iron Dragon Series are written. The Golden Cord is the first book and the others are just waiting to be edited. I wrote all of the novels before the first one was accepted for publication. I just had to get them all done and wrote the first drafts over a period of about three years. I was so focused on getting the books finished that I slavishly worked on them, sometimes staying up all night. Back then I could easily get 20-35 pages written in one night. My pace has slowed a bit as I agonize over each sentence, but I still love to write. The Golden Cord (tGC) is the opening of an epic adventure fantasy that will take the characters all over the harsh world of Ae’leron (A-luh-ron), which means winged in the ancient language of my world. The one line description of the book is: The dragon king arises, and a hunter must leave behind the woman he loves, give up all hope of survival, and guide his most hated enemies to the lair of the beast that threatens to enslave their world. The other books keep the story going and explore the world and the mystery surrounding the overall plot, which involves the diabolical dragon king and his goal of taking over the world; but behind the scenes, like a puppet master. Draglune is a dragon that doesn’t have to show up and burn the city down, though he does enjoy that. He would rather have his cultish spies and minions take over from the shadows, manipulating the people into doing whatever he wants, putting him in full control, but secretly. The main characters of the novel are very outmatched and are always on the edge of being burned to a crisp and having their ashes scattered into the wind. They struggle with what has gone before and those friends and family who they have lost. Most of the characters in The Golden Cord are literally haunted heroes. About my other projects, I’ve sold nine short stories as of March 2008, and I’m often getting asked to write more for various editors. There’s usually a short story on the back burner. However, my current novel project, aside from The Iron Dragon Series, is Medusa’s Daughter, a love story set in ancient Greece involving the mythological Medusa and the daughter she could have had. Read chapter one on my website. As of this writing, I’ve finished the rough draft of the manuscript. What is it about fantasy that you find most interesting? What are some of your favorite authors from the past and from today? What are you currently reading or plan to read? My favorite authors are: George. R.R. Martin (A Game of Thrones in the Song of Ice and Fire Series), J.R.R. Tolkien (Lord of the Rings), Michael Stackpole (The Dragon Crown War Cycle), Dennis L. McKiernan (Dragondoom), Joshua Palmatier (The Cracked Throne), Dan Simmons (Illium), Terry Brooks (The Elfstones of Shannara), and Bradley P. Beaulieu (Tears of Tendali—not out yet). I’m about to dive into several books right now. I’ve got about 40 on my shelf that need to be read, such as: In The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss, Dead To Me by Anton Strout, and Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson. I love fantasy and science fiction above all other genres. When I read it my imagination soars and I become part of the world and see things through the character’s eyes as if I was there. Experiencing a new world that I had never known before is my favorite thing, though the characters have to be great. It’s all about the characters for me now. I’m a character writer and want to read about well-developed characters. Cardboard cutouts of characters do not interest me anymore. I want to be in their heads and know how they think. If the writer does a good job, I identify with the character and live my life through theirs. I think that’s why reading is so great; you can live many different lives and experience things you could never experience unless you read the book. Movies are great too, but with books you can get inside someone’s mind and know what’s it like to crawl up the slopes of Mount Doom. On the subject of movies, do you find movie adaptations of books to be

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RIP: Arthur C. Clarke

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Mr. Clarke has passed away today. He was 90 years old. If you don’t know who that is, do a google search right now and realize he is one of the greatest science fiction writers to ever live. Here is the BBC report on Mr. Clarke’s death. (Don’t click the read more, there isn’t any more after this!)

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Anonymous and Cyber-terrorism: The Good and the Bad

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I’ve been meaning to blog about this very subject for quite a while. The links have been sitting in my “Discuss” folder and I think it’s about time it was brought up. I think this will work in two stages. The first stage is to talk about the group Anonymous and their war against Scientology (as it currently stands) and the second stage is to talk about cyber-terrorism in general, since it is an issue we are facing in the real world and will face to a greater extent in the future. For those of you a little out of the loop, Anonymous is a, well, anonymous group of people all around that world that have essentially declared war against the Church of Scientology. They (the people behind it, some of which do have names since there’s really no way to keep yourself hidden entirely) believe that the Church of Scientology not only is limiting free speech in acts of legal battering, among other acts, but is a dangerous, violent cult that is quite similar to a totalitarian regime in religious format. Given the length of controversy over the Church of Scientology there has to be a certain amount of skepticism in their position. Are we to assume that the entire Church is evil? Well, Anonymous would argue yes, and to some extent I would have to agree. Whether or not Scientology is a “religion” that can help people is put out of view in comparison to how the Church has acted in the past and in the present towards its members and towards dissenters and critics. The Church has silenced many people, threatened legal action against protesters, passed out defamatory leaflets and sought to ruin the lives of people that have spoke out against the Church. And there is no small amount of criticism on Scientology’s history (you might not know this, but L. Ron Hubbard was actually banned from the country of England–banned, not just deported, but banned from touching English soil). I think if you look at all the links I’m going to give you’ll get an idea of what Anonymous stands for. There are the two videos released by Anonymous here, here, and here that talk about their mission (not to mention their criticisms of the Church and the media). You can find a transcript of the first of those videos here. If you really want to get into who they are you can go to their main page and read all about where they come from, who they are, what they are doing, etc.Anonymous is not just playing around either. In fact, they are pretty damn serious about this. There are, according to their reports, 7,500 people protesting right now in cities all over the world (find that info here) as of TODAY. There were reports by news agencies a while back about the first protests, but what’s interesting is that they are still protesting and in rather large numbers when you think about it. Now, this sounds all well and good, but you might be asking what this has to do with cyber-terrorism. Not long ago there were reports about cyber-attacks by people claiming to be from Anonymous on Church of Scientology websites. Now, whether or not these folks were actually members of Anonymous and were told “yeah, do that” is entirely up to speculation, which of course the lovely Church will do into order to continue it’s long spew of legal silliness. Anonymous has never called themselves hackers, as you’ll see, in fact they simply call themselves “Anonymous” or “Legion” and make it very clear that they are doctors, teachers, construction workers, etc. They are just people, not a bunch of Internet hackers with nothing to do. The protests have very clearly shown this. (By the way, you should probably do a good look around Youtube to see just what all the hubbub is about the Church–there are some really interesting videos about what Church personal do about people who are just standing across the street with a camera, or even what Church people say to those who actually are quite peaceful.) Whoever hacked into the Church websites clearly has done something that is wrong. That can’t be avoided, but I don’t see Anonymous taking credit for it. One thing I find most fascinating about all this is that the Church is not taking efforts to deny that things happened (i.e. that there are some people that have died, which you can find a lot about here). In fact, they seem to almost ignore it. The cyber-war has, it seems, been remarkably successful in presenting the information and it is a wonder why the Church doesn’t play the nice card and try to solve the problems. Surely the death of Church members is bad right? Cyber-terrorism is not isolated to such silly things as bringing down Church of Scientology websites (which I find to be bad, but at the same time I don’t think it’s religious persecution, since the Church is not necessarily a religion, though it calls itself that. This is a point Anonymous is trying to make). Cyber-attacks are not at all isolated to website hacking, which has been around for probably more than a decade now. In fact, we’re seeing the dawn of a whole new era of cyber-attacks. The CIA reported a while back that: We have information, from multiple regions outside the United States, of cyber intrusions into utilities, followed by extortion demands. We suspect, but cannot confirm, that some of these attackers had the benefit of inside knowledge. We have information that cyberattacks have been used to disrupt power equipment in several regions outside the United States. In at least one case, the disruption caused a power outage affecting multiple cities. We do not know who executed these attacks or why, but all involved intrusions through the Internet. The scary part of this is that while it has not affected the U.S. to public knowledge as

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England, Here I Come (Plus My Ramblings Again)

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This will be my last life-intensive update for a while. I will be returning to regular blogging once finals are over and I’m back from my trip. I apologize if you’re expecting lots of well thought out posts or grand ruminations on the state of science fiction or fantasy in the world of literature. Finals are, to put it simply, somewhat more difficult this quarter than last considering that I actually have tests this time around, instead of essays. I am, by nature, far better at writing essays than taking tests because I feel I have more to offer from a writing perspective–when it comes to the material read–than I do from a memorization perspective. I learn far more from forcing myself to write essays than I do from forcing myself to cram information into my head that will, in a few months past, be largely forgotten. As such, I am generally against the idea of testing beyond quizzes or the occasional refresher to make sure one is actually reading. In any case, expect regular blogging to resume soonish. Now to the big news first. I am going to be gone from the 21st to the 31st. Why? Because I’ll be in England. This is two fold: part of it is to visit my girlfriend and the other part is to speak with Prof. Andy Sawyer of the University of Liverpool about the program he runs (MA in SF Studies). Finances have been, fortunately, better of late than they were before in part because I didn’t have to move when I originally thought I had and in part because Uncle Sam decided to grace me with the tax return I’ve deserved for quite some time (I worked for most of last year, so I get some money back of course). This means my trip is largely free. I also received a scholarship from UCSC that offset some of my educational costs (namely, my laptop, which I wouldn’t have needed if I lived ON campus, but do need because I live OFF campus and spend all my time ON campus due to my transportation situation–riding the vanpool). So, my trip is actually pretty much free and I’m not going to be starving, which is good. I also am planning to return to my regular scanning schedule for my cancer, since I can afford it and because I am most fortunate, thanks to you taxpayers, to have extremely good insurance through the university. That being said, this means I may or may not be able to do much blogging between the 21st and the 30th of March. I’m hoping to arrange some guest bloggers, but there’s no guarantee on that happening of course (update on that is that I should have two guest bloggers and I’m happy to have more). We’ll see I suppose. Now, to writing and reading news. I’ve started reading two other books as you can see on the right. One of them is a book for review. I started Rolling Thunder last night because I was finding it a little difficult to get into Whitechapel Gods (I think I may reread the beginning because I must have missed something and I think it’s one of those books that you have to read when you’re very much awake). Rolling Thunder is a rather interesting novel. I’m not far into it but I’m loving it already. The first chapter is rather witty and fun. I’ve also started reading some critical work on science fiction, as you can see. Mr. Roberts’ book is actually quite entertaining and I expect to talk about it in some detail here because it does have some fascinating insights into SF as a literary form. On the writing front, I am doing relatively well. I will have Interstellar Realty ready to go out at the beginning of this week to Writers of the Future. I think that title will stick with it, unless I can think of something more appropriate. I have also started another project called Mazer Shift, which seems to be taking itself in direction I hadn’t expected and may get put aside for more short fiction. Then I wrote a story on Friday and Saturday on a complete whim and I rather liked it. It’s short and to the point, and rather interesting in my opinion. I really want to write more short stories due to my love of the form, which has been, in part, inspired by Paul Melko’s novel Ten Sigmas, which was reviewed here. I think the richness of his stories has really inspired my SF mind on the short form, which is a wonderful thing. My girlfriend has done a lot of inspiring as well, which has less to do with the fact that she’s my girlfriend and more to do with that fact that she challenges my brain as good friends should and makes me suddenly think of things I might not have thought of before. So, I’ve been really churning out a lot of short fiction, or semi-short fiction. I don’t know if this is also due to the idea that it is somewhat ‘common’ among some of the great SF authors to start with short fiction and work their way up to novel length stuff, but it does seem, to some extent, a good possibility that that is what I am doing. I do want to write and publish novels, but there is a part of me that just loves the short form and prays it never dies. There are things you can do with the short form that you can’t do with the novel, not to mention my sudden love for Harlan Ellison, which was brought up to me when I discovered there is a documentary about him, which I must see and is entitled Dreams With Sharp Teeth. If anyone knows if that film will be released on DVD, please tell me where because I would love to see it in full. The

World in the Satin Bag

SF/F Links: March Roundup Part One

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This is a little later than usual, but so be it. There will be a roundup at the start of April, most likely, rather than two roundups for March, although I’ll still call it a March Roundup. I got behind due to finals. In any case, here are a load of links that might be of interest to you all (more to come): Universe Today Galileo returns to the Vatican. Yup, they’re putting up a statue for him. About damn time. On the subject of Galileo, New Scientist had a controversial question about whether or not scientists should exhume his body to do DNA tests to figure out if the person buried with him, presumably his daughter, is actually his daughter. Quite honestly I really don’t care. This is the same as arguing that Shakespeare didn’t write his plays. Who cares? Venus’ south pole has some weird weather patterns and it’s sort of stumped scientists. Imagine when you pull the plug out of a drain and watch the water go down. Yeah, something like that. Apparently scientists are thinking about putting an “Ark” on the Moon. What does that mean? Basically a giant computer run complex that holds seeds and genetic info and what not in case we all blow ourselves to pieces. Not necessarily news, but scientists believe that all the little bits that formed together and created life might have been brought here by meteorites. This is apparently due to having found meteorites with rich concentrations of amino acids, which are rather important after all. I wrote about germs becoming three times more likely to spread disease a while back, but Universe Today has an article on it which is quite interesting here. There’s a lot more talk about what this means for long space missions too. We might be able to find small, terrestrial planets around Alpha Centauri, which is every SF fan’s wet dream. All we need is five years a a moderately sized telescope. I’m in. More reasons why Pluto is so much better than Venus and Mercury, who are still planets (I feel sorry for Pluto…this is nothing short of racism): Pluto has two more moons, Nix and Hydra. Eat that Venus! Kessler Syndrome: the idea that space travel will become impossible without hitting something. Yeah, this is a problem we may be facing pretty soon. We need a giant garbage machine to go up there and eat up all that stuff and turn the material into convenient little metallic bobble-heads. That would be cool. Write, Pam, Write! has an awesome list of seven writing tips. Check it out! Strange Horizons has part one of an awesome article on the realities of space warfare! (Courtesy of SF Signal) The Devil Frog! That’s right, scientists have uncovered information about a giant frog that lived a long time ago when dinosaurs still roamed. Sixteen inches doesn’t sound like a very large frog, but that’s pretty freaking huge in the frog world! There’s a bit more about it here. Star Wars Toys that will never be made. Hilarity ensues. (Courtesy of SF Signal, I think) A supersaturated view of the moon. That translates to a really freaking cool looking rendition! Don’t know where I found this, but how about a list of nine of the most baffling theme parks around the world? Yeah, coolness! 25 ways to break your procrastination habit. Yeah, I need to pay attention. 10 Things You Didn’t Know About the Milky Way Galaxy. Too bad one of them isn’t “cause it’s freaking awesome”. (Courtesy of SF Signal) The only reason Bungie, the company that made the Halo games, is any good. One of the Mars Orbiters discovered an ancient Mars lake that might have been inhabitable once. (No, there wasn’t any water) New Scientist has an article that suggests that hardy bacteria could survive in Lunar soil (not in the vacuum though). That’s pretty cool. Listverse Top 10 Badass Swords. Poke! Top 10 Most Overlooked Mysteries in History. This one is youtyreally freaking cool! By the way, I want to see this Voynich manuscript! io9 A wristband your boss can use to track your emotions. Yeah, cause we need people to have MORE control of our lives. Sand Dollars (you know, those really interesting shelled critters with the cool shells?) apparently clone themselves when in danger, which is fascinating to think about. Imagine if you could clone yourself on command. These are hilarious. Pictures of scifi things that look like things in real life! 8 Unstoppable Rules For Writing Killer Short Stories! Yes! There’s been a breakthrough in how digits are grown, meaning that we might be able to “naturally” grow replacement digits. Now that’s cool right? We once figured that sleep patterns were primarily controlled by changes in light, well new studies suggest that TVs can also have an effect. I’m screwed, since a computer screen isn’t that much different. Crap. Would you inject your breasts with nanoparticles if they could be used to detect cancer? If I had breasts I would, but since I don’t…regardless, nanotech is the wave of the future. This is interesting: plants develop new reproductive systems in cities. They go from being dispersing systems (the seeds fly to some other spot) to nondispersing (they just lend next to the parent) because it’s more efficient. That’s neat! Evolution for the win AGAIN! Eat it creationists! 20 SF Novels That Will Change Your Life. Self explanatory right? Nanocrystals that absorb carbon dioxide. Cool? Yes, I think so. Robots are going to fight our wars for us. There’s some good and some bad about this. I might have to rant later. Scientists have found krill living as deep as 9,800 feet in the ocean below Antarctica. That’s good news for those of us hoping to find little aliens on Europa and what not. Rule 34: No exceptions. Yes, this picture is hilarious! Futurismic Immune system in a jar. That’s the title I’m going with. So, a virologist basically says

World in the Satin Bag

Well Shucks

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My story “Irlgem” was rejected from Eclipse Two. Unfortunate, but oh well, it’s off to someplace else then. We’ll see what happens. (Don’t click the read more, there isn’t any more after this!)

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