Book Review Up: Enchanters by David Bryan Russell
Another review up! Trying to play catchup at the moment. So, here’s the review. Beyond that, I’m still breathing and working my way cross country! Anywho!
Book Reviews, World in the Satin Bag
Book Reviews, World in the Satin Bag
Book Review Up: The House of the Stag by Kage Baker
I’ve finished a review for another book. Not to ruin the review, but the book is absolutely amazing. Buy it now while there are still copies left on the shelf. And if they have run out, demand more! One of the best fantasy novels I’ve read in years! You can find my review here. Anywho!
World in the Satin Bag
I believe in Unicorns – Hagelrat
Hi, I am really hoping that my legendary lack of sense of time hasn’t cropped up again and I am doing this in y’know the right month. Shaun has kindly offered me the chance to guest blog here over the next few days.My permanent home if you don’t know is Un:Bound which I am neglecting a little this week due to my involvement in the Special Olympics in my city, fortunately I have others to hold the fort for me there as I am attempting to help with here.Anyway, my post for today: I joined a local book club six months ago. I wanted to read outside my comfort zone and meet other people in the village who read. It’s worked in that respect. We have read The Clockwork Orange, The Forgotten Garden, Cloud Atlas, The Gargoyle , Coraline & The life of Pi. Coraline was one I pushed for. The other books were all standard book club fair and there was nothing I adored so I made them read this spooky childrens book. They didn’t get it. They couldn’t see why button’s for eyes, the characters weren’t deep enough, they’d have liked to see the other father developed more. Umm the other father was a construct, he was supposed to be paper thin, that’s the whole point. Buttons for eyes because it’s abnormal and scary, y’know, creepy like a gingerbread cottage.The problem was I simply couldn’t understand why they didn’t get it. Do they not still enjoy fairy tales? Would they want Hansel and Gretel’s father to be a more complex character? Did they just accept that a wolf could get in, eat granny, don her clothes and then hold a conversation with Red? As children did these very lovely and intelligent women accept that it is possible to climb a tower using hair as a rope or to bring someone back with a kiss (well ok but even in my day fairy tales were a bit sanitised even if they weren’t full on disneyed)? Presumably they did. So why don’t they anymore?My book group don’t really do fantasy, they don’t really get Coraline. My conclusion? They are too grown up and just can’t believe in unicorns anymore. I think that’s kind of sad. How must the world look if you never see dragons? So having now experienced this problem I started looking at it more widely. Obviously some people are just literary snobs and unredeemable, but what of the others, the grown ups whose inner child has given up? I really think that not being able to believe like a twelve year old hiding under the duvet with a torch, is what is keeping these people from enjoying genre fiction. I don’t know how to fix them, they probably don’t realise they are broken. They think comics are just for kids and LARP’ing is for the socially inept (seriously, they have no clue how hard it is to exist in their world 9-5 then fully take on a whole other set of social norms and acceptable behaviour when you escape for a few days).So next time someone gets that expression on their face (the one that says ok you read at least 3 times more books in a month than I do, but it doesn’t count because you only read SFF, y’know the one) remember, it’s not their fault, there are no fairies at the bottom of their garden and we should be more tolerant and sympathetic. After all what could bring more pleasure than allowing yourself to believe in magic?
World in the Satin Bag
Top 5 Science Fiction Leading Ladies
In fashioning this list I decided to set some ground rules. When I say leading ladies, I mean leading ladies, not sidekicks, or other characters who are overshadowed, even slightly, by male characters. Considering that means drastically minimizing my options, since instant favorites, such as Princess Leia, can no longer be included. Narrowing things down in this way makes this list fairly difficult to create. Unfortunately, there aren’t a lot of great female leads in science fiction, something I hope will be remedied in the coming years (girls are awesome too, you know). So, without further delay, here are my top ten leading ladies in science fiction: Ellen Ripley / Sigourney Weaver (The Alien Series)What list could be complete without Ripley? She is the quintessential science fiction leading lady. If you don’t believe me, then you need to see the ending for Aliens. Taking on the Queen Alien in a mechanized loading vehicle is pretty ballsy. But I’m sure the Queen got what she deserved. Sarah Connor / Linda Hamilton (The Terminator)She becomes a stronger character, physically, later in the series, but her first appearance is a memorable one. After all, she falls in love with a man who technically doesn’t exist yet and manages to defeat the Terminator in the nick of time! And don’t forget that her character grows into a bit of a badass later on. Evey / Natalie Portman (V For Vendetta)I think Evey’s psychological progression in the movie (and the comic) is a powerful and relatively unique portrayal in science fiction. It’s not often that we see movies that are well aware of the mental states of the characters. V For Vendetta does a fine job turning Evey into a complex female figure worth remembering. Captain Kathryn Janeway / Kate Mulgrew (Star Trek: Voyager)I’ve always been a fan of Voyager. My love for this Star Trek derivation comes from its unique characters. From Seven of Nine to Captain Janeway, Voyager is one of the few Star Trek series that, I think, really tries to push the envelope. Maybe I’m wrong, but Janeway is one of the top captains in Star Trek, only rivaled, in my opinion by the two biggest names in Star Trek (Picard and Kirk). It would be interesting to see Janeway make an appearance in a movie somewhere, because her character deserves more than just a television show. Laura Roslin / Mary McDonnell (Battlestar Galactica)You’d have to be a fan of BSG to know why Roslin is on this list. For a character who became President by a string of seemingly random deaths, Roslin is pretty much the ultimate of badasses. She’s not afraid to chuck someone out of an airlock for pissing her off and she tends to get what she wants, even if nobody else wants it. That, and Mary McDonnell managed to turn this character into one of the most astonishingly complex figures in science fiction history. More so than any other. But that’s BSG for you: a show that is about characters, that knows it’s a good show and isn’t afraid to show it. And that’s that. Unfortunately I couldn’t think of any good female figures in literature, so it seems this list will be primarily about film and television. But if you know any awesome female leads in science fiction literature, let me know in the comments. The same goes for anyone I might have missed that deserves to be here!
World in the Satin Bag
Or Maybe Don’t Pay the Writer
It seems that my post yesterday stirred a tad bit of understandable “negativity.” Perhaps I am naïve to think that simply expressing irritation on a blog about an issue I consider to be not only important to discuss, but important to resolve, will produce any sort of change in the writing industry. But, at the same time, I cannot possibly keep silent about this. More of us, whether amateur or professional, should be upset about the state of the industry. Why we have bent over and taken such lousy pay and treatment for so long without open revolt is astonishing. We’ve put up with it for decades. This is not an issue that began with the invention of Craigslist or the Internet; it has existed, in some capacity, since the dawn of modern publishing. The Internet has only created a fast-paced, flooded market that has little interest in what is good for writers—it is understandable that employers are interested in their bottom line and not in the ability of a writer to be able to eat. The endlessness of this issue, however, means that writers have not done enough to demand better, and perhaps now it is too late. True, there have been recent upsets in the industry, most notably the screenwriter’s strike that involved Harlan Ellison himself, a man who, while certainly angry and difficult to deal with, has earned his place as both a fantastic writer and a spokesman for writers everywhere. We should be so bold as to take up his mantle in all aspects of the industry. But, we’re not that bold. A handful of us will do what I am doing here: complain on blogs, websites, or even podcasts. That handful cannot possibly change things on their own. It requires greater action from movers and shakers in the industry. Don’t misunderstand me. I am not calling for a drastic adjustment of payment levels in the writing and editing world. I know this is impossible. The industry and writers themselves have developed a system that openly exploits writers who either don’t know any better or have subjected themselves to the mindset that doing a bit of “charity” work is what it takes to get anywhere in the industry. That mindset exists because it is now true. John Scalzi has waxed lyrical about the changes in publishing internships to highlight this mindset: the publisher isn’t going to pay if the writer/worker/editor/etc. is willing to take next to nothing for hard work. And yet, writing this, I get the sense that anything I say on this topic is pointless, just as anything Harlan Ellison might say, however articulate and true, will amount to nothing whatsoever—except, perhaps, resentment or hatred against him, wholly unearned. Writers and editors, it seems, must accept their fates. We have to scrounge at the bottom, some of us because we actually like it there (after all, sometimes there are jobs that you simply do because you like them, not because you want to be paid), and some of us because we have no other choice. We can’t possibly demand what we have not rightfully “earned.” Never mind that someone wanting to be a manager at any business, with rare exception, at least makes minimum wage by working at the bottom. I suppose “freelance” translates to “above the purview of the Federal Government.” I see a problem with that. Do you?
World in the Satin Bag
Pay the Frakking Writer
I’m one to agree with Harlan Ellison when he angrily complains about the state of professional writing. While I myself am not technically a professional writer, I do loathe the level of whoring oneself out present within the freelance and general writing communities. An entire generation of people have come to believe that they don’t deserve to get paid at a reasonable rate for the writing and editing work they do, a fact that continues to baffle me. Perhaps this has a lot to do with how the Internet functions, and how desperate amateur writers are to get a leg up in a fairly brutal industry. Whatever the reason, Harlan Ellison is right: pay the frakking writer. And not just that, but pay the frakking writer well. Professional quality deserves professional rates. There aren’t that many instances in which it is okay to not be paid for writing or editing work:–You’re doing it for charity. I can’t argue against writing a story to help raise money for cancer research.–You have a personal blog or website. Hard to hire yourself to write for your own blog.–Aliens have invaded your brain and forced you to write for free. Certainly a bad thing, and a good excuse, I think. There are probably other good instances, but, let’s face it, writers deserve to be paid, and well. The amount of money authors make for what amounts to a hell of a lot of work has been declining for decades. It used to be that one short story sale could pay your rent. Now? You’d be lucky if it paid your grocery bill. Novel sales aren’t any better, with an average advance making up a fourth of the income you’d need to be right on the poverty line. That’s not a lot of money at all, and I don’t fully understand why. Aren’t writers important members of society? Don’t they provide a valuable service? Or maybe I’m just an angry, bitter curmudgeon like Ellison, looking back to the glory days with longing. Maybe I want to see a world where writers demand and earn what they’re worth. But I doubt that will happen; not now, and not in the future. There are too many people willing to work for almost nothing thinking they’ll be like Stephen King if they just trudge at the bottom for a while, getting paid fifty cents for a 500-word article, or some other ridiculously low paying avenue. And now, with these folks, some not worth even the paltry sum they currently earn, flooding the market and selling themselves short, those who think writers should get more are put in a horrible position. We can join the ranks, or take fewer jobs. But, maybe the glory days never happened and any desire for a writer’s utopia is nothing short of a delusional fantasy. Give it a few years and we might be proclaiming the slow and agonizing death of the professional writer. And the world will suffer for it.