Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

No, I haven’t taken a job in Antarctica, or moved to Kathmandhu, I’m still here in Perth and the last three weeks have been truly hectic, hence no blogposts.

Here’s part of the hectic-making stuff: a shiny new issue of The Specusphere. As usual, there’s a rare mix of articles, reviews, fiction and poetry for your delectation and delight. Take a look at the Table of Contents:

Editorial
Where do I come from? by Stephen Thompson

Features
Irrealism and the Bizarro movement by Stephen Thompson
Ray-guns for Rocketeers by Jeff Harris

Up and Coming
Ford Street Makes Waves
The Wisdom of Water by John Archer
New Books from Gollancz for September–October 2008
New Books from Tor for September

People
Creating Memorable Characters: interview and discussion with Fiona McIntosh by Astrid Cooper

Writing and Publishing
Where do (writing) ideas come from? by Bill Youatt-Pine

Fiction
Hell Hath No Fury by David Such
Dolphin Dreaming by Ashley Hibbert
Chopped up Cut up by Damien Kane

Poetry
The Curse by Felix Calvino

Film Reviews
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, directed by Rob Cohen
Journey to the Center of the Earth, directed by Eric Brevig
The Happening, directed by M. Night Shyamalan
Hellboy II: The Golden Army, directed by Guillermo Del Toro

Book Reviews
The Wheel of Darkness by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
Son et Lumiere by Ian Nichols
Saturn’s Children by Charles Stross
Phantom Pleasures by Julie Leto
Midnight Never Come by Marie Brennan
Black Ships by Jo Graham
Bewitched by Sandra Schwab
Incandescence by Greg Egan
Heart-shaped Box by Joe Hill
Swiftly by Adam Roberts

This month’s reviews were written by Bobbi Sinha-Morey, Maurie Breust, Ross Murray, Simon Petrie and yours truly, and I think we did a pretty good job!

I have lots more things to blog but I’ll come back during the week with a catch up post. Meantime, do check out The Specusphere. You’ll see a link in my profile box at the top of the page.

Over on e-buddy Jo’s blog we had a bit of discussion last week about fantasy books we’ve enjoyed recently and the kinds of magic the authors had invented.

I must be odd. I don’t read fantasy for the magic, but for the characters. My premise is “What if there were a world just like ours but with different races of people, some of whom could do magic and some of whom couldn’t?” My primary interest is not in the magic per se, but in its effects on human relationships, so I don’t often show magic going on, but assume it as a “given” for my invented world. The reader often sees the results of magic, but not its performance.

Some readers, however, read fantasy primarily for the magic. I found this out when I was a member of Online Writers Workshop, an online critiquing group for speculative fiction writers. It was apparent from the comments of several OWW critters that I don’t show nearly enough magic for some people’s taste. As a result of those critiques, I’ve started to include a lot more of the actual workings in my books. But how much is too much? While I’m a firm believer in giving the public what it wants, I feel the gratuitous depiction of any one thing impinges on whatever modicum of artistic integrity a work might possess.

Gee, does that last line sound pretentious, or what? Nevertheless, I put it to you that it’s possible to use magic gratuitously, just as it’s possible to overdo sex or violence. Do many people really like to read about magic even when it has little bearing on the plot and does nothing to show character development?

Some fantasies I’ve read go way overboard with magic. That’s way overboard for my preferences, of course: as with all things, everyone has the right to draw their own line in the sand with regard to what constitutes “too much”. One person’s erotica is another person’s pornography. One person’s vivid description of violence is another person’s horror. Where do you draw the line, magically speaking? Post a comment and let me know.

I’m about to start a new house-sitting gig, this time for my friend Ellen, who is off to Russia to take part in an international choral festival. Choirs from all over the world are getting together to sing Verdi’s Requiem in St Petersburg and Moscow. What a wonderful experience that will be for the performers! As always, when my friends go away, I wish I could go, too! BTW, Juliet has blogged her marvellous Baltic experience at Writer Unboxed. It was obviously a trip full of contrasts, from the joy of a Latvian Folk Festival to the darkly emotional experience of WWII concentration camps. Russia and the Baltic are not common destinations for Aussie tourists, so I love to get reports of such expeditions.

No dogs and cats at Ellen’s place: just five chooks. (Chickens or hens to those of you who don’t live in the Land of Oz!) I haven’t looked after poultry for well over twenty years, so wish me luck!

I’ve spent a happy weekend hanging out at the Conflux Mini-con. This is a great idea: a precursor to the live convention and a wonderful second-best for people who, like me, can’t get to Canberra. I lurked around and occasionally commented on discussions led by some articulate and entertaining people including Jack Dann, Simon Haynes, Bruce Gillespie, Glenda Larke, Sharyn Lilley, Karen Miller, Marianne de Pierres, Gillian Polack, Cat Sparks and Sean Williams. Writers and fans from all over the world joined in. One new e-buddy, Pema Lloyd, from Tucson, Arizona, stayed up all night so she didn’t have to miss any panels! Now that’s dedication for you. If you’d like to read the words of wisdom that were bandied about, go to the Conflux forum and check out the entries. And bookmark the page for next year! On another part of the site you can even download recorded talks from last year’s Conflux.

Congratulations are due to the team, comprising Phill Berrie, Stephen Herring, Nicole Murphy and Gillian Polack. I’m looking forward to next year already.

In between the great discussions at Conflux, I’ve been planning a mini-con of my own. Well, not just mine, you understand, but mine and a few other people’s brainchild – (Ta Da!) – The KSPSF Mini-con!

We held the first one of these two years ago and it was successful beyond our wildest dreams. We thought maybe twenty or thirty people would show up, but in fact half Perth fandom appeared to be there. Trouble was, it rained, and activities planned for out-of-doors had to be held indoors. This time we’ve planned it for later in the year so hopefully the overcrowding won’t happen.

Confirmed panellists include Adrian Bedford, Janet Blagg, Lee Battersby, Lyn Battersby, Hal Colebatch, Stephen Dedman, Russell Farr, Simon Haynes, Elaine Kemp, Alisa Krasnostein, Martin Livings, Dave Luckett, Bevan McGuiness, Juliet Marillier, Ian Nichols, John Parker, Grant Stone and Tehani Wessely.

Our Fearless Leader, Helen Venn, has set up a blog for the minicon here. I’ve linked to the site (see left)so you can check for updates about guests, food, books for sale, activities etc as they are added to the schedule. It should be a great day – and guess what? Just one gold coin will get you in! A cheap lunch will be available as well as ongoing refreshments. If you live in Perth or not too far away, write it in your diary now – Sunday 21 September, 10.00am-5.00pm. Barring a naked orgy in the woods, what better way to spend the Equinox?

This is an easy post! I filched details of both these exciting events from LJ buddies:-)

First, check this competition out (closes 4 September 2008) -
Make sure you read terms and conditions before entry.
http://www.aboygoesonajourney.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=212&Itemid=122

Writers gifts

* Your manuscript on the top of the consideration pile for Morrigan Books. Check out their website to see if your manuscript would fit their style. (Update 28 August 2008 – this prize has been withdrawn.)

* A professional and in-depth critique of up to 15,000 words of your manuscript by Phillip Berrie

* One seat in a 2 hr online writing course ‘What not to do in your medieval setting 101′

Fantasy Book Pack

* Royal Exile by Fiona McIntosh
* The Accidental Sorcerer by K E Mills
* Winterbirth by Brian Ruckley

Dark Book Pack

* In Bad Dreams vol 1 edited by Mark Deniz and Sharyn Lilley
* The Painted Man by Peter V Brett
* The Scent of Shadows by Vicki Pettersson

Eclectic Book Pack

* Hal Spacejock – No Free Lunch by Simon Haynes SIGNED!
* Daikaiju Vol 1 edited by Robert Hood and Robin Pen
* Daikaiju Vol 3 edited by Robert Hood and Robin Pen

And don’t forget the Conflux virtual mini-con this weekend. It’s an online forum where various Conflux guests of honour (both current and past), workshop presenters, committee members and other worthies — wits and raconteurs all — get to chat with online visitors, answer questions and generally liven the day with sparkling banter and repartee.

Details of who’ll be in the hot seat for each session are below.

To take part, just go the Conflux forum at the appropriate time, sign in and banter away! Hope to (virtually) see you there.

Saturday August 2

12pm – Glenda Larke
1pm – Chris Barnes
2pm – Gillian Polack
3pm – Bruce Gillespie
4pm – Phill Berrie
5pm – Stephen Hunt
6pm – Peter Strong
7pm – Karen Miller
8pm – Fiona McLennan
9pm – Maxine McArthur
10pm – Sharyn Lilley
11pm – Karen Herkes
12am – Ellen Datlow

1am to 6am – break

7am – Sherwood Smith
8am – Nicole R Murphy
9am – Jonathan Strahan
10am – Kaaron Warren
11am – Sean Williams
12pm – Kevin J Anderson
1pm – Cat Sparks
2pm – Jackie French
3pm – Jack Dann
4pm – Simon Haynes
5pm – Marianne de Pierres

I have found two rather new Speculative Fiction web sites this week. I’ve been wishing there was a Fantasy web site – just fantasy, not hard SF or horror – and thanks to Simon Haynes’s eagle eye I’ve found one, It’s new, and it’s British, and it’s called Wonderlands. You sign up just like Facebook or My Space and have your own page. You can join in discussions and exchange messages with other members. Check it out here.

Another newish site is called A Boy Goes on a Journey and it also looks very promising. There are articles on writing, discussions and the opportunity to exchange critiques. My crit buddy Phill Berrie is one of a keen team of organisers. There’s loads of potential here: it just needs a bit of support to see it turn into something really worthwhile.

A lot of blood, sweat and tears goes into getting an e-zine on line, but the doughty team at The Specusphere has come through once again. Here’s a list of the latest offerings. If you can’t access anything from the Table of Contents on the front page, try the menu on the right for individual sections.

Editorial
SF Rules OK on TV by Stephen Thompson

Feature
Meet the Publishers (QWC Seminar Notes) by Amanda Greenslade

Up and Coming
New books from Orbit
New books from Voyager
BLACK Magazine exposes Australia’s Dark Side

People
Jack Dann in conversation with Satima Flavell
Alison Goodman in conversation with Satima Flavell
Edwina Harvey interviewed by Stephen Thompson
Glenda Larke in conversation with Satima Flavell
Alastair Reynolds in conversation with Simon Petrie

Fiction
The Flying Banana by James Hansen
One Last Time by Bill Youatt-Pine
All the Stage is a World by Damien Kane

Poetry
Traitors All by Warren Bernard

Book Reviews
Belladonna by Anne Bishop
Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny
Fires Rising by Michael Laimo
Dreaming Again edited by Jack Dann
The Dragon Waiting by John M. Ford
The First Law Trilogy by Joe Abercrombie
The Game by Diana Wynne Jones
The Healer by Sharon Sala
The Two Pearls of Wisdom by Alison Goodman
The Ice-cream Man by Jenny Mounfield
Wardragon by Paul Collins
Stargate SG-1: Do No Harm by Karen Miller
House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds
The Darkest Kiss by Keri Arthur

Film Reviews
The Orphanage (El Orfanato)
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian

Meet my fellow members of the Specusphere team: Stephen Thompson (editor), Amanda Greenslade (webmistress and writer) and Astrid Cooper (sub-editor and writer):

Since 1997, Stephen has pursued an interest in creative writing that he’d been nurturing for over 25 years. His publishing credits include poetry, radio drama, short fiction, non-fiction, music and screenwriting. He holds an industry recognised Diploma of Editing (Publishing) and works as a freelance editor, proofreader and publisher in Brisbane.

Amanda has a Bachelor of Communication majoring in writing and screen production. She fits her duties as Specusphere’s web mistress around a full-time job as a graphic design/multimedia manager for a non-profit organisation. Her interests include animals, writing, reading fantasy and science fiction, gaming, website design, film, theatre and music.

A published fantasy-romance novelist, Astrid’s work for The Specusphere focuses on author promotions, interviews and book reviews. She will also be writing the occasional “how-to” article, drawing upon her experience in the writing and publishing industry. When not working on her own books, she serves as an editor/manuscript assessor with an Australian agency.

I do hope you enjoy the fruits of our labours. The panic’s over now for another two months, but we’ll be back on 1 September with even more previews, reviews and interviews!

I am sorry about the kerfuffle with my Sunday post, which I have deleted. In it, I had tried to praise my children – subtly, so as not to embarrass them or sound like a besotted idiot of a parent – and someone took severe exception to what I’d written and posted a response that was nothing short of vitriolic. If it offended one person it obviously had the potential to offend more, so I deleted the entire post and its comments.

That incident upset me and I needed cheering up. Who better to do that than Hal Spacejock? I am sure most of you are familiar with Simon Haynes’s zany hero (although maybe “hero” isn’t quite the right appellation in Hal’s case) whose space adventures with Clunk, his long sufferering robot sidekick, have already delighted thousands of readers in this country. Overseas readers have had to send to Australia for the series (now up to its fourth course) and of course that’s added expense for them, but now they can download the entire first book Hal Spacejock, No Free Lunch, from the author’s web site. Go get it here if you haven’t already.

Here in Australia, as in many other countries, it’s Mothers Day. The UK celebrates Mothering Sunday in March, which has a much older tradition behind it, but as usual, the rest of the world nearly all followed America. But whenever you celebrate it, I hope you had a good one this year:-) I certainly did, as I had two sons, a daughter-in-law, two grandchildren, a niece and a grandniece to help me celebrate, and since it is granddaughter Cassandra’s birthday this week we celebrated that as well. We had a lovely meal that included dear little quiches prepared by dinlaw Narelle, with yummy caramel mud cake and a nice chardonnay to follow. Daughter Billy rang me while we were carousing (very gentle carousing, it was: none of your quaffing ale from a yard glass or shouting “skol” or “slangi”) so she was able to speak to her contemporaries as well as wishing me well. It was one of the nicest Mothers Days ever.

After a most useful meeting with my face-to-face writers group this week I have been happily revising the outline of The Trilogy and so far am feeling pretty confident that this, at last, might prove to be The Definitive Outline. Yes, I know, this must be about Mark 72, but don’t be impatient. Heck, it’s only taken five years!

But something else has been occupying my attention lately, too. Late last year, I decided that I really needed to earn some extra income. It’s a sad fact that the Age Pension doesn’t allow one to have very much in the way of quality of life. You can almost, but not quite, live on it, and it’s a constant struggle to stay abreast of the bills. One has to prioritise very carefully, and for me, the priorities are rent, food, other essentials (such as power and telephone bills) health insurance and internet access. You will notice that I don’t run a car. There’s a very good reason for that – I don’t drive. However, even if I did, and even if someone gave me a vehicle, the fact is that I couldn’t afford to run it. And if the cost of living continues to rise, pretty soon now I’ll have to decide between health insurance and internet access. I really, really, don’t want to do that. So I decided to look for work.

After several months of hunting, I finally found an advertisement for what looked like my dream job. It involved both office administration and writing. It almost looked as though my name was on it, so perfectly was it suited to my experience and abilities. And would you believe I actually got an interview for the first time in this round of job hunting! This was especially gratifying, seeing as there were about 400 applicants. Alas, I was the employer’s second choice, and of course a miss is as good as a mile. Jobs like that one being very thin on the ground, I felt the need to retreat, regroup and form another plan of campaign.

Academic editing is one thing I do for extra cash, but I haven’t been chasing it in recent years as I’ve wanted to focus on my own writing and on critiquing the work of other writers. I hoped to find part-time regular work that would enable me to keep writing for three or four days each week while replenishing the coffers, but realistically speaking, it doesn’t look as if that’s going to happen any time soon. So with a lot of help from my son Scott I have made a web site. Go and have a look here and see what you think. I’m hoping to expand my editing to include writing other than the academic variety: after all, I’ve been reading and writing both fiction and non-fiction for a long time now and feel I can offer useful suggestions to writers who are a little behind me on the path, especially those who are hoping to self-publish. It never ceases to amaze me how badly edited many self-published works are. I suspect some have never had a blue pencil anywhere near them, and as my mother used to say, if a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Perhaps I can help people present their books just a little more professionally, and without spending a small fortune.

It’s a competitive field and I’m probably never going to get rich from editing. It would be nice, though, to earn enough to raise my standard of living by a notch or two. Wish me luck. Please.

A thousand apologies for my long silence. I came out of retreat to find that I had overbooked myself, editing wise, and had a long list of things to do, all on tight deadlines. I’ve just spent a desperate fortnight shuffling jobs.

They weren’t all paid jobs. It was Specusphere time (see link in my profile) and the whole team of volunteers was frantically getting things ready for the publication date of 1 May. On the last day of April I was up until 3.00am, writing, editing and uploading. It was with a long sigh of relief that I finally fell into bed. But when I checked the site next morning it all looked very worthwhile indeed. Our doughty Editor-in-Chief, Stephen Thomson, had also had a late night and an early morning, getting the front page in order so all our new uploads could stand up and be counted. There are interviews with K.E. Mills, Sean Williams, Paul Collins and Tony Plank; two film reviews and no fewer than ten book reviews, plus fiction, poetry and features including my report on Swancon. I’m very proud of the fact that I wrote the editorial, too – the first one I’ve ever written! Amanda, Astrid, Stephen and I are now eagerly watching the hits mount up. It’s obvious that we have regular readers lying in wait for each edition to go live.

As well as handing out kudos to rest of the editorial team, Stephen Thomson, Amanda Greenslade and Astrid Cooper, I’d like to mention my wonderful reviewers. Bobbi Sinha-Morey and Joan Malpass are two regular contributors: Bobbi specializes in reviewing fantasy-romance and Joan is especially good with children’s fantasy. Both have written film reviews as well as book reviews. I am proud of them and our other reviewers. E-zines can’t survive without volunteers, so if you love Speculative Fiction I would urge you to offer your services. The Specusphere is always looking for new blood, as are many other e-zines.

Paid work included final editing of a PhD thesis for an architecture student, the first I’d done in that discipline. I enjoyed the work, but when I agreed to do it I’d forgotten that The Specusphere’s May edition was going up at the same time! To make matters worse, I am engaged in a series of house-sits at present, which, since I don’t have a laptop of my own, means that I have been using web-mail and other people’s computers – a deadly combination. Downloads failed, attachments didn’t attach, mail disappeared into cyberspace or else arrived in duplicate or triplicate. I should’ve read my ephemeris before starting on this last fortnight’s work! I probably would have stayed on retreat.

Speaking of which, the retreat was excellent. Vipassana meditation forces one to face oneself, which can be pretty scary, but, as Akiro Kurasawa, one of the greatest of film producers, is quoted as saying, “To be an artist means never to avert your eyes”. Learning not to avert one’s eyes from the unavoidable pain of life is one of the gifts of Vipassana. Being in silence for a lengthy period of time is in itself very confronting. It forces us to look at the constant inane chatter that makes up our thought streams and then to look beyond it. Then, as TS Elliot said at the end of his Four Quartets:

And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

The retreat was a gift, and now it’s time to make use of its fruits. As well as some hints of deeper insight, many writing ideas arose and as a result I’ve drafted still another outline of The Trilogy. I have still to hear the comments of my peers and betters – which reminds me that I have heaps of reviewing to catch up on next. I’d better get on with it!

This will be my last post until later in the month, since I am going on a Vipassana (Google if you don’t know what that is!) meditation retreat. It’s the first one I’ve done for several years so it will be interesting to see how I cope with twelve days of doing nothing but sit on a cushion and walk in the garden with a few short breaks for eating and chores.

The chores are the easy part. Before tackling Vipassana, I would never have thought that sitting and walking could be such hard work!:-) I’ll write a full report and explain more about the practice when I return on about 20 April. Y’all be good while I’m gone, mind!