aka The Curs of Chalion
Today’s roundup offers the collected wisdom of Sarah A. Hoyt, David Mack, Paul Weimer, Adam-Troy Castro, Alexandra Erin, Lis Carey, Brian Niemeier, Lyle Hopwood, Chris Gerrib, David Langford, and Less Identifiable Others. (Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editors of the day JohnFromGR and KestrelHill.)
Sarah A. Hoyt on According To Hoyt
“Glamor and Fairy Gold” – June 2
We’ve seen the same effect over and over again with people who comment on blogs (clears throat) both cultural and political, and even historical and that, no matter how often they’re proven wrong, keep coming back and stating the same thing they said in different words, as though that would make it true. They seem incapable of processing challenges, doubts, or even factual disproof of their charges.
Glamor. They’re under an enchantment. Something has affected them so hard, they can’t think, but can only repeat what they were told.
It’s not true, of course. Or not quite.
The enchantment of the “cool kids” is the glamor of social approbation and of opinions as positional goods.
People who have bought into an hierarchy of opinions, with some of the opinions “politically correct” no matter how factually wrong, have agreed to put themselves under the arbitrary power of others, and to subsume their reason and thought to them.
David Mack on The Analog Blog
“Write back (not) in anger (#SFWApro)” – June 2
Last August, I received an e-mail from a reader who was so offended by my inclusion of a same-sex relationship between a Vulcan woman and Klingon (disguised as human) woman in my novel Star Trek Vanguard: Harbinger that he swore off all my books forever. My public response, which I admit in hindsight was born more from passion than from reason, got noticed by a few sites.
When that post went wide, I expected to encounter some blowback and some criticism….For the most part, I deemed those uninformed responses unworthy of my attention or response.
Until this past weekend, I would have said the same about this piece by Amanda S. Green on the Mad Genius Blog: “Don’t break canon without good reason“.
For the impatient among you, here is a quick summary of her post: Amanda S. Green, an author and blogger who appears to have no professional experience writing or editing media tie-in fiction, tried to school me on the importance of adherence to canon when working in established universes, and on how I should have answered my homophobic critic.
Though Ms. Green provides absolutely no evidence to support her assertion, she accuses me of “breaking canon” vis-a-vis Star Trek for no reason other than to be “politically correct.” Her feeble attack on my professionalism and on my novel was published the day after my original post. Because Ms. Green did not mention me by name or link to my post, I didn’t learn of her essay until this past weekend, when a friend brought it to my attention…..
[Mack then analyzes the topic at length.]
Now, all this might seem to some folks like a lot of noise for very little signal. But I think it’s important to remember that as a nominee in the Best Fan Writer category, Ms. Green was offered the opportunity to submit self-selected examples of her work for the Hugo Voter Packet, to demonstrate which of her writings from 2014 show her to be worthy of taking home a Hugo award. That she chose to include the post I dissected above — an unresearched, factually deficient essay in which she lacks the basic courtesy even to name me as the author of the piece she tries (and fails) to deconstruct, never mind link to it so that readers can review the original materials and arrive at informed conclusions with regard to her arguments — speaks volumes.
I grew up knowing the Hugo awards stand for excellence in the broad and ever-changing field of science fiction and fantasy literature. Nothing I have seen in this essay from Ms. Green persuades me her work contains the insight or intellectual rigor that would make her worthy of being honored as a member of that longstanding tradition.
I also suspect she doesn’t know as much about Star Trek as she thinks she does.
I'm out of Nutty Nuggets
— Paul "Princejvstin" Weimer (@PrinceJvstin) June 1, 2015
Adam-Troy Castro
Open Letter To The Ants At the Base Of The Monument – June 2
Few things mark you as a schmuck faster than attacking a master for being “old.”
You can have great differences with a master. You can argue bitterly with a master. You can even think a master is an asshole.
But the second you start using his age and past accomplishments as a negative in your rhetoric. you mark yourself as a non-entity, a jackass, a pipsqueak, an ant shouting at a monument.
This sin, currently in evidence among some supporters of the Sad Puppies, is not exclusive to either end of the political spectrum.
Fans from the left wing thought they had reason to be upset at Mike Resnick and Barry Malzberg, a couple of years back, and though it was arguable that they had a case, it was downright appalling how many of them thought they were issuing slammers when they complained that these greats hailed from before their time, or were “old and irrelevant,” or, tellingly, “I never even heard of them!”
That controversy provided fuel for this one, where among things fans from the right wing are slamming David Gerrold for being old and senile and irrelevant and all those things he most assuredly is not.
David Gerrold on Facebook – June 2
Okay, so now that I’ve laid some groundwork — see my two previous essays about communication forensics and compelling questions — I’m going to ask some compelling questions.
In the past, I’ve asked these questions about the sad-puppy slate and the rabid-puppy slate:
1) Who are the horrible, no-good, terrible people who have conspired against the science fiction that has been “overlooked?” How have they conspired?
2) What are the qualities of storytelling that define excellence? How are these qualities recognized by the reader?
3) The stories on the sad-puppy slate and the stories on the rabid-puppy slate? How do they demonstrate the qualities of excellence that would make a reader consider them award-worthy?
Let me add a few more questions here:
4) If you are a supporter of either or both slates, then did you read the stories on the slate you support before the ballot was announced? Did you nominate any or all of the stories on either slate? Did you nominate any story you had not read? Why?
5) Have you now read any or all of the stories on the final Hugo ballot? If so, can you please tell us which stories you feel are award-worthy? Why? (Let me rephrase that.) Without considering the author or the politics of the author, can you explain why any of the stories from either slate are award-worthy?
6) Which do you feel is more important in the award process — the excellence of the story or the political views of the author?
I’m not the only one posing these questions.
I thought that the Sad Puppies would quiet down between the nominations and the actual awards. Boy, was I ever wrong.
— Paul "Princejvstin" Weimer (@PrinceJvstin) June 2, 2015
Alexandra Erin on Blue Author Is About To Write
“Because hope springs eternal.” – June 2
[Quoting a comment Erin left on Brad R. Torgersen’s blog.]
I’m sure I’m not the first person to try to tell you this, but the people who spew hot air about “warriors for social justice” are all over here with you. That’s not a thing people called themselves. It’s a pejorative made up to dismiss people, a la calling someone “PC patrol” or “feminazi” or “thought police”.
Some people have taken it as an ironic badge of honor or made geeky riffs on it (like “Social Justice Paladin” or “Social Justice Bard”), but by and large, you’re chiding people for not living up to the standards of a label that was foisted upon them in the first place.
Which is actually part of the function of the label. Most of the people I have seen getting slapped with the “SJW” label not only don’t describe themselves as social justice warriors, they don’t describe themselves as activists. They’re just people, living their lives, dealing with their own problems, and acting their consciences.
bibliogramma on My Life In Books
“Campbell Award Nominations: Jason Cordova” – May 26
Basing my assessment on these two submissions, Cordova has a future as an SF writer to be sure, and I enjoyed them both, but to me, his work does not rise to the level of previous Campbell winners such as Spider Robinson, C. J. Cherryh, Ted Chiang, Nalo Hopkinson, Cory Doctorow, Elizabeth Bear, Jo Walton, and others.
bibliogramma on My Life In Books
“Campbell Award Nominations: Wesley Chu” – May 26
Obviously, I am very much impressed by these two novels. Chu easily passes my standard as a worthy candidate for the Campbell.
bibliogramma on My Life In Books
“Campbell Award Nominations: Kary English” – May 26
English has some definite writing chops, but I felt that there wasn’t a lot of variety in the pieces offered, which weakens my overall assessment of her as a Campbell nominee. I have already noted the similarities in protagonist choice. There are also structural similarities in the pieces, and I was irked in that I wanted to use the word “bittersweet” in describing all three stories. I think English has definite potential and I hope she continues to develop her craft.
bibliogramma on My Life In Books
“Campell Award Nominations: Eric S. Raymond and Rolf Nelson” – June 2
Rolf Nelson and Eric S. Raymond did not submit any pieces [to the Hugo Voters Packet], but as there are samples of their writing in the Castalia House anthology Riding the Red Horse, submitted by the publisher in support of nominations of other pieces in the anthology, I read those in order to gain some sense of Nelson and Raymond’s work. I was not inspired by what was available to go searching for any more samples of either author’s work.
Lis Carey on Lis Carey’s Library
Journey Planet is visually attractive, filled with interesting and thoughtful articles, well-written, and well-edited. I’m totally impressed. Go read it. Highly recommended.
Brian Niemeier on Superversive SF
“Transhuman and Subhuman Part VIII: Gene Wolfe, Genre Work, and Literary Duty” – June 2
The eighth essay in John C. Wright’s Transhuman and Subhuman collection is a meditation on the merits of speculative fiction occasioned by SFWA making Gene Wolfe a Grand Master. “He is the greatest living author writing in the English language today,” Wright declares, “and I do not confine that remark to genre authors.”
“Sometimes in this life,” Wright says in regard to Wolfe’s accolade, “we see justice done.” If honors are rightly given to those who perform their duty, what obligations do SFF authors owe to their readers, to society at large, and to the truth itself?
Wright seeks the answer through a critical via negativa. What causes our disappointment–even outrage–when due honor is denied?
Chris Gerrib on Private Mars Rocket
“Hugo Thoughts, Down-Ballot Edition” – June 2
More thoughts on this year’s Hugo.
Best Fan Writer (777 nominating ballots, 265 entries, range 129-201)
Dave Freer
Amanda S. Green
Jeffro Johnson
Laura J. Mixon
Cedar SandersonFreer’s been an ass to me, and incoherent at length to pretty much everybody, so no rocket for him. Green and Sanderson seem to not like SJWs like me, so I’ll return the favor. I’m a bit reluctant to give Mixon the award for an expose. Johnson at least restricts himself to book reviews, so my ballot is Johnson and no award.
Reading SFF
“2015 Hugo Awards reading: Kevin J. Anderson – The Dark Between the Stars (2014)” – June 2
I did not finish this novel. I abandoned it at about 25% in (and I am “proud” of having made it so far) but the book did not grab me and the writing is not good enough to keep me reading for the sake of the writing. If I have the time (and I probably won’t have the time) to get back to the book before voting on the Hugos closes, I will try to finish it. But only then.
Lyle Hopwood on Peromyscus
“Big Boys Don’t Cry by Tom Kr*tman (Castalia House)” – May 30
This is a Sad Puppy and Rabid Puppy nomination.
It’s is an okay story about the basic training of AIs used in combat. The methods used are cruel, but the humans don’t care. They wall off the AI’s memories of pain and injury after training is complete, but in the case of Maggie, severe damage during combat allows her (she’s a she) to recall the training sessions. All the while she is accessing her memories, she is being investigated for scrap value, and she can see and hear the humans discussing her fate. It’s not a very new concept, but it’s handled well. It’s just so very long. It’s interesting to compare this with Steve Rzasa’s story, Turncoat, as the AI warships come to very different conclusions about humans.
Alexandra Erin at Blue Author Is About To Write
“Sad Puppies Review Books: STREGA NONA” – June 2
Reviewed by John Z. Upjohn, USMC (Aspired)
If you want chilling proof of the radical feminist lesbian witch cult (also known as “Social Justice”) that has infiltrated all ranks of society, look no further than this book which blatantly glorifies witchcraft, matriarchy, and the creation of a loyal slave nation of emasculated beta male cucks.
Exactly as foretold in a literal straightforward reading of the Book of Revelation, this book portrays a near-future world where even the Catholic Church itself is in thrall of a woman. The church is no longer the Bride of Christ but the scarlet woman of Babylon.
“Although all the people in the town talked about her in whispers, they all went to see her if they had troubles. Even the priests and the sisters in the convent went, for Strega Nona had a magic touch.” If that isn’t straight out of the Bible then I don’t even know what the Bible says. I do know that it says to not suffer a witch to live, not to treat her as a valued civic leader.
David Langford in Ansible #335 – June 2015
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@Camestros
I want you to know that I was deciphering your spoiler the long way around and was getting really confused and alarmed halfway through.
I though I had made a mistake somewhere. 😛
@Rek
Running the text of the book through tr and uniq, I found that “gun(s)” appeared 148 times, “weapon(s)” appeared 41 times, “sidearm” appeared 4 times, and “handgun”, “firearm”, “rifle”, “pistol”, and “carbine” appeared 0 times. I remembered the first time the word sidearm appeared in the book and it was a shock… hey, the author is using a different word for gun! Even the magic weapon which got a proper noun for a name was called the Gesundheit-something-something* Gun.
* It started with a G… that’s all I can remember.
So, the reason Ancillary Justice isn’t MilSF is because it isn’t weapons portn? That’s essential to the definition of “MilSF”? I’m sorry, but that sounds like rather determined special pleading.
@Seth Gordon
I confess that when ranking the nominees for this year’s Hugos, one of my chief complaints regarding TGE is that the fantasy element is so attenuated as to practically not exist. (I didn’t notice the magic, either.) I liked the novel, but…
A nontrivial plot point rests on the fact that some of the priests really can talk to the dead. That isn’t the only example of magic that should be hard to overlook.
Meredith: Cheese fiction is clearly an under-served fiction market. (Perhaps on a nice bit of crusty bread.)
Apologies to whoever mentioned it but I can’t find the post and I’m a bit slow on the uptake. Somebody mentioned Finnish pronouns awhile back? I hadn’t realized that Suomi/Finnish doesn’t distinguish he from she (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_grammar#Personal_pronouns )
So VD’s publishing house is in a country were everybody speaks a language a bit like Radch from AJ?
If everybody already talked about this while I was sleeping then…I hope you had fun 🙂
Meredith on June 3, 2015 at 3:32 pm said:
**The Goblin Emperor spoilerspoilerspoiler**
Its not spelled out explicitly every time it comes up, but I thought it was clear that abdicating (or, at the beginning, failing to get coronated) would not be good for Maia’s health and prospects of reaching old age.
To elaborate, anytime there are rival factions wishing to control a monarchy, the health and life expectancy of persons considered to be legitimate heirs is at risk. Even if the heir does not take the throne, or abdicates it, their continued existence will always provide the possibility for a group who opposes whoever is in power to use the legitimate heir as a pretext for overthrowing the current person in power. Legitimate heir no longer living = less opportunity for successfully overthrowing existing throneholder. see Lady Jane Grey for example
***endspoiler***
@Cally
Or baked into scones, or melted on top of shepherds pie, or a blend in mac and cheese, or a nice melty fondue, or thinly sliced on fruit bread right out of the toaster, or blue in a nice pear salad… Mmmm. Cheese. I have books about cheese, but all non-fiction, alas. 🙂
@Steven Schwartz:
A martini is made with gin. I am happy to lie down on the tracks (or gatekeep) that one. I suspect we agree.
XS: Like I said I was really discussing a different book with exactly the same tile and main character’s name 🙂
Tintinaus said: “Reading TKs comments both here and elsewhere makes me think that he would, in a certain Stephenson reality, have “Poor Impulse Control” tattooed on his forehead.”
That sounds like a great idea for a tattoo! I’m doing it right now, before I can consider the implications!
” Lady Jane Grey for example”
See also Edward II, Richard II and Henry VI.
“Meredith: Cheese fiction is clearly an under-served fiction market. (Perhaps on a nice bit of crusty bread.)”
See Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers
1 part butter
2 parts brie
3 parts neufchatel cream cheese
Melt together with some diced onion. Serve with vegetables or crusty bread.
There is cheese science fiction! Wallace and Gromit: A Grand Day Out
Also given that elves traditionally have a forest dwelling culture it is unlikely that they would have developed dairy farming. However if they did so (perhaps by borrowing the techniques from non-elvish peoples) it is unlikely that they would have sufficient tolerance for lactose to consume unprocessed milk products. On the other hand that may well lead to cultured milk products such a yogurt or cheese being an important source of calories and protein for a rapidly urbanising Elvish society.
Now, all I have to do is 1. put a bit about lefties being meanies and 2. make friends with Castalia House and next step “Do Elves Eat Cheese?” will be rocketing its way to a Hugo nomination next year! Hoorah!
“Wallace and Gromit: A Grand Day Out”
Hmm a film that features a beagle in a rocket ship? Sounds suspiciously Sad Puppy to me!
Wallace and Gromit is brilliant! Never been nominated, hm? Time to start a protest movement, obviously. 😉
Cally : Ohg gur zvffvat purrfr cvengr jnf gur xrl gb gur jubyr fgbel!
Ehoovfu. Lbh arrq gb pbafvqre urkncbqvn nf gur xrl vafvtug.
The Tiffany Aching stories had Horace, a cheese character. And Tiffany Aching herself was a cheese maker. Blessed are the cheese makers.
@Camestros:
If you really want to ensure a place on RP2, you may need to includes some reflections on the unfortunately flatulent side effects of multicultured dairy products and how elves should exercise their right of return to their forest homelands.
CPaca: Vf gur jbeyq ernql sbe urkncrqny purrfr?
The Housebroken Kingdoms
Cally, va Fbivrg Ehffvn, gur purrfr phgf lbh.
influxus: LOL 🙂
Luke, I am your puppy.
“Hmm a film that features a beagle in a rocket ship? Sounds suspiciously Sad Puppy to me!”
Gromit is a sweetheart! Now, Preston – there’s a Rabid Puppy for you.
(We’re clearly in backwards-land: all the fake spoilers are encrypted, and the real ones aren’t.)
@Will:
No. I am your puppy.
@influxus Yeah. The other way has become so common that I thought I’d get corrected regardless!
@Will
I just like how the actual quote functions as a correction to the misquote.
Also:
Hound shot first!
Scalzi also once posted a story about sentient yogurt: When the Yogurt Took Over. Think it qualifies as MilSF? It’s about an invasion . . .
Er–no, not an invasion, sorry; I misremembered. Still, a takeover?
@influxus Now witness the firepower of this fully FLEDGED and OPERATIONAL battle slate!
Scott Frazer: Good lord, reading James May’s comments are exhausting.
He sure is a tireless quote miner.
Meredith: The main flaw (in my opinion) with The Goblin Emperor is that we never see him royally screw up and have to deal with the consequences, but since I didn’t notice that until three days after I finished it I’m not going to hold it against a book that instantly leapt into my favourite books list.
Ur onpxrq Grguvzne vagb n pbeare jvgubhg vagraqvat gb qb fb. >_>
@Rev Bob
I wouldn’t call A Civil Campaign MilSF because I’d be busy calling it a Regency Romance disguised as Space Opera.
Even AJ is, to me, much more Space Opera than it is MilSF.
@cally
Jonathan Bing, cheese maker! From James P. Blaylock’s sadly neglected and underrated Elfin Ship trilogy!
Even if the answer to “how was the SP3 slate selected, and by whom?” is annoyingly long to keep retyping and/or dropping into people’s comment sections, Torgerson he could write it up once and put it on his blog. Then, if people keep asking, he can post a copy-and-pasted “I answered that in my blog post of $date” with a link to the explanation.
Will
I prefer battle plates to battle slates, which is why I took great pleasure in backing the Kickstarter for the Schlock Mercenary table top RPG; it’s an early birthday present to myself next year.
I thought that Howard Taylor handled last year’s debacle with great dignity so this was a win/win for me; I get a great product and I also get to support people who have behaved in an honourable fashion.
Also, I really love Schlock…
@stevie I’m embarrassed to say I hadn’t known it, but it looks like something I’d like. Any suggestions on where to start?
Then there is the smuggling to avoid high cheese duty subplot in the Jasper Fforde Thursday Next books.
.
Schipperke and Chihuahua: The Enchanted Chocolate Pug
Sadly, the problem with the ROT-13’d spoilers (those of them that may be legitimate) is that those of us who have read the book and like the discussion can’t read them without decoding them.
And for those of us who may at times be reading the site on iPhones, like, say, me, it’s impossible to copy/paste the stuff, so even if we have a ROT-13 translator handy, it still ain’t gonna happen.
On the other hand, I’m now half-convinced to write a story about cheese wizards. Milk is a powerful life-giving substance to work with alchemically, after all. It could fit into AUTUMNLANDS easily, but I’m not sure that’s the right place for it…
” You are no match for my Wenslydale!” screamed Gaspar the Arcane across the barricade.
Zeltan the Curdlemeister brushed a lock of her auburn hair away from scarlet eyes and then stared down at Meglar the half-cultured.
“This may take more firepower than I had anticipated. We have no choice – prepare the Stilton!”
Oh, darn. I hadn’t been aware that rot-13 didn’t work well on tablets. Sorry.
KB : On the other hand, I’m now half-convinced to write a story about cheese wizards.
In the UK TV series “Misfits”, various characters have found themselves with superpowers. Most often these are pretty crap powers, especially given the low production budgets of the series (which encourages creativity rather than CGI). The main protagonists found themselves in a situation where they had to come out to the world after someone went on TV demonstrating his abilities of “lactokinesis”, the ability to manipulate milk and milk products. “Monsieur Grand Fromage” was quickly overshadowed and laughed at when people with less ridiculous powers started showing up…
…until he used said powers to kill three out of five of the main crew and leave the character with immortality in a permanent lobotomized state. And then he chased the lactose-intolerant one with a knife. Turned out a lot of people have yoghurt or milk sitting in their bellies every morning.
Don’t diss the cheese wizards.
Copy-and-paste isn’t impossible on an iPhone. Press a word in a paragraph until a blue selection box appears. Expand it to cover the text to copy, then choose the command Copy from a pop-up menu that appears.
@Kurt Busiek:
One of the tricks I learned a while back was to make a JavaScript bookmarklet that handles ROT13 – so all you have to do is highlight the text and open the bookmark to decode it. Still not transparent, but it’s a decent balance.
If you want to do that yourself, go here, click on the “file suppressed” message, copy the one line of code to your clipboard, and save it as the target of a bookmark. (There are some pages that have “bookmark this link” code to make this initial setup simpler, but the code doesn’t work as well. YMMV.)
Can’t remember if this has been suggested before, but just in case:
Plan K9 from Outer Space
Brian Z –
It’s her house
It’s her blog
It’s her rules
Unhappy? I think it would be more productively managed if you discuss it privately through e-mail, not bring it up as a wannabe-“gotcha” element.
Still unhappy? Don’t post there.
Her rules
Her blog
Her house
I seem to remember devoting a lot of time arguing on Usenet about ‘what is MilSF’ in the Glory Days of RecArts SFWritten. My views were very strongly influenced by the fact both of my parents were career military, and therefore I had grown up immersed in the culture; my father served for 35 years in the Royal Air Force (RAF), and my first ever lesson on how to use an edged weapon was provided by a very nice Ghurka chap who was serving with my father at that time.
It was a very good lesson; and I have remembered it throughout my life. Suffice it to say that, with Ghurkas around, those who believe the maxim ‘Don’t bring a knife to a gun fight’ may wish to reflect upon this carefully in whatever time is left to them.
All in all, I suspect that the amount of gun porn is correlated with the amount of people who have never been anything other than civilian, and they haven’t a clue what battle actually means. It isn’t nice, it isn’t fun, you can’t pick up your toys and go home.
My father was a slave on the Death Railway; he survived but it left scars, most obviously on his skin, the other inside him. we couldn’t touch him while he was asleep because he might kill us. That is what war is, and unsurprisingly people don’t talk about it, particularly if you fear it all over again…
Will
Go to SchlockMercenary.com; new strips go up every day.
It’s a comic comic strip, it provides me an excellent way to start the day
I hope you like it!
PS the archives are huge…
Stevie: My father was a slave on the Death Railway; he survived but it left scars, most obviously on his skin, the other inside him. we couldn’t touch him while he was asleep because he might kill us. That is what war is, and unsurprisingly people don’t talk about it, particularly if you fear it all over again…
One of the most pleasant men I ever knew commanded an artillery battery in Vietnam. He didn’t speak about it, and went out of his way to be a thoroughly nice bloke. And he didn’t own guns or strut like certain people we could name.
But when you work in artillery in war time, you damn well know that you’re killing people regularly and in greater quantities than any infantryman. He still hurt from it. I remember his example, which is one reason I have such contempt for gun-porn posers.