(1) VITA BREVIS. Arnie Fenner’s tribute at Muddy Colors to artists and cartoonists who passed in 2015 is excellent.
(2) DOCTOR STRANGE. “First Look at Benedict Cumberbatch as Doctor Strange” at Yahoo! Movies.
The first official glimpse of Benedict Cumberbatch as Marvel hero Doctor Strange graces the new cover of Entertainment Weekly, and the biggest revelation is that he probably isn’t spending much time in the makeup chair. The actor sports facial hair and a cloak that will be familiar to comic-book fans, as well as Strange’s powerful amulet, the Eye of Agamotto.
(3) DARTH ZIPPO. “Watch This Homemade, Gas-Powered Lightsaber Destroy Things” at Popular Science.
The entire thing was built and modified from existing components, using a replica Skywalker lightsaber shell, a section from a turkey marinade injector, and several 3D printed parts to make it all work together. The result is a finished product by a Youtube craftsman that is neither as clumsy or random as a blaster.
(4) PALMER AND SHAVER. “When Good Science Fiction Fans Go Bad” is a companion article to Wired’s “Geeks Guide To The Galaxy” podcast which interviewed Ray Palmer’s biographer and learned about the Shaver Mystery.
Author Fred Nadis relates the strange story of Palmer in his recent biography The Man From Mars, which describes how Hugo Gernsback, founder of the first pulp science fiction magazine, Amazing Stories, helped inspire his readers to create a better future.
“He saw [science fiction] in very practical terms of shaping the future,” Nadis says in Episode 182 of the Geek’s Guide to the Galaxy podcast. “Almost a visionary experience of imagining the future and new technologies and what they could do, but he also felt like we had to spread this faith.”
If you’re interested in comparing viewpoints, here’s a link to the post I wrote about fandom’s response to Richard Shaver.
(5) WRITING NEUROMANCER. William Gibson’s 2014 piece for The Guardian, “How I wrote Neuromancer” was news to me, and perhaps will be to you.
On the basis of a few more Omni sales, I was approached by the late Terry Carr, an established SF anthologist. Terry had, once previously, commissioned a limited series of first novels for Ace Books – his Ace SF Specials. Now he was doing it again, and would I care to write one? Of course, I said, in that moment utterly and indescribably terrified, something I remained for the next 18 months or so, when, well out of my one-year contract, I turned in the manuscript.
I was late because I had so very little idea of how to write a novel, but assumed that this might well be my first and last shot at doing so. Whatever else might happen, I doubted anyone would ever again offer me money up front for an unwritten novel. This was to be a paperback original, for a very modest advance. My fantasy of success, then, was that my book, once it had been met with the hostile or indifferent stares I expected, would go out of print. Then, yellowing fragrantly on the SF shelves of secondhand book shops, it might voyage forward, up the time-stream, into some vaguely distant era in which a tiny coterie of esoterics, in London perhaps, or Paris, would seize upon it, however languidly, as perhaps a somewhat good late echo of Bester, Delany or another of the writers I’d pasted, as it were, on the inside of my authorial windshield. And that, I assured myself, sweating metaphorical bullets daily in front of my Hermes 2000 manual portable, would almost certainly be that.
(6) INTERNET TAR. Ursula K. Le Guin tells readers at Book View Café she never said it:
The vapid statement “the creative adult is the child who survived” is currently being attributed to me by something called Aiga —
https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/design-quote-creative-adult-is-child-who-survived-ursula-le-guin/
…Meelis pointed out this sentence in the 1974 essay “Why Are Americans Afraid of Dragons?” (reprinted in the collection The Language of the Night):
I believe that maturity is not an outgrowing, but a growing up: that an adult is not a dead child, but a child who survived.
Nothing about “creativity” whatever. I just said a grown-up is somebody who lived through childhood — a child who survived….
It is high time that this sentence, “The creative adult is the child who has survived,” be attributed to its originator, Prof. Julian F. Fleron.
If he did not originate it, and wishes to be freed from the onus of supposedly having done so, that’s up to him or to those who wish to preserve his good name. I just wish, oh how I wish! that he hadn’t stuck me with the damn thing.
(7) SCHOEN. Lawrence M. Schoen is interviewed by Sara Stamey at Book View Café.
Can you tell us about your small press, Paper Golem, which aims to introduce readers to fresh new authors? Any advice for those interested in setting up a small press?
More than a decade ago, one of my graduate students lured me away from academia to come work for him in the private sector as the Director of Research at the medical center where he was CEO. The result was fewer work hours and more money. I mention this because it meant that I was in a position to start a small press, going into the venture not with an eye toward making a fortune (stop laughing!) but rather the more modest goal of breaking even and using the press to “pay it forward.”
(8) STRAUB SELLS HOUSE. “Horror Author’s Not-Scary UWS Townhouse Sells for $7M” reports NY Curbed.
Despite the nature of author Peter Straub‘s work—he’s a horror author known for Ghost Story, The Throat, and his collaborations with Stephen King—his former Upper West Side townhouse is very much not terrifying. The gorgeous home, located on West 85th Street, was built in the 1880s and has some of its original details, including a stained-glass panel over the staircase and six fireplaces. It went on the market back in April, but unsurprisingly went quickly; according to StreetEasy, it sold at the beginning of the month, for slightly under its original $7.8 million asking price. (h/t 6sqft) Coincidentally, Straub’s daughter Emma, an author herself, recently sold her equally gorgeous townhouse in Prospect Lefferts Gardens.
Andrew Porter commented, “This is very disturbing news. I’ve known Straub for decades. He recently decided not to attend the World Fantasy Convention, held the beginning of November in Saratoga Springs NY, because of health concerns. I wonder if the effort of climbing up and down all those stairs finally got to be too much for him.”
(9) COINCIDENCE. Hundreds of readers “liked” the mainstream political graphic David Gerrold posted on Facebook but it seems an ill-considered choice by someone who recently hoped to convince people an asterisk had another meaning than ASSH*LE.
(10) MYTHBUSTER. Sarah A. Hoyt’s discussion of “The Myths of Collapse” is a good antidote to misinterpretations of history that are fairly common in the backstory of created worlds, however, it is also intended as political advice, and while fairly mild as such YMMV.
1 Myth one — collapse creates a tabula rasa, upon which a completely different society can be built. Honestly, I think this comes from the teachings on the collapse of Rome and the truly execrable way the middle ages are taught.
First of all, once you poke closer, Rome only sort of collapsed. Depending on the place you lived in, your life might not have changed much between the end of the empire and the next few centuries. I come from a place where it’s more like Rome got a name change and went underground. In both the good and the bad, Portugal is still Rome, just Rome as you’d expect after 19 centuries of history or so.
Second the society that was rebuilt wasn’t brand new and tabula rasa but partook both of the empire and the incredible complexity of what happened during collapse.
(11) TODAY IN HISTORY
- December 28, 1895 – First commercial movie screened.
In 1894, Antoine Lumiere, the father of Auguste (1862-1954) and Louis (1864-1948), saw a demonstration of Edison’s Kinetoscope. The elder Lumiere was impressed, but reportedly told his sons, who ran a successful photographic plate factory in Lyon, France, that they could come up with something better. Louis Lumiere’s Cinematographe, which was patented in 1895, was a combination movie camera and projector that could display moving images on a screen for an audience. The Cinematographe was also smaller, lighter and used less film than Edison’s technology.
(12) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY BOY
- Born December 28, 1922 — Stan Lee
(13) SF-LOVERS. “Scientists on their favourite science fiction”:
We invited scientists to highlight their favourite science fiction novel or film and tell us what it was that captivated their imagination – and, for some, how it started their career….
Matthew Browne, social scientist, CQUniversity
Consider Phlebas – Iain M. Banks
I love a lot of science fiction, but Iain M. Banks’ classic space-opera Consider Phlebas is a special favourite.
Banks describes the “Culture”, a diverse, anarchic, utopian and galaxy-spanning post-scarcity society. The Culture is a hybrid of enhanced and altered humanoids and artificial intelligences, which range from rather dull to almost godlike in their capabilities….
Perhaps the best thing about Consider Phlebas (apart from the wonderfully irreverent ship names the Minds give themselves) is the fact that a story from this conflict is told from the perspective of an Indiran agent, who despises the Culture and everything it stands for.
My own take on the book is as an ode to progressive technological humanism, and the astute reader will find many parallels to contemporary political and cultural issues.
(14) THE CLIPULARITY. The December 28 Washington Post has a lengthy article by Joel Achenbach about whether robots will kill us all once AI becomes smarter than people. He references Isaac Asimov and Vernor Vinge and discusses the nightmare scenario developed by Nick Bostrom about whether a machine programmed to make something (like paper clips) Goes Amok and starts ransacking the world for resources to make paper clips, destroying everything that gets in its way.
People will tell you that even Stephen Hawking is worried about it. And Bill Gates. And that Elon Musk gave $10 million for research on how to keep machine intelligence under control. All that is true.
How this came about is as much a story about media relations as it is about technological change. The machines are not on the verge of taking over. This is a topic rife with speculation and perhaps a whiff of hysteria.
But the discussion reflects a broader truth: We live in an age in which machine intelligence has become a part of daily life. Computers fly planes and soon will drive cars. Computer algorithms anticipate our needs and decide which advertisements to show us. Machines create news stories without human intervention. Machines can recognize your face in a crowd.
New technologies — including genetic engineering and nanotechnology — are cascading upon one another and converging. We don’t know how this will play out. But some of the most serious thinkers on Earth worry about potential hazards — and wonder whether we remain fully in control of our inventions.
(15) BAEN AUTHOR JOHN SCALZI. John Scalzi explains why his next novel won’t be out until 2017 in “Very Important News About My 2016 Novel Release (and Other Fiction Plans)” but makes it up to everyone by highlighting several pieces of short fiction that will be in our hands next year including….
* A short story called “On the Wall” which I co-wrote with my pal Dave Klecha, which is part of the Black Tide Rising anthology, co-edited by John Ringo, for Baen. Yes, that John Ringo and that Baen. Pick your jaws up off the floor, people. I’ve made no bones about liking Baen as a publisher, and I’ve noted for a while that John Ringo and I get on pretty well despite our various differences and occasional snark. Also, it was a ton of fun to write in his universe and with Dave. The BTR anthology comes out June 7th.
This news was broken in August but may have been overlooked by fans occupied by another subject at the time….
Black Tide Rising’s announced contributors are John Ringo, Eric Flint, John Scalzi, Dave Klecha, Sarah Hoyt, Jody Lynn Nye, Michael Z. Williamson, and Kacey Ezell.
(16) WRITER DISARMAMENT TALKS STALL. “George R.R. Martin and Christmas Puppies” is Joe Vasicek’s response to the recent overture.
Now, I don’t disagree with Mr. Martin’s sentiment. I too would like to see reconciliation and de-escalation of the ugliness that we saw from both sides in 2015. And to be fair, Mr. Martin does give a positive characterization of what’s going on right now with Sad Puppies 4. That’s a good first step.
The trouble is, you don’t achieve reconciliation by shouting at the other side to lay down their guns first. You achieve it by hearing and acknowledging their grievances. You might not agree that those grievances need to be rectified, which is fine—that’s what negotiations are for—but you do have to make an effort to listen to the other side. And it’s clear enough that Mr. Martin is not listening.
The core of the Sad Puppies movement is a rejection of elitism….
(17) OUT OF DARKNESS. Were reports that Mark Lawrence is a Grimdark author premature? In Suvudu’s “’Beyond Redemption’ Author Michael R. Fletcher: ‘NO SUCH THING AS GRIMDARK’”, Lawrence says he meant “Aardvark”….
Does anyone actually set out to write grimdark?
I certainly didn’t. I thought Beyond Redemption was fantasy, and maybe dark fantasy if you wanted to label it further. But then I live under a rock.
So I reached out to a few of the authors who have been accused of defiling reality with their overly dark writings.
All quotes are exact and unedited.
Mark Lawrence (Author of The Broken Empire series, and the Red Queen’s War series): “aardvark.”
Other quotes follow, from Django Weler, Teresa Frohock, Scott Oden, Anthony Ryan, Tim Marquitz, and Marc Turner.
[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Martin Morse Wooster, Andrew Porter, Will R., and Michael J. Walsh for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Daniel Dern.]
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1. If not for modern technology, would you still be alive today?
2. Care to list a few examples?
1. I think so?
2. I know I was born a few weeks early, but don’t think it was early enough to require heroic measures. Since then, my only major encounter with the health care system was laparoscopy for a hernia back in my 20s. But I also wouldn’t have been vaccinated against any childhood diseases, and would probably have been the scion of some dirt farmer, so …
Assuming I made it past chicken pox and all, the onset of porphyria symptoms at 15 would have killed me before my majority. And a variety of other things would have since then, if I’d survived that. I’m entirely a product of modern society.
One element that I didn’t discuss in my “would you survive without modern technology” comment is immunizations, which are always an issue. I had chicken pox as a child, and obviously survived it. On the other hand I was immunized against measles, which is a much more commonly life-threatening disease.
I was also immunized against a wide variety of tropical diseases: Smallpox, yellow fever, typhoid, and so on, and took chloroquine on a regular basis for an extended period of time because I lived in sub-Saharan Africa for nine years. Without those, there is a decent chance that I would have contracted one of those aliments during that time period. On the other hand, in a pre- or post-modern world, I probably would never have traveled to Africa, so I probably would never have been exposed to them.
You know, I always knew that was gonna come back to haunt me…
Aaron: However, a kid born in sub-Saharan Africa would have died from those things, as they still do. And smallpox was endemic everywhere in the Old World, including such tropical countries as England. Measles got everyone too.
The hypothetical us might have been better off as indigenous people of temperate North America; I don’t know what diseases they had, but certainly not as many.
Maybe something for the next scroll
11 Times Science Fiction and Fantasy Gave Us Hope for the Future in 2015
The whole article is good and a nice reminder of some of things that happened in SF this year.
1 Probably not
2 (a) I had a badly infected gall bladder surgically removed several years ago; the surgery would have been a much bigger deal even 20 years earlier, and I suspect the odds of making it through without antibiotics or even relatively recent ideas of antisepsis would have been low.
(b) I’m old enough to have been vaccinated against smallpox (though variolation is old enough it might not count as modern technology) but young enough to have been protected against most of the “childhood diseases” except chicken pox (and you had better believe I’ve had the shingles vaccine!), so add the risk of dying of measles or polio or TB or tetanus or scarlet fever…
Fortunately, here in 8501, “childhood diseases” is a purely historical term, and familiar mostly to specialists.
1. Probably not, because
2. Thanks to childhood leukemia I would not have seen my teens without chemotherapy; I’ve had strep and bronchitis at various points in my life, and they can’t be counted upon to just go away without antibiotics; and who knows to what extent my survival to adulthood can be attributed to vaccinations against measles, mumps, rubella, and tetanus? Or to being born late enough to benefit from the good work of the smallpox vaccine even without having had it administered to me personally?
—
“utterly, girlishly obsessed…”
“these fangirls who never heard of Doctor Strange…”
Hey, y’all? Could we not do the thing where we try to increase the insult intensity by accusing the target of being like girls? Surely we can say what we object to in VD, or in latecomers to comic franchises, without this side-swipe at everyone who identifies as female.
If born into a world without modern technology, I might be healthier than I am. My health problems don’t seem to be genetic, they come from exposure to toxins and lack of exercise. So I might be better off physically, but not enjoying the things I enjoy because so many wouldn’t exist.
If modern technology stopped while I’m in my current state of health, I’d probably be miserable and be unable to write, but not actually die.
All in all, I’ll take the technology.
1, Not a chance.
2, I still have a faint scar where they operated on me before I was a month old due to a food blockage (or so I was told). Prior to the technology to cut small babies open, rummage inside them, and expect them to live afterwards, I wouldn’t have even lived long enough to be named.
NJL : Surely we can say what we object to in VD, or in latecomers to comic franchises, without this side-swipe at everyone who identifies as female.
While I agree with the comment, I think I can speak for the majority of males who know of him when I say “We don’t want him either”. Given his general level of reliability in self reporting, I prefer to think of his
genderbiological sex as being in a state of quantum indeterminacy until collapsed by a notarized genetic analysis.I could be wrong, but I think in this instance the point wasn’t to say that the Benedict-Cumberbatch-obsessed folks who will swoon over the sight of him in costume are like girls, and to say that they are girls.
I don’t think it was meant as a shot at Beale or anyone Puppy-related. I don’t know what proportion of Cumberbatch fandom is female, but I think it probably skews female strongly enough that “fangirls” is a more appropriate generic than “fanboys.”
Certainly a gender-neutral term could have been used, but I think “fangirls” was not being used as a way to feminize those the poster didn’t like, but to refer to actual women who will kvell over Dr. Strange merely because of the actor playing the part.
While this might skew a little close to the “fake geek girl” stereotype, the poster (I’m too lazy to scroll back) did go on to say that people who actually already knew and liked the character could be as excited as they like, which seems to focus things more specifically.
I think the costume looks pretty good, myself. I was amused, however, to see one site breathlessly declaring that it was identical to the comics costume, when the first thing I did was note all the changes they’d made, but figure it captured the spirit of the outfit, so who cares?
Gedankenexperiment:
1. If not for modern technology, would you still be alive today?
In a high school history class, my teacher asked everyone in the class to raise their hand. He then asked people to put their hands down if they’d contracted certain easily treatable diseases/medical conditions. I don’t remember the exact list, but at each new condition, a bunch of hands went down. At the end of the exercise, I was the only one with my hand up. I was told that if it was the Middle Ages, I’d probably be the only one in my class who was still alive.
About a year later, I tested positive for the tuberculosis bacilli. I was given a course of chemoprophylaxis and never developed tubercles, but I guess pre-20th Century, that would have been the whole class, dead.
Kurt Busiek: I was amused, however, to see one site breathlessly declaring that it was identical to the comics costume, when the first thing I did was note all the changes they’d made, but figure it captured the spirit of the outfit, so who cares?
There you go, imposing your expert gaze on superheroes again.
I had the same reaction as Kurt to the Dr. Strange pictures: It’s not the comics outfit (at least, not any version I know), but it feels like it, just like a bunch of other stuff in the various X-Men and other Marvel movies. It feels good, in the pictures so far. Likewise the look of his sanctum, which is not very Ditko or Smith or whatever, but feels good. I do want to see how they’ll handle the phantasmagoria; in my heart of hearts I realize I won’t get to see a full-bore Ditko magicscape, but I can hope for something that resonates well.
As a longtime fan of Dr. Strange (I first encountered him, the Ancient One, Clea, Dread Dormammu and others in omnibus volumes in Black & White Reprints) I do have not any problems with Strange new fans. It doesn’t matter if they become fans because of Benedict Cumberbatch or not.
The last thing I want to do is to police someone else’s squee. Have we not learned anything from the Puppy kerfuffle or “fake geek girls”?
The sanctum looks bad to me; it’s sleek and modern, like it’s all Ikea but made of glass. It looks like something Tony Stark designed.
The costume, though, that’s nice.
@lurkertype
I would say you’re a hairsbreadth of terminology away from declaring Fake Geek Girls, and I’m uncomfortable with that. Did all the people who liked Guardians of the Galaxy and got excited about it before release have to have read the comics to be acceptable to you, too? The Marvel films are popular in their own right.
I’m sick and tired of Cumberbatch* these days (he really doesn’t have much of a range – or he’s being type-cast into the ground, also possible – and is badly over-exposed and also seriously could they have found anyone paler to play Khan if they tried?) but I don’t plan on assuming things about anyone happy about the casting of a Marvel film unless they explicitly state “idec about superheroes I just love Benedict lol”, and even then, well, that’s their joy, they should follow it.
*Plus I was not so secretly hoping for Oded Fehr to be cast. For reasons.
(16) The core of the Sad Puppies movement is a rejection of elitism
… which is why they nominated all these works by JCW, who wrote:
(What he calls “literate in the highest degree” to me looks more like a one-farthing mind stringing together ten-cent words)
@Laura Resnick:
One can also form an opinion of his publishing savvy by reading the products of his publishing house, or noticing that his most-promoted author had to resort to a desperate fundraising appeal to make ends meet.
@lurkertype —
Yep, definitely reads like policing who’s allowed to be excited about the Dr. Strange movie based on when/how they discovered Dr. Strange. This annoyed me when I read it, but at the time I was on my phone, where it’s much harder to quote.
And here in 5656, I wave my cane at such policing!
Can’t say for sure I’d have lived in earlier times. I was born just fine (My mother had a small chance she’d have bled out) but I did have enough minor nuisances (ear infections, strep throat, etc.) that wouldn’t necessarily be minor, because no antibiotics, no vaccinations, etc. But assuming I didn’t die of random infection or random violence or the like, I have no chronic conditions that make it a certainty.
I’d probably be a pretty healthy adult, and I have effectively demonstrated I’m on the extreme low end for likelihood to die in childbirth*. So, at least not dead of an obvious cause. Conditions so different it’s hard to say more than that.
BGHIlton:
Probably not the whole class. Kids survived many of those diseases and conditions even in the days when all illnesses were much more likely to be killers, just as kids do die of them even these days when they are much less likely to be. So, one or two still around as healthy adults, and a couple more deafened or blinded or weakened and liable to fall to the next bug to hit.
It’s still an excellent thought experiment to give to a class to demonstrate the sheer rate of mortality in earlier ages.
_______________
* Really. It is just about impossible to have had more successful labour and delivery. For post-natal reasons, the boys’ own survival might have been more of a question.
Gedankenexperiment:
1. If not for modern technology, would you still be alive today?
Nope! I was born prematurely with amniotic pneumonia (“You were too eager to get out and start interacting,” said my mother, later) and spent a week or two in an incubator.
I do think it’s possible to recognize that we’re reaching a state of peak-Cumberbatch without inappropriately insulting his fans. I’m reminded of something John Finnemore posted, towards the end of the Cabin Fever run, about (misquoted from memory) how nice all the so-called “Cumberbitches” were. (I did get the impression that all the Finnemore and Allam and Cole fans were frustrated at how many of the tickets to the tapings of the last few episodes the Cumberbatch fans nabbed. ‘Tis ever the lot of minor fandoms…)
BGHilton: Slight nitpick: A positive TB test doesn’t mean you’re likely to develop the disease without treatment; 90% of infections never progress past the latent stage, and it’s also possible for antibodies to remain even if the body already expunged all the bacilli. The reason people are normally given prophylactic treatment anyway is just in case you’re among the other 10%; if the infection does progress, it’s tenacious.
(Cabin Pressure! Argh.)
re: Watchmaker
MAY BE SLIGHTLY SPOILERY – BEWARE
——————————————————
It’s fascinating that people can come to such opposite conclusions about the protagonists of the book, especially the eponymous one. I really do wonder if Pulley intended it that way. We don’t have a body of her work to see if that sort of subtlety is part of her writing style or if she intended only one reading and just didn’t pull it off. At this point I lean toward thinking she left the good/bad intentions question open on purpose. Why else end it that way?
I read that she has another story with a younger Mori in the works, plus another fantasy novel. Maybe that’ll resolve the issues.
On the sexism question, I don’t see it the way Phil does. It read to me more as using the way women were treated in that time as motivation for a main character’s actions. Grace’s parents were both more caricatures of that era than fully developed characters. The sister and nephews are placeholders that are, again, only plot motivators. Actually, all her secondary characters are a bit cardboardy, so that’s a weakness – except for Katsu! :^}
I still think, overall, it’s an excellent story and wonderful world building with fascinating central characters that touches on questions about fate, free will and the ethics of ends versus means. It’s on my Hugo long list.
@Bruce Arthurs: Thanks! I tend to see novels priced higher than that. Do you buy a lot of self-published books? My impression is they tend to be less expensive, but I don’t know first-hand. The handful of self-published books I’ve bought were a little cheaper, but sometimes they’re shorter, too, so (shrug) I dunno. (Sometimes books are talked about or advertised as if they’re novels when they’re not, which I don’t always catch onto. Which confuses things.)
Anyway, I guess I’m settling on “novellas for $2.99 are fine, but not a deal,” and I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks again!
@Johan P: Heh, funny you should mention – the Big Idea piece is how Belt Three first got on my list to consider.
@JDC: Thanks for the link to Jemisin’s column! I was taken aback by her description of Renata in Planetfall as “completely unlikable”; maybe I was too wrapped up in her narrative, but I didn’t read her like that.
1, perhaps, perhaps not
2, forceps delivery, but that’s ancient technology I think.
At the age of 11 I ripped hole in my leg on a rusty nail sticking out of a wall. The tetanus shots and anti-biotics might have been essential, might not have been.
JCW: What I write is literate in the highest degree
I think JCW is weak at vocabulary, and he’s mixed up “literate” with “bloviate”.
Kendall: I was taken aback by her description of Renata in Planetfall as “completely unlikable”; maybe I was too wrapped up in her narrative, but I didn’t read her like that.
Neither did I. Planetfall is on my Hugo shortlist right now. I thought the description from the main character’s point-of-view did a fantastic job of showing how zragny vyyarff naq/be CGFQ pna ybbx sebz gur vafvqr, naq ubj vg qvfgbegf gur creprcgvbaf bs gur crefba fhssrevat sebz vg.
I know that one of the other commenters here thought she was awful because fur jnf “ehaavat njnl sebz gur zrff gung fur znqr”, ohg ubarfgyl, V gubhtug fur jnf chg fgenvtug orgjrra n ebpx naq n uneq cynpr ol gur gjb crbcyr jub npghnyyl perngrq gur zrff — gur crefba jub pbzzvggrq fhvpvqr, naq gur crefba jub vafvfgrq ba pbirevat vg hc.
Ng gung cbvag, vg jbhyqa’g unir znggrerq jung fur qvq, vg jbhyq unir pnhfrq frevbhf qnzntr gb gur pbybal, rvgure fbbare be yngre. Naq gura fur unq n zragny oernxqbja / CGFQ sebz gelvat gb qrny jvgu vg ba ure bja sbe zber guna gjragl lrnef.
I found the main character very sympathetic, and thought that she deserved her resolution. I’m really surprised that Jemisin found her “completely unlikeable” — I mean, I would have expected pbzcnffvba sbe fbzrbar jub jnf fb pyrneyl fhssrevat sebz zragny vyyarff, engure guna whfg orvat n anfgl be qhcyvpvgbhf crefba.
Gedankenexperiment:
1. If not for modern technology, would you still be alive today?
2. Care to list a few examples?
1. No
2. Allergic to breast milk, cow milk, not sure on sheep/goat. Ear infections, hernia, rusty nails, rotting wood splinters, hernia, severe anemia due to uterine fibroid, constantly sick starting at 3 months, etc. Without alternatives to breast milk I’d be dead. If I survived that then without antibiotics, modern surgery, tetanus shots, and vaccines I’d probably be dead.
I see where she’s coming from, and I’m inclined to agree. I don’t think it’s a negative comment in context. You can have sympathy for a character, and be an interested observer of their narrative, without necessarily liking them or being fond of them.
If the character was unlikable and uninteresting, that would be a problem.
@JJ: Agreed 100%, and it’s on my short list, too. You know, if anything, Mac seems to fit “completely unlikeable” a lot better! I mean, ur pbirerq vg hc, gevrq gb zheqre sryybj pbybavfgf (vapyhqvat gjb whfg gb znxr vg frrz nppvqragny!), rgp. Ur jnf ernyyl xvaq bs rivy, ybbxvat onpx; ur qvq ngebpvbhf guvatf naq gevrq gb rkphfr gurz jvgu VZUB syvzfl ernfbaf. And he comes off a bit smarmy, to boot.
I may be rereading Planetfall via audiobook sooner than expected. Usually I try to let time pass, but this book was SO GOOD (I’m yelling, for the record 😉 ). I’m having similar trouble putting off rereading (listening) The Girl With All the Gifts.
@rob_matic: Hmm, maybe for me sympathy does require liking a character at least a bit. I don’t know. Anyway, I don’t feel Jemisin’s comment is negative, exactly; I was just surprised because I didn’t see Renata that way.
Unlikable and uninteresting: traits leading to the eight deadly words. Uninteresting was definitely not (IMHO) one of Renata’s problems! 😉
1: I probably would be alive assuming I survived the one and only athsma attack I had at ~35.
I also failed the pre-TB Mantoux test. The only result from that was a chest x-ray and me being the only person in my year level without a sore arm for a week after they all needed the jab and I didn’t.
‘Tis far from modern technology we we were reared – because I grew up in 1970s Ireland, where they took dying babies like me to the local monastery and had them blessed with a piece of the True Cross. Also my Mum tracked down a new miracle cream called Bonjela. So medieval miracle baby AND saved by the wonderdrug!
I’d probably be alive without modern medicine. Between the broken elbow and the shoulder injury, though, my left arm wouldn’t be good for much.
I got my immunities against measles, mumps, chickenpox and rubella the old-fashioned way*, lying in a bed sweating, groaning and covered in rashes and unpleasant swellings…. Um. A tiny little injection is certainly easier, don’t you think?
*(Which is the only way available in 853 AD.)
Gedankenexperiment:
1. If not for modern technology, would you still be alive today?
2. Care to list a few examples?
1. No.
2. I would have died at birth. I was stuck on Mom’s pelvis, they had to use instruments to dislocate my shoulder so I could be born (before C- sections were common). My appendix became infected and was removed when I was 12, probably would have burst eventually or infection would have spread. I had 3 impacted wisdom teeth that probably would have become infected and killed me if not removed in my 20s.
@Kendall
I usually track for price drops through http://www.ereaderiq.com; for what it’s worth. It helps to find those flash sales – you can even create an account with a watch list for notifications; I just check the site now and again.
Kendall wrote: “@Bruce Arthurs: Thanks! I tend to see novels priced higher than that. Do you buy a lot of self-published books? My impression is they tend to be less expensive, but I don’t know first-hand. The handful of self-published books I’ve bought were a little cheaper, but sometimes they’re shorter, too, so (shrug) I dunno. (Sometimes books are talked about or advertised as if they’re novels when they’re not, which I don’t always catch onto. Which confuses things.)”
I’ve bought a fair number of self-published books. Less than when I first started reading ebooks, because I found the quality was *ahem* somewhat less reliable than books from traditional publishers. (Not that the Big Five don’t have their occasional stinkers.)
I’m pretty cheap with money, so I’ve almost always kept ebook purchases in the under $5 range. Higher than that, I’ll probably pay extra bucks for a hardcopy, but even there I tend to put books on a wishlist and keep an eye out out for discounts, sales, coupons, and other price savings before I buy. With a huge TBR pile on hand, waiting a while isn’t a big inconvenience.
There’s also the library. My wife reads about five books for every one I manage, so she gets a lot of her reading material from there. Saves money, and keeps us from having to buy a bigger house (again) for all the books. I browse the local library’s “New Books” listings each month, and have a “Books of Interest” list on their website that has about 200 books listed right now.
(I should write a longer “Being A Skinflint Reader” post for my own blog.)
Gedankenexperiment:
1. If not for modern technology, would you still be alive today?
2. Care to list a few examples?
1. Probably not
2. I had half my thyroid removed 30 years ago and have been on thyroid meds ever since.
Without the surgery I would probably have eventually choked on the benign tumor. Without a functioning thyroid… brrrr. NOT a pleasant symptom set.
Hmmm. I think a fully correct answer to that is unknowable. As others have mentioned, vaccination and sanitation alone make a huge difference. Going by the obvious stuff, though…
I’d probably be a lot healthier but less fulfilled without modern tech, for most of the reasons Kurt said: I live a sedentary life that is enabled by technology. It’s my job and my sideline.
I have epilepsy, but it’s well-controlled and was so even before I became medicated. My main triggers are a lack of rest and lights that flash at frequencies uncommon in nature, so I’d be fine on that front. No artificial light means plenty of rest!
I’ve had surgery twice: recently to remove my tonsils after an infection, and back when I was a teen to have a cyst removed. I don’t recall the cyst being a life-threatening problem, and it probably would’ve gone untreated in leaner times – an annoyance, sure, but nothing more. Aside from that… my only allergies are basic hay fever, and the only bone I’ve damaged was when I got hit in the nose. I own glasses, but I go weeks without wearing them.
All in all, while you might not think it to look at me, I’m fundamentally low-maintenance. A lower-tech setting would require me to slim down and shape up, which takes care of my main maladies: mild sleep apnea (no CPAP), obesity, back pain, low endurance, and the like. Infections – and I count the tonsils here – are the big wildcard. I can’t separate the circumstances from the setting, so the only thing I can responsibly do is make that note but otherwise drop them from the equation. That means no tonsillectomy.
@Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little:
More importantly, why on earth would we object to latecomers to comic franchises? Everything is always new to somebody. If somebody discovers something I think is cool, now, that’s great. If Benedict Cumberbatch is the vector, hurray for Benedict Cumberbatch.
On the “would you be alive without modern tech” question, I’d have to say that based purely on my known medical history, I know of nothing that would have killed me. (And for that matter, if “no modern tech” includes “no bicycles or ski lifts” then my more serious injuries wouldn’t have occurred in the first place.) I also seem to have an immune system that cheerfully handles anything thrown at it. Nearsighted, yes, but if absolutely necessary, I could drive a car without correction most likely without killing anyone (although navigating would be problematic). But then: no modern tech.
I should probably knock on wood, saying this. And, never having been pregnant, I haven’t been exposed to certain risks related to that condition (on the other hand, if genetics are a guide, my mother got through four pregnancies without incident).
I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be alive without modern medicine.
My thyroid got seriously overactive last year. In an unusual complication, it caused nausea so severe I couldn’t keep water down without anti nausea meds. Things like peppermint tea or ginger tea did not help, so I suspect without modern medicine I’d have died of dehydration last December. Right around my birthday or a few days after.
Of course, I might not have survived being born–labor had to be induced, which wouldn’t have been possible without medicine that I think of as “modern.” So there’s that.
I *like* the modern world and when I’ve run across characters in post-apocalypse stories musing about how life is more “real” or “meaningful” without modern tech it has a tendency to annoy me and kick me out of the story.
I’d be alive probably. I did have surgery on one eye as a little child (< 3) but that was to correct a squint. Without it my eyesight would be worse and it isn't great. Glasses (free as a child thanks to the evils of socialized medicine) meant I could read of course but I'm guessing this is a pre-literate society we are talking about. I'm long-sighted which is probably less bad in a less modern world. Being long-sighted is fine for avoiding walking off cliffs and seeing what is coming – not so great when fine details of things matter [this is why the long sighted are snobby about the short sighted in glasses wearing society – we would look down on them but then they stand too close and we can't see them properly anymore]*
Smoking killed my parents 🙁 but remove that cause of mortality and I look back at my ancestors and some of them look near unkillable. One grandfather was born in 19th century rural poverty (and his parents must have survived severe famine) and then worked as a coal miner most of his life and didn't die until his 90s despite all the excitingly new ways the 20th century found for killing people.
*[this isn't true, but I imagine it would be if wearing glasses was an active subculture and the long sighted were outnumbered by the short sighted – or in a world without glasses and a short sighted person and a long sighted person fall in love but they can never find just the right distance to stand so that they can gaze into each others eyes and thus their love is doomed from the start until the invention of spectacles]
@Camesteos Felapton:
Sorry to hear about your parents. Smoking got one of mine too. But then I look back at my family — two hundred years ago was only four generations back for us — and realize we are probably on average healthy as horses barring stupid bad habits and ill luck.
Still would want modern medicine, though.
On the “would you be alive without modern tech” question,
My mother celebrated her 21st birthday in the hospital after having her appendix removed. Since she didn’t marry until several years later, I think I wouldn’t be here without modern tech. Her view was that the 1950s were a fine time to raise a family, but she didn’t want to live in them again. She liked her computer and her microwave.
From out here in 4857, that’s all ancient history.
Comic mistakes: personally, I like the unhandy Jean Grey (though “And it won’t be me!” is right up there.)
http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-marvel-comic-book-bloopers.php
Most likely, no. (This is something I think about—the point where people would have died without access to modern medicine.) Some time in my late 20s I came down with what I at first assumed was simply a cold or flu that would clear up on its own. But it only got worse and worse, I was feverish, weak, unable to eat, and my whole rib cage hurt so much that I couldn’t lie comfortably. Late one night I’m standing, sleepless, and thinking that if I am alive the next day, I need to go to the doctor. Turns out that I had pneumonia in both lungs, and (according to the doctor) if I waited much longer or was much older I would have had to be hospitalized. I was given two shots and a prescription for horse pill antibiotics. (Must have been in the tetracycline family, because it caused some significant photosensitivity.) All told, I was out of work for around 3 weeks. I strongly doubt that it would have cleared up on its own and I wouldn’t have lasted too much longer if I had continued to not go to the doctor—or if there were no antibiotics.
I would be dead. When my mother was six months pregnant with me she had surgery to remove an ovarian tumour, and even with that technology she had to remain in a military hospital in the Egyptian desert until my birth.
Since that time I have spent a hefty chunk of my life in a variety of hospitals; I am greatly indebted to all those who served in WW2 for many reasons, but one of them is that servicemen and women voted for the political party which would provide free health care at the point of use to all those who needed it. The NHS is a direct result of those votes.
Conan O’Brien?
I hated just about everything about the first new Star Trek movie so I was spared the second one. However, I always liked James Mason as Captain Nemo, so I might not have objected to Cumberbatch as Khan if I had bothered to see it.