On Blogging | Graeme's Fantasy Book Review, I Salute You!

Blogs come and blogs go. The longer you do this thing, the clearer that sad fact appears. But the great and the good live on in our hearts and our minds, even after they're long gone. I often find myself thinking fondly of Floor-to-Ceiling Books, for instance, amongst myriad others.

But of all the blogs I've followed, and of all the friends I've made since becoming a part of this literary lark, good sir Graeme Flory and his absolutely fabulous Fantasy Book Review may have impressed the most lasting mark upon me — and The Speculative Scotsman as well. Never mind for the moment how prolific Graeme was as a blogger, how funny and insightful and kind in his writing and in real life: he taught zombies and honesty, and he taught them better than anyone else. 

So it's with sorrow in my otherwise impenetrable Scotch soul that I must inform you of the end of an era. Graeme's Fantasy Book Review closed its doors early yesterday... and I suddenly felt frightfully lonely.

Here's Graeme's explanation:

It's been a little while coming but it's time to bring this blog to a close. Obviously there are a whole load of reasons (none of them particularly interesting to you guys) but the bottom line is that I'm not really enjoying it anymore and that means that it's time to stop. That's not to say that I won't come back, in the future, and start something up again; just not here. I've got some ideas but I just want to stop and chill out for a while.

[...] 

It's been a amazing experience but you have to know when it's time to stop. It's time to stop :o)

In the final comments section, there's already been an outpouring of support for one of the very best bloggers there ever was, or ever will be. but if you haven't yet added your two cents to the discussion, I urge you: please do.

Luckily, we only have to say goodbye to a blog. Though I seem to have written an obituary - what can I say? I'm sad - Graeme himself is still well and truly with us, and I'd bet my last penny that we'll be hearing from him again... perhaps in some other capacity... and fingers firmly crossed, sooner rather than later.

In the meantime, you can harass the man on Twitter @graemesfantasyb.

In fact, could someone perhaps ask him who in holy hell will review all the zombie novels ever now?

Not it! :P

Guest Post | Stefan of Far Beyond Reality Reviews Her Husband's Hands by Adam-Troy Castro

Ladies and gentlemen: welcome once again to The Speculative Scotsman!

You may or may not know that I’m in America at the moment – if not, yes, it’s true... in fact I’m as far AFK as I’ve ever been before – but never ye fear! For in my absence, a few good men and women have volunteered to make the site their own, albeit only momentarily. They’re bloggers, by and large, but also friends; fine folks one and all that I’ve met on the internet (and occasionally off) in the course of keeping this shared space set aside for burbling about speculative fiction of all shapes and sizes.

They all have blogs of their own, of course, and I’d urge you to seek them out. I care a lot about what goes on here on The Speculative Scotsman, so let me stress this one thing before I get to giving over the floor: the fact that I’m hosting the work of each of these excellent writers here speaks to my admiration and my respect for every last one among them.

If you enjoy some or all of these terrific reviews and opinion pieces, do the decent thing and click through the links in the intro and outro of each. Follow a few of my favourite internet critics. :)  

I'm afraid today marks the last of the great guest posts. Which is to say the last of the guest posts, period... not that there are more coming up that are rubbish. Obviously. 

Anyway, to top this whole thing off, it is my inestimable pleasure to welcome Stefan Raets of Far Beyond Reality to TSS. For all that it's clearly hit its stride already, Far Beyond Reality is a fairly new blog, but I've been a fan of Stefan's superlative reviews since they started appearing on Tor.com, which which I also contribute to on occasion. He's truly a terrific critic - one of my very favourites of late - and going solely on the guest post below, in which Stefan considers a certain Nebula Award-nominee, I'm sure you'll be inclined to agree.

***

I’m currently writing an article about the Nebula-nominated short stories for Tor.com, covering all seven stories on the final ballot in one post. However, I quickly discovered that I have much more to say about one of the stories than would fit in the one paragraph or so I can devote to it. So when Niall invited me to contribute a guest post to The Speculative Scotsman during his trip abroad, I decided to devote it to that story: “Her Husband’s Hands” by Adam-Troy Castro. 

First of all, you can read the entire story here. I recommend doing this before reading the rest of this post, because doing it the other way around will significantly reduce your enjoyment of both.

One thing that struck me early on about this story is that there’s initially a huge amount of dissonance between the science fiction component and the emotional tone. I’m afraid this dissonance may cause some readers to dismiss the story, which would be a huge shame. There’s a bit of an adjustment required on the part of the reader, early on during “Her Husband’s Hands,” but once you’ve made that adjustment, you can expect one of the most emotionally gripping stories you’ll read all year. 

The science fiction component of the story initially seems to border on the absurd: any part of the body can be revived and loaded with the most recent backup of the owner’s personality and memories. It’s more or less exactly the negative of an amputation: instead of a soldier returning home without a limb, the limb returns home without the soldier. Sometimes this results in a person coming home as “just enough meat to qualify as alive.” The situation these survivors and their families find themselves in is so horrifying that “it was impossible to know whether to scream in horror at their predicament or giggle uncontrollably at its madness.” 

And so it happens with the story’s main character, Rebecca, whose husband’s hands are solemnly returned home to her, delivered by two serious soldiers. They arrive in a pretty box with an American flag draped over it, a grim parody of an American military funeral that becomes acutely meaningful later on. She’s told she’s lucky: it could have been just a random chunk of flesh in a box, not two perfectly preserved and functional hands. Still, there she is, sitting across the table from her husband, who has been reduced to two faceless extremities.

The strength of the story lies in the way Castro swings from absurdism to genuinely painful emotion in no time. He explores the complexity of Rebecca’s pain in unflinching detail: her husband is technically still alive, but all that remains of the man she loved are these faceless hands. She can’t help but feel revulsion for the sentient body parts. When he asks her to kiss them, she does so out of a sense of obligation. When he moves over to touch her, it’s described as “crab-crawling over,” like one of those scenes in zombie movies where mindless body parts keep moving. She longs for the man who could “arouse her passions as well as her pity,” and most painfully for her (and for the reader), she feels guilty as she does so. 

Rebecca can’t help but feel like a war widow. There’s not enough left for her to relate to. She feels like her husband is gone. That’s why the delivery scene, with the flag draped over the box, is so poignant: Bob is not a person to her anymore. It feels as if he’s dead. As if he should be dead. Before long, Rebecca feels trapped. She has to care for her husband. She can’t leave. She realizes the rest of her life is going to be spent in service to the remnants of the man she loved and the remnants of her marriage. She’s uncomfortable sitting across from him during lunch, and by dinner time she realizes that “the silence of their meals would soon be a familiar ritual, for as long as the future still stretched.” 

The other side of the coin is of course Bob, her husband, whose body has been almost completely destroyed. The story doesn’t touch as much on his feelings towards his wife, because it’s told from Rebecca’s perspective, but it does deal with the issue of PTSD or Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. In this future, the possibility of backing up your personality and memories also means that, after death or injury, the revived victim can decide how much he or she wants to remember. Bob initially claims that he’s had most memories of the horrors of war erased (so he can live “blessedly free of some experiences that would have crippled him even more than his current condition”), but eventually it becomes clear that this is untrue and that he remembers everything. The first hint of this comes when he tries to strangle Rebecca in her sleep during a nightmare, which leads directly to the support group, one of the most memorable scenes in the story. 

The support group is another part of the story where the absurd and the poignant walk hand in hand, creating what has to be some of the most uncomfortable reading on this year’s Nebula ballot. The other people in the group are all mirrors for Rebecca. One person has been so fragmented that she has to be carried around in a suitcase. One couple is in a situation that’s almost identical to Bob and Rebecca’s, except that the woman has had her hands amputated so her husband’s surviving body parts could be grafted onto her own body. Rebecca wonders if her own husband expects something similar and if she could ever bring herself to do it, which is the most overt example of the struggle between guilt and self-sacrifice that she’s going through: how much of her life is she supposed to give up to accommodate what happened to her husband? 

The most meaningful scene at the support group comes when a woman who is almost entirely intact - only her face has been replaced by the reflective silver interface - gives Rebecca a hug and says “You’re not alone.” She is literally a mirror: Rebecca sees herself, faceless. All of her identity is being removed now her life has been completely taken over by the return of her husband’s hands. Her reaction sums up the darkness at the core of this story perfectly: “She wanted to tell the other woman, of course I’m alone, and my husband’s alone, and you’re alone, and we’re all alone; the very point of being in hell is that there’s a gulf between us and all our efforts to bridge it for even a moment give us nothing but a respite and the illusion of comfort before those bridges retract and we’re left to face the same problems from our own separate islands. She wanted to say it, but of course she couldn’t, not if it meant embracing despair in defiance of this sectioned woman’s kindness, and so she wept herself blind and took the hug as the gift it was meant to be.” 

And then, at the very end, the story suddenly ends on a hopeful note, when Bob comes clean and admits that he didn’t have all his memories expunged, because “the only thing worth remembering about any of it was how much of it i spent wanting to return to you.” The couple finally find common ground, despite everything that’s happened. It’s a surprisingly gentle and tender ending to this story. 

Amputees sometimes refer to “phantom pain,” a strange neurological phenomenon that can cause them to have feelings in a limb that’s no longer there. In “Her Husband’s Hands” that phantom pain seems to happen to the spouse, whose husband is almost completely gone, leaving a gaping hole in her life that she is struggling to cope with. It shows in painful, direct language the unspoken feelings of helplessness and guilt that may be experienced by some military families. It’s an incredibly poignant story that’s firmly in the realm of science fiction but still deals with issues that are relevant today. I’m not a member of SFWA so I can’t vote in the Nebulas, but if I could, “Her Husband’s Hands” would have my vote on a very strong final ballot.

###

Stefan Raets reads and reviews science fiction and fantasy whenever he isn’t distracted by less important things like eating and sleeping. You can find many of his reviews at Tor.com and on his own site, Far Beyond Reality.

***

Thank you again, Stefan, for rounding off this month of fine friends and great guests with such style. I'll be sure to check "Her Husband's Hands" out myself just as soon as I have reliable internet access again, meanwhile you all have to promise me you'll bookmark Far Beyond Reality immediately.

In other news, please do stay tuned for the last of my Letters From America tomorrow.

And then? Well... that'll be that.

How sad. :(

Guest Post | Bryce of Only the Best SF&F Considers... Pretty Much Everything?

Ladies and gentlemen: welcome once again to The Speculative Scotsman!

You may or may not know that I’m in America at the moment – if not, yes, it’s true... in fact I’m as far AFK as I’ve ever been before – but never ye fear! For in my absence, a few good men and women have volunteered to make the site their own, albeit only momentarily. They’re bloggers, by and large, but also friends; fine folks one and all that I’ve met on the internet (and occasionally off) in the course of keeping this shared space set aside for burbling about speculative fiction of all shapes and sizes.

They all have blogs of their own, of course, and I’d urge you to seek them out. I care a lot about what goes on here on The Speculative Scotsman, so let me stress this thing before I get to giving over the floor: the fact that I’m hosting the work of each of these excellent writers here speaks to my admiration and my respect for every last one among them.

If you enjoy some or all of these terrific reviews and opinion pieces, do the decent thing and click through the links in the intro and outro of each. Follow a few of my favourite internet critics. :)

Speaking of which: Bryce Lee, of Only the Best Science Fiction & Fantasy. Bryce was one of the first folks I met when I started doing this thing in early 2010, and even today, nearly three years later, I look forward to those all too rare occasions when our paths cross, because he's honestly one of the warmest, friendliest, most generous people I know -- not to mention one of the very best bloggers I currently keep up with.

Today, for your pleasure and mine, Bryce has set his inimitable sights on... well, it's not so simple as that, actually. In fact, I'm going to let the nice man tell you himself.

***

I’m really honored to be here today. I’ve been keeping up with The Speculative Scotsman since its infancy and it continues to be one of my favorite blogs even without all that cute baby fat. [You see what I mean? :) - Niall]

One of the main reasons for that is Niall’s way with words, so I apologize in advance for not being nearly as erudite or eloquent in this post. Ah look at that, I’ve already exhausted my vocabulary.

My initial plan was to post about one single subject, but I had a hard time sticking with one idea, so my solution – shotgun effect - write about all of it. You’re welcome in advance. I’ll go from subjects such as Self-Published books to ratings to navel-gazing... oh my!

• Blogging and Self-Pubs --- When I started blogging, I had this idea that I needed to read a bunch of Self-Published books to sort of earn my way in the scene. What was I thinking? Don’t worry, I was really bad at it.

• Independent and Self-Published Books --- I have a love-hate relationship with Indie and Self-Pubbed books. Admittedly, I’ve read some amazing books that were not published by one of the Big 6, but then again I’ve read some of the worst books of my life because of them. Anymore, I’ll wait until they’ve been reviewed elsewhere and read ones others have enjoyed. But that’s not fair is it? I think Justin has a pretty good solution.  

• Two and a Half Men --- I don’t only wonder how it’s still on the air, but how is it the number 1 comedy? “That girl is soooobangable” “I’m no good with women” *pushes glasses up nose* I just wrote 5 episodes. Now Community is a show to watch and it just barely scrapes by.

• In Defense of Ratings --- Lots of people don’t use ratings such as said Scotsman (luckily he’s out of the country at the moment so he’ll never see this) and I understand their reasons, but for me it’s the perfect punchline to the review. I can’t always read the full review, like what if it’s a sequel to a book I haven’t read? But I can still see how a trusted reviewer felt. Sometimes you don’t really have anything bad to say about a book, but it still wasn’t a perfect book. Tack on a rating to keep it in check.

• Speaking of Ratings --- I propose a new rating system in addition to “out of 5” or “out of 10.” I admit the number system is a bit flawed. How do you compare the complexity of Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire and Erikson’s Malazan Book of the Fallen to let’s say, The Dresden Files. I love them all but in different ways. So, new categories are “Long in the Wind (not a fart joke…okay it is),” “Fast and Furious,” “Complex as a Cat [or insert alliteration or complex animal here],” “Fun and Funny.” Then you can give the book a number rating. I’m only half joking on this one, I do think ratings need a bit of a push, but at least need to be read in conjunction with the review. Incidentally and while I write this, Patrick (the YetiStomper) just changed up his rating system.

• Ever enter the freeway and think, “You always told me to stay off the freeway…” “Then let us hope…that I was wrong.” (the “…” was my Morpheus impression)

• Publishers Not Finishing Series --- There are few things I hate more than getting into a series only to find out the final volume won’t be released because of low sales of the first book(s). This has happened to a few authors recently and it drives me up the wall! LianeMerciel, Harry Connolly, and David Anthony Durham are a few off the top of my head. I get publishers’ reasons, but I don’t think publishers are thinking long term. You’re teaching readers not to trust new authors, thus opting to wait until series are complete. In the long run, this is a bad call. 

• The Walking Dead TV Show --- I am a HUGE fan of this series and I can’t wait for more, especially after that last scene in season two, you know, the one with guy who … But there’s something I gotta know: what’s the deal with their surprise zombie attacks? Lots of zombie films get this right by having someone in the house, usually at the beginning of the movie before it’s well-known that there are zombies everywhere. But The Walking Dead keeps doing surprise attacks out in the middle of nowhere. The human turns around and suddenly – zombiefied! And then afterward the zombie is moaning and stumbling along just like every. other. zombie. Wha? How did the character possibly not hear that?

These were my thoughts, it’s now time to wake up. Thanks again to The Speculative Scotsman for the chance to grace a great blog. At least take heart in the fact that Niall will be back in no time! 

***

The man tells it true. Alas, we're already in our final week of great guest blogs... I'll be home before it's even over, and come Monday, the blog will be back to boring old me, and me alone, mostly. So sad. :(

But let's keep our chins up. It's easy enough, really, particularly given how happy I am that Bryce was good enough to go on record on all of the above subjects for TSS. You should know this by now, but he blogs away his days over at Only the Best Science Fiction & Fantasy, and trust me when I tell you you really need to be along for the ride. Thanks again, Bryce!

Tomorrow: the last guest blog you'll be seeing on The Speculative Scotsman for some time, given that this holiday of a lifetime I've been on is almost at an end. And of course I've saved some of the best for last, haven't I?

Stay tuned, in short, for Stefan the Second! :)

Guest Post | Zoe of Fantasy Bytes Considers Small Press SF&F

Ladies and gentlemen: welcome once again to The Speculative Scotsman!

You may or may not know that I’m in America at the moment – if not, yes, it’s true... in fact I’m as far AFK as I’ve ever been before – but never ye fear! For in my absence, a few good men and women have volunteered to make the site their own, albeit only momentarily. They’re bloggers, by and large, but also friends; fine folks one and all that I’ve met on the internet (and occasionally off) in the course of keeping this shared space set aside for burbling about speculative fiction of all shapes and sizes.

They all have blogs of their own, of course, and I’d urge you to seek them out. I care a lot about what goes on here on The Speculative Scotsman, so let me stress this one thing before I get to giving over the floor: the fact that I’m hosting the work of each of these excellent writers here speaks to my admiration and my respect for every last one among them.

If you enjoy some or all of these terrific reviews and opinion pieces, do the decent thing and click through the links in the intro and outro of each. Follow a few of my favourite internet critics. :)  

Today, the lovely Zoe of Fantasy Bytes (nee Fantasy Nibbles) sets her inimitable sights on small press and self-published science fiction and fantasy. Is it all rubbish? For so sayeth the received wisdom, let's make no bones about it. 

Zoe, however, says no...

***

It's been around six months now since I started book blogging, creating a site purely as a place to record and briefly review my reads. As I slowly got up and running I stumbled across other like-minded bloggers and had my eyes opened to the world of ARCs, and was rapidly introduced to the quagmire of SF&F publishers out there. Up until this point I'd been essentially just reading titles from 'the Big Boys', Epic Fantasy from the likes of Voyager & Orbit etc., pure mass market fantasy from the bestseller list on Amazon. I was completely unaware of the hordes of smaller publishers out there, and of the way in which the publishing world is so intertwined: a colossal, swollen mass of imprints and sister companies, a vast many-tentacled beast sucking up submissions and churning out titles. I was equally clueless as to the real power of blogging, and had no idea that the larger publishers would happily ship out ARCs to small-time bloggers, eager for mentions and reviews. My little site had opened up a massive new world to me. 

(There's a point to my reminiscing, honestly, I'm almost there now...)

Once I started enjoying ARCs from the better known publishers, I began paying more attention to the many other blogs similar to mine, and at this point it occurred to me to add some kind of "contact me if you’d like me to review your book" section to my site. I felt a bit daft in all honesty, and didn't expect anyone to use it, but within a couple of days the requests started trickling in. This is the point when things really got interesting for me, as I was suddenly being sent titles from all sorts of authors and publishers that would otherwise never have registered on my radar at all.

To be 100% honest, I wasn't expecting much... I had a kind of subconscious publisher snobbery thing going on [I know exactly what you mean --- Niall]. If these titles were really any good they'd have been taken up by the Big Boys I said to myself. But there was one called "My Sparkling Misfortune" which from the blurb sounded like fun, and just the thing for a rainy afternoon, so I delved in and gave it a go. And I absolutely loved it, it was extremely well written and engaging, and not only could I not put it down I also couldn't fault it. And then I hoovered up the sequel. And my eyes were opened to an whole new world of titles. I've since read and enjoyed a massive amount of novels from often tiny publishers (other notable examples being CassaStar, CassaFire & Overlord Rising ), and whilst each one that blows me away is a treat, I can't help feeling hugely disappointed when I think how many fantasy readers will never see these books.

Obviously with the increasing popularity of e-readers the odds of titles like this taking off are vastly improved. One of the main barriers to hard copies from independents, in my experience at least, is the price. If I want the newest Voyager paperback I'm usually looking at around a fiver on Amazon, but if I want a small paperback from an Indie it can be up around $20, which is an instant put-off. Kindle versions are usually a much better deal. It's much easier to take a risk on an unknown quantity with a significantly smaller price-tag.

Some of my absolute favourite reads since starting the blog have been from independent publishers. However much I shout them out on my site though, I only have a small readership and these titles don't get anywhere near the recognition they deserve. And that really bothers me. In many cases the writing is vastly superior to many of the big titles out there, so what is it that determines who gets picked up by the big names? Is it a case of 50% talent and 50% luck? Or are the odds even worse than that? Maybe it's who you know as much as it's what you write...

Let me use an example from the Urban Fantasy genre. Penguin's new imprint, Berkley UK, have got a title due out this Spring, a werewolf novel that's a walking, talking, trite and tired cliche (IMO of course). With the might of Penguin behind it they've already sold the film rights, and it will no doubt rake in gazillions of monies. Candlemark and Gleam have recently published Matchbox Girls, a fresh and innovative (IMO of course) Urban Fantasy that spurns the usual stereotypes and would make a truly fantastic film, if only it would get some serious notice. It's beautifully written, and damn near cliche free. It's not right! These two are the wrong way around.

These are of course just my personal ramblings and foot-stompings. I don't know if authors aim for a certain publisher initially, or if they try many, and go with the first one who seems keen. Maybe many of them make a conscious decision to avoid the larger houses; I clearly don't know the process. I just have an assumption that you would start high and then go lower if you're not successful. I have to admit it's a topic increasingly close to my heart as I struggle to coax the fantasy novel that has been brewing in my head for the last couple of years, out, and onto paper.

I've noticed that some of the older and more established review blogs won't touch independent titles at all. I presume time spent on reviews like this hurts their site's stats and they don't want to take the hit. They're missing out one some absolute gems though. And so are their readers. I’m thankful to have widened my reading experience, and tend to be on the lookout for the Davids more than the Goliaths these days.

***

Inspiring words, Zoe! And thank you ever so much for putting them thus here on The Speculative Scotsman. For my part, I'm all for underdogs - at the very least I like to think I am - so I'll make a note to pay more attention to the small press review requests that come in through the site from here on out.

Remember, everyone: you can find Zoe blogging ALL THE TIME over at Fantasy Bytes. Get in on the action on the ground floor now!

So what's coming up tomorrow? Again, I'm not 100% sure myself yet, so we'll all just have to wait and see... but judging by the last couple of weeks' worth of content, odds on it's going to be awesome.

Guest Post | Sarah of Bookworm Blues Considers Her Comfort Zone

Ladies and gentlemen: welcome once again to The Speculative Scotsman!

You may or may not know that I’m in America at the moment – if not, yes, it’s true... in fact I’m as far AFK as I’ve ever been before – but never ye fear! For in my absence, a few good men and women have volunteered to make the site their own, albeit only momentarily. They’re bloggers, by and large, but also friends; fine folks one and all that I’ve met on the internet (and occasionally off) in the course of keeping this shared space set aside for burbling about speculative fiction of all shapes and sizes.

They all have blogs of their own, of course, and I’d urge you to seek them out. I care a lot about what goes on here on The Speculative Scotsman, so let me stress this one thing before I get to giving over the floor: the fact that I’m hosting the work of each of these excellent writers here speaks to my admiration and my respect for every last one among them.

If you enjoy some or all of these terrific reviews and opinion pieces, do the decent thing and click through the links in the intro and outro of each. Follow a few of my favourite internet critics. :)

Now then. In honour of the time-tested blueness of Mondays, I thought the thing to do this Monday was to host a blueish guest post, and truly, who could be better qualified for the job than Sarah of Bookworm Blues? 

Like all the other guests we've had on TSS this last little while, and those still to come, Sarah is a fantastic blogger, and a mainstay on my favoured feed-eater. It's a real honour to have her here on the blog, and doubly so considering the post she's got in store for us: a frank, intimate and considered article on how our comfort zones can become, counter-intuitively, too comfortable.

It is, in short, exactly the sort of thing I had hoped Sarah would write for the site, though I'd never have asked. It's what she does best -- though I should say she does everything else very well indeed. I'm going to let her tell the rest of this tale, but if you're not on the Bookworm Blues bandwagon already, by the end of this blog you bloody well will be.

***

First, I want to thank Niall for asking me to guest blog. It’s incredibly flattering to think that Niall thinks I’m good enough to write on his fantastic blog. [Oh, I know so --- Niall] Secondly, I should admit that I wracked my brain for weeks about what to write about. Niall told me to review something I don’t typically review. That leaves comics and movies and I don’t read/watch either and I usually post all the reviews of the book I read directly onto my blog as soon as possible, so I had no reviews of books left to write about. I decided to review something else entirely.

Well, “review” might be quite a stretch.

I need to give you some background. In November of 2010 I was diagnosed with cancer. You can imagine how terrifying it was to hear that I had a potentially terminal disease at the age of 28. I had surgery to remove my tumor two weeks after I was diagnosed. In the beginning of January I went to start my cancer treatment in the hospital and found out I was (surprise!) pregnant. It was the last thing I expected. The pregnancy was very difficult, not only because I was worried about my cancer spreading due to my inability to treat it while pregnant, but I also faced other health problems. My daughter was born via c-section on August 15. A few weeks later I had an ultrasound done and learned that my cancer probably spread while pregnant. Now I’m sitting here waiting to start the next leg of my treatment at a cancer center, probably sometime this summer.

I’m not saying any of this for sympathy. I’m saying it to give you some background. I’ve had a hell of a year (and a bit). It’s been very difficult for my family and me and I can tell you that sometimes the only thing that got me through was taking a vacation from myself and the best way to do that is by reading some damn good books. I’ve devoured more books during this period of my life than at any other.

Now, why on earth am I writing any of this on Niall’s blog?

After I was diagnosed with cancer I read to escape my own skin. I wanted to forget all the issues facing me. Then, when my back went out during my pregnancy and rendered me basically paralyzed for six months, I really started really flipping out. I was fighting cancer, trying to grow a healthy baby and unable to walk. My usual everything didn’t cut it anymore. I needed unusual. I needed to escape everything, even my reading comfort zone. So what did I do? I read the books I wouldn’t have touched with a ten-foot pole a few months earlier. And I liked them. That’s the real crazy part. I liked them.

Avid bookworms like myself tend to have a comfort zone. We like what we like and we tend to disregard everything else. [All too true --- Niall] However, this period in my life taught me how closed I was to myriads of good books I had spent years ignoring. Before I’d only read a book if it was epic fantasy. It had to be bloody and filled with tons of complicated plot elements. Politics were always a plus. Then, this period of my life happened and I ventured out. I read urban fantasy, sci-fi, military sci-fi, fantasy with assassins, thieves, steampunk, new weird, young adult and whatever else. I even read Twilight. I didn’t like it, but I read it.

Not every book was a hit and I didn’t enjoy every author, but I learned that right outside of my comfort zone there were worlds that I had never dreamed about and talented authors that I had closed myself off to simply because my comfort zone was too comfortable. Why try something else when you know exactly what you like?

Well, sometimes life needs a bit of extra spice. Sometimes your usual meal needs to be changed out for something new. What’s amazing to me is how many authors there are who are incredibly talented that I overlooked before simply because I was too comfortable to move over and see what books were on the next shelf. I’m lucky, I get plenty of books sent to me by publishers from myriads of different areas of speculative fiction and while I would have ignored most of them before, now I read all of them. It might take me a while to get to them, but I read them. I read the new authors and the time-tested authors. I read epic fantasy, urban fantasy and young adult, as well as whatever else is thrown my way. I feel rather ashamed of how closed I was to many books before. My tastes are far broader than I had expected and I never would have known that unless all of this health stuff happened to me.

Cancer has changed me forever. Once you hear those fateful words, “you have cancer” there’s no going back. While I am still fighting my battle, and I will win it, there are lessons it has taught me that I would have never learned any other way. One of them is not judging a book by its genre, or it’s cover. Each book has a new world and vision to offer, and each book deserves its chance. Comfort zones are nice. I will always favor epic fantasy, but now I realize that epic fantasy isn’t all that’s worth reading.

I guess you could say that this post is a review of reading styles and the lesson in the end is, maybe the next time you go to the library or the book store, stop at the isle next to the one you prefer and maybe choose a book you’d avoided before because it’s not your typical fare. You might just learn that breaking out of your comfort zone can add some incredible spice and flavor into your usual literary feast.

***

Absolutely fascinating stuff, Sarah -- thank you so much!

So we want to know: what are your comfort zones, folks? And how often do you read outside them? One book in ten, would you say? More, or less?

Now I'm not sure what's coming up tomorrow on The Speculative Scotsman, but... it'll be brilliant. Or else it'll be me, with a belated Letters From America! Meantime, Bookworm Blues is where you'll find Sarah, and I think you and I both know you want to.

Guest Post | Justin of Staffer's Book Review on Sex in SFF

Ladies and gentlemen: welcome once again to The Speculative Scotsman!

You may or may not know that I’m in America at the moment – if not, yes, it’s true... in fact I’m as far AFK as I’ve ever been before – but never ye fear! For in my absence, a few good men and women have volunteered to make the site their own, albeit only momentarily. They’re bloggers, by and large, but also friends; fine folks one and all that I’ve met on the internet (and occasionally off) in the course of keeping this shared space set aside for burbling about speculative fiction of all shapes and sizes.

They all have blogs of their own, of course, and I’d urge you to seek them out. I care a lot about what goes on here on The Speculative Scotsman, so let me stress this one thing before I get to giving over the floor: the fact that I’m hosting the work of each of these excellent writers here speaks to my admiration and my respect for every last one among them.

If you enjoy some or all of these terrific reviews and opinion pieces, do the decent thing and click through the links in the intro and outro of each. Follow a few of my favourite internet critics. :)

On this fine Friday, it's entirely my pleasure to welcome one Justin Landon to TSS. Justin, as you may well be aware, is the writer behind one of my favourite genre blogs of recent years, namely Staffer's Book Review.

By all means, click through that link and come on back here when you're good and ready... after all, it should only take a minute for you to realise why having Justin here is such a treat.

Now that we're all on the same page, behold this musing amongst musings!

***

Sex. Dirty, icky, squishy, sloppy, romantic, loving, and harmoanious (sic) sex. Most fantasy novels have it to one degree or another, but very few seem to get it right. Ask any author, what's the hardest thing to write? Most of them, I suspect, would answer sex. Although, Sam Sykes would probably say something like words. Smart asses aside, sex is hard because everyone's had it. Unlike sword fights, or politics, or horse riding, sex is a universal experience. If an author gets it wrong, readers will know it on a visceral level.

Maybe it's easier to write sex for young adults, those little punks don't know any better!

I've had sex. Not a lot of it - I mean I do read SFF - but I like to think I've had enough to identify what sex is like. Not what it should be like, or what it could be like, or what I wish it were like, but what it actually is. A few weeks ago I read an early review copy of Elizabeth Bear's Range of Ghosts, a second world fantasy built on the foundation of steppe culture. In the early going she wrote a sex scene that I immediately dubbed, THE BEST SEX SCENE IN FANTASY NOVEL HISTORY. Bold words! Why is it the best? What makes Bear's scene capture what it's like to do the dirty?

Before I get into that, let's talk about what other authors are doing wrong. I don't mean a failure to use sex for a purpose -- to serve story telling, or to communicate theme and tone (something Joe Abercrombie does brilliantly) -- rather a failure to capture the perfect balance of pornography and romance. Since I mentioned Abercrombie, let's use his Best Served Cold as Exhibit A.

"Uh, uh, their mindless grunting. Creak, creak, the bed moaning alone with them. Squelch, squelch, his skin slapping hard against against her arse." Best Served Cold -- Joe Abercrombie

This scene captures a lot of what Abercromie tries to do with sex. There's a cinematic aspect to it, but also a detachment. His sex lacks investment from his characters and maintains a psychic distance from the act. There is a self consciousness to it that translates the kinds of characters he writes. The result is something inherently pornographic, a dead behind the eyes kind of fucking. Is it effective? Absolutely. But, as a sex scene, as a series of words meant to convey the act of sex and all that it is, it fails. There's an inherent lack of emotion that I believe cannot be separate from sex -- even in the most casual of relationships.

What would Abercrombie's on-line porn website be called? Before They Are Banged?

Then there's Charlaine Harris who wields sex like a laugh-track.

"While I stood stock-still, paralyzed by conflicting waves of emotion, Eric took the soap out of my hands and lathered up his own, set the soap back in its little niche, and began to wash my arms, raising each in turn to stroke my armpit, down my side, never touching my breasts, which were practically quivering like puppies who wanted to be petted." – Dead to the World by Charlaine Harris

I'm sorry, did she say quivering puppies? I can't recall the last time my wife's chest barked at me. I must be doing it wrong. And then we have pure unadulterated stereotypical paranormal romance:

"I let my hand stroke boldly downward, my fingers aching to set him free, to grasp his turgid magnificence." – A Brush of Darkness by Allison Pang

I don't know about the other men reading this, but if my partner called mine turgid magnificence I'd be hers forever. [Amen - Niall] I asked my wife to say this sentence out loud and she couldn't do it. I asked her to think it next time we were mid coitus. She ended up laughing at a rather inopportune moment. All that goes to say that neither Harris nor Pang portray sex that carries any approximation to the real thing. Just as Abercrombie creates a false image that belongs in a Van Nuys garage illuminated with 1,000 watt bulbs, the PNR community trends toward over-glorification of the act, an idealized image of what sex should be. Or more specifically, some warped perception of what it should be. It lacks the selfishness, the craving of power, and the fear of failure that are inescapable realities between the sheets

It's not just me, right? Oh God, it is just me... isn't it? [I'm saying nothing! - Niall]

Kameron Hurley, author of God's War and Infidel, who I have in the past compared to Abercrombie, demands similar results from her sex, but restrains herself:

"She kissed and licked Jaks in a detached sort of way. It was like watching two people she didn't know have sex. God's War -- Kameron Hurley

Like Abercrombie she's using sex to develop character and set a tone for the novel, a tone similar in nature to the one quoted above. Unlike him, she eschews the graphic descriptions, the two quoted lines making up the entirety of the scene. This restraint is something likewise exhibited by Brandon Sanderson:

"...." Everything He's Written -- Brandon Sanderson

I'm kidding, in so far as to say that Sanderson mentions sex about as often as he mentions Satan as his Lord and Savior. For his purposes, story telling and otherwise, Sanderson ignores sex, a perfectly reasonable endeavor albeit somewhat willful in its denial of a fundamental human activity. Hurley doesn't ignore it, but prefers not to describe it. She recognizes it and uses it as a character device without risking the land mine that is an awkwardly written sex scene.

For my money, I'd rather Hurley's approach than many other's. As I sat down to write this article, making a list of sex scenes in my mind, I remembered that one from God's War. In my memory it was far more graphic than Hurley wrote it. I filled in the blanks. It's effective use of sex, but it's not really a sex scene, is it? This gets at the question, of why write a sex scene at all? I respond, why write a fight scene? And the answer is because people want to read them. Sex, just like action, can make for compelling theater. Just as a carefully orchestrated duel between two equally matched fighters can make for a breathless climax (pun intended!), so too can sex. The problem is that few authors attempt it in such a role, and fewer still can succeed.

Man lance. Seriously. Someone called it a man lance. Hey baby, want to get lanced?

To come full circle, Elizabeth Bear takes the rawness of Abercrombie, the idealism of Pang, and the purposefulness of Hurley. She uses sex as a character builder and a plot device, but also chooses to write in the details. She captures the selfishness, the self consciousness, the passion, and the romance. It is equal parts fucking and love making. It resonates for me as the realest thing I've read in something that's inherently fantasy. Bear creates excitement, anticipation, and release as her two character clash in a battle not of swords, or wits, but of their loins (awkward sex scene word!).

It is, in short, perfect. I leave you, fair reader, with a taste:

"She was softness, lush dimpled softness of arms and flanks wrapped around strength, like a bent bow. She was the fall of cool hair across his throat and his burning face, like water to a man sick with sun. She was the smell of sweat and pungent oils. She was the warmth of the night, and seventeen moons rose over her shoulders while she rode him with the purpose and intensity with which she raced her mare." Range of Ghosts -- Elizabeth Bear

***

Brilliant stuff, Justin... just brilliant! And one more time: thanks so much for putting it all together for The Speculative Scotsman.


Remember, you can and you assuredly should point your browsers towards Staffer's Book Review for more of Justin's masterful musings. Would you believe this bloke's been on the scene for barely a year? And already methinks he puts most of the rest of us to shame.


On that note, you may have noticed today was supposed to be the appointed day for another installment of Letters From America. Well, it's still coming... but it'll either be a little late, or I'll wrap this week's random recollections in with next week's, so hold your horses, y'all. :)


Everyone have a happy weekend, now. I'll see you on the other side!

Guest Post | Jason of Kamvision Reviews High Rise by J. G. Ballard

Ladies and gentlemen: welcome once again to The Speculative Scotsman! 

You may or may not know that I’m in America at the moment – if not, yes, it’s true... in fact I’m as far AFK as I’ve ever been before – but never ye fear! For in my absence, a few good men and women have volunteered to make the site their own, albeit only momentarily. They’re bloggers, by and large, but also friends; fine folks one and all that I’ve met on the internet (and occasionally off) in the course of keeping this shared space set aside for burbling about speculative fiction of all shapes and sizes. 

They all have blogs of their own, of course, and I’d urge you to seek them out. I care a lot about what goes on here on The Speculative Scotsman, so let me stress this one thing before I get to giving over the floor: the fact that I’m hosting the work of each of these excellent writers here speaks to my admiration and my respect for every last one among them. 

If you enjoy some or all of these terrific reviews and opinion pieces, do the decent thing and click through the links in the intro and outro of each. Follow a few of my favourite internet critics. :) 

So what do I have to entertain and inform you all today?

Only an incredible review of a brilliant book! An fond old favourite of mine as well, though I suppose I've never had call to mention it here on TSS before.

As to who wrote it... well, if you haven't been formerly introduced, then let me do the honours: everyone, meet Jason Baki, of Kamvision fame. Jason? Meet everyone. :)

I'm tragically short on time today, I'm afraid, so that's going to have to do it for me for the moment, folks, but here: read this review. And then this book.

And then? Well you immediately bookmark Jason's brilliant blog, don't you?

*** 

Buy this book from:

Amazon.co.uk / Amazon.com

IndieBound / The Book Depository

"When a class war erupts inside a luxurious apartment block, modern elevators become violent battlegrounds and cocktail parties degenerate into marauding attacks on 'enemy' floors. In this visionary tale, human society slips into violent reverse as once-peaceful residents, driven by primal urges, re-create a world ruled by the laws of the jungle."

***

JG Ballard’s often remarkably prescient dystopias, like those of George Orwell and Philip K. Dick have ensured his name is frequently cited among contemporary writers as an influence on their work. My own introduction to Ballard was a late one, I first read Crash shortly after seeing Paul Haggis’s film adaptation in 2004. Like many before, I was immediately struck by the visceral prose and his compelling insight into social dynamics. But in finally getting around to reading High-Rise, it wasn’t so much his fixation with the fragility of civil society that lured me, but rather it was the physical setting for the novel. I myself have spent the largest part of my life so far living at the top of a high-rise tower block, and now I am working on a novel of my own that is inspired in part by my experiences of this environment. So in coming to this work, I was particularly intrigued to see what Ballard had done with the physical space and how he imagined the design of a high-rise tower would impact on those who dwelled there. I have my own direct experience which informs my view, but I was certain Ballard would have some vivid insights of his own. Most certainly, he does.

The first notable feature about the actual physical building is that Ballard imagines it as a high-tech self contained world, complete with gymnasium, swimming pools, restaurant and shops. The second thing is that, as the above indicates, this is a luxury apartment peopled by those with good to high disposable incomes. This is most definitely not any old residential tower block located within an urban wasteland. 

It may not be inhabited by the urban poor, but the first indication of the physical influence of the building on the minds of its inhabitants is very much related to class. Ballard sees the tiered arrangement of the living space in a vertical environment as naturally predisposed to social hierarchy. A little over 50 pages into the novel he writes, “In effect the high-rise had already divided itself into the three classical social groups, its lower, middle and upper classes.” From this hierarchical arrangement stems the fundamental tensions between the residents that drive the narrative. In effect, from the outset the physical space imposes itself on the psychology of its residents, transforming educated, hitherto well-adjusted members of society, into rival clans driven by petty self interest. It’s a fascinating premise and one which instantly places the physical building itself at the centre of the action, which from my own perspective was exactly what I was hoping for. Much more than this, it allows for Ballard’s characteristic insight to run riot (along with most of the buildings occupants) as he explores the ramifications of social fragmentation. 

Ballard does, however, go a step further than just exploring divisions based on perceived social groupings. He also explores the impact of the space on the individual. Here, he suggests that the buildings self-sufficient design has an isolating effect. Many of the inhabitants withdraw from contact with the world outside the building except for work and later even from this. They begin to see themselves as separate not just from those occupying other floors within the building but even from those a few doors away. Ballard it seems is suggesting that apartment living and self-sufficiency are socially isolating. 

Now a great deal has already been written on the effect of architecture on human behaviour, and numerous reports have looked into the relationship between urban design and criminal activity. My own estate, heavily blighted by crime, was demolished and then entirely rebuilt as low-rise housing, due in no small part to the findings of such research. But in reading High-Rise I don’t think Ballard’s intention is solely to suggest that flawed urban design and modern physical living arrangements (the book was written in 1975) promote a breakdown of social cohesion. It seems to me that Ballard sees such divisions already in place across wider society irrespective of environment per se and constructs his high-rise as a microcosm. 

Why do I say this? Ballard makes reference throughout the book to the internal processes of his key characters and their relationship to the physical space in a manner that increasingly blurs the boundaries between their thoughts and their environment. There are three principal characters, Laing, Wilder, and Royal, who are each representative of one the primary hierarchical divisions mentioned earlier. Each of them comes to see themselves as somehow inseparable from their status within the building. Every little fissure and fragment in the block, serves only to reinforce this identity. Eventually the building no longer even functions effectively, yet the characters are so entrenched in their respective positions they scarcely notice what is happening around them. They choose to remain in the building, living in torrid conditions, largely by choice. So either they have massively internalised their environment or they are the architects of it. The narrative suggests both to a degree. In fact one of the key characters, Royal, a member of the upper tier of the social system, is actually an architect involved in the building’s design. But the social psychology that the novel explores in exaggerated form is indicative of widespread real world social hierarchies as exemplified by the class references. Surely Ballard isn’t suggested that class based hierarchies are primarily a product of urban design? Although he may be suggesting they are reinforced by such. Yet if we consider that all of the buildings occupants were initially drawn from similar comfortable social classes, in other words they were to a greater or lesser extent equals, then it seems to me the tiered living arrangements of the high-rise in the novel serves to illustrate the fragmentary effect of imposing hierarchies on those who would otherwise be equal. It is this that I think underpins the novels thematic focus much more than a simple critique of architectural form. Further evidence of this type of wider social commentary occurs later in the novel when a character from the upper tier seeks to use those in the middle tier to suppress those from the lower tier, “...Once we’ve gained a foothold there we can play these people off against those lower down – in short balkanize the centre section and then begin the colonization of the entire building…” A pretty good summation of divide and rule, I would say.

The novel also states on several occasions that those in the middle tier are naturally the most at home with life in the high-rise. The text describes how those dwelling in the central section of the building seem most content to isolate themselves, being both comfortable enough not to require too much from the outside and yet preoccupied with gaining access to the upper levels. I think Ballard’s intent here is fairly plain to see.

Back to my original interest in this novel, wondering how Ballard would use the physical space of a high-rise building, I found his approach fascinating. The high-rise described here isn’t just a physical entity: it’s also a psychological and psychosocial space. I have long been fascinated by the relationship between design, environment and psychology, perhaps because of my earliest influences. In High-Rise, Ballard demonstrates how these elements can combine to great effect within a novel. 

Away from these considerations, I found the book to be highly visual (it’s currently being filmed by Canadian Director, Vincenzo Natali), at times brutal, and possessed of an almost obsessive quality. The frequent comparisons to Lord of the Flies are not without merit. The narrative structure follows a form of ever increasing tension as the building descends into greater disarray, but with little variance. The female characters are also presented in a way that could be deconstructed along a number of interesting lines. The greatest strength of this novel by far is the expert twinning of theme to environment, which is then used to drive every aspect of the narrative - fine by me, because that’s what attracted me to it in the first place. High-Rise is an evocative novel, insightful if a little single-minded, but ultimately one which deserves its place as a classic of socially relevant hyper-real literature.

***

Everyone say thank you, Jason. 

Thank you, Jason!

Seriously: Kamvision is where it's at. Now go on and follow this fellow. :)

Tomorrow on The Speculative Scotsman, well... more awesomeness, obviously. More specifically, sex, courtesy of Staffer's Musings.

Guest Post | The Walker of Worlds Interviews Eric Brown

I did all my burbling about the great Mark Chitty yesterday, so let's just cut to the chase today. Walker of Worlds is awesome. I have a hard time believing that there's anyone out there with an eye on science fiction and speculative literature that isn't already reading, but in the unlikely event some of you lovely lot are the exceptions to the rule... well. You know what to do.

Now let the Q&A commence! :)

***

Firstly, many thanks for taking the time to answer a few questions.

If I may, I'd like to start by talking about The Kings of Eternity (Mark's review, Niall's review, SFFWorld review). You mentioned in my last interview with you in 2010 that you had "...been writing the novel, on and off, for ten years, and I think it's probably the best thing I've done." It certainly was a great novel, and from the reviews I've seen from around the internet I'm not alone in that. Both Mark Yon and Rob Bedford over at SFFWorld.com named it their favourite science fiction release of 2011. How have you found the reaction to it?

Thanks for your kind words – I’m pleased you enjoyed it.

To my delight, the reaction has been uniformly excellent. I don’t think I’ve come across one bad review… yet. When one of my books is published I’m pretty resigned to reviews running the gamut from good to bad and everything in between. When a book goes out there, I know that some people will love it, some hate it with equal passion, and many people won’t give a damn either way. The response to Kings is especially rewarding as of all my books it’s the one I’m most pleased with. I loved writing it, I loved rewriting it, and, when I dip into it very occasionally, it’s the novel that picks me up and carries me along – it’s almost as if I didn’t write it. It’s certainly the novel that means the most to me, of all my stuff: I identify with the characters, their predicaments, and the sentiments expressed. Because I wrote it over such a protracted period – over ten years – I think it had time to mature, and I certainly had the opportunity to go back to it again and again and tinker, fix, cut…

I believe your next novel due out, Weird Space: The Devil's Nebula, is a venture into a shared world setting with Abaddon Books. Can you tell us a little about the novel?

The Devil’s Nebula is about small starship, ostensibly a salvage ship, and its crew of almost-criminals in a future fascistic, human empire. They sail close to the judicial wind, keeping just to this side of the law – until they land on a world within the out-of-bounds territory of the alien Vetch, searching for art treasures. Caught by the Terran authorities, they’re given an ultimatum: ‘face the death penalty or take your ship beyond Vetch territory to the Devil’s Nebula, in search of a colony ship that left human-space a century earlier’… It’s out-and-out space adventure, of the type I love to read, set in a universe where an evil alien life-force, the Weird, are bent on invading our universe through portals from another dimensions. It’s a space opera with Lovecraftian overtones.

How did you find the process of creating such a setting knowing that other authors would be writing within it at a future date?

That’s one of the delights of the project: setting up the background – the ground-rules, if you like – and seeing where other writers will take it. I’m looking forward to reading the novels in the series and taking inspiration from them, borrowing ideas maybe, riffs, and hopefully writing more in the series. It has great scope for many fascinating adventure stories, of many types, and I’m fascinated to see where it goes. The first novel, while complete in itself, sets up the series, leaving many ideative avenues for others to explore.

After The Devil’s Nebula we've got Helix Wars to look forward to, a sequel to your 2007 novel, Helix (SFFWorld review). Is there anything you can say about that yet, and why the choice to return to that setting?

Helix Wars is set two hundred years after the events depicted in Helix. Humankind has settled on New Earth, the colony is thriving, and the alien Builders of the Helix have conferred upon humanity the mantle of Peacekeepers – to monitor the six thousand-odd alien races who inhabit the Helix. However, the Builders ceased communicating with the human colonists around a hundred and ninety years ago, retreating into virtual quiescence. The humans have been going it alone for that long and successfully keeping the peace between the various races – until now. Further along the fourth circuit of the Helix where New Earth is situated, an alien race known as the Sporelli has invaded the peaceful world of Phandra and the neighbouring world of D’rayni, and the central character, Jeff Ellis, is caught up in the conflict when his shuttle crash-lands on Phandra and he is saved by the elfin, pacific natives. What follows is a story of personal loyalty – as Ellis attempts to save the life of the woman who saved him, when she is kidnapped by the Sporelli – and the destiny of various races on the Helix.

The Helix is a vast playground, and it was great to return to it. I’ve had great fun writing this novel – I love SF adventures featuring humans and aliens, exotic settings, fabulous inventions, crash-landed starships, strange cults… I can see myself (if my publisher so wishes) returning again and again to the world(s) of the Helix. The amount of fun I can have there is never-ending.

Any further novels planned, and if so can we get a sneaky bit of info on them?

The novel contracted for after Helix Wars is The Serene Invasion. It’s an idea I’ve had for years, and one I’ve wanted to write for ages. And it might be the most difficult I’ve ever tackled. The background is that an alien race, the Serene, come to Earth and abolishes the act of violence, our capability for violence, for the better of the human race. The novel will follow the consequences of this over the course of approximately forty years. It will focus on three or four characters and chart not only how their lives have changed, but how society and the race as a whole have been transformed. I want to write a novel of character, like Kethani, and a big novel of ideas. Sometimes I’m daunted by the task I’ve set myself. I’m confident of depicting the characters to my satisfaction, but it’s the societal examination of the premise that will be a big challenge.

After that… As I mentioned earlier, I’d like to do another Weird Space novel. And I’m always working on short stories. I’ll be writing a novella soon with Keith Brooke, and finishing off my Salvageman Ed story cycle, which very possibly will be appearing as a book in France before anywhere else.

I have a collection (Ghostwriting) of my horror stories due out soon, as both an e-book and a pod book, from infinity plus books. I’ve just had a proof copy through, and it looks great. It contains my eight horror/ghost stories to date – though they’re not bloody, gory, macabre tales, rather examinations of characters in stressful/horrific situations. Depending on how well Ghostwriting sells, infinity plus books might also do my e-book SF collection, The Angels of Life and Death, as a pod book.

I wrote a crime novel last year, set in 1955 – it’s still doing the rounds – and I’d like to write further novels about the central character.

All in all, what with moving up to Dunbar in Scotland earlier this year, I’m more than a little busy.

Somewhere across the Atlantic ocean, a Scotman's ears just perked up, Eric! If I might for a moment intrude on this excellent interview Mark's been conducting with you - and let me take this opportunity to say thank you, thank you several times over for that matter, for taking the time to answer our pesky questions - might I ask if the move you mention to Dunbar in bonnie old Scotland has inspired you at all, creatively speaking or in some other sense? As I recall, you have a lovely castle and a beautiful harbour up that-a-way as well...

Too early to say, yet. I usually find I'm inspired by countryside, and it's certainly beautiful up here. So there might be short stories forthcoming using the local setting. While I was living near Cambridge, I found the flatness of the landscape (after hilly Yorkshire) rather uninspiring... though the city of Cambridge itself is beautiful. I've found in the past that I start writing about places only after a longish while, so Scotland might feature in a year or so.

You’ve recently had some of your older novels and novellas come out through the ebook imprints Infinity Plus Books and Anarchy Books. Have you updated any of these, and are there any plans to get the remainder of your backlist out via this format?

I’ve not updated anything that’s gone into e-book format, other than correct of few errors or typos and things. Most of my longer work is available in e-books, I think – with the exception of The Fall of Tartarus and my two Web books for children, Untouchable and Walkabout. Solaris e-books all my novels; PS Publishing brings out all the novellas I’ve done for them as e-books (or will do soon); and Anarchy Books are doing the Virex trilogy.

Speaking of ebooks, the success of the Kindle and other devices has brought a flood of self-published books to the market. What are your thoughts on the ease in which books can be published like this, especially with many of yours available in e-versions only?

Well, it does mean that the market is flooded with unedited rubbish, so it’s harder for the reader to wade through the dross to find the good stuff. And, I suppose, that means my e-work will be buried under the flood. But I’m not complaining. I often wonder if, had the internet and e-publishing, and POD, been around when I started writing thirty-odd years ago, I might have gone down that road to start with. What I did was put all my unpublished – and unpublishable work (some twenty-odd novels and three hundred short stories) – under my bed, where it didn’t get edited, or read.

I’ve read three authors recently who self-published their stuff as e-books, sold – or had downloaded – millions, and achieved real publishing deals as a result - two Americans and a Brit. All three books were garbage, and I despise the respective publishers for jumping on the band-wagon.

I still think Alfred Bester’s dictum should be seriously considered by every writer (and I’m paraphrasing him here): Write a million words, and only then try to sell.

We've covered ebooks, but what are your thoughts on audiobooks? I'm a big fan, especially on long walks and journeys, but searching the popular site such as Audible and Amazon turns up no results for anything of yours. Do you know of any plans to bring your stories to life in this way? And what are your thoughts on audiobooks?

Three or four of my children's books have been done as audio books, and they're excellent. I don't listen to audio books myself, (I don't drive, don't walk that far, so the opportunities to do so are limited - and I don't have baths, but showers.) But I'm all for them if they get the author's work out there - and if they don't take liberties in terms of cuts and edits etc. As for how to get my SF made into audio books, I'll ask my agent.

You mention that you’re always working on short stories, and you’ve had some collections of these out in the past (Kethani (Mark's review), The Fall of Tartarus (Mark's review)). I like the idea of these collections that focus on the same setting and/or characters, and I’m aware that you have other short stories and novellas that fall into this category (the Starship stories, Salvageman Ed). Can you see these being collected either as a print or ebook edition in the future?

Ideally I’d like to see them as print books. PS Publishing is doing all four Starship novellas in one big hardback volume – so it’d be lovely to see a mass market paperback of that. It’d work, as in total it’s around 120k, and reads like a novel. As for the Salvageman Ed tales; they stand at 70k at the moment, and they’re almost finished, and it looks as if they’ll be coming out in France as a print book from the people who publish the Bifrost SF magazine, where some of the tales have run.

Finally, where would you recommend a new reader to your work to start?

Mmm… that’s a difficult question, because it depends what the reader likes. For readers who prefer space opera, I’d recommend Helix, Penumbra and Engineman; for those who like more quiet, introspective, character-driven SF I’d recommend The Kings of Eternity; Kethani; The Fall of Tartarus; and the Starship novellas, and the novella Gilbert and Edgar on Mars, featuring G. K. Chesterton and Edgar Rice Burroughs on the red planet. Then the Bengal Station trilogy, I suppose, combines both space opera and character – in fact, in terms of characterisation, I think Vaughan in those books is my most successful creation, in that I managed to achieve – I think – exactly what I set out to do in starting with someone who had very little to live for, was a nihilist at the start of the first book, and through his experiences over the course of the three books came to some degree of happiness and contentment.

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Mark, I can't thank you enough for all this - and a massive tip of the hat to Eric as well! A fellow Scotsman, as good as, and truly an excellent author to boot. I know I can hardly wait to read The Devil's Nebula.


But I really must wave goodbye for the day. And that's it for Mark and Eric too, I'm afraid... but that isn't to say we're all out of awesome, here on TSS. Why I do declare we're hardly even halfway! :)

Guest Post | The Walker of Worlds Guides Us Through the Work of Eric Brown

Methinks our next very important person needs no introduction.

Mark Chitty is a man among men, and a blogger – but of course – amongst bloggers. He established Walker of Worlds way back in 2007, and in my opinion the site's gone from strength to strength in the many years since. Of late, I dare say Mark’s been through the ringer a bit, so it says a lot about the gentleman that he still took the time to write up this unmissable introduction to the work of one Eric Brown... a personal favourite author of his, and mine.

Come to that, Mark Chitty is the whole reason I read Eric Brown – if I recall correctly it was his inspiring review of Engineman which in turn inspired me to give the novel a shot, and I'm so glad I did – so it’s lovely, just lovely, to come full circle in this way.

And there’s much more to come! Mark went above and beyond when I asked him if he might be interested in contributing something to TSS while I was in the States... but I’m going to let him tell you all about what’s ahead of us.

For the very moment, over to you, good sir. :)

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When Niall asked me if I'd like to contribute something to The Speculative Scotsman while he buggers off to the US (I'm not jealous, no way) I had to think for all of 5 seconds about what I could do. You see, Eric Brown is an author I've come to enjoy and admire for his stories. He writes science fiction, but not the sort you'd normally associate with the term. Yes, you've got spaceships, aliens, high technology, and all manner of other things you'd expect from a sci-fi novel, but he tells a human story that far outweighs and outshines the science side.

Starting with his first novel, Meridian Days (review), you see exactly what Eric Brown writes. It's a character focused novel set on another planet, very much on the lighter side of SF. While his second novel, Engineman, is more than that. It's very much a sci-fi novel with an intergalactic society and aliens, but again very character focused. Solaris re-issued this one a couple of years back with all but one of the Engineman short stories included (my review is here, while you can read Niall's here). We both liked it quite a lot, and I think it's a perfect starting place if you're new to Eric Brown's work, showing off his creativeness in both novel and short story form. Penumbra is another novel in the space opera vein and very much worth a read, again an ideal starting point.

Moving on to the Virex trilogy (New York Nights, New York Blues, and New York Dreams), and I'm afraid I can't say much here - I've not read them. Or at least, I've not read more than the first few chapters of New York Nights. So, check out the above links to the synopses. I can say that what I did read was interesting, though why I didn't progress is something I can't quite put my finger on. Anarchy Books have released the first and second as ebooks, and hopefully the third will follow shortly.

Before Eric moved to Solaris Books, Gollancz released a short story collection called The Fall of Tartarus. This is a collection of stories in a shared setting, the planet of Tartarus, whose sun is soon to go nova. It chronicles the last years of the planet through character focused short stories, each enjoyable, and is an interesting read - my full review is here.

It was when Eric moved to Solaris Books I really became aware of him. In fact, Helix was the first novel of his I read when it was released back in 2007. Admittedly I haven't read it again since (though I will do, what with the sequel, Helix Wars, due out later this year), and haven't actually reviewed it. I remember enjoying the combination of a crashed starship on a Big Dumb Object, the discoveries made on the Helix, and the alien races introduced - a space opera kind of novel. Others who have read it also enjoyed it, like Rob Bedford over at SFFWorld. That's a review worth reading!

Kéthani (review), much like The Fall of Tartarus, is a collection of short stories dealing with the peaceful coming of an alien race to Earth. However, the difference with this one is that includes some bridging scenes between stories that certainly help. I've actually just re-read Kéthani a couple of weeks back so it's fresh in my memory, and I still think it's one of the best things Eric has written. It does, however, depend on what you want out of the stories. It's not hard sci-fi, in fact it's barely sci-fi at all. Focusing on a small cast of characters, we see the arrival of the Kéthani through their eyes and the impact it has on their lives. While the idea behind the Kéthani is positive, not all the stories are, and the emotional effect their coming has is examined over a broad range of subjects.

I've thought long and hard about what my favourite book by Eric Brown is, and I couldn't narrow it down to just one, so I choose three - the Bengal Station trilogy (Necropath, Xenopath, and Cosmopath). A cop out? Maybe, but if you take nothing else away from this post, make sure you read these books. The character progression over the three books of the main protagonist, Jeff Vaughan, is one of the best pieces of characterisation I've read. The fact that the stories themselves are gripping, interesting, and very much SFnal, are simply a bonus. I'll direct you to my reviews of the books (here, here, and here), otherwise I'll just talk for hours about the awesomeness of the trilogy. READ THEM!! Oh, and you may come across a novel called Bengal Station – ignore it! It’s effectively Necropath, but an early version, and from Eric has told me in the past, Necropath is an expanded and improved version of Bengal Station.

Aside from the Virex trilogy, Guardians of the Phoenix is the only novel I haven’t read. I know the reason – I read the short story in the Mammoth Book of Apocalyptic SF that it was based on, and didn’t really enjoy it – but it sits on my shelf taunting me. I keep on meaning to get to it, but, unfortunately, Niall’s review hasn’t helped me getting around to picking it up.

And then to The Kings of Eternity. Well, if you want to try Eric Brown and don’t want to commit to more than one book, this is the one to choose. I’ve seen so many positive reviews of it around the net that I know my opinion, and Niall’s, aren’t just one-offs. It’s probably the best single work Eric has written and is completely engrossing. It’s a story with multiple levels told in different time periods, again very character focused, and it just works. And if you’re not usually an SF fan, this may change your mind, the sci-fi side is so light that you sometimes wonder whether it’s actually science fiction.

Other than novels, Eric Brown has written a fair amount of novellas and short stories. Approaching Omega (review) is a sci-fi/horror story, and while it was written before the film Pandorum, I can’t help but think of it every time I read the story. One of those things I suppose, but it’s still a good one. The others of his that I’ve read are the first two parts of his Starship series, Starship Summer (review) and Starship Fall. Both of these follow the same group of friends, and each is thoroughly enjoyable. They’re only the first two part of a quartet, with Starship Winter due out soon and the finale, Starship Spring, due next year. These are released through PS Publishing (well, Starship Fall was through NewCon Press), so not all that easy to get hold of due to the limited release, but it looks like they’re coming out in ebook form now, with a hardback collection of all four due next year. You can be sure I’ll have them on order ASAP! Some others he’s released, though I’ve yet to get hold of and read, are The Extraordinary Voyage of Jules Verne, Gilbert and Edgar on Mars, and A Writer’s Life.

As for short stories, well, I doubt I’ll ever read all 114 Eric has listed on his website. But fortunately he’s released many collections, from the previously mentioned Kéthani and The Fall of Tartarus, through to others like The Time-Lapsed Man and Other Stories, Blue Shifting, Parallax View (with Keith Brooke), Deep Future, Threshold Shift, and The Angels of Life and Death. I’d expect to see more in the future, and I’d recommend any of these without hesitation. Eric Brown can write a damned good short story!

Eric has also ventured into children’s stories quite regularly, but these are ones I just haven’t got to. Maybe one day…

So, what else is there to say? Eric Brown is easily one of my favourite authors writing today, and not just in SF. His stories are so accessible to anyone afraid to try sci-fi, and so very readable. I think he’s one of the most underrated writers in the genre, and if you’ve yet to read anything by him I urge you to pick at least one of his novels up, I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

And if you think that’s all, you’re wrong! Stay tuned as tomorrow there’ll be an interview with the man himself, with some tasty information about his upcoming novels…

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And much more besides!

Thank you, Mark, for that excellent introduction to the work of Eric Brown. Dude's written a lot of books, so this post should be a huge help to anyone wondering where to start, or else which of his novels to pick up next.

I'll leave it at that for today, but do come on back to The Speculative Scotsman tommorrow, everyone, for a fascinating Q&A with the man - indeed the men - of the hour.