Chuck Wendig's Blog, page 44
July 8, 2020
Gabbling Into The Void 5: The Void, in 3-D
[image error]HULLO HULLO. It is I, your bearded Charon guiding you down the rivers of the Underworld. Come, take a boat ride with me to the bubbliest, barmiest of blogtowns.
I’m reminded of polio. I know, starting off real exciting, right? Polio? JFC. I’m just saying, polio is one of those diseases where it infected a lot of people — but a bunch didn’t show symptoms, a bunch got the equivalent of a flu, and a smaller percentage ended up with muscle problems, paralysis, and death. Then, as if that weren’t sucky enough, some folks got a follow-up round of PPS (Post-Polio Syndrome) anywhere from 15-40 years later. And they don’t know why. Because viruses are weird.
What I’m trying to say is, take COVID very seriously. In particular, take warnings about neurological damage with considerable concern. Further, it’s worth realizing that survival — while good! — doesn’t mean a life free from symptoms or problems. We need to stop pretending like this is just the flu, like you get it and move on, like we understand the margins of this thing. We don’t. Even with a vaccine, its effects will be with us for a while. Wear a mask. Try to remain distant. Stop going to parties and bars, for shit’s sake.
In better news, Far Side is back. I mean, holy shit. The Far Side is back?!
Some TV I’m enjoying? I started up both The Boys and Doom Patrol and… okay, listen, I wasn’t sure about The Boys. I kinda figured it was gonna be a bro-town meh-fest, but I should’ve have doubted. It’s great. I’m digging it. And Doom Patrol? Who knew? Both are squirrely, dark takes on the superhero thing, and I’m not super into the dark takes right now, but what can I say? What works, works. And these work. What shows or movies have you been digging?
I got a hammock. Its singular purpose was for reading — to disconnect from the world and to pick up a physical book and just read it. My pleasure reading has been erratic as hell since all this started, but lemme tell you, I started Paul Tremblay’s Survivor Song yesterday, and in a blink, I was 100 pages deep. I haven’t read 100 pages of a book in one sitting since before the Quarantimes. Ironically, it’s a book about a virus — an upgraded rabies virus. It’s horrifying. Tremblay is a monster. A wonderful monster who is a helluva writer. What are you reading right now?
I saw a video that has made me laugh so hard I wept. It’s Akilah and Milana. Just watch it and improve your life one thousand percent.
A casual reminder that you can find me on Instagram. It’s @chuck_wendig over yonder.
Our garden doth grow. Been eating snap peas, which have been sweet. Our radish days are gone. Got kale that needs harvesting. Shishito peppers blooming. Peas starting. And something called “Dragon Beans” which are, no joke, growing taller than anything we have supporting them, so I’m pretty sure they’re some kind of mythological legume. We also used compost to help jump start our blueberries, but I guess the compost had squash seeds in them because now the blueberries have some squash buddies growing alongside them? I’m sure that’s fine.
Beer me, barkeep. I had something called Cocoa Cow from Sunriver and hot dang that was good. It’s like dessert, except it’s beer? I wanna put some vanilla ice cream in it. Because if you’re going to be unhealthy, you might as well press pedal and pitter-patter.
So it’s been a year, now. Happy birthday, Wanderers. The little big book has been out for a full year, and it’s done very well and I’m happy, but do you remember when it was fiction hahaha aaaaghhaaAAAAGHHHH yeah me too. Also holy shit, it’s at 989 reviews at Amazon — ?! That’s a helluva thing. I’m still very proud of the book. It was serendipitous in the writing and the reception, and equally so — if more troubling — in how it occasionally would come to mirror some of reality. I don’t think the book’s journey is over, and it continues (somehow?) to sell pretty well, and I’m just glad it’s out there and did okay. I remember taking a road trip to do research for it and — wow, remember road trips? Remember going places? Remember doing stuff outside your house. Of course, because we live in Two Americas, there are lots of people who remember those things well, because they just did them like, last week. Half our local cases are from people who thought, “Now’s a good time to go to Myrtle Beach, where I can rub my nose in some coronavirus with lime, baby.” Seriously, our cases in PA are coming from out of state. Because people just can’t be smart and keep it under control. IF I DON’T GO TO THE BEACH I’LL DIE, they say, before going to beach and catching a disease that could kill them. Cool cool cool, extremely cool.
I have all kinds of news I can’t yet share. One day I’ll share it. For now I’m sitting on a nest of eggs that only I know are there. HATCH, LITTLE NEWS GOSLINGS, HATCH.
ANYWAY that’s all she wrote, I think.
Wear a mask.
Here’s a flower.
Andrea Phillips: The Corporation As Tool
I’m often wont to say that plot is Soylent Green — it’s made of people. Meaning, people make decisions, and that’s what forms an overarching plot or story, not some external hero’s myth, not some skeletal framework of A to B to C. And that’s in narrative, yes, but it also translates to the real world. Science and history are both driven by people — their decisions, their choices, their observations and recordings. And here, Andrea Phillips — with her new novel, America, Inc. out this week — talks a bit about the idea of the corporation, and how it relates to the individual:
***
My name is Andrea Phillips, I think corporations get a bad rap that they don’t entirely deserve. I even wrote a book called America Inc. that’s about a corporation running for president of the U.S. — and they’re the good guys. See, I think the corporation is just a tool, and like every tool, it can be used for good or for evil.
In the beginning, corporate personhood was a great idea. The whole point was to legally separate a business from its owners. That way they wouldn’t be ruined if something went wrong and the business went under — say a ship was lost at sea, or the shop burned down.
Recognizing the business as a separate legal entity created a shield that meant the people the business owed money to couldn’t come after the owner’s house, couldn’t take all of their life savings, couldn’t take the lollipops from the mouths of their children. That doesn’t seem so bad, right?
So why do people hate corporations today? That tool fell into the wrong hands. They’ve taken the legal and financial shield and applied it to other areas of responsibility. It’s become a moral shield, too.
When Deepwater Horizon spilled hundreds of millions of gallons into the Gulf of Mexico, we blamed BP. When researchers discovered diesel cars cheating their way through emissions testing, we blamed Volkswagen. When the 737 Max turned out to have gone into service with fatal flaws, we blamed Boeing.
But each one of those incidents is the result of decisions and actions taken by individual people — and not just one or two, but a cascade of people all choosing to do the wrong thing.
This also applies to business practices. It’s easy shorthand to talk about Amazon’s monopoly power or Wal-Mart’s decision to underpay their workers. But Amazon didn’t decide anything. Wal-Mart didn’t, either. In a very concrete way, neither Amazon nor Wal-Mart even exist. You can’t touch them, and you certainly can’t throw them in a jail cell. Every one of those actions is a choice that some asshole made — some asshole who took on the mantle of the corporation to shield him from the consequences.
The corporation isn’t the problem. The problem is a cultural and legal structure that absolves individuals of moral and criminal culpability for the choices they’ve made. The problem is letting those assholes run things without consequences.
It doesn’t have to be like that.
OK, fine. Sometimes, in the most egregious of cases, we’ll throw a few assholes in jail. Sometimes, though, the people who wind up in hot water aren’t the ones who made the original decision; they’re just water-carriers following orders for the people who sign their checks.
We could be doing a lot more. We could be exercising punishments for corporate malfeasance with more bite than skimming off a fraction of a percent of profits in fines. We could and should create a criminal framework that punishes both businesses and decision makers for their antisocial, anti-environmental, anticompetitive choices.
Creating sweeping change like that is hard and slow. In the meantime, all of us have to operate within this corrupt system. There’s no escaping it. But that doesn’t mean we have to be corrupt ourselves.
Individuals have much more power than they realize. Every day, we make choices, and our little choices can add up ripple by ripple to become a great wave of change. We’ve seen it in #MeToo, where each person calling out the instigator of their harassment emboldens others to share their experiences and enforce a new cultural acceptance that that kind of shit isn’t okay. We’re seeing it right now with Black Lives Matter, where years of tremendous work of Black activists has finally stirred even apathetic white people to protest and to support massive changes in police use of force, disciplinary processes, and funding.
I’m not saying that little by little we can change the complicated international financial-legal system on our own. But in your own workplace, you can be a sticky cog, finding ways to prevent evil and ways to do good. Every business that sent out an email supporting Black Lives Matter did that because an individual at that company made a choice — a moral choice. We can all find ways to try to make our workplaces less racist, or less exploitative, even if it’s just by example.
Me, I’m just a reclusive author. I can’t press my employer to, say, make Juneteenth a paid holiday because I don’t have one. So for my part, I’m donating 15% of net profits from sales of America Inc. to Common Cause, a nonprofit that works to protect voting writes in the United States.
Be the change. It’s got to start somewhere. And once you start, you just might discover you’re not as alone as you thought.
***
Andrea Phillips is an award-winning immersive experience designer and author. Her short fiction includes the critically acclaimed novelette The Revolution, Brought to You by Nike. America, Inc. is its novel-length sequel. Her other books include Revision, The Daring Adventures of Lucy Smokeheart, and A Creator’s Guide to Transmedia Storytelling. She also created the Serial Box LitRPG project Alternis, and co-authored Bookburners and ReMade. You can find her on Twitter at @andrhia. I mean, if you like that sort of thing.
Andrea Phillips: Website | Twitter
America, Inc.: Buy Now
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July 7, 2020
Matt Wallace: Five Things I Learned Writing Savage Legion
They call them Savages. Brutal. Efficient. Expendable.
The empire relies on them. The Savages are the greatest weapon they ever developed. Culled from the streets of their cities, they take the ones no one will miss and throw them, by the thousands, at the empire’s enemies. If they live, they fight again. If they die, there are always more to take their place.
Evie is not a Savage. She’s a warrior with a mission: to find the man she once loved, the man who holds the key to exposing the secret of the Savage Legion and ending the mass conscription of the empire’s poor and wretched.
But to find him, she must become one of them, to be marked in her blood, to fight in their wars, and to find her purpose. Evie will die a Savage if she has to, but not before showing the world who she really is and what the Savage Legion can really do.
***
I didn’t know how to write an epic fantasy novel.
I grew up reading sprawling fantasy sagas, from Dragonlance to Pern to Forgotten Realms. While that did a good job of schooling me on the tropes of those novels I wanted to avoid and/or examine, it did not, as it turns out, prepare me to write one. I tend towards short form fiction naturally, and structuring something so long and of such scope spun me around something fierce. I had to trash and restart SAVAGE LEGION at least twice, and oddly the only thing that ended up saving me was falling ass-backwards into writing a series of novellas. I solved my structuring problems by viewing my epic fantasy as three novellas which would compose three acts and feature three POV characters (the number three just started to make sense to me, I guess). If I hadn’t embedded that in my brain as a guide, I never would’ve finished the book.
The line between giving yourself time and living in fear is razor-thin.
It took me longer to write this novel than any other work I’ve ever produced. It was at least four or five years from the first word I typed to handing off the first draft to my agent. I needed the time to teach myself how to write this book, but there definitely came a point when I left it sitting for long periods because, quite simply, I’d become afraid of it. It was too much. Mentally, emotionally, physically. And the more time I left it alone, the easier it became to keep doing that and the harder it became to return to it. While I do believe some of those years were vital to figuring the book out and arriving at the final draft we did, if I’m being honest with myself I probably could’ve cut those years in half by dealing with the unhealthy caverns of that fear instead of letting it fester and so often steer me.
The smallest piece of advice can change your entire world. Literally.
This book was originally (in the long-long ago) going to be titled WILD MAN. After a time, the exclusiveness of that title began to bug me. I talked to author Kameron Hurley about it, who told me how she reacted when she first heard Star Trek’s famous opening narration make the change from “where no man has gone before” to “where no one has gone before” and her emotional reaction to it. Needless to say, it was a profound moment for her, one of inclusion she didn’t even know she craved that deeply. Her story, her perspective, not only led me to a new title, it ended up completely altering my view of the novel and its world. I’ve often and publicly credited Hurley with helping me reshape this novel, and Hurley always reacts incredulously and dismissively. “What, that thing about the title?” she once asked me when I brought it up. It was a brief and innocuous bit of craft exchange to her, but to me it was vital and formative.
Your novel is only as good as the village that helps you raise it.
My writing career up to this point had been very isolated and insular. I never liked anyone “telling me how to write,” as I saw it. SAVAGE LEGION completely changed my perspective on that. It started with my agent, who is also an experienced editor. My actual editor at Saga Press, Navah Wolfe, was as much collaborator as overseer. Our sensitivity readers who were integral to informing the experiences of the characters who aren’t like me. I needed them all, and I am 100% convinced SAVAGE LEGION wouldn’t be the book I believe it is without every single one of them. I’ve never allowed so many people inside my process before, and I am grateful that I did, but more importantly, I’m grateful they were the right people for this book. That dynamic is paramount. It’s not about getting a bunch of notes from a bunch of folks, it’s about finding the right perspectives to inform your process and the work itself.
It’s worth the years it took to write because you finished it.
This is a shitty time to have a book coming out. There are vastly more attention-consuming and frankly more important things happening than a story I wrote. Pandemics, civil uprising, rooting out predators and racism in every industry and field. There have also been a lot of behind-the-scenes issues with the publication of this book I won’t go into here. Needless to say, I’ve been very discouraged as we approach release day for SAVAGE LEGION. What I’ve ultimately learned, however, is you can’t replace time. No amount of fanfare or recognition or sales numbers will give me back the years I put into writing this book. In the end, it is either worth the cost of time to you as the author or it isn’t. For me, I’ve decided the years I spent on this book weren’t a waste, because I finished it. I did what I set out to do, and the book is exactly what I wanted it to be. Nothing else really matters, not in the final tally.
***
Matt Wallace is a retired professional wrestler and the author of the Sin du Jour novella series (Tor.com Publishing), as well as the Savage Rebellion series (Saga Press). His debut middle-grade novel, Bump, is scheduled to be released in 2021 by Katherine Tegen Books. In 2018, alongside co-host Mur Lafferty, he took home the Hugo Award for their podcast, Ditch Diggers. In addition to writing for several television series, Matt has also done extensive narrative work on video game titles for publishers such as inXile Entertainment. He currently resides in Los Angeles with his wife, Nikki, and maintains a steady Twitter presence @MattFnWallace, as well as a more sporadic presence on YouTube with his channel, Angry Writer.
Matt Wallace: Website | Twitter
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July 1, 2020
Gabbling Into The Void 4: The Quest For Quainter Quarantimes
OH HELLO I DIDN’T SEE YOU THERE. All right. Let’s light the tires, kick the fires. Is that right? Whatever. Miniature blog posts in 3, 2, 1… *flips switch*
The dogs of authors, on display. Today! Do not forget: author pet show!
Wait, it’s fucking July already?! That’s it. Time is broken. The calendar is a shuddering, sparking machine. I’m surprised my watch doesn’t just show a man on fire shrugging vigorously.
Right now, as I type this, blue jays are shit mad at something outside. I’m curiously getting pretty good at discerning what precisely it is they’re mad at — for instance, there’s a Cooper’s Hawk around, and I know their alarm cries when it comes by. This isn’t that. I’m betting crow? They get salty as fuck at crows. One thing I saw and found fascinating about blue jays: one day our yard jays were sounding the beak-bells about the Cooper’s Hawk, and other jays showed up. Like, a lot of them. They streamed in from two different directions, all joining the din. They called in the goddamn blue jay air force. It was a thing to behold, and I don’t know that I was aware that birds of that sort had any level of… allegiance to one another? Either that, or they were rubber-neckers. Just a buncha oglers like people who come out of their houses when there’s sirens or noise outside. HEY WHAT’S GOING ON. YEAH NO I’M NOT INVESTED IN THIS I JUST WANNA SEE. ARE YOUSE GONNA FIGHT OR WHAT. I’M GOIN BACK INSIDE.
But, I do like that some birds flock together. We’ve long had flocks of certain birds flock together — it’s not unusual, for instance, for certain feeder birds to hang out. Chickadees, titmice, nuthatches, and the like. What’s been interesting this year is seeing a gaggle of chickadee fledglings and a flurry of titmice fledglings play together. Literally play. Chasing each other up and around trees, bopping about. Not for food, just zipping around this way and that. I’m perhaps anthropomorphizing this behavior, but I’m not a BIRDOLOGIST so I’m not married to scientific rigor, it just seems to me like the only explanation is some measure of play — which I’m sure has value for them as it does for humans. But it also is suggestive of a greater intelligence than you’d think for such a tiny little nitwit bird, and a greater sense of society, if it can possibly be called that.
Hey, did you know there’s still a pandemic? Turns out, yup, it’s still rockin’ and rollin’, this whole thing. But I don’t know that people believe it? Who needs facts and experts and reality, when literally anything can be politicized and turned into a both-sides argument?
I think what floors me the most is people who aren’t taking it seriously, but also, who think they’re taking it seriously. What I mean is, you hear stories of friends-of-friends who are like, “Yes, mmm, coronavirus, very bad, very bad, wear your masks everyone! Social distancing is important! Anyway, me and my family were in Myrtle Beach last night and had a great time at a bar, and we met some other friends from Florida and Texas, and then we went to three different house parties — oh man, the last one was a real rager, we all played this great new game called HOW MANY TIMES CAN YOU COUGH IN EACH OTHER’S MOUTHS, and gosh, it was wild. Anyway! We’re back home now and I’m eating in restaurants for every meal and inhaling toilet plumes to get high, but don’t forget, wear your masks and social distance.”
Our numbers remain low, but in two weeks, now that we’re effectively reopened? We’ll see. They’re talking about opening schools in the fall, which to be is paradoxically both a) essential and b) impossible. I just don’t know how you do it. And a lot of schools are demanding parents make a choice of EITHER/OR — you either choose to have your kid go to school physically, or choose a totally digital path, and, uhhh. Ennh? To me, a mix feels smartest — stagger kids going, so you can limit numbers in classrooms, get them as much outdoor time as possible, and so on. But a lot of schools, even good ones, have abysmal ventilation. And they’re not gonna make kids wear masks or socially distance. They’re guaranteeing… I think three feet? Which I appreciate is hard to get kids to not be near one another, so, I grok the problem. I just don’t know the fix, and the fix seems to be, “well, fuck it.” Which is kinda the fix for everything these days, isn’t it?
There’s a passage in Wanderers that I think has become the one most quoted to me. It’s not part of the book proper — it’s an epigraph, one of the “flavor text” chapter openers. I post it here for shits and giggles, because… well, it feels dangerously appropriate.
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A most troublesome thing is that people think they know this disease. And they don’t. “It’s just the flu, it’s just a respiratory disease, it won’t kill you.” We’ve a number of family friends who’ve had it, and it’s a wildly mixed bag. One is completely lost to the throes of autoimmune encephalitis, trapped in his own burning brain, staring down the barrel of a long or maybe eternal hospital or facility stay. Others report, even three months later, spikes of fatigue, or loss of smell and taste, or other strange little symptoms. Even in our area, I think the hospitals have said that “fever” isn’t even the most telling symptom anymore — so temperature checks aren’t worth a damn. We’re still a long ways out from really understanding what this thing is, and what it can do. Wear a mask. That seems to help. Socially distance, when you can. Wash your hands. JFC. And holy shit don’t go to bars or parties.
The best Mission: Impossible movie is Fallout. And that’s because of Henry Cavill locking and loading his fists in the bathroom fight scene. No, this isn’t relevant to anything, but I figured it was good to break the mood and stop talking about the pandemic, which will one day go away, but the Mission: Impossible films will remain.
What have we been watching lately? Hmmm. There’s a spate of dipshit game shows we’ve been liking. Holey Moley is like exxxtreme mini-golf, and that’s on Hulu. Floor is Lava is on Netflix, and though it gets a little repetitious, it’s still a delight watching people faceplant and then slide unceremoniously into lava. (And the show makes you think they’re being pulled under, never to return.) We watched Hercules on Disney+ because we’d never seen it and now I wish we could go back to that kinder era. (Okay it wasn’t that bad, it was fun and funny but basically a brainless Looney Tunes telling of Greek Myth.) I keep trying to watch the Birds of Prey movie, and I’m about 75% through it, and I like it a good deal, but it’s hard to watch proper R-rated movies when you’re in a house where your kid really can’t go anywhere for two hours. But we do watch Letterkenny. Twenty-minute bursts of foul-mouthed Canadian hicktown shenanigans. Think early Kevin Smith, but redneckier, and in Canada.
Speaking of madcap mini-golf… if you haven’t played What The Golf? on Nintendo Switch, fix your shit immediately. Boy that’s fun. And weird. And rarely difficult, but occasionally tricky. Brilliant game design that makes fun of itself and all of game design.
Just a reminder, I’m still off of Twitter right now. I think the account is still locked, though I’ll fix that… I dunno, eventually. But even then, I intend to trim it up and use it mostly for signal boost and book-stuff. I suspect my time there has largely sunsetted, and at this point I fear I’m giving a lot more to it than it is giving to me. (And a reminder too, the locking-of-said-account was due to the Internet Archive kerfuffle. I’d seen folks like Pablo Hidalgo go full lockdown, and honestly it seemed more peaceful, so I did that.)
Also to remind you, no I am not suing the Internet Archive. I got a handful of emails this week, some trolling, some earnest, asking me to stop my lawsuit against them, and I’d like to remind you not to believe everything that enters your eyeballs on this here internet. You can go check the suit — I am not named in it, nor are my books. I did not “lead the charge,” and in fact, outside of some dumb tweets, have absolutely nothing to do with it. I didn’t even ask them to remove my own books, much less get litigious about it. I do not want the Wayback Machine to go away, and am not responsible for anything that happens there. So, I cannot pull my lawsuit, because I have no lawsuit to pull. Go bother publishers, who are further not acting on my behalf. Cool? Cool.
I think that’s it for now. Here are some photos. Including those BABBY TITMICE.
June 30, 2020
Author Pet Show!
PSST. Hey! Wanna help the SF Bay-area bookstore, Comix Experience? Want to see me and a buncha authors parade around their pets for the purpose of supporting a cool bookstore? OF COURSE YOU DO. Tomorrow, I’m joining a bevy of amazing authors (Charlie Jane Anders, Mallory O’Meara, Seanan McGuire, Mike Chen, Annalee Newitz, Fonda Lee and Meg Elison) to show off my dogs (er, assuming that they are in canine compliance and won’t try to lick the laptop to death).
James S. Murray: Five Things I Learned Writing Obliteration
When Cafferty enters a nest underneath the Nevada desert, he is horrified to find it completely empty. It can only mean one thing: the battle for survival is not over. Across the planet, creatures are emerging from their subterranean homes. Now, the all-out war against humanity has begun—a war in which only one apex species will survive. Humankind has finally met its match.
Cafferty knows that only one man can help him stop the onslaught. A man who is despised by the world. A man who has already caused the death of millions. A man who is a sworn enemy hell-bent on taking Tom Cafferty down forever: Albert Van Ness.
But even this desperate move may not be enough to stop the creatures and save humanity . . .
***
TRILOGY IS A POWERFUL WORD
Fifteen years ago, when I started writing the short story that eventually evolved into Awakened, I never imagined it would become the sprawling international trilogy that it is now. The first book was a New York-centric thriller, inspired by the action movies and novels that affected me as a kid growing up in Staten Island. But planning and nailing an entire trilogy is a whole lot more difficult.
The sequel The Brink took the story overseas, and by the time we get to Obliteration, we’re following characters in every corner of the globe. To nail down each twist and turn of the plot while staying true to the emotional arcs and backbone of the story, the plan had to be in place long before words hit the page. Mapping out the course of this massive story was one of the most challenging yet most rewarding tasks of my time as an author.
A CO-AUTHOR IS A BLESSING
On a similar note, no book happens alone. This is especially true in the case of the Awakened trilogy.
When my publisher proposed the great idea of pairing me with a co-author, I somehow stumbled upon the devilishly handsome and very British Darren Wearmouth. Our partnership has evolved into a lifelong friendship of collaboration. I can’t express enough gratitude for his steadfast creativity and persistence to make this trilogy as great as we both knew it could be.
I highly recommend finding your Darren. When you’re stuck on a word or a turn of phrase, chances are, your co-author knows the exact right answer.
KILL YOUR FRIENDS (IN THE BOOK)
What’s the point of writing a thriller series about a race of monstrous creatures threatening humanity without killing off a few of your friends?
Over the course of the trilogy, I’ve fictionally murdered a lot of characters inspired by people in my life. And I can tell you honestly: nothing is more satisfying that describing a friend’s brutal death for thousands of people to read.
Is a creature tearing apart an old buddy from high school an honored tribute? Or is it because I’m secretly holding a grudge against them? They’ll never know. Either way, it’s a nice little surprise for them when they get around to reading the book (if those jerks ever do.)
EASTER EGGS BRIGHTEN EVERYONE’S DAY
As every writer knows, some days go smoother than others. Sometimes, you need an extra bit of spice to keep the words from blending together on the computer screen in front of you. For me, easter eggs have been that special seasoning.
Darren and I are lucky enough to have the support of a lot of fans of Impractical Jokers, so anytime we can give them a nod, we try to. In all three books, there are fun little references to fan-favorite episodes and inside jokes that keep the series hyper personal to me. And each time I read them back, they make me smile.
THE ENDING HAS TO BE RIGHT
At the end of the day, when you strip away all of the bloodshed, the atomic bombs, and the decades-long conspiracies, you’re left with the characters. And ideally, those characters are the reason you started writing in the first place. We’ve all probably read a fantastic book where the ending leaves us unsatisfied. To put in all the work of the previous two books and to have Cafferty’s story fall flat was a fate we weren’t willing to accept. Apart from tying together every loose end plot-wise, the emotional side of the ex-Mayor’s story needed to feel full and complete. I probably stared at those last chapters longer than I stared at the deed to my own house. The ending of a trilogy has to be right. It’s true of every story ever told and a lesson that every writer should have buried deep down inside.
***
JAMES S. MURRAY is a writer, executive producer, and actor, best known as “Murr” on the hit television show Impractical Jokers along with his comedy troupe, The Tenderloins. He has worked as the Senior Vice President of Development for NorthSouth Productions for over a decade and is the owner of Impractical Productions, LLC. He recently starred in Impractical Jokers: The Movie, and also appears alongside the rest of The Tenderloins, and Jameela Jamil, in the television series The Misery Index on TBS.
James S. Murray: Twitter | Instagram
Obliteration: Harper Collins
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June 25, 2020
A Statement About Recent Harassers In SFF
My Twitter account remains locked due to GG-style harassment of me (death threats, doxxing, harassing my followers and repliers) tied to the Internet Archive situation, but those who don’t follow me wouldn’t have seen my recent statements, so I thought it best to put something here, too.
Recently it has come to light that a handful of authors inside science-fiction and fantasy publishing have engaged in various acts of harassment and abuse against women. These authors are authors with which I am friendly, particularly online — Paul Krueger, Myke Cole, Sam Sykes — and I am deeply sorry if that friendliness or if me boosting their work and amplifying their voices has in any way given them cover for their actions or given them unearned trust. I never saw the harassment or abuse in play, but my ignorance of it is not an excuse, and I should be better about actively attempting to make spaces like conventions and conferences safe. Some of the women who were harassed or abused are friends or acquaintances, as well, and that makes me heartsick to realize that I didn’t know or see what they were going through. It’s not enough to simply go along to get along, but rather, to maintain a vigil and to be ever on the lookout for harassment and attempt to call it in when witnessed.
I’ve cut personal and professional ties with these men and will not be signal boosting them further. I’m listening to victims and believe them. The men have apologized but it’s not on me to accept, deny, or judge those apologies.
June 22, 2020
Gabbling Into The Void 3: Effervescent Blog Bubbles
Once again, a mixed precipitation blogpost coming at you. It’s a little bit rain, a little bit hail, maybe a couple frogs-n-toads tumbling from the heavens. And away we go.
Is there a gentler phrase than ‘Wisconsin Public Radio?’ I’m sure there is, I’m just saying, it just feels like a place where you can, in dulcet tones, talk about various cheeses and the cheesemaking processes that birth them. It conjures a kind of pastoral coffeehouse chat. Regardless, I got to chat with WPR about Wanderers, which is not really as gentle a subject as we might like, given, well, *gestures broadly* all the pandemicness going on outside our door. You can read the article they posted, but that also contains a link to listen to me yammer on about bats and artificial intelligence and Stephen King and such.
The Stephen King thing is definitely a question that comes up a lot. And I always want to be clear that The Stand is a huge inspiration for Wanderers — that and to a different extent, Swan Song. They’re books that feel like they have the scope and cut of epic fantasy but instead of Middle Earth, it’s America, and with the horror aspect dialed way, way up. (Though let’s not pretend fantasy is without its horror. Shelob is horror. The Forsaken in Wheel of Time are agents of horror, often.) Wanderers definitely attempts to grapple with The Stand as a story, and does so in part by acknowledging it directly in the text — it’s a book some of the characters have read. I’d never as an author want to fail to acknowledge that pandemic-sized elephant in the room — a true classic of the genre, a pillar of the subgenre. Wanderers only exists because of The Stand, really.
Speaking of the Quarantimes… most of the counties in our state, including our current county, are green or headed to green, which is “good,” I guess? Mostly reopened? I mean, it’s good in that it means our numbers have remained low, and we’ve (theoretically) earned our green status by not opening prematurely. But I also know that we’re in for another spike, because people assume that GREEN means GONE, and you’ve got a bunch of poopy-pants man-children who won’t wear masks. And they’re talking about opening up schools in the fall and even in green status, I just don’t see how. The virus still exists. We didn’t eradicate it. It’s spiking huge in parts of the country, and it’s not like people can’t come here from there, and… oof, JFC, this is like fire season. Just because you put out that fire doesn’t mean we can’t have more fires. There’s still dry tinder laying around, ready to spark. It’s hard to be optimistic here, but reality is reality, and the virus moves when we move. It’s the equivalent of the Weeping Angels from Doctor Who — the moment we blink, the monster comes for us.
There’s a family friend who contracted it toward the beginning. And now he’s got autoimmune encephalitis from it. It essentially changed his personality, left him with terrible neurological symptoms — essentially a kind of high-test dementia. There’s no end game, yet. No treatment has worked. He’s maybe only ten, fifteen years older than I am. I can only say, take this disease seriously. Those it hits may not die, but they’re not always left whole, either. And we’re only a mile down this road and can’t see what survivors are left with in a year, or ten years, health-wise.
It’s officially summer. Is that good? I dunno.
Also, Father’s Day. I am fortunate to have an incredible kiddo. Did a puppet show for me. Drew me a card with an amazing blue dasher dragonfly on it. He helped make dinner. It was good. I planted a buncha plants — we’re really working to put in native plants here, and now we have planted, let’s see, helianthus, asters, bee balm, mountain laurel, viburnum, blueberries, phlox, mountain mint, swamp milkweed, coneflower, and hyssop. A lot of stuff is already blooming, which is great. And we’ve a small garden that’s doing okay. We ate the radishes. We have snap peas and hull peas and green beans growing in. The kale is looking kinda funky. Carrots are looking healthy, but I think they need a couple more weeks before we can do anything. I have random squash growing out of a compost pile.
Need a list of Black-owned bookstores? Yes you do, and here it is.
Trump sucks canker ass, and I’m glad his wretched rally was a pathetic mess trolled by K-pop stans and teenagers. The kids are all right. (Though important to note, they didn’t limit the attendees, since tickets weren’t capped. No, the low attendance was simply a combination of PANDEMIC plus HE SUCKS CANKER ASS.) Either way, get fucked, marmalade hitler.
Starhawks and Rae Sloanes and Aftermaths, oh my. I’m honestly a little bit burned out on anything called “Star Wars” right now, but that Squadrons game trailer tickled me more than a little — nice to see shots of the Nadiri Starhawk and Rae Sloane. (The first of which I came up with for Aftermath, the second of which was gratefully conjured by John Jackson Miller in his Rebels novel and who served as the backbone for the waning Empire in the three Aftermath books.) I’m honestly excited any time you see those ripples cascade out into other books or games or what-have-you.
P.S. I’m still on Twitter vacation. Still locked down, still not visiting much. It’s been nice. I expect that vacation to continue in some form through much of the summer, though again I’ll be here and on Instagram posting pretty photos and what not. And I’ll post photos here, too, like this batch.
June 16, 2020
Gabbling Into The Void 2: Drinking From The Firehose
[image error]*turns around dramatically in chair* OH, HELLO, I didn’t see you there. How’re ya now? Once again I return from the wasteland, emerging from the apocalyptic veldt, with an awkward fusillade of mini-blogs. Less a single boulder catapulted through your castle wall, and more a crate of pebbles dropped unceremoniously upon your head.
First things first, where’s Wendig? I’ve got a series of appearances lined up over the next week or two. I recorded with Slayerfest 98 over the weekend, joining a panel of rad humans to talk about the Season 6 finale of Buffy (“Grave”). Not sure when that lands, but I expect sometime this week. Then, tonight I’m at the Bethlehem Public Library reading from and talking about Wanderers. Tomorrow, I’m at Greenlight Books, talking to Ilze Hugo about apocalyptic fiction (her new novel is The Down Days, also about a pandemic). Finally, next Wednesday I’m chatting with Josh Malerman via the Doylestown Bookshop online. Very excited about all of these, and I hope to see you there.
Why yes, Virginia, Twitter is a Hell Realm. This past weekend was a fucking delight on Twitter, which is to say, apparently I became the poster boy for the publishers suing the Internet Archive due to the IA’s overreach on copyright. I’m guessing it’s because people just don’t like me, because, to reiterate one last time, I had nothing to do with the suit. I didn’t contact my publishers regarding it, I am not named in the suit, I do not control publishers with my mind, and I wasn’t even the only author talking about this thing on Twitter when it happened back in March. I appreciate people think I wield more persuasive power than, say, Neil Gaiman (with 2.8 million followers on Twitter), but I assure you, I do not. Regardless, people have since gone on to doxxing me, threatening me with death, and assorted other standard awfulness. As such, I locked my account and took a weekend off of Twitter and it was very nice, so you can expect that to continue. I’m not deleting the account or anything, but will be considerably more scarce there over the summer. I’d rather devote time and energy to writing this big damn SECRET BOOK I gotta write. I will continue to be here, of course, and you can also find me on The Gram, as it were.
We’ve been watching Letterkenny. That, at the behest of a number of friends (including but not limited to, Delilah Dawson, Kevin Hearne, Rob Schnell), and finally we relented because hey it’s on Hulu, and that’s a Texas-sized 10-4, Big Shooter. It’s a show where I only understand about 80% of what they even say (up from what I’d say was about 50% when we started), but god-dang it’s funny. Ferda!
Other things on the blinky box we have enjoyed? Well, if you’re not watching What We Do In The Shadows, something is wrong with your brain. The movie was amazing and I knew there was no way they could do a TV version that equaled it — and yet, here we are, because it is as good. We’re also watching a lot of cartoons. Craig of the Creek is one of the best toons on TV. Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts is back, and is the best.
Okay, I know, but bear with me. Sonic the Hedgehog wasn’t awful. I know. I know. It looked terrible. He had creepy teeth at one point. It was a whole thing. But somehow, it was actually kinda… fun? Is that okay to admit? It’s not gonna win any awards, and at no point was I moved to tears by it, but it was an hour-and-a-half of mirth. And Jim Carrey plays a curiously sinister Robotnik — I expected him to just be silly, camera-mugging Carrey, but the character was genuinely kind of evil? As evil as you can be for a kid’s movie, I guess.
I’m getting bored with Animal Crossing. The samey-samey comfort of it is wonderful, but also started to feel… well, samey-samey. Rec a new game? Also, I’m starting to feel like my life would be improved if I got back into PC gaming? Would it? Am I wrong? Hm.
I went to a park yesterday. It’s pretty out-of-the-way, a bit wild, not a lot of “facilities,” so it’s mostly just… nature. Which is great, because, ennnh, nobody was there? Okay, a couple people, but all at a distance, and we had masks. Took some pictures, listened to the babbling of brooks and what-not. Ooh, I saw a pair of orioles and their nest. Photos forthcoming later! Soon as they’re processed.
ANYWAY HERE IS A PHOTO
June 11, 2020
Gabbling Into The Void
HELLO, FRANDOS. I haven’t popped by here much over the last couple weeks because — well, there was a lot of important stuff going on with the protests over George Floyd’s death, and I just didn’t want to mist everyone with whatever aerosolized sewage you’d get from me, and further, I was on deadline finishing a book (Dust & Grim, the MG novel). That said, though I hope my stand on all this is clear, I support Black Lives Matter, I support the protests, I support defunding the police. Black Americans live a life entirely separate from white Americans in terms of their interactions with not just the police, but every dominant socio-cultural system. These are egregious faults which must be corrected and that currently stack to protect white privilege. As the saying goes, it is not enough to merely be not racist, but we must be anti-racist. If you’re white, you’re probably racist, and I believe it’s best to operate from that standpoint — no, I’m not suggesting you’re actively racist, seeking to do harm, but rather I’m saying that you have long benefitted from a system of bonuses and bennies exclusively for white people, and the very air around us is culturally suffused with a whole lotta racism, and we breathe it in, and we swim in it, and we unconsciously take some of it in and it is on us to recognize that, see that it is wrong, and do our best to untangle those nasty hidden knots inside us.
Further, given that J.K. Rowling has really chosen this moment to roll around in a mud-puddle of her own dead empathy, while again I’d hope my viewpoint here is known, I find no harm in reminding and restating: trans women are women, trans men are men, non-binary individuals are whatever gender expression they are, as well — and we must commit not just to these simple statements, but to undoing all the systemic prejudices that exist against our transgender and non-binary friends, whether in health care or safety or education or careers or — well, it’s a list that covers all aspects of daily life. As a call to action, here are some links you might click that will help you part with some essential donations:
Links to support black trans organizations.
AND with these things, remember that this is not a fight du jour, but rather, one that is ongoing in both our culture and inside your own damn heart and mind. So keep the vigil, hold the line. Okay?
Okay!
All that being said, usually I was calling these random scattershot blog posts DISJECTA MEMBRA, which is awful dang fancy and ooh-la-la, but honestly, it’s far too high-minded for the kind of word-hurk I’m chunking up, so instead I’m going with gabbling into the void. So, here we are, gabbling into the void once more. A blog post turned to viscera and slopped upon your information plate.
Some of you are still missing your FIYAH subscriptions. We were giving away 15 and only six (!) people have gotten back to me, so check the replies, see if you won. Go here, check the replies, and see if you won. Then contact me!
I saw a fox this morning. And a pileated woodpecker. Though I’m no longer writing in the woods as I once was, it’s nice to still be surrounded by a good bit of nature. Nature is soothing. Not that nature’s job is to soothe me, obviously, but I AM SOOTHED JUST THE SAME. The loud rappa-tap of the woodpecker’s beak. The gentle bounding of a fox. The soft squirrel I use as a loofa. What? Shut up. Squirrel Loofas are totally the big thing. Also the name of my new band.
School is now over for the not-so-tiny human. That’s both amazing, because school for the last couple months was… more like half-school, through no fault of anybody, it’s just circumstances. But it took a lot of work to schedule all that stuff, and effectively, everything became homework. Because school was home and home was school. And it necessitated a lot of work on our parts, too because though we weren’t teachers… we totally had to be teachers. (My wife far more than me, to be clear.) So! Summer is welcome, but with it comes the new challenge of OH GOD WHAT THE FUCK DO WE DO NOW. The days are long and the time is weird and we can’t just go on vacation or really even do most of the things we’d do. Sure, our county here in PA has gone from red to yellow (and maybe soon to green), but the virus didn’t go away, and we’re seeing a second surge rise — it could go poorly quickly, and blergh. So, now we have to supply structure for the summer, somehow. In some way. In a way that isn’t forced and is also fun. Maybe we just plug our son into a VR simulator and occasionally spoon-feed him nutrients? That can work, I’m sure. Bonus, he can power our home with his human energy! This is a very original idea and nobody has ever had it before and nothing can go wrong.
Just a casual reminder that COVID-19 is still serious shit. We’ve friends who have had it for weeks, even months, with lingering symptoms. One friend of the family had it, recovered, then developed bizarre personality-changing neurological symptoms that have only worsened — finally they figured out it was autoimmune encephalitis, likely a result of the virus. Neurological symptoms can persist and… we don’t know if everyone comes out the other side unscathed. Death isn’t the only thing this does. Take it seriously. Wear a fucking mask, embrace social distancing, stay frosty.
I’m still on my bread bullshit. I’ve had some spectacular failures. I had one loaf of sourdough taste so vinegary, you’d think you were drinking pickle juice. I had one sandwich loaf come out like a brick, a goddamn brick. (It tasted good, at least.) One was too tough, and from it I made bread pudding that was great. Been trying to make sandwich bread and finally, finally did so, with spectacular result:
There are good cartoons and you should watch them. First, Avatar: The Last Airbender is on Netflix again. HBO Max has the Ghibli films. Craig of the Creek is killing it this year. Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts is back… this week I think? There’s gonna be a We Bare Bears movie at the end of this month. All fun, funny storytelling at the top of its game. Good with kids or without, I’d wager.
AAAAANYWAY, here are some photos. Bye.
