Lorina Stephens's Blog, page 54

Michell Plested short story on Every Photo Tells

Five Rivers' author, Michell Plested (Mik Murdoch: Boy Superhero), has a short story up at Every Photo Tells this week.





Inspiration photo, for
You Can Never Go Home
by Michell Plested



We thought you might enjoy this mood piece, as narrated by Mick Mordet.

An interview with Michael Fletcher, author of 88

We met up with Michael R. Fletcher, author of the debut SF novel, 88, for an interview.





Michael R. Fletcher






Q: Would you please give us an
overview of your novel, 88?




MRF: This should be fun. I seem to have
injured myself doing handstand push-ups and am currently floating on a lovely
cloud of (legal, if slightly beyond their best before date) narcotics.




The story takes place in the year
2034 which was about as random a year as I could decide on. I thought all of
the advances I predicted would likely take much longer than I've allowed, but
that's the way things happen. One day you're staring at green text on a
monochromatic screen, and the next you're Googling performance stats for
Ferrari's new electric super car.




Back to the story. I started with
the assumption Artificial Intelligence wouldn't happen (or at least not fast
enough). Add to the mix the technology to scan human minds so they can be used
as sentient computers, and you have a recipe for tragedy. The human mind makes
an excellent computer. Well, that's not entirely true; some human minds make
excellent computers. Mine wouldn't, but that lead me to the question: What
minds would make the best computers? The answer is obvious. The minds of young
children, unhindered by preconceptions and primed for learning, are perfect;
particularly if you can get hold of them before their parents mess them up.




Oh, let's try a for real overview.
Hm. How do you describe a book without giving anything away?




The
dream of Artificial Intelligence is dead and the human mind is now the ultimate
processing machine. Demand is high, but few are willing to sacrifice their
lives to become computers. Black-market crèches, struggling to meet the
ever-increasing demand, deal in the harvested brains of stolen children. But
there is a digital snake in that fractally modelled garden; some brains make
better computers than others.




88, a brilliant autistic girl, has
been genetically engineered and raised from birth to serve one purpose: become
a human computer. Plagued by memories of a mother she never knew and a desire
for freedom she barely understands, she sets herself against those who would be
her masters. Unfortunately for 88, the Cuntrera-Caruana Mafia clan have other
plans for her.




Griffin Dickinson, a Special
Investigator for the North American Trade Union, has been tasked with shutting
down the black market crèches. Joined by Nadia, a state-sanctioned reporter and
Abdul, the depressed ghost of a dead Marine inhabiting a combat chassis,
Griffin is drawn deep into the shady underbelly of the brain trade. Every lead
brings him one step closer to an age-old truth: corruption runs deep.




An army of dead children,
brainwashed for loyalty and housed in state of the art military chassis, stand
between Griffin and the answers he seeks. But one in particular, Archaeidae, a
14-year old Mafia assassin obsessed with Miyamoto Musashi, Sun Tzu, and Machiavelli,
is truly worthy of fear. Archaeidae is the period at the end of a death
sentence.





6 x 9 Trade Paperback, 414 pages
ISBN 9781927400234
$32.99
EPUB, 414 pages
eISBN 9781927400241
$9.99
Available from online booksellers worldwide May 1, 2013
And directly from Five Rivers Publishing





Q: Tell us a bit about the
inspiration for 88?




MRF: Strangely, none of the original
inspiration made it into the book. The story evolved beyond the germ that gave it
birth. It all started when, back in university, myself and four friends rented
a car (with unlimited mileage) and drove to the Gulf of Mexico and back over a
long weekend. I remember sleeping in the trunk being surprisingly comfortable.
While passing through Matamoros--a Mexican border town across from Brownsville,
Texas--I was astounded by the number of dentistry offices. There seemed to be
one on every corner. It's a visual that stuck with me for reasons I can't
fathom.




Years later, after reading too
much conspiracy literature on how cell phones cause brain cancer, I once again
thought of that visual. Only this time they were neurosurgeons. How cool
would that be, I thought, if an epidemic of brain cancer drove the pace
of neuroscience? The idea of scanning human minds and saving them as
computers came out of that background, even though none of that made it into
the book.




It all started with wondering what
a world would be like where brain cancer decimated the human population and
neuroscience outpaced the other sciences. Neat as that idea was, in the end it
didn't really matter to the story and the needs of the story must come first.
As I wrote, the background evolved and the story I wanted to tell changed.




I also take a lot of inspiration
from whatever music I'm listening to at the time. While writing 88 I
picked my background music based on the scene I was working on. I listened to
an awful lot of Slayer and death metal while writing this book.





Slayer








Q: After inspiration, what were
the key elements you wanted to illustrate in the novel?




MRF: When I started writing I had a lot
of ideas I wanted to incorporate. Some were philosophical questions, and some
were simple what ifs. This being my first novel I began with none of the
usual things that writers do. I didn't sketch out a plot line, and I didn't
decide on who all the characters would be. I just sat down and started writing.
If you're forgiving, you could call it an organic process. I'd call it insane.
People I liked ended up dying and characters I'd originally assumed were
background stepped up their game and became important. Sometimes I felt like I
had no control whatsoever over what was happening.




At the time I was playing a lot of
online First Person Shooters and regularly getting my butt kicked by children
and teenagers. It occurred to me these folks would make excellent soldiers and
killing-machines given the right (or wrong, depending on your point of view)
environment. That's where the idea of children piloting combat chassis came
from. I think some of that FPS addiction crept into my fight scenes as well.




People have a tendency to
underestimate children, both in terms of what they're capable of, and what they
understand. A huge part of this book is seeing things from the point of view of
the children involved.







Q: In reality, how close are we
to creating a biological computer?




MRF: We're kind of already there. If I may lift a little from
everybody's favourite source, Wikipedia:




In 2002, researchers from the
Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, unveiled a programmable
molecular computing machine composed of enzymes and DNA molecules instead of
silicon microchips. On April 28, 2004, Ehud Shapiro, Yaakov Benenson, Binyamin
Gil, Uri Ben-Dor, and Rivka Adar at the Weizmann Institute announced in the
journal Nature that they had constructed a DNA computer coupled with an input
and output module which would theoretically be capable of diagnosing cancerous
activity within a cell, and releasing an anti-cancer drug upon diagnosis.

In January 2013, researchers were
able to store a JPEG photograph, a set of Shakespearean sonnets, and an audio
file of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s speech I Have a Dream on DNA digital data
storage




It's just the beginning, but if
you look back at how fast digital computing evolved, I'd suggest we're not more
than a few years from useful biological computers. The funny thing is, I'm not
sure they'll be much more useful than other computers. At least at the
beginning.












Q: Recently there’s been some
exciting news regarding neural-interface prostheses. Was it this sort of
scientific development that inspired you to create the character of Griffin,
who ends up being one of the key characters in the novel?




MRF: Ooh. Drugs really kicking in now.




In a word, no. I employ something
of a Head in the Sand technique for surviving the barrage of pointless
information that is modern life. I don't watch TV, I don't read the news, and I
don't follow current events--scientific or otherwise. It means I am incapable
of following most water-cooler conversations, but since my days are spent
sitting at a desk at home, it's no great loss.




That said, when I get hooked on an
idea I do research the crap out of it.





Examples of latest developments in neuro-interface prostheses








Q: Are there authors who
inspire you, and if so who are they and why?

Yes, definitely. The very first
version of 88 was basically me pretending (really unsuccessfully) to be
Neil Stephenson. I desperately wanted to write Snow Crash. Once the
editors beat that out of me I began to search for my own voice.




Writers like Richard Morgen, Iain
M. Banks, Vernor Vinge, George Alec Effinger, and William Gibson are hugely
inspirational, each in their own unique way. Morgen and Effinger have an edge
to their writing that few can touch. Vinge brings the ideas like no one else,
and Banks is one of the few people who can write a Utopian future and keep it
exciting. Intending no comparison, I feel a little like William Gibson; he
wrote his cyber-punk books knowing next to nothing about computers and the
internet. I too have no idea what I'm talking about.





William Gibson








Q: There is a great deal of
technical information in your novel. Was this the result of research, or
extrapolation from existing research?




MRF: A lot of research went into the
writing of the book. It's all part and parcel of being a complete shut-in
know-nothing. I love the process of learning new things and then pushing what
little understanding I have to extrapolate possible outcomes. Even though it
plays an absolutely minuscule role in this book, I ended up reading about the
gold standard to an exhaustive degree. The funny thing is, I still don't
understand economics. The whole thing looks like a big Monopoly game where the
people who are playing the part of the bank get to change the rules whenever
they want. If you aren't one of the folks making the rules, why on earth would
you play the game?




The science was more fun. Though
I'm not of a particularly scientific bent, almost all of my friends are Nuclear
Physicists, Bio-Physicists, and Computer Engineers. They were amazingly helpful
in chasing down ideas and then picking apart my fanciful interpretations of
their mostly incomprehensible ramblings. A great many conversations started
with me saying, what if...







Q: Tell us about your writing
ethic.




MRF: My writing ethic has changed a lot
in the last two years. It used to be terrible. When it came to writing I was
very Manic-Depressive. There would be days (sometimes weeks) where I'd spend
eight hours a day sitting at the computer hammering out words as fast as I
could two-finger type them. And then I'd hit a wall and not write a word for a
month or longer. I think I gained about twenty pounds writing 88. I had
no understanding of life balance, ate crap, never exercised, and drank
excessively.




The birth of my daughter changed
all that. I left my job as an Audio Engineer (I did live sound for crappy bands
in crappier clubs) to focus on my writing and being a father. I should have
done it a decade ago, but sometimes I'm a little slow. As a work-from-home Dad,
I am forced to schedule my writing time. Where I used to rise from bed at the
crack of noon, I am now at my computer at six in the morning, trying to sneak
in a few hours before my daughter wakes. If she naps for two hours in the
afternoon, every minute of that is spent writing. As she gets older (she's two
and a half now) and requires less of my immediate attention, I look forward to
stealing back a little more writing time.







Q: Is there a sequel to 88
planned?




MRF: Grumble. I wrote a fairly detailed
skeletal outline for the 88 sequel. It took place some thirty thousand
years in the future and was very, very cool. And then I rewrote the ending of 88.
Twice. As soon as I finished that last rewrite I realized that I wanted to
write a very different sequel. I have a basic skeletal structure and a lot of
ideas that need exploring and researching. I do know the book begins on July
8th, 2034, the day after 88 finishes. For now I'll call it 88.1.




First, however, I have to finish
editing Beyond Redemption, my dark fantasy novel. My brain shifts gears
like an old Datsun and doesn't like working on multiple projects.




Okay. I have to go and try and
lift my daughter out of her crib now. I might need more muscle-relaxants. Wish me
luck.





courtesy haroldgibbons.com

Launch for John Poulsen's Shakespeare for Reader's Theatre today.

The launch for John Poulsen's Shakespeare for Reader's Theatre: Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, and Midsummer Night's Dream, takes place this evening at 7:00 p.m. at the Round Street Cafe, 427 5th Street, Lethbridge, Alberta, hosted by the University of Lethbridge Bookstore.





John Poulsen





Here's a schedule of the evening's events:



6:45 doors open and people will be invited to snack on the Round Street goodies. 



7:00 Kate (John Poulsen's daughter) will welcome everyone, introduce the evening's program and introduce Dr.Robert Runte, Editor-in-Chief at Five Rivers Publishing.


7:05 Kate will introduce John Poulsen.

7:08 John Poulsen will explain about the students who will be performing one of the abridged versions of Romeo and Juliet from John Poulsen's book.

7:10 Students will introduce themselves and perform.

7:30 Final words by Kate. Clarification of how to buy the book.

7:35- 8:00 Snacks and chat.









Shakespeare for Reader's Theatre is available in print and ePUB from major booksellers worldwide, as well as the University of Lethbridge Bookstore, and directly from Five Rivers.







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Jeff Minkevics discusses cover for Type

July 1, 2013 Five Rivers will release Alicia Hendley's second novel, Type.



The novel focuses on the fallout from the Social Media Era, when rates of divorce, crime, and mental illness were
sky-rocketing and civilization was at its breaking point. As a result, prominent
psychologists from around the globe gathered together to try to regain social
order through scientific means.







Their
solution? Widespread implementation of Myers-Briggs personality typing, with
each citizen assessed at the age of twelve and then sent to one of sixteen Home
Schools in order to receive the appropriate education for their Type and aided in choosing a suitable occupation and life partner.




North
American society becomes structured around the tenets of Typology, with
governments replaced by The Association of Psychologists. With social order
seemingly regained, what could go possibly wrong?






Trade paperback 6 x 9

ISBN 9781927400296

$25.99

EPUB

eISBN 9781927400302

$5.99

Available July 1, 2013

Five Rivers' Art Director, Jeff Minkevics, kindly took time from his busy schedule to talk about the cover he's recently created for Alicia Hendley's forthcoming YA SF novel, Type.





Q: What was the creative trigger for the cover of Type?



JM: Oddly enough, the inspiration for this one came from a Visual Communications class I'd taken while at ACAD, that was simply titled 'Lettering'. Computer assisted design was just coming into its own, and although I had some Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator experience, they wanted to put all of us through our paces in an 'old school' manner, doing typesetting and hand-crafting in a manner that was similar to how it had been done in the past. One of my assignments was to produce a poster that used letters as design elements without them forming actual words. I was really into H. R. Giger at the time, and figured some sort of industrial 3-d 'wall' visual with inset/embossed letters would satisfy the requirements, so I created a grid of letters on illustration board and spent a week or so creating airbrushed 3-d 'alien pipe' effects around them in a strange yellow-green industrial sort of way. When I realized that this particular novel was about Meyers-Briggs typing, where every personality type could be represented by four letters, I made the connection to that piece right away.



Q: Tell us a little about how you decided to realize that inspiration?



JM: When I thought of Meyers-Briggs typing in the way it had been presented in the novel, I immediately focused on the whole notion of dehumanizing someone - the act of breaking them down into a category rather than seeing them as a person with their own wishes and desires. I visualized streaming computer data on a LCD screen, with rows and rows of personality types flying by, each one representing an individual person. Then I realized that 3 out of the 4 letters in the title of the book were actual letters that were used when defining Meyers-Briggs personality types, and that the missing 'Y' could easily be re-created by substituting either a modified 'J' or an 'I'. With the rows of data meant to be read left to right, I imagined an accidental vertical alignment that spelled 'Type', and the whole concept solidified for me.



Q: Why choose the colours you have, or was that simply personal preference?



JM: I realized fairly quickly that I didn't want to go with an excessively 'computer' font, because the whole concept was more about human beings making high-level choices about how other human beings were going to be sorted rather than an arbitrary computerized choice. So, rather than focus on a green electric-light effect or something similar, I went for more of a 3-d 'classical lighting' steel effect for the letters themselves, so the categories would have a more 'set in stone' feel to them rather than a 'decided by computer' feel. Because this story was about a revolution of sorts, I went with blood red to differentiate the vertical 'accidental' spelling of the book name, with a hint of a blood spatter thrown in to the 'Y'. A very pale green was used as background for Alicia's name because it contrasted the red nicely, and allowed that portion of the cover to pop. Though most of the book cover is a series of letters, the two things that dominate the cover are the red 'Type' lettering, and the green-backed author's name, which is as it should be.



Q: Was the cover the result of several prototypes, or did you experience an epiphany?



JM: Honestly, I was surprised how quickly this one came together. I remember thinking "Hey, I think I have a solid idea for this cover! I should do a quick sketch of it in Photoshop, before I forget!" and the next thing you know, I'm staring at a cover concept that was pretty close to what I had imagined. A print-ready version of the whole thing only took a few hours to put together, because the only real elements in the whole thing were font-based. So yeah, after reviewing how everything came together ... I figure it was definitely an epiphany.

A Method to the Madness: advance orders and contest

In an almost unprecedented move, a conclave of The Super
Evil convened last year at a secret lair in North America to create a guide
book for aspiring ne’er-do-wells. The result? A collection of papers known
generally as A Method to the Madness: a
Guide to the Super Evil, a collection destined to become the handbook globally
of every evil genius.









It was agreed such an undertaking required hiring of minion
editors, as such a task is beneath the genius of an Arch Villain. And who
better to fill those two editorial positions than Jeffrey Hite and Michell
Plested?

Jeffrey Hite is co-founder and editor at Flying Island Press, and an author in
his own right. Michell Plested is the author of Mik Murdoch: Boy Superhero, podcaster of Get Published, and GalaxyBillies. 





Jeffrey Hite
(we think)






Michell Plested
(incognito after the Conclave)




The cover is the result
of a psychotic episode suffered by Five Rivers’ Art Director, Jeff Minkevics,
after being caught eavesdropping on the conclave.






Jeff Minkevics
(immediately after being caught eavesdropping on the Conclave)




A Method to the
Madness: a Guide to the Super Evil, will release July 1, 2013 in both trade
paperback and eBook, and will be available through online booksellers globally,
as well as directly from Five Rivers.




The collection includes 24 papers presented by evil
luminaries such as Her Serene Omnipotence Calassandra, Conqueror and Empress; Janus
Kinase Hateyuaniwae, BFA, PhD, PhD, FRCCP, P.Eng; and Dr. Evil-n-Carnate,
Frequent Flyer, Grocery Shopper and Overlord Of Cubical Block 3257J – to name
but a few. Between the 24 sages who assembled at the North American Conclave,
they created insightful papers on the pressing subjects of Cognitive Perspective in the Pursuit of Evil; Principles of Biology and
Genetics for Minion Breeding Programs; and, The Importance of Date Night to the Married Super Villain.





6 x 9 Trade Paperback

ISBN 9781927400258

$23.99

Advance price $18.00














A Method to the
Madness is now available for pre-order until June 30, 2013, in trade
paperback, directly from Five Rivers, at a special advance discount of 25% off retail,
which means instead of paying $23.99, you only pay only $18.00.




Further, Five Rivers is staging a treasure hunt. The first
10 aspiring super villains to correctly collect the URLs to all the QR codes
(all 25 of them) in the collection, will receive a free signed copy of
arch-nemesis to super villains everywhere (and especially Cranberry Flats,
Alberta), Mik Murdoch: Boy Superhero.

Treasure hunt closes August 31, 2013.





Nemesis to villains everywhere

Alicia Hendley's Type gaining attention

Alicia Hendley's forthcoming YA SF novel, Type, is destined, it would seem, for great things. This past summer Hendley wrote a screenplay based on Type, subsequently entered it in the Canada International Film Festival (CIFF), and was notified yesterday by CIFF officials she's made the cut: "Your...screenplay has been chosen as an Official Selection of the 2013 Canada International Film Festival."




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According to CIFF information, Hendley's screenplay is only one of 23 films and screenplays chosen to feature at the festival, selected from among hundreds of entries submitted from over 30 countries.


Awards are given for the top screenplays in competition. All films and screenplays featured in the Canada International Film Festival are selected based only on the overall quality and merits of the work. Organizers say, "We aim to discover and recognize simply the best new, original voices in storytelling from around the world."



The 2013 Canada International Film Festival will be held April 5th to 6th, 2013 at the Edgewater Casino in downtown Vancouver. 




Alicia Hendley is also the author of A Subtle Thing, published 2010 b Five Rivers.




Five Rivers' very best wishes go with Alicia Hendley. In fact, YOU GO, GIRL!





Alicia Hendley with brother and fellow writer, Nate Hendley,
at Toronto's Word on the Street, 2010

John Poulsen presents Shakespeare for Reader's Theatre

John Poulsen, the video crew at the University of Lethbridge, and students from a local middle school, had a blast making this video, in which Poulsen demonstrates and discusses the dynamics of his book, Shakespeare for Reader's Theatre: Book 1, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Midsummer Night's Dream. 

Review: Hell to Pay

Hell to Pay by Matthew Hughes

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



In this conclusion to Chesney Arnstruther's adventures, author Matthew Hughes take a more philosophical and darker turn to his tale of the autistic actuary turned crime fighter, who is added and abetted in his deeds of good by former Al Capone assistant-now-demon, Xaphan.

Hughes continues the concept God is writing a book and making up the plot as He goes. Along the way we are introduced to Biblical characters who have been written-out, and who have found themselves caught in an equivalent of a Groundhog's Day loop.

The humour that started with The Damned Busters diminishes greatly in this third book, and for some readers who are seeking a farcical romp may find this third instalment off-putting. For myself, I found the story quite intriguing, far more developed and rounded than the almost comic-book narrative of the first.

All things considered, a satisfying end to an intelligently written trilogy, from an author who deftly handles farce and wit.



View all my reviews

Launch for Poulsen's first Reader's Theatre Book

John Poulsen



On February 1, 2013, we released John Poulsen's excellent book, Shakespeare for Reader's Theatre: Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, and Midsummer Night's Dream. This is the first of a series of readers theatre books Poulsen will publish with Five Rivers, all of which focus on the plays of Shakespeare.









And what would such a book about the dramatic arts be without a launch and book signing? The good folks at the University of Lethbridge Bookstore, in conjunction with Round Street Cafe will be hosting the launch.



On Friday, March 15 (on nothing less than the Ides of March!), please join John Poulsen and friends at:




Round Street Cafe

427 - 5 Street South

Lethbridge, AB T1J 0T5

Canada

403-381-8605




Knowing John Poulsen, it will be an evening filled with witticisms and laughter. 








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Featured on Women in Horror Month

I was featured this past week on Colleen Anderson's Women in Horror Month. 

The mandate of the event, which is sponsored by the Viscera Organization, is to highlight women who are under-represented in the artistic field. You can find their vision and mission statements at the end of the article.