Edward Willett's Blog, page 48

Free Novel Saturday: Star Song, Chapter 2

Star Song

By Edward Willett

Read Chapter One

Chapter Two

Kriss stepped into a huge, austere vestibule, with walls and floor of black and white stone in severe geometric patterns. A thin, middle-aged woman in a gray uniform stood at a long white counter, guarding the six black doors in the far wall like a dragon.

The dragon looked up as he approached. “Yes, sir?” she said in a bored tone.

“I…” He cleared his throat. “I have to report a…a murder.”

Her expression didn’t change. “Homicide, second door.” She glanced down at something out of Kriss’s line of sight. “Lieutenant Carlo Elcar. Third door on your right down the hall.”

“Thank you,” Kriss said to the back of her head as she turned away. He controlled an impulse to reach across the counter and shake her and instead walked toward the unmarked door she had indicated. Lieutenant Elcar would be different. He would care.

The door slid smoothly open as he approached, revealing a long, utterly straight, antiseptically white corridor. More black doors, closely spaced, lined the walls. The third one on the right, as promised, bore Lieutenant Elcar’s name in neat white letters. Kriss raised his hand to knock, but the door opened before he touched it and, feeling foolish, he stepped through.

Gray predominated the tiny office beyond, right down to Lieutenant Elcar’s uniform. Elcar glanced up, his broad Farrsian face impassive. “Be seated, please.”

Kriss sat down in the soft, velvety chair facing the desk, and suddenly felt very tired.

“Name?”

Kriss straightened. “Kriss. Kriss Lemarc.”

“Age?”

“Sixteen, standard.”

“Local units, please.”

Kriss felt a flash of irritation. “Fourteen point eight.”

“Address?”

“Look, what does all this have to do with…?”

“Regulations. I have to fill out a report. Address?”

Kriss clenched his fist, down where the policeman couldn’t see it. “Black Rock. It’s a village near—”

“I know the place. Parents’ names?”

“I don’t know. They died when I was a baby.”

“Legal guardian, then.”

“Mella Thalos.”

“And where is she?”

“She’s dead,” Kriss snapped. “Murdered. That’s why I’m here.”

“I see.” Elcar tapped the glossy black surface of his desk; lights chased across it. “When and where did she die?”

“Nine days ago. In Black Rock.”

The lieutenant looked up. “Nine days? Why didn’t you report it sooner?”

“I couldn’t walk any faster.”

“Even Black Rock has a commlink. Why didn’t you use it?”

“Because I think the villagers killed Mella!” Kriss glared at the policeman. “You sound like you think I did it!”

“I’m not accusing anyone. I don’t have enough information. Why do you think the villagers killed your guardian?”

Kriss took a deep breath, trying to hold back the anger. Mella had been murdered, and nobody seemed to give a… “Maybe I’d better start at the beginning.”

“Maybe you’d better,” Elcar agreed. “There’s something very strange here.”

“I know. Me.” Kriss ran a hand through his hair. Blonde hair, he thought. Like no one else’s in Black Rock. “Look, I don’t know anything about my parents except they died here. Mella was a friend of theirs, so she looked after me. She never told me anything more about them. Maybe she would have, but…” He paused. The lieutenant sat quietly, hands folded. “Aren’t you going to take notes or anything?”

“Everything is being recorded. Go on.”

Kriss glanced at the desk. “All right. Nine days ago. I’d hiked out to a lake not far from the farm and spent the day swimming, fishing, just being lazy.” He had also spent several hours playing some of the folk tunes Mella had taught him on the touchlyre—but he didn’t mention it. Mella had told him to never let anyone else know about the mysterious instrument. The least he could do for her—the only thing he could do for her now—was obey her wishes. “I dozed off, and when I woke up the sun was going down. I’d promised to be home by sunset, so I ran.”

His throat tightened at the memory. Happy, carefree, he had run through the forest, leaping a stream, hurdling a fallen tree, not really worried about being late (Mella wasn’t terribly strict about things like that), but running because he loved to, loved to feel the surge of muscles beneath his skin and the strong, rhythmic pounding of his heart. He’d even sung as he ran, a nonsense nursery rhyme Mella had taught him when he was very little.

“I smelled smoke as I got close to home.” Mella’s cooking supper, he’d thought, and had sung a little louder, though he’d had little breath for it, until he’d finally burst into the farmyard, gasping and laughing.

“At first I didn’t realize what had happened. I thought I was lost. Then I recognized the big stormtree by the gate—but everything else had changed. The cottage…was burning. Most of the furniture was on the ground, smashed, ripped apart, along with everything from the storage shed. Even the flour sacks were torn open. I screamed for Mella and ran toward the house.”

Fear for his elderly guardian had almost choked him. How could an old woman stand up to people who would do something like this? They might have tied her up in the house, left her to burn…the terror flooded back as he told the story again.

“I…” His voice broke; he swallowed hard and continued. “I came around the corner and I…I saw her. On the ground, just outside the front door. One arm twisted under her, the other stretched out, for help, maybe, or…I don’t know. She…there wasn’t a mark on her, but she…she was…dead.” He pressed his lips together. It was a long moment before he could speak again. “After a while, I buried her,” he finished hoarsely. If only I had been there. If only…if only… He looked down at his hands, and clenched them into fists. They trembled.

After a long silence, Elcar cleared his throat. “Would you like a drink of water?”

Kriss let his hands fall limp, and nodded. The lieutenant leaned sown behind the right side of his desk. He straightened a moment later and handed a small plastic glass filled with icy water to Kriss, who drank from it gratefully.

The lieutenant watched him. “Can you go on?”

Kriss nodded. He took another swallow, then carefully set the glass on the desk. “I found a shovel near the shed…about the only thing unbroken. I also found footprints—at least three sets. But I didn’t look very close. I just got the shovel and went back and…and dug a grave. Under the stormtree by the gate.”

He had dug numbly, like a robot, then had wrapped Mella in a blanket and lowered her into the rich, moist earth. But when he threw the first shovelful of dirt down onto that pathetic bundle, something broke inside him, and great, shuddering sobs shook his body—and continued to well up, uncontrollable, until the job was done and long after. When at last the tears dried, he had simply sat in the dark, staring into the forest…until finally he had turned to the touchlyre, thinking of playing some of Mella’s favorite songs…

Except when he touched it, something had happened: something that had never happened before.

His first touch had brought forth only a discordant wailing that sent sleeping starklings screaming skyward, but somehow even that horrible sound had been right, had perfectly matched his mood; and as he had continued to hold the touchlyre and let his love and sorrow pour through him, his emotions had somehow seemed to pour through the touchlyre, too, molding its shimmering sounds into a song that had purged him of his grief and tears and finally left him at peace. Sometime just before dawn, he had slept.

He told Elcar none of that. “The next morning I packed what I could salvage and headed here.”

“And you think the people of Black Rock were responsible?”

“Who else? They hated us. And they hated Mella most. I was just an offworlder, but she was a Farrsian who had dared to bring an offworld child to their village. They treated her like an outcast, even a traitor.”

“Do you know why?” Elcar said.

Kriss shook his head. “No.”

“Because the Commonwealth betrayed Farr’s World,” the lieutenant said softly. “Farr’s World was intended to be the administrative center for this sector. That’s why we have such magnificent government buildings, why the spaceport is large enough to accommodate twenty ships.” He leaned forward, hands folded on the desk, and his voice turned bitter. “But then someone found a world not that far away, just as beautiful, just as habitable, and with one thing Farr’s World lacked—an abundant supply of metals. And just like that, our beautiful garden world became a backwater. The Commonwealth turned away, and the colonists who had come here with high hopes—our ancestors—found themselves on a primitive world out of the mainstream of galactic society.” He sat back again. “That’s why there are nine empty floors in this building. That’s why some of the other government towers are nothing but hollow shells. That’s why only four starships stand out there on that vast landing apron. And that’s why some Farrsians feel anger every time an offworlder walks by.”

“Ancient history is no excuse for murder!”

Elcar met his gaze steadily. “No, it’s not. And that’s why I don’t think the villagers did it.”

“But you just said…”

“Very few Farrsians are violent. Almost all the murders we investigate are committed by offworlders. It’s unlikely the people of Black Rock would conspire to do such a thing—especially after so long.” He leaned forward again. “Didn’t you say Mella didn’t have a mark on her?”

“Yes, but—”

“Isn’t it possible she died of a heart attack, brought on by the stress of what started as a simple robbery?”

“It’s still murder!”

“I’m not trying to downplay the crime, just establish what happened.” He tapped the surface of his desk. “Nine days won’t have left many clues, but we’ll send out a team first thing in the morning.”

“If the villagers didn’t do it, then who did?”

Elcar rubbed his forehead. “This is a large planet with a small population concentrated within an area of only a few thousand square miles. Outside that settled area is wilderness, but wilderness where a man can survive, with skill and luck. You want another reason Farrsian’s don’t like offworlders? Because there’s a whole industry devoted to smuggling fugitives here. They arrive with false papers and then vanish into the mountains and forests. Sometimes they raid outlying farms and villages—and Black Rock is about as outlying as you can get.” He looked at Kriss speculatively. “which raises another question. Why did your guardian take you there? Were your parents fugitives of some kind?”

“I told you, I don’t know anything about them,” Kriss said dully. “And now I never will.” He’s not going to do anything, he thought. He sympathizes more with the villagers than with me. Suddenly he couldn’t stand to be there any more. He stood. “May I go?”

Surprised, Elcar also rose. “If you want to. Where are you staying?”

“I don’t know. I don’t have any money. I suppose I’ll look for a job.”

“They’re hard to find. You’d be better off going back to the villages—if not Black Rock, another. Some farmer would take you on.”

“No!” The only way I’m leaving this city is straight up, he thought. The sooner the better. “I won’t go back out there.”

“The city can be a rough place for a boy on his own,” Elcar warned.

“You just said Farrsians aren’t violent.”

Elcar’s lips tightened. “Suit yourself. But contact us when you find a place to stay. We may need to get in touch with you.”

Kriss folded his arms. “Anything else?”

“No.” The lieutenant sat down again and swiped a hand across the surface of the desk. Lights flickered at his touch. “You can go.”

The door slid open. Kriss spun and strode out, down the hallway, through the vestibule, and out into the early night. Only a little sunset color remained in the sky behind the mountains, and black clouds were rapidly blotting it out, riding a chill wind from the high icefields.

Dust danced in tiny whirlwinds around Kriss’s feet as he crossed the road, now almost deserted. He gripped the mesh of the spaceport fence and leaned against it, his last tears for Mella dimming his view of the floodlit spaceships, shining against the darkening sky. At that moment the dream they represented seemed just as blurred and indistinct.

He didn’t know how long he had been standing there, lost in memories and grief, when lightning cracked open the sky and tiny drops of ice-cold rain spattered his cheek and the dusty pavement. In seconds the sprinkle became a downpour, and Kriss wrapped his arms around himself and dashed across the road, pressing against the still-warm stone of a low building next to the police tower. Its bulk gave him some protection from the windblown rain, but even there cold drops found him, as if to remind him he couldn’t sleep in the streets.

He shivered. However bleak Elcar said the prospects for a job were, it was either work for a living or not live. Stepping out into the full force of the storm, he looked up and down the wet street, shiny and black under bright, bluish lights. From somewhere the wind carried shouts, raucous laughter, and a wild strain of music.

An inn, he thought. Only inns are open this time of night. And inns always need dishwashers, right?

At that moment the thought of plunging his icy hands into hot dishwater seemed downright seductive. He stepped away from the wall, set his face into the icy wind, and followed the sounds of life into the heart of Stars’ Edge.

The birth of The Hobbit

I posted this back in July, but it seems apropos to post it again today, with the release of the first movie in the new trilogy based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s book The Hobbit. It’s the first chapter of the biography of Tolkien I wrote for Enslow Publishers, entitled J.R.R. Tolkien, Master of Imaginary Worlds ..and it’s all about how The Hobbit came to be written and published. Happy Hobbit Day!

 

 

***

J.R.R. Tolkien: Master of Imaginary Worlds

By Edward Willett

Chapter 1: In A Hole in the Ground Lived A Hobbit

The world might never have heard of J.R.R. Tolkien, or The Lord of the Rings, if not for two young people. One was an anonymous student. The other was the son of an English publisher.

The anonymous student delighted Tolkien by leaving a blank page in his School Certificate paper. One year in the late 1920s or early 1930s (Tolkien couldn’t remember exactly), Tolkien was marking School Certificate Papers in his home in Northmoor Road, Oxford.[i] (School Certificate Papers were exams given to high school students who wanted to attend one of the colleges.)

This wasn’t part of Tolkien’s duties as Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford. It was really a summer job, a way to bring in a little extra money between school terms. [ii] It was also terribly boring. In a letter to W.H. Auden years later, Tolkien wrote of “the everlasting weariness of that annual task forced on impecunious (poor) academics with children.”[iii]

But then he turned over one page to find, “One of the candidates had mercifully left one of the pages with no writing on it (which is the best thing that can possibly happen to an examiner) and I wrote on it: ‘In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.’”[iv]

That single, simple sentence was like a seed that eventually sprouted into The Hobbit. From The Hobbit, years later, grew The Lord of the Rings.

“Names always generate a story in my mind,” Tolkien said. “Eventually I thought I’d better find out what hobbits were like.”[v]

Tolkien’s first attempt to turn his single sentence into a complete novel didn’t get past the first chapter. He put the manuscript aside for years, then began again. He read chapters to his children after tea on winter evenings. But he still didn’t finish the story.[vi] In fact, he abandoned it shortly after the death of the dragon Smaug, late in the book. He’d occasionally show the manuscript to friends like C.S. Lewis (author of The Chronicles of Narnia), but mostly it sat in his study, unfinished and likely to remain so.[vii]

But one of the people who did see it was an Oxford graduate named Elaine Griffiths. On Tolkien’s recommendation, Griffiths, a former student of his, had been hired by the London publishers George Allen & Unwin. In 1936 Griffiths mentioned to a friend of hers, Susan Dagnall, a member of the publisher’s staff, that Tolkien had a wonderful unfinished children’s story. Dagnall asked Tolkien for a copy, and took it back to London. She liked it, and asked Tolkien to finish it. He took up the story again, and in October sent the completed manuscript to George Allan & Unwin.

Stanley Unwin, chairman of George Allen & Unwin, thought that the best judges of children’s literature were children themselves, so he gave the manuscript to his son Rayner, age 11.[viii] Rayner read it and wrote a short review of it for his father, who paid him one shilling for his work. Rayner liked the book, so his father published it in the fall of 1937.

 

Begin SIDEBAR

Rayner  Unwin ‘s book report on The Hobbit

Here’s the report (complete with the original spelling) that Rayner Unwin wrote about The Hobbit for his father, Stanley Unwin:

“Bilbo Baggins was a hobbit who lived in his hobbit-hole and never went for adventures, at last Gandalf the wizard and his dwarves perswaded him to go. He had a very exciting time fighting goblins and wargs, at last they got to the lonley mountain; Smaug, the dragon who gawreds it is killed and after a terrific battle with the goblins he returned home–rich! This book, with the help of maps, does not need any illustrations it is good and should appeal to all children between the ages of 5 and 9.”[ix]

Rayner said years later, “I earned that shilling. I wouldn’t say my report was the best critique of The Hobbit that has been written, but it was good enough to ensure that it was published.”[x]

End SIDEBAR

 

The publishers received a lot more than one shilling as a result of trusting Rayner’s opinion. Critics loved The Hobbit. The London Times reviewer wrote, “All who love that kind of children’s book which can be read and re-read by adults should note that a new star has appeared in this constellation.”[xi]

The London Observer called it “…an exciting epic of travel, magical adventures…”. W.H. Auden called it “the best children’s story written in the last fifty years.” And when Houghton Mifflin published it in the United States in 1938, it won the New York Herald Tribune prize as the best children’s book of the year.[xii]

The first edition of The Hobbit sold out by Christmas. A reprint was hurriedly prepared, this time containing some of Tolkien’s own colored illustrations.[xiii] Since then, The Hobbit has stayed in print continuously, and has sold more than 40 million copies.[xiv]

The initial sales and acclaim for The Hobbit were such that just a few weeks after it was published Stanley Unwin invited Tolkien to London to talk about a possible sequel. Tolkien submitted a number of manuscripts he had on hand, including The Silmarillion, Farmer Giles of Ham and Roverandom, but they weren’t what Unwin had in mind. He knew that the first book about hobbits had sold really well, so he wanted another book about hobbits.

Tolkien wasn’t sure he had any more stories to tell about hobbits, but he gave it some thought. On December 19, 1937, he wrote to Charles Furth, who was on the staff at Allen & Unwin, “I have written the first chapter of a new story about Hobbits–’A long-expected party.’ A merry Christmas.”[xv]

We don’t know if Charles Furth had a merry Christmas that year or not, but many readers since then have, because ‘A long-expected party’ was the first chapter of The Lord of the Rings.

Tolkien’s “new story about Hobbits” would eventually become his masterpiece–and one of the most beloved books of the 20th century.

 

[i]Tom Shippey, J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century, (London, HarperCollins Publishers, 2001), p. 1.

[ii] Ibid.

[iii] Humphrey Carpenter, Editor, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, (London, HarperCollins Publishers, 1995), p. 215.

[iv] Humphrey Carpenter, Tolkien: A Biography, (Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1977), p. 172

[v] Ibid, p. 172.

[vi] Ibid, p. 177.

[vii] Ibid, p. 179-180.

[viii] Michael Coren, J.R.R. Tolkien: The Man Who Created The Lord of the Rings, (Toronto, Stoddart, 2001), p. 73.

[ix] Carpenter, p. 180-181.

[x] Daniel Grotta-Kurska, J.R.R. Tolkien: Architect of Middle Earth, (Philadelphia, Running Press, 1976) p. 83.

[xi] Ibid., p. 84

[xii] Ibid.

[xiii] Carpenter, p. 182.

[xiv] Shippey, p. xxiv.

[xv] Letters, p. 27.

 

The next big thing

I don’t very often follow up on things I’ve been “tagged” with in the online world, but I was tagged twice for “The Next Big Thing,” both times by writers from Australia, and that seems somehow karmically important. So…

The way this is supposed to work is that if you get tagged you answer10 questions, post the result on your blog, along with links back to those who tagged you (Adrian Bedford and Laura Goodin, in this case), and then you’re supposed to tag five more people. Supposedly you’re supposed to obtain the agreement of five more writers to participate before you post your answers, but did I mention I don’t usually do the tagging thing? Works both ways. I tag not, neither am I tagged.

So I may or may not get five more writers to take part. If I do, I’ll post them down below. If I don’t…oh, well.

Forthwith, then, the questions:

1. What is the [working] title of your next book?

Masks, the first book in a trilogy which will continue with Faces, and conclude with Shadows. They’ll appear under the pseudonym E.C. Blake.

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?

The primary inspiration was nothing more exciting than some masks we happen to have lying around the house from some masquerade party or other. I started looking at them and wondering what it would be like to have a society where everyone went masked…and why.

Oh, and the first two titles, Masks and Faces? Totally the name of the Regina Little Theatre newsletter.

3. What genre does your book fall under?

Young adult fantasy.

4. What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

Actually, I’d choose new, young actors nobody had ever heard of, since all of the main characters are kids.  Besides, new actors need the work more than established actors.

5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

A young girl in an authoritarian society where control is exerted through magical Masks discovers she has far more power than she realizes—power that holds both the promise of freedom and the threat of complete destruction.

6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

I’m represented by Ethan Ellenberg, and the book will be published in hardcover by DAW Books next fall.

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

Two or three months. I wrote the 100,000-word first draft of the second book in the series in one month flat. That’s the fastest I’ve ever written anything, although I did do 50,000 words in a week once when I was at the Banff Centre and working on my previous DAW novel, Magebane (written as Lee Arthur Chane). If I’d kept that up I could have written two 100,000-word novels in a month, but steam would have been coming out of my ears and I might have been reduced to blubbering.

8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

Stories of young people who discover they have special abilities are not exactly rare in fantasy, so there are lots it could be compared to. I’d prefer not to make those comparisons, though, for fear I send people to those other books instead of mine. The one book, although it’s very different, I would mention is Justine Larbalestier’s Magic or Madness trilogy about the girl named Reason, because her system of magic offers power but also great risks for those who use it. There’s something similar going on in my book. Mara, my main character, has the potential to be save the whole kingdom from tyranny…but also the potential to become the greatest monster the kingdom has ever seen.

9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I supposed my agent did. He said, “We need a new project to present to DAW. Send me some ideas.” So I came up with ten. He liked this one. So did I. So did DAW.

Or to put it another way, I don’t rely on inspiration.  Otherwise I’d never get anything done.

Or to put it yet another way, my inspiration was the need to keep my writing career going!

10. What else about the book might pique the reader’s interest?

It’s got magic, intrigue, brutality, slave labor, darkness, light, beauty, terror, humor and, I hope, a main character people will enjoy reading about as much as I enjoyed writing her. What’s not to like?

Pondering perfection in an imperfect post

Here’s a rather metaphysical question for you: why do we strive for perfection?

Cold logic tells us that perfection is impossible. As a writer, I know perfectly (sorry) well that I will never in my life write something perfect. In fact, I know logically that it’s impossible to even define what a perfect piece of writing would look like, because there are always multiple ways to write anything, from a simple action to a complex character’s internal monologue, and you can never be certain there might not have been another way to do it that would be better than the way you chose: another way that’s a little bit closer to perfect.

And yet, in my mind, there is an ideal that I’m striving for. (In school and library presentations, I sometimes talk about feeling as if each story idea I’ve come up with is a shining, mirrored sphere, like a giant Christmas ornament: I can see it hanging there in my mind, glittering, unmarred, a thing of perfect beauty…and then I take it down, smash it into shards, and try to glue those shards back together into some semblance of the original perfect object using nothing more than words. The result, if I’m lucky, may be a bit silvery and a bit glittery and more or less round, but it sure as heck isn’t a shining thing of perfect beauty.)

Athletes (I presume, since I ain’t one) strive for a perfect layup, a perfect run, a perfect dive, a perfect pitch, a perfect swing of the bat. Musicians strive for a perfect performance, but having sung all my life as both a soloist and in choirs and musical theatre productions, I can promise you no musician in his or her own mind has ever achieved such a thing, no matter how adoring the crowd’s response might be.

No perfect building has ever been built by even the most talented architect, no perfect painting created by anyone from da Vinci on down, no perfect speech written, no perfect play performed, no…

Well, you get the idea.

And yet, we all have this notion of perfection. We know, or think we know, what a perfect world would look like. Our political parties have different ideas of that world, but those parties exist, in the far-from-perfect world of politics, because at some time in the past groups of people who shared a vision of perfection got together and began striving to achieve it. They’ve fallen short (wow, have they fallen short), but the vision remains.

Our failure to achieve perfection is a constant thorn in our sides. Imperfection makes people upset, depressed, even angry. We even have a saying, “the perfect is the enemy of the good”: our desire for perfection sometimes blinds us to the considerable virtues of the failed effort to achieve it. After all, getting nine-tenths of the way to perfection isn’t bad: an A effort. Yet we still tear ourselves up over not getting that A+.

And yet it’s a good thing we have this longing for perfection, for it is the driving force behind all creative efforts; all of our efforts of any kind. If we lived in a world in which perfection were possible, there would be no need to create anything new, for the perfect version of everything would already exist, and by definition, you cannot improve upon perfection.

But if nothing truly perfect exists, then where does our desire for perfection come from? In an imperfect world, how is it even possible for us to imagine perfection, or think we would recognize it if we saw it? How can we feel so certain that perfection is out there, somewhere, and that we must strive for it, when nothing and no one ever achieves it?

The religious answer is that Perfection exists, and has always existed, in the person of God, and our striving for perfection in all our time-constrained lives is one with our striving to rejoin the Eternal Perfection that created the universe in which we struggle.

The specifically Christian answer is celebrated at this time of year: that once upon a time Perfection, loving its once-perfect but now fallen creation, took on the form of the Imperfect to bridge the gap between Imperfection and Perfection, so that one day the Imperfect may once more be Perfect.

Don’t like the religious answer? Perhaps our sense that perfection is possible and something to strive for is something ingrained in our genes, a product of the evolutionary process that has brought us from simple single-cell slitherers to magnificent multicellular men and women.

Or perhaps there is another answer, one that we don’t know…at least not yet. For perfect understanding of the universe, like all other forms of perfection, eludes us.

Here endeth my post on perfection.

You know, in my mind it was way better.

 

My future city: I dabble in public prognostication

Later this morning I’m expecting a phone call from a reporter at the Regina Leader Post, who wants my science-fiction-writer take on the future of the city, ca. 2035.

Of course the city has its own rather boring (well, from an SF writer’s perspective) plan for the futuristic city of Regina, which is full of lots of nice buzzwords like “sustainable” and “accessible,” exactly what you’d expect, but as First World War German Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke the Younger famously said (only, of course, in German), “no plan survives contact with the enemy”—and in this case the “enemy” is rapid advancement in technology.

I suspect the reporter is not looking for the kind of SF scenario that leads to exciting stories but terrible futures—you know, like the “no need to worry about 2035 because Regina, along with Perth, Australia, is going to be destroyed by a bomb launched from Mars by Ex Nihilo, a gold-coloured, horned alien creature” scenario that just surfaced in the Avengers comic book.

I mean, the easiest thing in the world is to create a scenario in which civilization is overthrown and we in Regina—and everywhere else—are into Mad Max territory. I’ve done it myself, in my YA novel The Chosen, which is set in Saskatchewan (though the characters never get to the ruins of Regina). There are so many disasters to choose from. All-out nuclear war used to be a favorite; less so now, although the Islamic-terrorists-get-the-bomb-and-nuke-selected-cities is certainly still believable. Civilization-destroying-plague could come from the aforementioned terrorists playing around with new DNA-manipulation technologies, or just from a mutated influenza virus, a la Stephen King’s The Stand (see, these scenarios aren’t even new; that book came out decades ago). I did the nanorobots-out-of-control-eating-everything-in-sight schtick in my short story “Waterlilies”; Michael Crichton did it in his novel Prey ten years ago (Crichton kind of specialized in this stuff, although I think the dinosaurs-brought-back-from-extinction scenario is highly unlikely).

There are more mundane catastrophes to choose from. Climate change? Sure, although global warming isn’t nearly as scary in Saskatchewan as global cooling would be. To warmth, you can adapt. Cold, on the other hand, kills. And we are overdue for an ice age.

And then there’s that massive volcano slumbering under Yellowstone, the one that could bury most of North America in lava and ash…

Great storytelling possibilities in all of those. But still, probably not what the reporter wants.

So that means we’re into near-future extrapolation-type science fiction scenarios here. (Which means this guy really ought to be talking to Robert J. Sawyer, but, oh well.) And that brings us back to technology.

See, the thing about predicting the future is that you can’t, not accurately, and the reason you can’t, mostly, is because technological advances not only have a way of sneaking up on you and taking you by surprise, they also have spin-off effects that even those who developed the advances don’t predict.

The automobile is a classic example. You might have predicted it would drive horse-buggy manufacturers out of business and take over the roads, but would you have predicted roadside attractions (like Corner Gas’s infamous World’s Biggest Hoe), whole neighborhoods where it’s impossible to walk anywhere because there are no sidewalks, or a sexual revolution driven in part by the fact that cars allowed teenagers to be alone together in a small space far away from prying eyes?

More recently, there’s the World Wide Web. It’s not even twenty years old yet, and look at everything it has changed, from the way we find out facts (see yesterday’s post about that 18th century lawyer who shared my name for an example) to the way we get news (newspapers are struggling everywhere, and the Web is the reason) to the way we shop (see a lot of small independently owned bookstores around anymore?).

It’s hard to pick, out of what I know about current technological developments, what will have the biggest impact on the city another 20-plus years down the road. But I’m going to have to tell the reporter something, and since the focus is on the city more than individuals, I think I’ve come up with a few things to think about.

If there’s one thing that defines the look of, and life in, cities, its transportation. Think of New York’s subways (of course, Regina has Subways, too, but ours only sell sandwiches),Venice’s canals, and, everywhere in the world, automobiles and buses.

What’s one thing that’s going to change future cities? Changes in our vehicles. Cars that drive themselves are already being tested and developed; eventually, they’ll start to show up in cities. But even cars people drive themselves will change, because cars are starting to talk to each other, and interact with intelligent infrastructure like traffic lights. By 2035, maybe the notoriously bad Regina driver (I know, every city’s population likes to claim, rather perversely, that its drivers are the worst, but really, I think we may have an edge in that dubious department) will be a thing of the past, as some cars (and potentially all taxis and buses) drive themselves, and those that don’t are in constant communication with each other and their surroundings, resulting in calm, ordered, efficient and stress-free commuting.

(Which of course would make for a really boring science fiction story, so if I were to write one about such a future, I’d be looking for ways to mess up that system and sow chaos and confusion in which my intrepid characters could have adventures…but that’s not what this exercise is about it. So stop it, brain.)

From the cities’ perspective, though, the rise of these kinds of intelligent transportation devices may lead to unexpected costs, as existing infrastructure has to be updated to accommodate them.

Materials science in general may transform the look of cities. (See my science column from a few weeks ago on “butterfly buildings”, buildings covered with an iridescent, color-tunable, water-resistant coating that also contributes to the efficiency of the built-in solar panels…to name just one example.) One hopes new roadway surfaces are developed that will not react to our climate and clay soils by potholing. And a truly effective anti-graffiti surface to which paint simply won’t stick (or, in my dreams, is immediately blown back in the face of the graffiti “artist,” thereby instantly marking him or her as a vandal) would be a wonderful thing.

Also on the city-wide scale, I expect to see changes in law enforcement technology. There are all kinds of advancements in surveillance technology (with corresponding concerns about privacy and individual liberty), but the one thing I’m almost sure we’ll see, because it’s already in use elsewhere, is the use of aerial drones to do everything from monitor traffic to keep an eye on Grey Cup crowds to watch for drug deals going down. (Bonus: how long before people hack into the video feeds of such drones and start throwing them up online, where they become extremely popular?)

Aerial drones are a kind of robot, of course, and I expect robots will be pretty much ubiquitous in another couple of decades: not humanoid robots, necessarily, but single-purpose robots like the aforementioned autonomous vehicles, floor-cleaning robots in high rises, snow-shoveling robots (please, please, can we have snow-shoveling robots?), automated Zamboni machines in ice rinks, etc., etc.

Some changes to the city won’t be apparent in the buildings or roads, but out of sight, inside people’s homes. But they could be the most disruptive. Take, for example, 3D printing. Already burgeoning, this could spell the end of some kinds of businesses as it becomes practical and affordable to simply print at home things you used to buy in stores, from dinnerware to electronic devices. (How close is this to the mainstream? In Europe, Staples in planning to start offering 3D printing services, of a simple kind, along with their other printing services.) How will big box stores survive when you can get much of what you used to buy there out of a little box in your home?

But I suspect the really disruptive technologies that may shape (or misshape) our lives and our cities over the next couple of decades are on hardly anyone’s radars yet, and will arrive, when they do, with a speed and impact that startles us at first…but which we soon take for granted, like we do looking at our phones for automated directions to our next destination now.

Science fiction, as I (and many others) have said before now, isn’t really about predicting the future; rather, it’s a literature that draws attention to the fact (a rather recent development in human history) that the future will be different from the present: that our children and grandchildren are likely to inhabit a world irreversibly altered, in many significant ways, from the one we grew up in. As much as anything, science fiction is a prophylactic: an inoculation against future shock.

Regina will be a very different place in 2035. Just how different remains to be seen. But the great thing about the future is that eventually all its secrets are revealed.

All you have to do is wait.

Well, and survive the alien bombs headed our way from Mars.

Circadian desynchrony and the blue light special

We’re coming up on the shortest day of the year in the northern hemisphere: at the latitude I live at, in Regina, Saskatchewan, that means that today the sun rose at 8:49 a.m. and will set at 4:54 p.m. We’ll lose a few more minutes yet before the winter solstice.

That’s not a lot of daylight: we spend two-thirds of our day in darkness this time of the year, and of course further north it’s even worse, until you get to the Arctic and twenty-four hours of sunlessness.

Thank goodness for artificial light! It means we can live pretty much as we want without being a slave to the natural cycles of the world.

Well, except for that pesky little thing known as the biological clock.

Our bodies have an internal clock that keeps us on a daily or “circadian” rhythm. The sleep-wake cycle is the obvious example. There are also rhythms to hormone release. The circadian rhythm is pretty much exactly set to the 24 hours it take the world to go around, which, obviously, works out handily for us…most of the time.

Trouble is, we can disrupt the circadian rhythm through exposure to artificial light and irregular meal, work and sleep times. This produces something called “circadian desynchrony,” and recent research indicates that this has consequences for our metabolism, and may even cause obesity.

According to Dr. Cathy Wyse, who works in the chronobiology research group at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, “studies in microbes, plants and animals have shown that synchronisation of the internal clock with environmental rhythms is important for health and survival, and it is highly likely that this is true in humans as well.” She thinks that circadian desynchrony might be contributing to the relative sudden and recent increase in obesity in the developed world, in addition to the obvious factors like diet and exercise.

There’s a genetic factor, and Dr. Wyse thinks that some people may therefore be more at risk of circadian desynchrony than others. She hypothesizes that humans originating from equatorial regions, where day and night lengths don’t vary like they do in places like Saskatchewan, might be more sensitive to the effects.

One of the triggers for circadian desynchrony (a word, by the way, I haven’t yet managed to type correctly in one go, so I’m going to keep using it until I do) is artificial light. Now chemists at Yale University may have uncovered one of the mechanisms for that.

In a paper published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Sivakumar Sekharan, Jennifer Wei, and Victor Batista have shed some light (you should pardon the expression) on the pigment molecule melanopsin, which is present in the eye but is not involved in vision: instead, it absorbs blue light—something shed in great quantity by most electric lights, not to mention computer and mobile device screens—and triggers a neuronal signal to the suprachiasmatic nuclei, a small region of the brain that (you guessed it) is at the heart of regulating our circadian rhythms and matching them to the natural cycle of the 24-hour day.

Nobody has ever pinned down the structure of melanopsin, but the Yale scientists have proposed a model for the mouse version of the pigment (which is probably much like ours), based on studies of a closely related pigment in squid.

The researchers think melanopsin optimizes the visual pathways depending on the time of day. They note that early morning is often associated with being “bleary eyed,” which hints at a connection between the time of day, the biological clock, and visual acuity. (As my daughter’s new pajamas say, on behalf, I think, of everyone in the family, “Mornings just aren’t my thing.”)

Their model of the chemical structure explains how the pigment might work, and that’s important because, as they conclude, “Understanding the structure, wavelength sensitivity, and spectral tuning of melanopsin is the first step toward manipulating the regulation of circadian rhythms. As light is a powerful regulator of the circadian system, the findings could allow us to optimize the use of light in therapeutic applications”—a treatment, in other words, for circadian desynchrony. (Yay! Typed it right the first time!)

And if it leads to some way to climb out of bed in Saskatchewan in the winter without feeling like a half-revived zombie, well, bonus.

The curious case of a previous Edward Willett, and his letters to Mrs. Bellamy

“Edward Willett” isn’t a name you trip over everywhere you go, but it’s not exactly rare. Nor is it new: it crops up in genealogies and histories down through the past few centuries.

It’s true that these days if you Google “Edward Willett” (and doesn’t everyone?) the majority of the links will relate to me, but those other Edward Willetts crop up, too: including a fellow in the 18th century who wrote a book with the curious title of Letters Addressed to Mrs. Bellamy, Occasioned by her Apology.

I’ve been seeing this for years; last night I finally decided to find out what it was all about, and found myself fascinated, not just by the particulars of that little book, but by the ease with which I traced those particulars, and what that says about the amazing wealth of knowledge the Internet puts at our fingertips.

My assumption had been that Letters Addressed to Mrs. Bellamy, Occasioned by her Apology would be some sort of genteel comic piece from one friend to another, the latter of whom had had some reason to offer an apology and the former of whom, through this little tract—it runs to only 75 pages and 10,000 words or thereabouts—gently pooh-poohed the very idea of an apology being required for whatever minor wrong had been done.

Nothing could be further from the truth, as it turns out, for Letters Addressed to Mrs. Bellamy, Occasioned by her Apology is in fact a pretty acid response by a lawyer to a woman claiming he had cheated her out of money that should have come to her from the actor who had been living with her for ten years prior to his death.

Here are the particulars, as I have been able to determine them: and as I said, the very fact I was able to find these particulars, and in such detail, in so short a time, is a graphic demonstration of the power of the Internet, and the value of the (much-derided and questioned, alas) effort by Google and others to scan every book in every library, making their contents available to all of us with an Internet connection, not just those who have time and money and knowledge to present themselves physically within the confines of the library in question; and have you ever noticed (if I may make an aside) that when one reads books from the 18th century, one tends to adopt their style, which tends to both longer sentences and a great many more words (many of them much longer than those we gravitate toward today) than is the custom these many decades down the great stream of time?

Ahem.

So. Before we get to Mr. Willett and Mrs. Bellamy, let me first introduce you to Harry Woodward (that’s him at left, dressed as Petruchio, in a painting by Benjamin van der Gucht). “One of the finest comedians of the eighteenth century,” according to the biography of him from the book English Actors: From Shakespeare to Macready (New York: Henry Holt and Co., 1879), as posted at Theatre Database. He made his debut at Covent Garden as a boy and had a long and successful career. That biography continues, “his face was of a serious cast; but the moment he opened his mouth upon the stage, a certain ludicrous air laid hold of his features, and every muscle ranged itself on the side of levity. The very tone of his voice inspired comic ideas…So naturally graceful was he, that it was said he could not throw himself into an ungraceful attitude.”

The Dictionary of National Biography, published in 1900, and archived for us of the Internet age by Oxford, adds: “Woodward has had few equals in comedy. His figure was admirably formed and his expression so composed that he seemed qualified rather for tragedy or fine gentlemen than the brisk fops and pert coxcombs he ordinarily played. He was unable…to speak a serious line with effect, but so soon as he had to charge his face with levity, and to display simulated consequence, brisk impertinence, or affected gaiety, he was the most engaging, consequential, and laughable of actors….” It also notes, however, that, “sometimes indeed he over-acted.” (Something I’ve never been accused of myself, but…hey, what’s that guffawing sound?)

At the very end of that biography comes this:  “Mrs. Woodward predeceased her husband, and Woodward spent the last ten years of his life with George Anne Bellamy. To her he left the bulk of his estate, which, however, she never succeeded in obtaining.”

And that brings us to the Mrs. Bellamy (yes, that’s her) whose Apology occasioned the letters of the man with whom I share a name.

According to the entry in the 1910 edition of  Encyclopedia Britannica, which is posted at TheatreHistory.com,  George Anne Bellamy (really intended to be Georgiana) claimed to have been born in 1733 but was actually probably born in 1727 (actresses!), in Fingal, Ireland, the illegitimate daughter of Lord Tyrawley, British ambassador at Lisbon. Lord Tyrawley, and good for him, acknowledged that she was his daughter, had her educated in a convent in Boulogne, and introduced her to a number of notable people in London, where she eventually became an actress.

Notes the encyclopedia, “Owing to her personal charms and the social patronage extended to her, her success was immediate, and till 1770 she acted in London, Edinburgh and Dublin, in all the principal tragic rôles. She played Juliet to Garrick’s Romeo at Drury Lane at the time that Spranger Barry was giving the rival performances at Covent Garden, and was considered the better of the Juliets.”

But, it concludes, “Her last years were unhappy, and passed in poverty and ill-health. She died on the 16th of February 1788. Her Apology (6 vols., 1785) gives an account of her long career and of her private life, the extravagance and licence of which were notorious.”

And now things began to make sense. The apology of Mrs. Bellamy which occasioned the publication of letters from Edward Willett was not an apology to Mr. Willett; it was an apology for her own life. (In six volumes, no less! She must have felt she had a lot to apologize for.)

Mrs. Bellamy clearly felt wronged by Mr. Willett (which she consistently misspelled Willet, leaving off the final T…alas, for us two-T Willetts, it seems some things never change), for she mentions him several times in her Apology (the full title of which is Apology for the Life of George Anne Bellamy, Late of Covent Graden Theatre, Written by Herself). The tone of those comments is…well, one good-sized passage will suffice:

“At the expiration of the time usually limited for executors to settle the affairs entrusted  to their care, a trust of the most sacred and important nature, I waited on Mr. Woodward’s executors to know what had been done. When, to my inexpressible astonishment, I was informed, that there was no money for me, nor the least room for me to expect any. They added, that I must apply to Mr. Willet (sic), their attorney; as they were determined to be guided wholly by him, and being resolved not to act themselves, they had given their power up to him.

“Having met with this unexpected rebuff, I prevailed upon a friend of Mr. Woodward’s to call on Mr. Bromfield, but he would not hear what he had to say. I wrote repeatedly to him with as little effect, my letters being referred to Mr. Willet. At length driven by distress, I called at the house of the latter, where I was treated with an insolence I never before experienced.

“He informed me, that he had proceeded against Mr. Crawford till he had got execution against him. And upon my representing that the warrants to the bonds were in the hands of Mr. Burton of Dublin, he insolently replied, that indeed he would not cross the herring-pond. Upon my asking him when he thought I might expect any advantage, he told me, I had nothing to expect; that the executors had as good a right as myself to the effects if there were any; as I should squander it all away, supposing any advantages were to arise to me.

“It was in vain for me to remonstrate with a person who could have the effrontery to tell me this…”

And so forth and so on.

In the newspaper biz, there’s a saying that one should never argue with a man who buys ink by the barrel. Similarly, it’s never a good idea to insult a lawyer in public.  Letters Addressed to Mrs. Bellamy, Occasioned by her Apology, was Edward Willett’s response, and the tenor of those letters is sharp, to say the least; Mrs. Bellamy, he says, despite her claims, has never been a close friend of “Mrs. Sincerity,” but is very well acquainted with “Mrs. Duplicity.”

At the very end of the little book, he writes, “You have brought your bosom friend, Mrs. Duplicity, to a public trial. You—even you, your own dear self—have turned evidence against her, by proving out of your wretched Apology, and with your own hand-writing, that she is a ‘Double Dealer,’ and an ‘Hypocrite;’ and, with the concurring testimony of true and faithful witnesses, she has also been proved ‘guilty of evil speaking, lying, and slandering.’—What remains but the SENTENCE!.

“When I took up my pen to address you, I had three objects in view.

“1st. To justify my own conduct.

“2nd. To present you with a mirror, wherein you may behold GEORGIANA BELLAMY, Spinster.

“3d. To exhibit you to the public, that you may be viewed in your true colours; not only where you now are, but long have been; ‘A far more capital actress in private life, than ever you were upon the public stage.’”

He notes the profits from the publication of his letters (priced at one shilling and sixpence) would be given to one of her favorite charities, The Lock Hospital, and ends with, “I take my leave of you in the words adopted by the governors of that Charity, as a motto, ‘Go, and sin no more.’

As we would say in this Internet age, “Ouch.”

This little pamphlet garnered considerable attention when it was printed, no doubt because Mrs. Bellamy had some fame as an actress. The Critical Review noted that “Mr. Willett in these Letters defends himself from the accusations brought against him by Mrs Bellamy in her fifth Volume with great reason and some humour. The description of the lady in some situations and her letters in others leave impressions very different from those produced by her Apology…”

On the other hand, the English Review said, “His defence of himself as a man of business is indeed highly satisfactory. But we can by no means approve the style of his letters. It is rudely and peevishly acrimonious. The sex of Mrs. Bellamy and her misfortunes ought to have protected her against many of his insinuations. Nor would he have defended himself with less advantage if he had abstained from them. A simple state of the business without any comment would have justified him as completely and would have conduced more to his honour. Mr Willett does not here appear as a professed author and indeed as a composer he had no claim to commendation.”

And again, “Ouch!”

So there you have it. A brief foray into the world of a previous Edward Willett. Like me, he also wrote for publication, albeit apparently only this one thing. Still, thanks to the printing press originally and now the Internet, this one thing has come down to us over nearly two and a half centuries, keeping alive, in some small ways, the personalities of a long-gone age.

It makes one wonder if the things we write today, in pixels or in print, will likewise carry our name into the future.

If so, it is perhaps best that we all be friends with Mrs. Sincerity rather than Mrs. Duplicity, less SENTENCE! be passed on us all.

Free Novel Saturday: Star Song, Chapter 1

 With this post I’m starting something new: a free, full novel, which I’ll offer one chapter at a time, every Saturday.

The novel is Star Song, a young adult science fiction novel that was the first thing I seriously tried to sell (which is why astute readers will find echoes of Heinlein in here, and more than a soupcon of Andre Norton)…and came oh-so-close.

Back then it was called The Minstrel, the same as the short story (which I posted a while ago) which is the first version of the tale. In the early ’90s, the late Josepha Sherman was editing for Walker & Co. I had sent her The Minstrel, and she had sent it back saying she liked it but she felt there needed to be several chapters added in the middle, where I’d kind of jumped over a considerable amount of time. I wrote new chapters, polished the whole thing one more time, and sent it back…and she still didn’t take it.

But, she told me later, and said publicly at the World Science Fiction Convention in Winnipeg in 1994, she had in fact been “ready to make an offer on it” when the publisher of Walker & Co. died, his son took over, and the son decreed that Walker & Co. would no longer publish science fiction.

And that was it. The book Josepha Sherman thought was good enough to be published never was: it never did find a home, and I haven’t even submitted it in years, figuring I’d need to re-edit it anyway after so long.

But enter the brave new digital age. I can publish it, myself, as I have The Chosen and The Haunted Horn, and at least a few readers might find it that way. There’s still the need to re-edit it, though.

Which is why I’m going to publish it serially here. Every Saturday, I’ll post another chapter, which I’ve freshly re-edited. When all the chapters have been posted here, I’ll have re-edited the entire book, and then I’ll put it together as an ebook and paperback and put it up for sale on Amazon and elsewhere.

But you get to read it first, for free.

Comments are welcome! What works, what doesn’t…I’d be happy to hear your thoughts. This isn’t necessarily the final edit, after all: this is still a work-in-progress.

Enough blather. Enjoy Chapter 1!

***

Star Song

By Edward Willett

Chapter 1

Kriss Lemarc swore, hopped once or twice, and finally sat down in the prickly dry grass by the roadside and pulled off his left boot, turning it over to dump out a pebble that must have magically migrated through the worn brown leather—he could see no other way something that large and sharp could have lodged under his heel. He pounded on the sole a half-dozen times just to be sure no other bits of gravel were lurking inside, turned the boot right-side up again prior to slipping it back on—and unexpectedly found himself thinking of Mella’s wrinkled hands, patiently working the heavy needle through the thick leather while she complained mildly about the way he seemed to outgrow each pair of boots almost before she could make them.

He ran a finger over the boot’s fine stitching, then roughly shoved his foot back inside it and stamped on the heel. Mella, and all his first sixteen years, lay dead and buried eight days behind him, beneath a fresh black mound of earth beside the trampled garden and the now-cold embers of the burned-out farmhouse. His future lay over that next ridge, a quarter of a mile away, and over an unknown number of ridges beyond that, until this road finally took him to Stars’ Edge. He should start walking again.

But the memory of Mella wouldn’t let him go; the memory, and the hurt it brought with it. The villagers, he thought yet again, for the thousandth or ten-thousandth time since he had set out on this endless road. It must have been the Black Rock villagers.

He couldn’t prove it; he had been miles away when the farm was looted and burned. But he knew—he knew.

He knew as surely as he had known that every time he went into Black Rock the villagers would stare at him, and whisper behind his back. “Offworld bastard…what did she bring him here for?…alien…not one of us…”

Kriss held up his hand, closed it into a fist. If only he were short and dark, like the natives of Farr’s World, instead of tall, blond and green-eyed. Maybe then Mella would still be alive.

But wishing changed nothing. He opened his hand, and angrily brushed away moisture from the corner of his eye. Crying wouldn’t help, either, and he had finished his that first night after Mella’s death. Now he had to think about the future…

Except, of course, his future was inextricably bound to his past. Kriss shrugged out of his backpack, lifted its flap, and took out a triangular bundle wrapped in white leather. Gently he undid the rawhide thongs that held the wrapping in place, and pulled what it had protected out into the sun.

Soft black wood gleamed; seven silver strings, stretched tight between two burnished copper plates, glittered in the hot light. Kriss ran loving fingers over the three gently curving sides and the smooth, swelling back, then rested the broad base on his legs, so that the slender neck rose by his left ear. As he touched the copper plates the strings shivered with cool, formless sound, like wind passing through ice-laden reeds on the verge of a frozen lake, and his spirits lifted. In his hands he held his future: the instrument which had once belonged to his parents, his only clue to their identity, passed on by Mella on his twelfth birthday, in the standard Earth years Mella had always insisted on. Since that day he had nurtured a dream he’d never shared with his guardian: a dream of striking out among the stars, and, by tracing the instrument’s past, finding the world he could truly call home, and whatever family he might still have there.

The strings whispered into silence as he lifted his fingers. Now, with no other choice, he had set out to fulfill that dream…and he would have given it up in an instant to have Mella alive again.

He carefully packed the instrument away, then stood and hoisted the backpack once more. He could not change the past, and the future he had mapped out for himself would never happen unless he made it happen. Sitting by the side of the road wasn’t going to do it. Taking a deep breath of warm, humid air, cinnamon-scented by the crushed telgrass, he set out again.

After only five steps he stopped as a flock of starklings rose, squawking, from a bright-orange stand of bushes. An instant later he felt a deep, rumbling vibration in the ground and air—a rumbling that swelled to a full-throated, crackling roar as a tiny, glittering needle leaped into view above the ridge, riding a pillar of bright fire. Kriss stared, head thrown back, as it dwindled skyward to a white-hot speck, then vanished, its thunder following. With it went all thoughts of his dead past, while his future narrowed to one goal: to get to the top of the ridge.

With sweat stinging his eyes and his heart pounding, his initial dash reduced to a stumbling trot, Kriss crested the ridge and at last saw his destination: Stars’ Edge, capital and only spaceport of Farr’s World, sprawling across a vast plain, huge, smoky, and more daunting than he had ever imagined. And at the very center, beyond the rough wooden buildings at the city’s edge, the tumbled structures of brick and stone further in and the handful of glittering glass towers, the slender spires of four starships shimmered like mirages under the hot sun.

Faced with his goal at last, Kriss suddenly felt very young and alone. His pack contained the instrument, enough bread and cheese for two skimpy meals, a half-full canteen, three quarter-feds, some clean clothes, a blanket, and a knife. It didn’t seem like much with which to challenge the universe.

But behind him lay only fire and death…a death, he reminded himself, he still had to report to the police. He tugged at his black leather vest in a futile attempt to unwrinkle it, tried to brush some of the dust from his shirt and pants with even less success, and finally wiped grimy sweat from his forehead, took a deep breath, and started down.

The turquoise native stormtrees gave way at the bottom of the ridge to green Earth wheat and corn growing in rich black soil, and the trail Kriss had followed so long joined another road that swept in from the north, bringing with it all kinds of people—on foot, on horseback, in wagons, and—

Something bright red roared past, so close Kriss jumped back, tripped, and rolled headlong into the muddy ditch alongside the road. He struggled back up the slippery slope, wiped his face with his sleeve, and stared after the disappearing vehicle. A groundcar! He’d heard of them from Mella, but he’d never thought to see one; complex machinery, electronics and other high-technology devices were enormously expensive on Farr’s World, because none were produced on the metal-poor planet. Kriss started forward eagerly. What other wonders might await in Stars’ Edge?

He soon found out; as he entered the outskirts of the city the road became more and more crowded. More groundcars passed, at more sedate speeds, plus massive transports and, most of all, people—more people than he had ever seen. With his offworld coloring and height and his rumpled, muddy clothes, he felt painfully conspicuous, but no one gave him a second glance. Within a few blocks he began to relax and enjoy a sensation that was new to him: anonymity.

Aside from the vehicles, Stars’ Edge at forst seemed to be just a larger, dirtier and much more crowded version of Black Rock—until, when he had already been walking long enough to have passed through Black Rock fifty or sixty times, the wood-and-plaster structures of the outskirts gave way to brick and stone shops and houses, and finally to big, blank-walled warehouses that seemed to close in on him, leaning over him threateningly. And then he rounded a slight bend and saw the spaceport.

Ignoring traffic, he dashed across the wide paved road that circled the vast landing field and clung to the high, wire-mesh security fence, relief at being again surrounded by open space mingled with awe at his first close view of starships.

Enormously tall, they soared even above the steel-and-crystal spires that housed the world’s government. Needle-sharp prows, blazing in the sunlight, swelled gracefully into curved, mirrored flanks that cast back sharp reflections of the city. The ships literally pointed the way to the stars—to his future. He gazed at them thirstily, with a silent promise that he would be on one of them when it left.

Then something much closer and smaller drew his attention: two men, just crossing the field, dressed alike in gray uniforms; two very tall and very pale men, who walked with a strange, fluid grace. Offworlders!

One of them looked up and saw him staring, and elbowed the other, who glanced Kriss’s way and laughed. Kriss flushed and turned away, the assurance he had felt a moment before gone like a pricked puffplant. He looked up at the impersonal government towers. He had yet to talk to the police, and the afternoon was half over. It would soon be night, a night he would spend alone and without shelter in a strange city.

One thing at a time. Maybe the police could help.

When at last he found the police tower, halfway around the spaceport, he ran up the imposing flight of steps—and stopped, staring at his mud-stained reflection in the mirrored surface of the door. He couldn’t blame them if they just locked him up.

Well, if they do, at least I’ll have a place to spend the night, he thought. He stepped forward, and the door slid aside, taking his reflection with it.

Kingdom in Shadows, by Alice Willett, age 11

My daughter likes to write, too. Here’s a recent piece, illustrated by the author.

Kingdom in Shadows

By Alice Willett

The Kingdom of Averendel was dying. One girl looked out of her window, the rain drizzling outside. The girl was crying. Her little sister came in with a letter. The girl turned, wiping tears from her eyes.

“You have mail!” the littler girl said cheerfully.

The older girl forced a smile on her face. “Thank you,” she said. As her little sister left the girl opened the letter and read three words: Find. The. Cure.

#

Genevieve was going to the castle. She was sure that was where the letter had come from. She walked quickly, not wanting to be out on the deserted streets for too long. She shuddered at the thought of why the streets were deserted.

She started walking up the path to the castle. At the gate Genevieve told the guard that the queen had called her. After she was let in she slowed and looked at her surroundings. She knew the only reason she had been called to the castle was that when her mother was younger she had been the queen’s (at the time the princess’s) lady in waiting. They had become friends and when Genevieve’s mother left to marry her father the queen remembered and made sure that Genevieve’s family was well cared for.

But even that won’t save mother, Genevieve thought.

Inside the castle, Genevieve walked slowly, taking in everything.

The castle is beautiful, Genevieve thought. The inside was pearly white marble, covering the floor, ceiling and walls. Enormous pillars held up the roof and arches encased magnificent doorways. Tapestries and paintings of battles and feasts lined the walls. The glowing torches made the hallway bright and cheery but nobody felt that way.

When she reached the throne room Genevieve knocked on the door.

“Enter,” a tired voice called.

Nervously Genevieve opened the door. Until now she had been sure the letter was from the queen. Quietly she said, “Did you send the letter?”

The queen paused before answering, “Yes.”

“Why?” Genevieve asked. “How can I find the cure to the plague?” She looked at the queen helplessly. “I—I don’t think I can.”

“You must,” the queen said gently.

Suddenly Genevieve burst out, almost angrily, “Why me? Why not one of your knights? I can’t go out and find the cure to the plague! That’s impossible!”

The queen stood up. “I chose you because you have motivation!” the queen yelled. Then her voice softened. “With your mother dying you have something to strive for. Also,” she slumped in her seat, “most of the knights are sick and with the king away…you’re brave and I need your help.”

Genevieve nodded at the defeated queen.

“I will help you,” she said, then she turned and left.

#

“But you can’t leave!” Genevieve’s little sister Arrieta said. “What will I do without you?”

Genevieve fought back tears. “You have mother,” she said, “and Lucia will come after you.”

Arrieta crossed her arms. “I don’t like Lucia.” Lucia, a friend of the family, was basically the house’s babysitter.

“You will stay with her and not complain,” Genevieve said sternly. Arrieta looked mad but agreed.

Genevieve looked at the door to her mother’s room. “Good-bye,” she whispered. “I’ll miss you.” Then she packed her bag and left for the woods, leaving her house in shadows.

#

At the gate to the woods Genevieve saw the queen waiting. She bounded down the slope, then slowed. Someone was with the queen. Cautiously she led her horse to the gate.

“Greetings, Genevieve,” the queen said.

Genevieve curtsied. “Greetings, Your Majesty.”

The queen nodded. “This is Jhonn. He is to be your companion on the journey. He is an expert swordsman and will protect and help you.”

“Greetings, Genevieve,” he said, his voice dripping with sappiness.

Genevieve’s first thought was, I hate you.

“Let’s get on with it,” Genevieve growled.

#

“Can I call you Gen?”

“No.”

“Thanks, Gen. I’m sure it will be easier for both of us.”

It had been five days since Genevieve had started her quest and all Jhonn had done was talk.

This is pure torture! Genevieve’s thoughts screamed. But don’t let it get to you. He thinks he’s better than you, but don’t let it get to—

Suddenly Genevieve yelled at Jhonn, “Can you be quiet for ten seconds?” Jhonn shut up. Pleased with herself, Genevieve had time to think.

The cavern of mysteries could be dangerous so I’ll have to use my wits and be careful. Who knows what’s in—

“Which weapon do you think I should use? A sword or a dagger? They’re both good weapons, but which one do you think is preferable? A sword or a dagg—”

“Why are you talking?” Genevieve yelled. “Didn’t I tell you to be quiet?”

“Yes,” Jhonn said. “For ten seconds.”

Genevieve put a hand to her head. “I didn’t really mean be quiet for just ten seconds, I meant—” She was interrupted by violent coughing.

Oh, no, Genevieve thought. Not you, too.

“Are you okay?” she asked worriedly.

“Oh, yes, absolutely fine.” Then Jhonn fell off his horse.

“Jhonn, Jhonn, talk to me!” Genevieve cried. He’s sick, Genevieve thought. I have to get him to shelter so he will be safe.

A little way ahead Genevieve found an alcove for Jhonn to stay under. Leaving some food and a note saying where she had gone, Genevieve looked at Jhonn, turned, and left for the cavern of mysteries.

#

At the entrance to the cavern of mysteries Genevieve made a torch. She took a branch, ripped some cloth off her dress, put oil on the cltoh and set fire to it, only thinking of one thing as she worked: I will find the cure.

It was dark. Very dark, and even with the torch it was hard to see. Her bright green eyes looked around the cave warily.

What have I got myself into? Genevieve thought. What if I die here? Who will look after Arrieta and mother?

Suddenly Genevieve heard a voice. “What have you gotten yourself into?”

“Who…who are you?”

“I, Genevieve,” the voice said, “am your worst nightmare, and if you want the cure you’re going to have to use your wits!” The voice laughed. Genevieve saw the vial of potion with the cure and ran towards it.

“Not so fast, Genevieve.”

Genevieve was plunged into a nightmare.

#

Where am I? Genevieve thought. This isn’t Averendel.

Then she saw something horrible. She was right. She wasn’t in Averendel. She was somewhere else: Palor. Her father was on a stage, hands tied behind his back, rope around his neck.

Genevieve heard a voice, “And now this traitor will die for what he’s done.”

“No!” Genevieve heard herself scream. “You can’t!”

“But I will,” the executioner said.

Genevieve ran. She saw a lake and jumped in.

#

She was back in the cavern of mysteries. I’m out! she thought, relieved.

Then the voice said, “It’s not over yet,” and Genevieve was plunged into another nightmare.

#

“She could die tomorrow,” a doctor said.

Genevieve was confused. “What do you mean?” Genevieve asked.

“She may not make it.” Genevieve looked at the bed and gasped. There was her sister, sick and dying. She shrank back.

I have to get out! Genevieve thought desperately. But how…?

She blocked out everything around her, then opened her eyes. She was still with her sister. She ran for the door. Locked! She looked at the bed. The doctors lowered their heads.

“No!” Genevieve screamed. She closed her eyes. I’m in the cavern of mysteries. I’m in the cavern of mysteries…

#

She opened her eyes. She was back. She ran for the vial.

“What are you doing?” the voice screamed. “How are you awake?”

Genevieve grabbed the vial. The room became quiet. Just an empty cave.

“Because,” Genevieve whispered, “I have motivation.” Then she turned on her heel, left, and collapsed outside.

#

Genevieve held her breath. Would it work?

After five days to get back to the castle, Genevieve had given the cure to the queen and was promised that Jhonn was in good hands and would be okay. She was sent back with some potion.

The whole room seemed still. Slowly her mother resumed breathing and opened her eyes. Genevieve cried as she walked toward her mother. Suddenly she was on top of her mother, crying with happiness.

Her mother smiled weakly. Genevieve didn’t even hear the people in the room cheer: all she thought was, “She’s alive! My mother is alive!”

The End

 

The Way You Look Tonight, Edward Willett version

Playing with new audio software today at the same time I was picking out a song for an audition tonight, I made the recording below of Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields’s “The Way You Look Tonight,” from the Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers movie Swing Time. It won’t make anyone forget Fred Astaire’s version, or Tony Bennett’s version, or for that matter anyone of dozens of other recorded versions…but I had fun. Think of this as a proof of concept rather than a truly finished recording, proof that I can do something not half bad with the equipment and software I have at home.

Which means, of course, I may inflict more music on you in the future.

Anyway, have a listen:

Who’s the accompanist? No one: I purchased the sheet music from Musicnotes.com. They have a free app that plays the sheet music for you–just the piano part, or piano and vocal together.

As Paul Simon sang (and that was years ago now), “This is the age of miracles and wonders…”