Amy Griswold's Blog, page 2

A rain of books!

A Death at the Dionysus Club is now out in print from Amazon as well as for Kindle, if you'd rather have real pages to turn. Still waiting on other sellers/formats.

Stargate: Far Horizons is now out in Kindle! As always, the print version will be following along behind -- I'll let you know when it's available. Wraith fans, my story "Consort" is for you: the untold history of "Todd" the Wraith during the Wraith/Asuran war.

Also, here's a sneak peek at the Nancy Kress story in the Young Explorer's Adventure Guide: Why I hate earth. The Kickstarter's rolling along, but not yet completely funded, so if you're interested in middle-grades SF (or want to sponsor a copy to be donated to a library or school), head on over: http://kck.st/1EXLFbQ

A Death at the Dionysus Club

The Kindle edition of A Death at the Dionysus Club is now available to purchase! Print, Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, etc., will follow shortly.

Young Explorers Adventure Guide

Girls need to read stories where any number of possible roles are modeled for them. Just as importantly, boys need to read stories where girls are active participants in adventures. And children of all colors and backgrounds need to know the future includes them.

The Kickstarter for the Young Explorer's Adventure Guide is up -- if you or a kid in your life is interested in middle grades science fiction, please consider backing the project and spreading the word! I think it'll be a fun anthology, including 20 stories by some great authors.

$5 will get you a DRM-free electronic copy of the anthology; $20 will get you a paper copy or let you donate a paper copy to your local library or school. Higher backer rewards include story critiques, additional books, and the opportunity to have the name of a character in one of the anthology's stories changed to the name of your choice. Go check it out!

Anthologies!

A couple of recent short story sales I'm pleased about:

My fantasy short story "Figs and Roses" will appear in The Lane of Unusual Traders shared world project, coming in 2015. Check out the lovely map of the Lane and concept art, and I'll keep you posted as the project takes shape.

And my middle-grades steampunk story "The Wreck of the Airship Octavia" will appear in the 2015 Young Explorer's Adventure Guide (formerly the 2014 Young Explorer's Adventure Guide, but looks like it may hit shelves in early 2015 instead.) The Kickstarter for that project will go live October 15, so stay tuned!

And a couple of other short stories of mine hitting shelves in the next few weeks:

My Wraith story "Consort" appears in the Stargate anthology Far Horizons, on sale in ebook October 23 (print book to follow), and my fantasy short story "Chosen Ones" appears in Sword and Sorceress 29, out November 2.

Adventures in Middle-Earth

I've been playing The One Ring RPG lately, and really enjoying it, partly because now I have an excuse to buy dice. My old dice bag and dice collection have gone missing at some point in the last few years -- it's possible they're still in the house, but I'll be damned if I know where -- and I needed d6s and d12s in order to play. And needed the other dice that aren't actually used in this game because ... well. Dice.

(If you're not a tabletop roleplayer, you may be skeptical of the need to have the right color of dice for your personality and your mood, and to have enough dice that you can switch dice when one set appears to be punishing you. To which I can only say: go to a gaming store and look at all the dice. Run your hand through the loose dice bin. Feel the stirring of sensations that will make you sympathize with dragons and their hoards.)

We're playing the Darkening of Mirkwood campaign with some other Wilderland content mixed in, with most of the plotlines we’re pursuing centering around Radagast and the elves of the Woodland Realm, although we may head West over the mountains for a while once the Ruins of the North supplement comes out. It's my first time using this system, and I like it; there's a big world to explore, and I'm liking the way the player characters' actions have consequences that shape the setting and future events as years progress.

I'd say it's fairly rules-light, but not all the way to being a freeform storytelling game; many actions require a skill check, but your chosen specialities and distinctive features can give you an automatic success on basic tests (if you have the specialization Boating, you don’t have to roll to succeed at boating unless you’re trying to do something truly absurd, like go down a waterfall in a barrel.)

And I think the game does a good job of dealing with both the challenges and the pleasures of playing in an established world. You can interact with important characters from the books, but they can’t (or won’t) solve your problems for you. The events between The Hobbit and Fellowship of the Ring are happening as the campaign progresses, and the extent to which you notice or care depends on your party’s background and choices. (Every now and then our party hears news from Gondor. I think there’s only one character in our party who could even find Gondor on a map, and that’s the extent of his interest in it. We’ve heard slightly more about what dwarves of Erebor are up to, but really just enough to make it clear that a party of dwarves would be having an entirely different campaign.)

The difficulty can be a little punishing for a party of new characters, especially a small party -- expect to spend several gaming sessions getting competent at things like “travel from one side of Mirkwood to the other without dying.” By the time you start getting good at fighting and surviving in the wilderness, you can start worrying about succumbing to the Shadow. For a fantasy RPG, the characters stay fairly low-powered, even after lengthy play, which is part of what makes the tone feel true to Tolkien’s world -- Aragorn is a good warrior and leader, but he isn’t Superman -- but means you need to calibrate your strategies for human-scale characters. (If you're heavily outnumbered, it's time to talk fast, create a distraction, or run.)
I’m not sure you need to be a huge Tolkien fan to enjoy this (although it helps), but I would say you need to be able to pick up on the tone of the story -- this is not the system for playing amoral or actively awful people, unless you want to watch them fall to the Shadow and meet nasty ends. Which isn’t to say there’s no moral complexity; one scenario left us debating a moral dilemma for some time, with no easy answers in sight. But the game setting is designed for characters who care about doing the right thing, even if they disagree about what that is and how much they’re willing to risk to do it. And I think you’ll have the best time if you actively engage with those questions as you play.

Metaphysics

st_aurafina asked for more explanation of the magic system in Death by Silver, and I've attempted to oblige:

If I had to describe the magic in Death by Silver in brief, I'd call it a steampunk version of Enochian, with "because angels!" replaced with "because SCIENCE!" as a more culturally palatable explanation for why things work. Like Enochian, it has an invented alphabet and an invented vocabulary and grammar, which we've combined with a system of sigil construction based on Cornelius Agrippa's magic squares. Unlike Enochian, there's no attempt to explain any of this as divine revelation; it's the work of very learned metaphysicists who developed the ideal system for modern and scientific magic.

It's worth pointing out to start with that this is specifically the system used by educated people in Ned and Julian's Victorian England. India and China have their own elaborately constructed systems of symbolic magic, with long histories and extensive scholarship about their theory and practice, most of which hasn't been translated into English. Other parts of the world have magical traditions that look extremely different. The Victorians, being Victorians, naturally assume that their system is the best, and exert pressure on colonized peoples to use it instead of their own traditional practices.

Even in England, there are both older traditions of folk magic and unauthorized experimental metaphysics, some of which is compatible with this system and some of which, rather spectacularly, isn't. That's "nonconforming magic," and you'll see more of it in the next book.

It's meant to be over-complicated, in true Victorian fashion, but you can break it down like this:

Orthography

The magical alphabet is 36 letters. Each letter also has a meaning, the first being "beginning" and the last "end;" we know from one scene in Death by Silver that "light" is the 31st letter in the alphabet. We haven't worked the whole thing out, although we probably will at some point, so really all you need to know is that this is true.

Vocabulary

The simplest metaphysical words are single letters with "end" added to them, for reasons that will become clear in a minute. So "light" = letter 31 "light" + letter 36 "end." Others are much longer and more complex, with the meanings of the individual letters usually contributing to the meaning of the entire word. It doesn't matter if the words can be pronounced -- this is a purely written language.

The metaphysical vocabulary is extensive, and is continually added to as modern life requires coming up with words for things like "omnibus" and "coal-gas." The Journal of Metaphysics publishes annual additions to the approved vocabulary, and you can look up new or obscure words in the Commons library. Metaphysicists like Ned are expected to know all the vocabulary dealing with common household problems, and to keep abreast of new useful terms, but figuring out what to call anything really off-beat is likely to require consulting a reference book.

Or can use generalizations, like "book" for anything from an unabridged dictionary to a pamphlet -- but the thing you're calling a book had better fit the definition of "book" used by the metaphysicists who worked out the vocabulary word, or you're likely to get unexpected results. Is a book a thing with pages, or a thing with writing in it, or a set of words? This is what metaphysicians go to school to learn, and what metaphysicists spend their time debating and writing papers about.

Grammar

The basic form for enchantments is "verb + object": "bring light," "remove ink," "repel water," etc. You can add adjectives or possessive pronouns as specifiers: "remove metaphysical words," "gather together same color," "hide my tracks," or extend sentences with more complex grammar.

Where this gets interesting is when you start layering one enchantment on top of another, because you end up with something like a multi-dimensional word puzzle; verbs in one enchantment will create sentences with nouns in another enchantment, and you'll get the result of that sentence as well, which may be intentional or very much not.

So, you have an enchanted umbrella that's supposed to stay dry. It's enchanted with "repel water." You can test for the verb used in the original enchantment by using the noun "light;" it will momentarily form "repel light," the umbrella will look like it's sitting in a dark shadow, and you can say to yourself, why, yes, that's an enchanted umbrella.

On the other hand, suppose you're a forgetful metaphysics student, and you know your enchanted umbrella is around here somewhere, so you try "bring umbrella." First of all, this is a bad idea because the energy involved in making your umbrella come to you will probably leave you too tired to go anywhere; more on that in a minute. Second of all, if you're lucky, "bring" will catch on "water," you'll get "bring water," and when you find your umbrella, it will be soaking wet and sitting in a spreading puddle. If you're unlucky, "umbrella" will catch on "repel," your umbrella will try to repel itself, and you'll very quickly learn where your umbrella is -- or rather was -- as it rips itself to pieces and covers your parlor in shredded umbrella parts.

Especially with more complicated enchantments, you may also get tangled grammar, where two (or more) enchantments have merged to form one horrible ungrammatical sentence, and the enchanted object now doesn't do anything, or does random undesirable things.

Sigils

To actually do metaphysics, you write the enchantment, either on paper or in the air with a wand. Metaphysicians will tell you that a certain type of wand is ideal, and metaphysicists have written a lot of words about the properties of various types of woods and metals, but really you can use a stick, or a pen, or a knitting needle. People get very attached to their wands, but that's about the same level of grounded in truth as saying that you can't write without your pen (your pen, your special pen.)

However, rather than writing out the entire enchantment, enchantments are shortened by converting them into sigils. Here's how you do it:

First, pick a magical square. Each one corresponds to a planet, and sigils are typically formed using the square that corresponds to the planet that corresponds to what you want to do. If it's a love spell, you're using the Square of Venus. If it's a prosperity enchantment, you're using the Square of Jupiter. When in doubt, you can use the Square of the Sun for almost anything.

Each square is made up of numbers that add up to the same total in each direction. To draw a sigil, you visualize each number as corresponding to a letter of the alphabet, and then spell out your words by connecting the "letters" in order. On the squares with more than 36 numbers, you can ignore the ones that are higher than 36. On the squares with fewer than 36 numbers, each number represents more than one letter. If you look at the example about halfway down this page of how the sigil of Hagiel is constructed on the magic square of Venus, you'll get an idea of what I'm talking about.

Most of the time you're just visualizing the square, not actually drawing it out. Intent matters here as much as anything. Julian has a bad habit of drawing sigils that in fact look like "crabbed squiggle," but it still works because he knows what letters his sigil is supposed to be connecting.

Limitations

Enchantments done according to this system have certain limitations. They can't create things out of thin air or make things vanish without a trace. They require energy on the part of the person casting the enchantment, which is why a lot of things are impractical to do with metaphysics; it's usually far more exhausting to move your bookcase by metaphysics than it is to get up and move your bookcase (although I imagine there are disabled metaphysicians who have "how can I use metaphysics to move objects with the least effort and greatest results" down to an art.) That can be partially counteracted by doing an enchantment over a period of time. They can't be done instantly: you at least need time to visualize and sketch the sigil, which is hard to do if you're being punched, falling off a cliff, or running for your life.

Laymen

Most people in Ned and Julian's world have no clue how any of this works, any more than most people who use a computer understand how a computer works, or than most people who take medicine when they're sick know how the medicine works. The wealthy hire metaphysicians to do their household enchantments for them; the lower middle class and most prosperous of the working class buy commercially enchanted objects; the poor buy badly-enchanted objects, or second-hand ones, or go to back-alley magical practitioners.

The majority of Ned's job is enchanting household objects so that they'll do what people want them to do (stay clean, repel water, protect against fire and burglars, etc.) correctly and without unwanted side effects. Most of the rest of his job is dealing with household enchantments gone wrong, either because two enchantments are conflicting, or because something was badly made, or because something has worn out. And starting in the second book, he's going to be spending more of his time working for Hatton, where he'll be investigating the more criminal uses of metaphysics.
Was that helpful? Or at least entertainingly confusing?

"Can't Make It To Worldcon" Sale

Can't make it to Worldcon? Feeling that August will never end? Console yourself with these fantasy and science fiction ebooks on sale August 14-20, including (ahem) Death by Silver:

Death by Silver

Melissa Scott & Amy Griswold

Murder and magic in a Victorian London that never was.

Metaphysician Ned Mathey certified that the Nevett family silver held no curse, but Nevett patriarch is dead, struck down by a silver candlestick. Can Mathey and his sometime lover Julian Lynes find out what really happened before more people die?

$3.99

(regularly $9.99)

ePub | PDF | PRC





The Armor of Light

Melissa Scott & Lisa A. Barnett

Dark magic threatens Elizabeth I of England.

Royal agents Sir Philip Sidney and Christopher Marlowe are sent to track the evil to its source, but at least one of their patrons would prefer that the culprit was never found…

99¢

(regularly $3.99)

Kindle | ePub | PDF | PRC






The Emperor’s Agent

Jo Graham

Courtesan, actress, medium—spy.

Elza is Napoleon’s secret agent, tasked with uncovering a British spy in the camps of the Grand Army. With the life of the man she loves hanging in the balance, it will take all her cunning, charm, and a magical ability she is only beginning to learn to use.

99¢

(regularly $4.99)

Kindle | ePub | PDF | PRC





Railroad Spine

Geonn Cannon

Steampunk adventure.

After having her child taken from her for the crime of sharing knowledge, an airship captain teams up with a group of terrorists to bring down an oppressive government.

$1.99

(regularly $3.99)

Kindle



All is Silence

Robert L. Slater

What if death forgot you?

Lizzie, suicidal teen, searches for reasons to live and a stranger she thought was dead in this realistic apocalypse.

$3.99

(regularly $6.99)

Kindle | Nook | Kobo

Dance for the Ivory Madonna

Don Sakers

The cyber-thriller that predicted Google Glass

“Imagine a Stand on Zanzibar written by a left-wing Robert Heinlein, and infused with the most exciting possibilities of the new cyber-technology: Dance for the Ivory Madonna.” -Melissa Scott

$1.99 / £0.99

(regularly $3.99/£2.49)

Kindle US | Kindle UK





Somewhere in the Middle of Eternity

edited by Phil Giunta

Thirteen imaginative tales of horror, science fiction, fantasy and the supernatural by Daniel Patrick Corcoran, Michael Critzer, Phil Giunta, Amanda Headlee, Susanna Reilly, Stuart S. Roth, Lance Woods and Mark Time & Parsec Award-Winner Steven H. Wilson.

99¢

Use Smashwords coupon HN84Y

(regularly $2.99)

Kindle | ePub | PDF | LRF | RTF | PDB | TXT




Sword and Chant

Blair MacGregor

Epic Fantasy

Shala and Jaynes are enemies, but they must lead their people to reconcile before the god of sacrifice – strengthened by mortal bloodshed – grows powerful enough to crush any who defy His commands.

$1.99

(regularly $4.99)

Kindle | Nook

Book meme!

A book meme, borrowed from jo_graham :

Give me a letter and I will hold forth on one of the following topics:

A. Author You’ve Read The Most Books From
B. Best Sequel Ever
C. Currently Reading
D. Drink of Choice While Reading
E. E-Reader or Physical Books
F. Fictional Character You Would Have Dated In High School
G. Glad You Gave This Book A Chance
H. Hidden Gem Book
I. Important Moments of Your Reading Life
J. Just Finished
K. Kinds of Books You Won’t Read
L. Longest Book You’ve Read
M. Major Book Hangover Because Of
N. Number of Bookcases You Own
O. One Book That You Have Read Multiple Times
P. Preferred Place to Read
Q. Quote From A Book That Inspires You/Gives You Feelings
R. Reading Regret
S. Series You Started and Need to Finish
T. Three Of Your All-Time Favorite Books
U. Unapologetic Fangirl For
W. Worst Bookish Habit
V. Very Excited For This Release More Than Any Other
X. Marks The Spot (Start On Your Bookshelf And Count to the 27th Book)
Y. Your Latest Book Purchase
Z. ZZZ-Snatcher (last book that kept you up WAY late)

Shore Leave + other updates

Being a guest at Shore Leave 36 was great fun! I'm so glad for the chance to meet my publisher at Fandemonium, Sally Malcolm, in person, as well as so many other great folks. It was my first year at Shore Leave, and I was really blown away by how fun and friendly the convention was. I definitely hope I can get back again soon.

The Fandemonium launch party Saturday night was a blast, complete with blue jello, Fruit Loops, and a gorgeous Stargate cake. It's really been a thrill this week to hear from so many people who love UNASCENDED and the rest of the Legacy series, and I'm energized for working on my next SG-1 book, currently titled MURDER AT THE SGC. It stars Cameron Mitchell and the season 10 team turning detective to solve the murder of one of the civilian scientists at the SGC, and should be out in 2015.

I spent most of my time jogging from panel to panel (the main panel spaces were at opposite ends of a large hotel), but I did get to see Richard Dean Anderson's Q&A session, which was well worth it -- he's a hilarious speaker. My one big regret is that I missed seeing Teryl Rotherty, because I was on the "Fan Fic to Pro" panel scheduled opposite her appearance. Clearly next year the con needs to provide access to a time travel device for guests ...

In other news, I've seen the gorgeous cover draft for DEATH AT THE DIONYSUS CLUB, so we continue moving toward our scheduled fall release. I'll keep you posted when I have an actual release date.

And my werewolf detective story "Outsiders" sold to FictionVale magazine's Episode Five (their November issue), which will be fantasy/mystery themed. So keep an eye out for that!

Any questions about anything currently out or upcoming?

Lammy!

Death by Silver won this year's Lambda Literary Award for Best LGBT SF/Fantasy/Horror!
I really didn't think we'd win -- it was a strong field this year, and I'm super pleased. Also, congrats to all the other winners!