E.C. Ambrose's Blog, page 13

Welcome to 2015

Happy New Year!�� For most of us, anyhow, if you celebrate the turn of the year according to a different calendar, then you can file this away to consult at the appropriate time.

The clock tower at Hogwarts (Warner Brothers, UK)

As for me, I wanted to both inform you about some of my plans for the year–in hopes I’ll meet some of you along the way!�� and also to make public commitments about some of my goals, in hopes you’ll nudge/encourage/badger me to get there.

For today, I hope I am writing while you read this. I try to start the new year in the way I plan to continue, with a balance of writing, exercise, family, and outdoor life.

Right now, I’m finishing up the edits on the third book in the Dark Apostle series (yes, I’m still being a bit cagey about the title).�� Wish I could show you all the cover sketch, but I’m not allowed. Rest assured, you’ll be the first to see it when I have permission to post!

I plan to roll right from there into revising book 4 based on comments from my beta readers (are you interested in becoming a beta reader for me?�� Drop me a line!)

The Arisia convention is my first scheduled event, January 16-19 in Boston, MA.�� This is a big regional con complete with masquerade, gaming, and lots of panels!

My February project (once I finish book 4 revisions) is to flesh out my outline and start drafting on book 5, the series climax–I have a basic synopsis already, and some scenes I’m really psyched about!�� Also in February, there’s the Boskone convention, February 13-15, also in Boston, MA.�� Boskone is a little more literary, features a science speaker, and often attracts some New York editors as speakers, so I heartily recommend it for the authors out there.

Hopefully, I’ll wrap up the draft on book 5 by the end of March (I used rapid drafting techniques to maintain the energy of creation).�� Then, I’ll be experimenting with a new genre:�� adventure!�� I have some fun ideas for archaeological thrillers.

April will see the release of “The Grail Maiden”, a Dark Apostle novella, set around the time of the historical hinge-point for the series, during the failed invasion of Scotland by Edward Longshanks.�� This story features the history of Randall and Alyson, later to become the Duke and Duchess of Dunbury.�� I learned so much about them from writing it–and I’m looking forward to sharing it with you.

May, I’ll be at the International Medieval Congress in Kalamazoo, affectionately known as K-zoo, picking up ideas for new books and stories, and soaking up the medieval vibes.�� Maybe I’ll connect with some of my history buff acquaintances.

In June, I’m the kick-off instructor for the Odyssey Workshop here in New Hampshire, for those aspiring speculative fiction writers. Jeanne Cavelos, the founder, is an amazing teacher, and I’m one of the guest authors.�� There’s still time to apply, for you or your writer-buddy who needs a boost.

July will see the release of book 3, with appearances, signings, promotions, or whatever I think of.�� I’d love to have your creative ideas about that.�� It is also the season for my overnight camps, this year featuring kayaking Lake Umbagog and climbing at Rumney (always a favorite) bracketing the Readercon Convention, the most literary of the bunch, on July 9-12 in Burlington, MA. All books, all the time.

August–maybe I’ll slack off. . .nope!�� I’ll be at Sasquan, the World Science Fiction convention, this year in Spokane, WA, Aug. 19-24

By September, hopefully I’ll have finished revisions on Drakemaster, the first in a proposed Silkpunk series, a Chinese epic fantasy about a clockwork doomsday machine.�� I’ve got the draft already, will be tweaking it for my beta readers, then revising based on their feedback.�� Did I already mention I’m looking for readers?

The Fall will have me developing and drafting a Whole New Book.�� What will it be?�� Will it be a thriller?�� a new fantasy world, maybe inspired by something I learn at K-zoo?�� Even I don’t know yet!�� But I had a bang-up season this year, drafting Drakemaster at about 3700 words per day, so I’m eager to do it all over again.

Then the cycle begins anew, with revisions on book 4 (my 2016 Dark Apostle release) and so on. . .don’t worry, I have a spreadsheet to keep track of everything.

But this is also where you come in.�� I’d like to invite my friends, fans, followers and writing buddies to help me stay accountable.�� If something on this list catches your interest, get in touch.�� When March rolls around, ask me how far I’ve gotten on book 5–and make sure I’ve got a great reason if I’m falling behind!

What are your dreams and goals for the coming year?�� I’d love to hear about them, and to encourage you as well–but beware–accountability goes both ways!

The Bones of the Magi

In my Dark Apostle series about medieval medicine and magic, my secret society of witches refers to themselves as “Magi,” (singular:�� magus)�� from the Persian word for one with knowledge of Oriental magic and astrology (according to my OED).�� Interestingly, the root for the word “magic” itself, which seems to be related, is actually Latin, magica or magicus.�� I still suspect there is a relationship, but the OED is not helping me out this morning. . .

But I digress (as usual).�� This is, of course, the season in which many are celebrating Christmas, and re-telling the story of the Magi, those three kings from the Orient who traveled to worship and give gifts.�� While I was in Germany a couple of years ago, I had the chance to visit the cathedral at Koln (Cologne) and view the Shrine of the Magi, which supposedly houses the bones of those very kings.

The cathedral is so awesomely tall and crowded into its place in the city that it’s very hard to take a good photo without going far out of your way (perhaps in a helicopter).�� And yes, I climbed the hundreds of steps up into one of those towers.�� It is a marvel and a classic of Gothic architecture that makes most of the churches in Rome look rather plain.

So how did the Magi get to Germany?�� The relics of the Magic were originally kept at Constantinople (you may recall that the Emperor Constantine, when he converted to Christianity, dispatched his mother to the Holy Land to find evidence of his new religion and bring back its symbols.�� This she did with a diligent effort, returning with the true cross and a number of other things she located via divine inspiration, and with the assistance of the locals–in the classic fashion, probably taking advantage of a wealthy tourist by showing her all the sights and convincing her to bring home some impressive souvenirs).

Around 344, Constantine entrusts the relics of the Magi to the bishop of Milan, from whence they were stolen by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in 1184 who had them sent to Koln where they have remained ever since.�� Wait–did I say “stolen?”�� Saint’s relics are, more properly, translated–that is, they are taken from a holy location to a more profane one.�� However, the medievals figured that, if the saint didn’t really want to move, he or she would have prevented the act of theft, so, if the relics successfully arrive in the new shrine, then clearly it had been time for a change of venue.

King Otto gave three golden crowns to the cathedral in 1199 for the three kings.�� The shrine itself was completed in 1225, with the labor of many artisans.

The golden casket that contains the remains of the three kings.

The reliquary is entirely gilded, and richly carved with images from the Bible and various regal symbols to remind us of both the earthly and spiritual power of the Magi.�� Whether or not you believe that the bones belong to right people (or even to the right period), they have served as an inspiration for wonder, healing, and art for over a thousand years.

 

Fan Fiction: intrusion or flattery?

I belong to a number of writers’ networks, and the topic of fan fiction arises on all of them from time to time.�� Fan fiction, for the non-writers out there, is when a fan writes his or her own stories in your world, sometimes using your established characters.

Attitudes among authors vary from, isn’t it great that readers care so much about my work? to, those jerks are violating my copyright, but often hover somewhere in the middle, with the author feeling somewhat flattered, but also a bit disturbed.�� Some authors ask, if the fan is that excited about writing, and inspired by this kind of work, why doesn’t the fan simply go out and write her own original creations?

From a copyright standpoint, the fan stories would appear to be “derivative works” a right specifically held by the creator of the work.�� We now have Amazon stepping into the fray by making arrangements with rights holders to allow fan fiction to not only be written and appear online, but also for the fan-writer to earn money from the work.

Some authors are forbidden from reading the fanfic generated in their worlds because of concerns that, if the fan story is similar to something the author had in mind, then the author now appears to be stealing from the fan (who was already on shaky ground copyright wise).�� Yikes!

I have a confession to make here.�� My first complete fantasy story was written for a summer workshop when I was about eleven years old, and featured a young boy who gets bonded with a dragon, and learns to ride the dragon to defend his planet from dangerous threads. . .yep. It was “Dragonriders of Pern” fanfic.�� I submitted it to the workshop instructor, who praised its creativity. . . but I felt sorta guilty the whole time because, though my character and scenes were original, I had based the whole thing on Anne McCaffrey’s work. ( I actually had the chance to tell her about this at her induction into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame–she seemed amused more than anything.)

This was one of two works of fanfic I have ever produced, but certainly not the only ones I have thought of.�� Why?�� Because, as a writer, I play in the world of “what if?”�� Nowadays, I write historical fantasy, and the worlds I write my what-if’s into are particular times and places I read about and get excited by.�� Sometimes I even borrow historical characters and employ them in my fictional plot.�� Sound familiar?

Using an existing framework of ideas that excited you as a place to create new stories allows the writer to experiment with the constraints of that framework, whether it is the world of Pern, or of 14th century London.�� It establishes a certain realm of expectation for the readership, and also allows them to feel comfortable and engaged because they are entering a place they already enjoy.

Writing fanfic, like writing historical fiction, can be a way to understand the world more deeply, to study the relationships between its elements by digging in with them–seeing how flexible they are, what can be changed or added, and what cannot without the world disintegrating or becoming something completely other.

The difference, of course, is that, when you write fanfic, the framework you are borrowing was created from the imagination of another writer, who owns all the parts of it, and feels a justifiable pride in its creation, and it its association with his or her own name and reputation.

Fanfic can be a fun way to explore the writing process, and to play out the ideas that come to the reader as he or she enjoys a great book, the way you might daydream about participating in the plot yourself.�� There are authors who condone fanfic, and those who don’t.�� An internet search will usually reveal the difference.�� If your intent is to honor your enjoyment of the author’s world, and to be able to share it with others who share that enjoyment, then it’s polite to make sure the author you wish to honor will receive your work in that spirit.

But if you are not invited in by the creator, it’s more like a home invasion where you eat the food they planned to have for dinner, then rearrange the furniture and leave your fingerprints all over the glassware.�� Whether it actually harms the author or not, it is an intrusion into a place the author holds dear.

My second work of fanfic was the Dark Crystal novel, “The Darkseeing Stars,” written as my entry into the Dark Crystal Author Quest last year.�� While I had friends who expressed concern about writing a work for hire, or one in which I could not control its destiny, to me, it was a chance to celebrate the delight that Jim Henson and Brian Froud had given me with that film.�� Unlike my earlier intrusion onto Pern, I was invited to their house to play with all of those amazing toys–guilt-free.

#sfwa

The Teen Apocalypse

A while back, I fell into conversation with another author, and we wondered about the trend in young adult literature toward the apocalypse:�� so many popular teen titles are post-apocalyptic or dystopic (Hunger Games, Divergent).�� On the one hand, there has been a fair amount of this in books for adults as well (see the success of the Wool series by Hugh Howey), on the other hand, when I was younger, I used to get together with my friends and run around in the woods pretending we were the last people on earth, making up wild scenarios in which I could fly a plane and fire a gun to escape from dangerous situations like mutant whales.�� So I have to say the post-apocalyptic phenomenon is not new.

A ruined sugar mill in St. John

As an adult reader, I have to say I’m not much attracted to books about the end of the world.�� The subject doesn’t engage me.�� But clearly, it grabs lots of teens, and, just as clearly, at one time, I was one of them–possibly under the influence of the Cold War nuclear brinksmanship still rippling through society.�� Why the attraction?

I think it exists on several levels.�� First, and this is where my author friend and I began, is the idea that, for teens, everything is hugely dramatic.�� Thirty years down the line, we know that first love is probably not the same as true love, and that bad grades, big storms and even car accidents are rarely the end of the world.�� We also know that, even though terrible things happen, often unexpectedly, and have a great impact on us and on our society, the world has managed–so far–to overcome them.

But teens don’t have that perspective yet.�� They are aware enough to know that things are happening in the rest of the world, yet they always relate it to themselves first.�� Everything is big, exciting, frightening because it’s all happening for the first time. It’s the first time (for them) that America is at war.�� The first time a disease in a foreign country made the news.�� The first time that violence and anger erupted over a political decision.�� It’s the first time that hottie in math class met their eye.

However, I think it goes further than that.�� Why would this series of firsts–of striking dramas, both personal and epic–trigger the desire to play-act being the last people on earth?�� Do they want everyone else to go away?�� Let’s look at this exodus from a slightly skewed perspective:�� why, in Disney films, fairy tales and fantasy novels, are the parents so often absent or deceased?

Because it is time to have an adventure.�� For the younger market of those works, the idea of losing their parents is both scary and exciting–the young protagonist must make the choices that would otherwise be done by mom or dad.�� And often, in the end, there is a reconciliation–the child can return home, rescue the parent or restore a younger sibling, and make the world right again.

For the teen, the end of the world is adulthood.�� It is the end of that idea that they can return home and settle back in to the routine of childhood where someone else makes the decisions and drives the narrative.�� They are on the cusp of not merely being free to have an adventure, as they might in a younger narrative form, but of being permanently responsible for, well, everything.�� Not only their own choices and actions in the world (as on the adventure) but being custodians of the world itself.�� Making the big decisions that will affect other survivors, becoming an actor on a bigger stage than their own home or town or school.

The world is coming to an end, and they must make their place in it. There will no longer be defined places for them (dutiful child, good student) to fit nor a comfortable place to return to, it will be on their shoulders to live or die, to create a better world, or buy into the ruined one, perhaps to stand atop the rubble of the past and feel stronger, perhaps because of some books that let them imagine all of this without actually leaving their comfort zone.

When Astrology and Astronomy were One

One of the areas I did not delve deeply into for the Dark Apostle books was that of astrology. Certainly much of the educated medicine of the 14th century (and for a long time before and after) began with knowing the astrological sign of the patient, and taking into account the dominant astrological characteristics of the season before determining the method of treatment.  My protagonist, Elisha, focused more on the physical evidence than on any celestial influence.

An astronomer’s chair at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England

Nowadays, most people treat astrology as an amusing diversion (as the warning on my newspaper’s astrology column points out), although nearly everyone you ask will likely readily know their astrological sign and may even have some belief that this affects their personality in the same way that a red-haired friend of mine claims her hair color as an excuse for her temper. It happens to be the month of my birth, and so more people than usual are commenting on my presumed nature based on that single fact.

On a scientific level, I may be more ready to believe in some genetic basis for a link between hair color and temperament (which would still account for only part of how that temperament is expressed in any given individual) than in a link between the accidental timing of my birth and a pattern that some ancient observer noticed in the sky. Many of my friends will also, if having a bad day, off-handedly remark that Mercury has gone retrograde, an astronomical phenomenon that occurs about three times a year, given the relative disparity between the length of the year for Mercury, and our own. So these otherwise intelligent and responsible people, even today, maintain some sense that their lives are influenced by distant patterns in the heavens.

This belief in astrology is long-standing and wide-spread, with peoples around the world all mythologizing some link between the stars and the people beneath them. However, the patterns they thought worthy of note vary widely, even in what type of pattern might be considered important. The constellations that seem obvious to Westerners are broken up into parts of other asterisms in other cultures, and the ancient Peruvians relied not on the stars to envision their patterns, but on the black areas between them.

When you are out at night, perhaps in the wilderness far from artificial lights, its easy to see why mankind so often finds connection to the stars. They sweep grandly overhead, inspiring poetry, art and awe. If you watch for many months, you identify patterns to the movements, the same stars returning over and over, with other bright “wandering stars” moving against that backdrop. In a nomadic culture, the return to a summer or winter camp might well be linked to the reappearance of a pattern in the stars, a pattern that culture names and tells stories about, solidifying the connection between the skies and ourselves.

So the first detailed observations of the sky have little to do with science and much more to do with a sense of influence and power the stars wield over our little lives. Signs in the sky like shooting stars or comets were viewed as portents sent by gods above whose intention must be interpreted through observation. It’s only been in the last couple of centuries that the idea of celestial observation uncoupled from the sense that the stars themselves influenced our destiny as individuals.

In China, innovators developed elaborate clocks and astronomical devices and methods in order to track detailed information about the birth of imperial children to interpret the astrological significance of the moment.

Nowadays, we send out ever more elaborate devices to study the stars and planets in our solar system and beyond. We remain in awe of the stars not because they might govern us, but because they are, in themselves, awesome: beautiful collisions of gasses and elements. We study them because they still fulfill a need within ourselves—a need to understand and interpret, to reach beyond and seek a greater meaning. In studying the stars, we might come to understand more of our own star and planet, how we began and where we are going. We are no longer subject to the stars, but partners with them on our journey through the universe.

Technology in Medieval Fantasy, thanks to Steampunk

I have just returned from the World Fantasy Convention, held this year in Arlington, VA, where I got to hang out with many other authors and readers, sharing our knowledge and celebrating the realm of fantasy writing. One of my highlights was participating in a panel about the use of technology in Medieval Fantasy, along with Beneath Ceaseless Skies editor Scott H. Andrews, and medieval scholar Michelle Markey Butler.

an early English mechanical clock

When I participate on panels, I usually start out with some notes about my ideas or references for the topic, to make sure I present the most useful and engaging information for discussion. We discussed the roles that technology plays in the real world, noting the absence of technology from many prior works of fantasy, and finding an increasing number of recent publications that reference historical technology. It looked, to the panel, as if the use of technology in medieval fantasy has been increasing, and it occurred to me that this trend might owe a lot to the Steampunk movement.

I know that, while there are many who revel in the gears and goggles that are emblematic of Steampunk, many others bemoan its popularity or worry about its embrace of a historical period known for the colonization of the lands of others. However, I suspect that the explosion of Steampunk, and in particular its exuberant use of mechanical innovations, however unlikely they might be, have liberated authors of other sorts of fantasy to employ similar innovations in their own work.

Until recently, the extrapolation and use of technology has been the purview of science fiction, while fantasy focused on building worlds around imagined magics, creatures and countries. When technology did appear, it often did so in opposition to these elements, so the industrialization of the Shire leads to degradation at the end of The Lord of the Rings, and the six-fingered man uses a machine to suck the life from the Man in Black in The Princess Bride.

But historically speaking, technology is how people work to make their lives better, whether that is the back-and-forth development of weapons and defenses, or the labor-saving innovations of water and wind mills, spinning wheels and paper-making. Even in a world of elves, wizards or dragons, people need clothes to wear, grains to eat, and surfaces to write on, yet most fantasy novels incorporate the products of technology without any sense of the means of production or development required to get there. (I started this blog by railing against the presence of books in fantasy novels, and this is one reason why).

Steampunk, on the other hand, puts the technology right out front. It not only uses historical background technology, it extrapolates new things based on the history, and I think it has liberated the idea of technology and technological advancement from the pages of science fiction and returned it to its rightful place, at the heart of human need. Authors began poking around the edges, thinking about the technologies between the age of steam, and the current age, and they also began looking back.

Those of us writing historical fantasy and fantasies that imitate historical eras, might choose to foreground the technology appropriate to our own period of time, or simply to suffuse our worlds with the means of production and material culture that technology allows—but I, for one, am excited to see where the Steampunk explorers might lead.

Book Promotion: Nobody Cares about your Crazy Names (sorry!)

Once again, I have had the opportunity to read someone’s blurb for their fantasy novel.  You see these things all over the place–on advertising materials at conventions, on the back covers of books, on blogs or in emails asking you to support the author.  All too often I’m thinking, “Jeez, man, I’d love to support you–but first you gotta write some copy worth selling!”

If you are an author, whether you are writing your query letter to send to agents, or writing the copy that goes on websites to promote your indie-published book, you must remember that that blurb is the first writing sample your audience is likely to read.  That blurb must be freakin’ brilliant–it might even be the most important thing you’ll ever write related to that book, including the book itself.

I am a fantasy writer. I am a fantasy reader. And one of the first things that many people who avoid fantasy will tell you is that they don’t like a lot of unpronounceable names.  Here’s a little secret:  even readers who love fantasy can get turned off fast by the same issue.

During the course of the first few chapters, the typical fantasy novel will introduce a series of names for people, places, countries, various novae (like magical concepts or local plants and animals).  For the fantasy junkie, that’s cool–because those unusual names are introduced in context–they relate to other things on the page, other elements of the story, and begin to build the sense of other-worldliness we enjoy.  The name isn’t just a bit of decoration, it is a handle for a person, place or thing with other individual attributes which find a place in the mind of the reader.

This is not the case with the blurb for a fantasy novel.  In a blurb, you have one paragraph, a few sentences, to get the reader’s attention and convince him or her to read the book.  Again, it doesn’t matter if that reader is just a person looking for their next book, or an agent looking for their next best-selling author–the impact is the same:  you need to inspire the reader to want to read more.  And a series of strange names is highly unlikely to do so.

Here’s an off-the-cuff example:

Ga’thorna of Trigyrra travels to the Phonerevon Mountains to study the mystic skill of Pacheira which will allow her to control the weather, but when Trigyrra comes under attack by the Acherides with their malevolent hipponychus, Ga’thorna must hurry home to defend Trigyrra against the threat that might change Malfsion forever.

In all seriousness, ANY series of names is unlikely to inspire the reader.  Because those names (whether they are Ga’thorna of Trigyrra, or Jennifer Stone) don’t relate to anything.  The names themselves are meaningless without the context of the book.  There is no reason for the reader to care about the handles when they have not been introduced to the thing the handle refers to.  Fantasy novels are merely the most extreme example of the problem–even my romance-writing friends have the tendency to throw a bunch of names into a query, wasting most of their precious blurb-space.

Instead, focus on the protagonist and the conflict that he or she faces.  Suggest the setting (which may require a place-name, but might be more effective with a more evocative handle) and move on.  You may also need to suggest the antagonist or the love-interest, but that character probably doesn’t need a name.  Instead of filling up your blurb with handles–much less unpronounceable ones–fill it up with phrases that capture the essence of the place, time, problem, or magic. . . Show what will make your book worth reading, and your characters worth caring about, by displaying the heart of the story, not by referring to things your reader does not yet understand.

Here’s the blurb above, substituting specific phrases or images for most of the names:

A gifted young mage, Ga’thorna, leaves her island home for a distant monastery in the mountains to study weather-magic, but when the island comes under attack by an ancient enemy with an army of flesh-eating seahorses, Ga’thorna hurries to defend her home against a threat that might change the world forever.

Sure, “hipponychus” is a cool word, and it evokes the concept I have in mind, but compared with “an army of flesh-eating seahorses,” it says nothing to the reader. Removing the strange words has also encouraged streamlining the prose so that the new blurb reads much better (and might even be something I could remember if I needed an elevator pitch for this imagined book).

When they have the chance to explore your world and meet your characters in the context of the novel, readers are happy to learn their names, but when you need to catch someone’s attention and do it fast–leave the names in the book and deliver the impact of your story instead.

What are some of your pet-peeves about the marketing of fantasy?

 

#SFWA

 

The Black Death/ Ebola Smackdown

Right now, the news is full of Ebola.  Everyone–especially politicians–is in a tizzy about this dread disease, which is infecting and killing thousands in a certain area of Africa.  Should we ban air travel to West Africa?  Has the CDC done enough to protect American citizens?  How afraid should we be? do we keep kids home from school when we hear a rumor that somebody has a fever and knows somebody who might have once been to Africa?

Er.  Okay, maybe nobody’s asking that question, although a number of parents did keep kids home from school because of rumors that someone got off an airplane with a fever.  Maybe I’m the only one this happens to, but I often catch a local cold virus while traveling, and I have yet to be stopped at the airport. . .  So let’s return to the question, how afraid should we be?

How about a look at the real face of disease vectors in America, and a reminder of a threat which is still among us:

A marmot prepares for quarantine. . . er, for winter.

This is a marmot. It happens to be a Yellow-bellied Marmot in Rocky Mountain National Park.  In Mongolia, the bubonic plague is endemic to the local marmots.  You remember the Bubonic Plague,  AKA, the Great Mortality, AKA, the Black Death?  Bubonic Plague was likely carried on fleas spreading from the area of central Asia, and transported by rats all over Europe, both rats and fleas being pretty ubiquitous in earlier times (and still in many places).  Fleas likely also traveled in blankets, cloth and clothing, also pretty common.

When the fleas bit people, people became infected. Lots of fleas.  Lots of infections.  30 to 50% die-offs in areas where the plague ran rampant in the 14th century, for example.  You can also get it by exposure to bodily fluids of the infected. About 50% of people who contracted the plague died from it.  Later, the plague becomes Pneumonic:  it adapts to be spread by coughing or sneezing, and has a higher death rate, say, 75% (there is also a septicemic variety which killed about 90%).  Remember, all of the historical percentages are based on either eyewitness accounts (likely exaggerated), death roll analysis, or archaeological evidence, so they are a bit fuzzy, and may be lower or higher.

The Black Death lead to widespread panic, lots of praying, lots of anger and suspicion against the wrong people as many people looked for someone else to blame.  It also lead to the use of quarantine (from an Italian word, meaning separating possible infectious individuals for 40 days), which was often effective.  Eventually, the disease died out on its own–returned periodically, and died back again due, at first, to environmental factors (cold winters), and later to an increased understanding of disease vectors coupled with more effective prevention and treatment.

Okay, E. C., but that’s history.  Except in the areas where the plague remains endemic. Plague is endemic (meaning, it’s already present) in many rodent populations in the Southwest–like marmots, prairie dogs, and those adorable ground squirrels people are always feeding when they visit the western National Parks.   According to the CDC, we get an average of 7 cases per year in America. That’s more than the current number of confirmed Ebola cases in the States.    Thankfully, we’ve gotten the death rate down to around 11% with prompt treatment.  The World Health Organization says about 4000 cases of the plague are reported every year, though they suspect this number should be higher due to under-reporting in many areas.

Here’s a brief rundown on Ebola:  it has an incubation period of 21 days (which is much longer than the 2-6 days of Bubonic plague–so that’s kinda scary, but you have to be symptomatic to spread the disease), you must have contact with bodily fluids to become infected (whether from an individual, or from contaminated objects), and in Africa, it has a current death rate of about 50%, but outbreaks in the past have ranged from 25% to as much as 90%.

Yep, that’s scary–especially if you live in West Africa or work directly with patients. However, if you look at the trend over time you find that, yes, more people are being infected, but a smaller percentage of them are dying.  Just as with the death rate from the Bubonic Plague going from 50% or so, down to 11%, as we develop counter measures against the spread of the disease, better monitoring and better treatments, the disease becomes more survivable.  We still do not have a vaccine for the plague. Thousands of people live and visit areas where the plague is endemic, and avoid getting sick–and almost none of them even think about the potential for sickness.

It seems to me that, rather than spend time, money and human attention worrying about Ebola becoming an epidemic in America, we should spend some proportion of that on developing and offering effective prevention and treatment for people who *are* likely to be exposed to the disease–those in Africa and the compassionate people who work with them. That requires the travel of health professionals and scientists to study and treat the disease. It may require education and the encouragement of openness about how to handle the dead, and what foods are safe to eat because the first cases likely came from consuming bush meat, and were transmitted by customs surrounding the care of the dead.  Yes, it also requires keeping the uninfected safe, for instance, reasonable precautions about travel from affected areas, and the increased protocols introduced recently by the CDC for healthcare professionals.

Hand-wringing? Paranoia and accusations?  Stigmatization of the families of the affected after they have passed quarantine?  That’s what we don’t need. Instead of harnessing a manufactured hysteria to produce political gains, let’s harness our energy to send Ebola back into the woods and encourage it to stay there.

 

Climbing back on the Bandwagon

In the last couple of months, I have sadly fallen off of several bandwagons:  the blogging bandwagon, the exercise bandwagon, the music practice bandwagon, lately the vegetarian diet bandwagon.  I say “sadly” because these are all things I would have liked to maintain–and because it is easier to maintain a habit than to begin one.

I have also gotten back on, possibly, the most important bandwagon of all (for me, anyhow) which is writing every day. I’ve been writing 3000 to 5000 words every weekday on my new WIP, Drakemaster (for those of you keeping track, this is my Chinese epic historical fantasy).  I was incredibly busy over the summer, between leading adventure camps and attending conventions–all very worthwhile and enjoyable things–so I didn’t get any writing done.  Now, I did not go from 0 to 5000 words the next day, I had to ramp back up to it with a few hundred, then a thousand, then two thousand (I always picture a freight train picking up speed)  I am very happy to be riding this particular bandwagon again, but still thinking about those other ones that have been left behind.

How to get back up?  The key is persistence. It’s all too easy to fall off–or, more often, to be knocked off any given habit you’re trying to maintain. You want to eat a particular way, then you get invited to a wedding, and, well, you can’t just ignore wedding cake, right?  you want to exercise daily or even every-other-day, then you get sick or injured, and you just can’t make it for a few days.  Or, worst of all, Life Happens.  Kids, family, work obligations, blackouts, car troubles–the list of reasons to stop is pretty much endless.

But you’ve gotta get back up again.  You will not reach your goals (whether fitness, career, financial or creative) without regular practice, without building and maintaining the habit of getting it done.  Someday, you just begin again.  You screw up your courage, renew your gym membership or humble yourself before your writing workshop and make a new commitment.  Yep, it’s hard to do this if you’ve let things slide.  You’re probably going to do fewer reps on the Nautilus this time around. You’re going to start with fewer words on your daily count. You’re going to be tempted by the goodies when you stop off at your favorite bookstore that happens to have a cafe. . .

Here is the thing to remember:  Life is a series of choices.  All the time, every time.  Sometimes, you don’t have the leeway to make a different choice:  you have to try your sister’s cassarole, even if it blows your diet.  Next time the choice returns to you, pick the right one.  Next time you can choose to watch tv or write–choose to write. Next time you can choose between a long lunch break, and taking a walk–choose the walk.

It’s hard to keep making the right choice–and it’s easy to think, if you’ve made the wrong choice a few times in a row, that it’s not worth the struggle to get going again.  How will you feel if you never reach your goals?  If you’re willing to just give up, go for it. If you’re going to kick yourself later, then take a step now.  Even a tiny one. Tomorrow, make a bigger one, the day after, a bigger one yet–

The more often you make the best choice, the more you can maintain those habits that will get you moving the right direction, and you’ll find yourself back on the bandwagon in no time.  For some more specific advice and ideas about self-motivating, check out the work of Luc Reid, author and instigator of The Willpower engine (and the Willpower Engine for Writers free e-book–cheap at twice the price).

I can’t guarantee that I’ll stay on the blogging bandwagon, but I can guarantee that, next time I fall off, I’ll make the choice to get back on.   See you next week!

Review: Home for the Holidays, discovering voice

Home for the Holidays by Randee Dawn

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I had the pleasure of meeting the author at a local convention last year some time, and actually won this book when I attended her reading. I highly recommend that others should go out and buy it, not least to encourage the author to write lots more!

Voice is one of the tricky bits of being a writer. Editors and agents will tell you that they look for an author with a strong “voice” and new writers will scratch their heads and try to figure out what that means and where to get one.

I am not one of those who reads to experience the flowery and self-congratulating prose that is often presented as an example of a strong voice for an author. I prefer and more subtle and vigorous approach that grows, not from the author’s desire to impress an English teach who’s probably been dead for decades, but from the author’s attempt to present a clear and striking picture of the story world that is so deeply embedded in the consciousness of character that you can’t remove the narrator’s voice without the work falling to bits.

Randee Dawn is such a writer. In each of these stories, she creates such a strong sense of the character behind the narrative that the reader must pull out at the end and be startled to find that yes, the author of that nasty little Christmas fable which provides the title, and the elegant mannered “The Folly of Miss Arbuthnot” is, in fact, the same person.

Dawn has the ability to sink into each of these works through their characters and reveal them from the inside out. That sort of confidence and investment creates a voice for the author that makes me want more. The work reminds me of Peter S. Beagle, who can so easily assume the identity of an old wine-sot sailor, then slide into the mind of a teenage Chicana. How? Teach me this magic!

If the fingerprint of the author is here on the prose, it is to point the reader in a new direction. If the author’s voice is whispering, it is to lull you into the dream that is a story.

More work by Randee Dawn is sincerely to be hoped for–hers is a voice I could listen to for a very long time.

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