Malcolm R. Campbell's Blog, page 122
October 21, 2019
Review: ‘The Ten Thousand Doors of January,” by Alix E. Harrow
On July 26, 2018, Alix E. Harrow–an award-winning author of short fiction, posted a blog entry called “Holy Cats, I sold my book” in which she called the pending publication: “Big, life-altering, universe-skewing, time-space-continuum-wrecking news.”
[image error]Her reaction also describes the book, a mix of magical realism and fantasy, with a delightful plot that bends time and space in upon themselves as–quite possibly–an illustration of the “many worlds” interpretation of quantum physics. Fortunately, you don’t need to know anything about quantum theory to follow the story.
What you do need is a wide-open, non-judgemental imagination because this story is quite a unique trip. No doubt, Harrow used that kind of imagination to write the book, to follow the world-leaping exploits of her main character January Scaller who learns–while looking for her parents and running from the bad guys–how to travel between worlds as easily as walking from here to there and (with luck) back again.
Her plotting, language, and tone are among the best I’ve seen through ten thousand hours of reading every book I could get my hands on. Each of those books was a door into a new world, a fact you’ll believe more firmly than ever by the time you finish “The Ten Thousand Doors of January.” In fact, you’re more likely than ever to discover new worlds after reading this beautiful (and beautifully written) debut novel.
It’s a big, life-altering, universe-skewing, time-space-continuum-wrecking novel.
–Malcolm
Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of magical realism and contemporary fantasy novels and stories.
October 20, 2019
Local stores took Oregon Pie Cherries off the Shelves, The Bastards
Pie cherries are for people who make real pies rather than using the pie filling sludge that’s showing up on grocery store shelves. We tried the sludge once, and it was too sweet, too artificial, and basically inedible.
We each had once slice and threw the rest of the sludge-filled pie in the trash.
Kroger’s tart cherries were okay and the pie was much better. However, we had used the Oregon brand for years and thought only evil-doers would remove it from the shelves.
So, to hell with them (the evildoers). We bought a flat of cherries and berries straight from Oregon Fruit Products. Our pantry now looks like those pantries in TV commercials where the whole shebang has 100000 cans/boxes of one product.
Tonight, we’re having a blackberry pie. It looks good. I’ve refrained from eating a slab during the afternoon.
Most people put too much sugar in their pies. The situation is worse when they use that pie filling sludge. So tonight, we’re eating like royalty with my speciality beef stew and Lesa’s wonderful pie. And wine, of course.
–Malcolm
October 19, 2019
The Power of Multiple People Thinking the Same Thing
An egregore (pronounced egg’ gree gore) is a group thought-form. It can be created either intentionally or unintentionally, and becomes an autonomous entity with the power to influence. A group with a common purpose like a family, a club, a political party, a church, or a country can create an egregore, for better or worse depending upon the type of thought that created it. – Wikipedia
The concept is ancient and found in esoteric literature and in the practices of mystery schools. With the thoughts of many people thinking the same positive affirmation simultaneously at the same moment, or at planned times during the day, there can be beneficial outcomes, often indirect, in the world or the community. I especially like Rummer Godden’s description of an abbey in her 1969 novel In This House of Brede as a powerhouse. The nuns’ meditations impact the world via an egregore in addition to their value as prayers.
Mystery schools create egregores intentionally and create meditative ways for achieving a “higher level of thought” at specified contact times to enhance the power of the group’s intent of manifesting something positive for humanity.
[image error]Many groups have used this technique, asking members to meditate upon positive outcomes based on the groups’ philosophy/goals–world peace, the end of discrimination, the feeding of the hungry, and other causes. Since the benefits are usually indirect, it’s difficult for groups to persuade their members to hold their meditations for a long period of time. So many people become discouraged when they don’t see immediate and overt results.
When this happens, the egregore fades away like a fire starving for oxygen. As it begins to fade, participants are less likely to see positive change, and so they stop meditating and the whole thing becomes like a helium balloon with a leak in it.
Some of the nasty things we see in society, I think, occur when multiple people think of the same criminal, hateful, and spiteful things simultaneously–it’s like mob rule but on a thinking/speaking basis. Recent increases in white supremacy, racism, and Nazism may well have begun from overt causes–events, speeches, books–but they sustain themselves via the power of multiple people thinking the same thing. None of these people realize they have created an egregore, a thought-form that multiplies the power of the individuals many times over: they simply think what they think.
The results can be catastrophic. They can lead to more books, more unseemly events and speeches, and violence on the streets, all of which serve to create more people thinking in concert with the mess they’ve been creating.
Sending “thoughts and prayers” has become rather a joke when people suggest doing it as a response to street violence, school shootings, terrorism, and genocide. Most people believe thoughts have no impact on events, so the first thing they do instead is to ask Congress for more laws, advocate sending in SWAT teams and the National Guard, and jailing the leaders. The last thing they believe is to believe that–rather than sitting at home frustrated as they read the latest news–they can have an impact on events through their church, club, website, or other community groups. If an anti-Nazi/racism website went viral with the idea of meditating for peaceful times, then what would happen if a million people thought about a positive alternative to white supremacy and racism simultaneously, we would probably see a positive outcome.
Doing this is counterintuitive. So we lose the powerhouse of good people doing their best to counteract the bad people.
[image error]Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of the three novels in the Florida Folk Magic Series, “Conjure Woman’s Cat,” “Eulalie and Washerwoman,” and “Lena,” all of which show the power of the individual (or group) in combatting the evils of the times.
You can save on the e-books by buying this set.
October 18, 2019
I’m not at the cancer clinic today!
My last radiation treatment was yesterday. The nurses and techs congratulated me for sticking with the 40-day program. I told them I felt like I was being let out on parole. The main tech said, “Aw, it wasn’t that bad.” I told her it was the commute that was tedious because I had to drive 35 minutes each way. (Nothing like my one-hour Atlanta commutes in the old days.) I think I’ll probably end up being the most wild and crazy patient they ever had since I see the world differently and am liable to say anything–and did. (When they asked me what the doctor said about the chills I had recently, although he said it had nothing to do with the therapy, I told the techs he said somebody put a hex on me but I wasn’t allowed to say who it was.)
[image error]The treatments, which lasted about 10 minutes each, were done with one of the clinic’s three Varian Linear Accelerators. Very high tech. I’ll have a follow-up appointment at the clinic in a month, presumably to go over everything.
Hormone therapy continues with my next appointment in January, three months after the last radiation treatment. This takes away what the cancer cells need. It could be three to six months before we know about remission. The hormone therapy provides false readings on the tests until the therapy is complete.
A breakthrough with the MRI about five years ago that can see cancer cells based on the sugars surrounding them is not yet out of testing (presumably) and in the field. If it passes muster, it should make all or most biopsies unnecessary. And, for my purposes, would tell me exactly where I am right now.
The treatment program I’m following is usually successful. I got a certificate from the clinic saying I’d undergone that therapy. One of the nurses grabbed me by the hand and dragged me out into the waiting room where there’s a mounted bell on the wall, along with a plaque that says patients should ring this when they finish a therapy program.
I asked if there was any particular approved way to ring it. She said “no.” I looked at my watch and said, “It’s 2:30. In the Navy, that’s five bells,” and I proceeded to ring it briskly in the proper manner: Ding Ding. . .Ding Ding. . .Ding.
I heard a lot of applause, but have no idea whether or not there were any former sailors there who understood I gave the time I was leaving the clinic.
It’s nice to be done with this phase.
October 17, 2019
Briefly Noted: ‘The World That We Knew’ by Alice Hoffman
I reviewed The Dovekeepers which was extraordinary. The World That We Knew is also extraordinary, but it’s well beyond my poor powers to review.
[image error]It’s a breath of fresh air at a time when for reasons I cannot comprehend anti-Semitism is rearing its polluted self around the world along with the equally bankrupt white supremacists. And then, my generation was born in the shadow of World War II and that’s had a life-long effect on us.
Among other things, the sins of the world–from Nazi Germany to the U.S. and other countries who wouldn’t accept Jewish refugees–are still strongly on my mind. So, this novel stops the world of today and takes me back into the horrors suffered by the Jews in Germany, France and elsewhere. Hoffman’s novel is tantamount to an immersion in a history we cannot bear.
So, I’m too biased about the subject matter to speak objectively about The World That We Knew. I think it is perfect, complete (as is typical of Hoffman in The Dovekeepers) with a blend of brutal facts, magical realism, and characters we care too much about before they are gone. There was love here, too, in spite of the atrocities surrounding the characters.
Perhaps that love was enough, a brief flash of divine light above misbegotten times, places, and unspeakble crimes.
October 16, 2019
Writing Fru Fru
As an author, I feel so far off the beaten track of techniques, theories, movers and shakers, and writing schools, that I must confess I have no idea what’s going on in terms of best practices and goals. Furthermore, I don’t think I care.
I subscribe to several writing magazines. Some of the material is interesting. Most of it makes my eyes glaze over. And that includes the 1000000 ads per issue about MFA programs. These ads list their faculty. I’ve never heard of 99.9% of them. Of course, they haven’t heard of me either, so that’s no a condemnation of those running the show.
[image error]My brand of heresy is that I think many writing programs kill off more students than they help. My English minor in college just about killed me. Courses in taxidermy and underwater basket weaving would have been more helpful.
Yes, I’m a rebel when it comes to how writing and literature are taught. Yet, I think most prospective writers will do much better if they are left to figure out how to find their own voice and style without prompts from a professor. Sure, there are plenty of good tips out there about practical matters.
If you want to write, then write. You alone know what interests you, what kinds of stories are haunting your dreams to be told, and how words best spill from your brain onto the printed page. It’s a natural thing. Programs and rules tend to disrupt that natural thing: writing as only you can do it.
While you may not know a dozen theories your 300- or 400-level college course wants to impart to you, you do know yourself and how you see the work you wish to do. The drummer or song or inspiration behind your work always comes from within, not somebody standing behind a lectern who says ABC is good and XYZ is bad.
I always picked XYZ and made it work as my way of mocking silly writing theories. As Mark David Gerson says in his popular writing books, “There are no rules.” Every time a guru says don’t, I can show them a successful author who did it. We always need something fresh and innovative, and sticking to ancient rules ensures we’ll never find it. Which is not to suggest we need pure chaos, though a little bit of chaos in writing can be energizing.
Good writing, I think, comes from people who thought it was more important to know themselves rather than to know the substance of an MFA program. Why? They chose life over conformity.
October 15, 2019
Smothered by Others’ Expectations
Many children, teens, and adults go through life with little or no support from anyone including parents, teachers, spouses, and friends. This lack is often the theme of TV shows and novels: we see a person who’s been through hard times finally getting a little support from somebody else and finally believing in themselves enough to try.
The flip side of that record can also be a problem. Some kids’ families–through tradition and/or grades and/or the results of various tests–are overtly expected to do great things. That scenario can be better than one in which everyone expects you to fail. However, it can also become a burden.
[image error]As a teenager and a young man, I was always expected to become a writer, partly because my father was a writer and partly because I had shown some early inclinations in that direction. Life–as people often say–got in the way. So, I ignored my writing many times because I was tired of being pushed and I was tired of being asked about it.
It got to the point where–had I just survived some hideous accident–somebody would say, “Well, in spite of that, I hope you’re keeping up with your writing.”
“Hell no, I’m not.”
As a former college teacher, literacy volunteer, and writing mentor, I still don’t know where the line is between too little support and too much support. So, more often than not, I remain silent in day-to-day life about writing because I really don’t know what to say. The support I received was damaging, representing a constant pressure to have a manuscript accepted by a magazine or book publisher, to win a contest, or to put together a winning column in a magazine or newspaper.
The constant pressure to perform brought me to the point where I ignored or sabotaged my own goals. I never want to bring another person to that point. My daughter was an excellent documentary editor, then gave up her career to raise a family. I said nothing, for I didn’t feel the right to second guess her choices the way so many adults second-guessed my choices. She has a great family and has done some great volunteer work. I’m proud of her for that.
It’s hard to stay carefully silent when one’s children and one’s students go out into the world. I want them to know that I’m here if they need me, but that I’m not here to smother them with my expectations. I hope they will be happy and successful because that’s what I always wanted people to hope for me when I was young and rebellious and uncertain about the future.
October 14, 2019
Reading survivors’ stories
The clinic where I’ve been going for radiation treatments (42, so far) has a support group, which I haven’t attended, and throughout the building, large black and white photographs of previous patients who ended up cancer-free. Each photo is accompanied by a small plaque with several paragraphs of text that briefly tell each person’s story.
Inasmuch as my prostate cancer was caught early and wasn’t particularly aggressive, I didn’t feel the need for the support group; I think I might have felt out of place had each meeting been filled with people fighting cancers more like that of Jeopardy host Alex Trebek. However, I have felt a silent and on-going measure of support from the photographs and each individual’s successful fight (or multiple fights) against cancer.
[image error]
Harbin Clinic, Rome, GA
Since I tend to arrive at the clinic a little early, I’ve read each story multiple times. Even with a somewhat low-grade cancer, I still find comfort in all those words and smiling faces.
In the local Wendys, there’s a lady (Shirley) about my age who gives me trouble about everything because I give her trouble about everything. Last week, she told me she hadn’t seen me for a while and thought I looked sick. When I said I was taking hormone and radiation treatments for cancer, she said her husband had gone through the drill a couple of times. We had the same doctor, as it turns out.
There’s a small bell in the clinic’s waiting room with a plaque instructing people to ring it when they’re cancer-free. So, I asked Shirley if her husband was still with us. She smiled and said he is. Said, “Did he ring that bell on his last day at the clinic?”
“Your darn right he did,” she said. We high-fived without damaging our hands or my junior bacon cheeseburger.
My radiation treatments end this Thursday. Since the recently developed MRI that can see cancer cells is probably still in testing, I’ll have to wait a while before standard tests will tell me what these daily visits have accomplished. But, if the staff should one day ask me to ring that bell, I will. Not because my journey has been scarey but because the sound might bring those in the waiting room a dosage of hope.
October 13, 2019
Turkish Delight Banned in the U. S.
Washington, D. C., October 13, 2019, Star-Gazer News Service–In response to the Turkish invasion of Syria to exterminate long-time allies of the United States, the administration has banned Turkish Delight until the Turks stop killing Kurds.
[image error]
Wikipedia Photo
Banning Tsar Joe Doaks said that, “With Hallowe’en just around the corner, this action will hit Turkey in the pocketbook big time, forcing it to stop the invasion we greenlighted several weeks ago.”
While Kurdish spokesmen remain unconvinced the ban will save their lives or keep ISIS prisoners from escaping blown-up jails, the Administration believes new sanctions will “teach Turkey a lesson.”
“Don’t make us ban turkeys from Thanksgiving,” Doaks said. “If Turkey really wants to suck up to Russia, let them eat Borscht.”
DeepState, a policy thinktank outside the long shadow of the White House, said, “The U. S. can sanction countries around the world until the cows and coffins come home, but statistics show that such sanctions never stopped anyone from doing whatever they wanted to do.”
In a DeepState white paper released yesterday, experts said they found the Administration’s assertions that it had not abandoned the Kurds “laughable” even though two out of three comedians say “it’s no laughing matter.”
The Kurds, who have been U.S. allies longer than Turkey (neutral during most of WWII), said that “At present, we feel no need to ever trust the United States again, especially since the Turkish invasion will lead to more chaos in the region for years to come. When that happens, don’t come back to us with the lame ‘pull my finger joke.'”
Doaks blamed Wikileaks for telling the Kurds about the “pull my finger joke.”
Informed sources say that Americans no longer know “what the hell” Turkish delight is, so most trick-or-treaters won’t be harmed by the ban.
–
Story by Jock Stewart, Special Investigative Reporter
October 12, 2019
Misspeaking and Apologizing
When my brothers and I were in school, we believed that if we were ever caught doing or saying anything “bad,” we’d claim we were rehearsing for an upcoming play and all of our real or imagined transgressions would be erased.
We never had to use that excuse. Luck, I guess.
I remember this every time a politician is quoted saying something nasty and then claims s/he misspoke. Or, when the same or a similar politician says or does something really awful and offers a public apology. In both cases, the misspeaking claim and the apology are expected to erase the reality of the moment and restore those politicians real or imagined good graces to the media and the public.
I don’t buy it. And, because the Campbell family motto is Ne Obliviscaris (Forget Not), I don’t forget. Perhaps I’ve been too harsh. After all, like most people, I have good friends who–in one desperate state or another–have said some pretty awful things. But I know them, their history, their deeds, and I see the awfulness as an aberration and not a lifestyle.
[image error]With politicians, I’m less sure. Perhaps it’s because even the best of them sooner or later turn out to have skeletons in their closets and tapes of conversations where they misspeak at great length of multiple occasions.
The old reporters’ joke is asking a candidate, “When did you stop beating your wife?” There’s no good way to answer that question that doesn’t lead to political ruin. So, with that in mind, if I were a reporter covering a news conference in which a politician said s/he misspoke, I would ask, “When did you stop misspeaking?”
After they hemmed and hawed, my follow-up would be, “Was it when you got caught?”
It has saddened me over a lifetime that so many people I adored, trusted, and believed in, were caught, claimed they misspoke, (and possibly) apologized. I expect better than that of people. All of us make mistakes. Yet I’ve come to believe that a history of misspeaking is a way of life rather than a mistake.
In fact, misspeaking has become so rife, it’s hard to tell whether people are misspeaking when they claim to have been misspeaking or if they are referring to what they did or said that got them into hot water.
A popular and hackneyed line out of lawyer TV shows is when the witness is asked, “Were you lying then or are you lying now?” I’d enjoy interviewing politicians and beginning with the question, “Will you be misspeaking today or is all that over and done with?”
My alterego Jock Stewart asks what I can’t:
