Come Play In My Backyard

Folks:

Here's an interesting statistic:

In the film industry, it is believed that:

Happy Endings make more money than any other type. (Protag. attains a goal PLUS a need.)

Down or Tragic endings win appreciation from critics. (Protag attains neither a goal nor a need.)

Ironic endings are most often picked for Oscar attention. (Protag attains either goal or need)

I was told this about the book industry -- but I had no idea it applied to films. I never analyzed the Oscar winners, and I don't read "critics." (I REVIEW books, not criticise them).

I've always thought that you bring your story to it's PROPER -- internally consistent -- ending and you have a chance at any or all 3 of the above, money, fame, or glory.

But apparently that's not so, according to screenwriting lore.

Therefore, before starting to craft an IDEA into a story, complete with protagonist, antagonist, conflict, beginning, middle, end and resolution of the conflict, you really should think hard about the ENDING.

What a backwards way of looking at it.

Most Romances -- even Alien Romances -- have "happy" endings in that the main characters find true happiness, even if they've switched partners a few times during the story.

So Romance is not always about attaining a GOAL -- i.e. you don't have a "happy ending" unless the protagonist attains their goal and also gets what they really need in life. A Romance ends where the protags get what they NEED -- and only sometimes what they thought they were going after.

In fact, the most interesting Romances are ones where both protags shift their goals during the story and only gradually discover their own needs -- and the needs of their S. O.

Could that be why very few serious and complex Romances make it to the screen?

Romances should be cheap to make -- well, not Alien Romances or grand Historical Romances (costume pieces), but contemporary, A.U. or even most Paranormals would be filmable.

But to justify the expense of making a film -- (which in my not at all humble opinion is what Alien Romance should be! TV and Film is the right medium for this wonderful sub-genre) -- you need:

a) 4 audience demographics -- this is from SAVE THE CAT! by Blake Snyder but he didn't invent it:
Men over 25
Men under 25
Women over 25
Women under 25

Believe it or not, that's how Hollywood looks at us.

Men under 25 are THE core film audience courted most by Hollywood because they go to films more than anyone else -- AND they bring their dates to films.

So if it doesn't interest "men under 25" when presented as a poster, your story won't be made into a high profile film with the Stars you might envision in the lead roles.

Romances aren't seen as inherently interesting to men under 25.

BUT SCIENCE FICTION IS!!!!

So the SF-Romance should be a classic 4-Quadrant genre!

So if you can create an SF-Romance with blazing action, (Think TERMINATOR or STARMAN) you can write a novel that will be made into a blockbuster film.

All you have to do is craft a totally HAPPY ENDING with maybe a whiff of IRONY onto an SF-ROMANCE to have the kind of audience "reach" and Awards Potential to get a big budget with Big Stars wanting an Oscar. You could rival STAR WARS for opening weekend boxoffice.

OK, we have 6 dynamite alien romance writers here. Can we come up with a dynamite CONCEPT with an ending like that for a standard 110 page screenplay?

When I started in fandom, we did a thing called a ROUND ROBIN -- in fact my very first fiction writing that got me started so that I couldn't stop was a ROUND ROBIN where an alternate-I was my character.

So just for fun, I have an opening Round Robin challenge for each writer to add to in outline here. Let's see if we can fulfill the Hollywood formula.

Here are the elements we need:

CONCEPT LOGLINE: An interstellar dog catcher meets her match.

Opening Image: Inara stands over a huge cage made of light-bars. Within is a dark, dirty, vicious and angry creature.

Someone off-shot says, "What among all the stars is THAT?!"

Inara, panting discheveled and scratched, shrugs: "Well, my mom told me not to take a job as an xeno-petcatcher. I wonder how she knew?"

The howling, crazed nameless creature in the cage says: "Maybe my mom told her!" Then its gyrations finally release the catch and it scrambles out and away.

OK, WHO WILL ADD A LINE OR THREE TO THAT?

Before this thing could be written, we need to know:

END OF ACT ONE (p 25) major climax into the middle of the film which is the longest part, 60 pages, fully half the 110 pages. The middle is the chase, danger, cliff-hangars, and bonding between the two reluctant soulmates who will become lovers.

END OF ACT TWO (p 85) since this needs a happy ending, p 75-85 have to be the absolute nadir, Inara's most devastating failure, utter and complete loss of everything valuable to her with no apparent way out of the trap she's in. (she can't BE RESCUED - she has to invent an astonishing and successful strategy to get herself out of this, as does her soulmate).

ENDING: This has to be a HAPPY ENDING - where Inara and her soulmate both reach their goals and also attain something they really need, something other than the goal.

TAG: the denoument, page 110 -- the FINAL IMAGE.

Well, if the opening image is a dogcatcher's cage, the final image has to include that, but changed in some way.

QUESTION: is the mad creature in the cage Inara's soulmate -- or is it like a parrot, reciting something it's owner taught it - and the owner is Inara's soulmate.

Perhaps if Inara recaptures the creature, the law says it has to be put to death, so the owner is racing Inara and blocking her every move, to recapture the creature first? Maybe it's a circus creature? Maybe the creature is a human being out where humans are thought to be animals?

Want to play in my backyard?

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/

Come Play In My Backyard

Folks:

Here's an interesting statistic:

In the film industry, it is believed that:

Happy Endings make more money than any other type. (Protag. attains a goal PLUS a need.)

Down or Tragic endings win appreciation from critics. (Protag attains neither a goal nor a need.)

Ironic endings are most often picked for Oscar attention. (Protag attains either goal or need)

I was told this about the book industry -- but I had no idea it applied to films. I never analyzed the Oscar winners, and I don't read "critics." (I REVIEW books, not criticise them).

I've always thought that you bring your story to it's PROPER -- internally consistent -- ending and you have a chance at any or all 3 of the above, money, fame, or glory.

But apparently that's not so, according to screenwriting lore.

Therefore, before starting to craft an IDEA into a story, complete with protagonist, antagonist, conflict, beginning, middle, end and resolution of the conflict, you really should think hard about the ENDING.

What a backwards way of looking at it.

Most Romances -- even Alien Romances -- have "happy" endings in that the main characters find true happiness, even if they've switched partners a few times during the story.

So Romance is not always about attaining a GOAL -- i.e. you don't have a "happy ending" unless the protagonist attains their goal and also gets what they really need in life. A Romance ends where the protags get what they NEED -- and only sometimes what they thought they were going after.

In fact, the most interesting Romances are ones where both protags shift their goals during the story and only gradually discover their own needs -- and the needs of their S. O.

Could that be why very few serious and complex Romances make it to the screen?

Romances should be cheap to make -- well, not Alien Romances or grand Historical Romances (costume pieces), but contemporary, A.U. or even most Paranormals would be filmable.

But to justify the expense of making a film -- (which in my not at all humble opinion is what Alien Romance should be! TV and Film is the right medium for this wonderful sub-genre) -- you need:

a) 4 audience demographics -- this is from SAVE THE CAT! by Blake Snyder but he didn't invent it:
Men over 25
Men under 25
Women over 25
Women under 25

Believe it or not, that's how Hollywood looks at us.

Men under 25 are THE core film audience courted most by Hollywood because they go to films more than anyone else -- AND they bring their dates to films.

So if it doesn't interest "men under 25" when presented as a poster, your story won't be made into a high profile film with the Stars you might envision in the lead roles.

Romances aren't seen as inherently interesting to men under 25.

BUT SCIENCE FICTION IS!!!!

So the SF-Romance should be a classic 4-Quadrant genre!

So if you can create an SF-Romance with blazing action, (Think TERMINATOR or STARMAN) you can write a novel that will be made into a blockbuster film.

All you have to do is craft a totally HAPPY ENDING with maybe a whiff of IRONY onto an SF-ROMANCE to have the kind of audience "reach" and Awards Potential to get a big budget with Big Stars wanting an Oscar. You could rival STAR WARS for opening weekend boxoffice.

OK, we have 6 dynamite alien romance writers here. Can we come up with a dynamite CONCEPT with an ending like that for a standard 110 page screenplay?

When I started in fandom, we did a thing called a ROUND ROBIN -- in fact my very first fiction writing that got me started so that I couldn't stop was a ROUND ROBIN where an alternate-I was my character.

So just for fun, I have an opening Round Robin challenge for each writer to add to in outline here. Let's see if we can fulfill the Hollywood formula.

Here are the elements we need:

CONCEPT LOGLINE: An interstellar dog catcher meets her match.

Opening Image: Inara stands over a huge cage made of light-bars. Within is a dark, dirty, vicious and angry creature.

Someone off-shot says, "What among all the stars is THAT?!"

Inara, panting discheveled and scratched, shrugs: "Well, my mom told me not to take a job as an xeno-petcatcher. I wonder how she knew?"

The howling, crazed nameless creature in the cage says: "Maybe my mom told her!" Then its gyrations finally release the catch and it scrambles out and away.

OK, WHO WILL ADD A LINE OR THREE TO THAT?

Before this thing could be written, we need to know:

END OF ACT ONE (p 25) major climax into the middle of the film which is the longest part, 60 pages, fully half the 110 pages. The middle is the chase, danger, cliff-hangars, and bonding between the two reluctant soulmates who will become lovers.

END OF ACT TWO (p 85) since this needs a happy ending, p 75-85 have to be the absolute nadir, Inara's most devastating failure, utter and complete loss of everything valuable to her with no apparent way out of the trap she's in. (she can't BE RESCUED - she has to invent an astonishing and successful strategy to get herself out of this, as does her soulmate).

ENDING: This has to be a HAPPY ENDING - where Inara and her soulmate both reach their goals and also attain something they really need, something other than the goal.

TAG: the denoument, page 110 -- the FINAL IMAGE.

Well, if the opening image is a dogcatcher's cage, the final image has to include that, but changed in some way.

QUESTION: is the mad creature in the cage Inara's soulmate -- or is it like a parrot, reciting something it's owner taught it - and the owner is Inara's soulmate.

Perhaps if Inara recaptures the creature, the law says it has to be put to death, so the owner is racing Inara and blocking her every move, to recapture the creature first? Maybe it's a circus creature? Maybe the creature is a human being out where humans are thought to be animals?

Want to play in my backyard?

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/

Jurassic Passions: A Look at Character and Motivation

A dinosaur came into my online classroom a while back, courtesy of one of my students, Celia. Now, let me make clear right up front that I was teaching "Investigative Methodology For Writers" online, so that at best, the dinosaur was an E-mail-osaurus Rex.

But he was a useful bugger and I'm glad Celia brought him in. I'll tell you why.

He was a motivated dinosaur. I named him Celia's Jurassic Passion.

The class was discussing 'motives' and the dinosaur was an example Celia used to illustrate a fictional character's hobby: "A passion so intense that his thinking is temporarily turned off."

Passion. Habit. Achilles' Heel. Motive. In this particular example, this character is tricked into revealing his true identity because of his fascination with dinosaurs. He couldn't stay away from a specific exhibit. This one last shred of his real self gives him away.

Fiction, you say?

Naw. Really happens.

One of the interesting things about a character, or a person's, motivations is that it's often a key issue both in fiction writing and investigative work. It's life imitating art, and art imitating life.

In the case of Celia's Jurassic Passion, we have a unique flavor of motive that works well for a PI and damned beautifully for a writer. It's that one unattainable goal that drives a writer's protagonist or antagonist. That hones a conflict line. That keeps a reader turning page.

For the PI, it's the road sign saying: He Went Thataway.

In any really good PI work, a PI has to climb deeply into the psyche of subject of the investigation. She has to do more than find out the facts. She has to understand what motivated the subject to lie, to steal, to philander, to connive, to run. She has to know what drives him, and what drives him is called motivation.

And it has to be something strong enough, deep enough, to make him go against the norm. To take the risk. To take it all with him or, conversely, leave it all behind.

In an effort not to violate the dictums of "believable characters", many writers seem to choose mundane motivations. One hundred per cent plausible, believable motivations. A drunk driver mows down Alphonse's granny in the middle of Main Street, so Alphonse goes on a rampage against all drunk drivers.

But after ten-plus years as a private investigator, I can tell you that it's not the logic or the believability of the motive that is the crux, but the intensity. I have seen people take actions for some remarkably stupid reasons, in my estimation.

But to them, those reasons were everything. Their own Jurassic Passion.

Intensity is what fuels the motive. Because the motives are, for the most part, as instinctual and primal as, well, a dinosaur, living deep in the very beginnings of our psyche. And often just a beastly.

Many writers develop only lofty, altruistic and logical motives for their characters in the belief that the noble goal is universally understood. In my humble estimation, those writers are missing out on one of the most fascinating elements of the human psyche. Our ability to defy reason, ignore logic, damn the torpedoes and go full speed ahead because we are so blindsided by our passions we can see no other way of responding.

Give me Grieving Alphonse who isn't raging against drunk drivers but against television weather reporters. For it was the TV weather report that made Granny leave her humble home that day and cross the street to buy an umbrella. The drunk driver is simply, in Alphonse's primally passionate mind, a bit player.

As a reader, a passionately illogical motive gives me the better hook, the better twist, the bigger surprise factor when all is finally revealed on the last page.

It also, whether I like it or not, draws me into a shared identity with the character. We all have our Jurassic Passions buried somewhere inside. And motives stem from our passions. The one thing we cannot live with. The one thing we cannot live without.

As an investigator, I sought out motives as my pinpoint flashlight on a roadmap through the winding, bumpy terrain of misinformation. As a writer, you can develop a character's motives and passions as a pinpoint flashlight to zig and zag your reader over a similar emotional terrain.

It's been said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. It's only fitting, then, that the guy driving the bus to hell is none other than E-mail-osaurus Rex, your friendly and illogical Jurassic Passion.

~Linnea
www.linneasinclair.com

Insufficient Mating Material--embarrassing things to ask dignified people

Reviews are starting to come in for Insufficient Mating Material, and --much too late-- I'm having visions of readers sidling up to librarians and whispering "Do you have Insufficient Mating Material?"

I never thought of that before. My grandfather, who was mischievous, used to amuse himself by tapping the Fish menu and asking impassive-faced waiters slightly ungrammatical questions that involved the words "are soles?"

No doubt my Grandpa would have taken great delight in choosing his victim, and demanding my book in the most inappropriate wording possible.

Best wishes,
Rowena Cherry


Utterly enthralling

A year ago Tarrant-Arragon wouldn’t believe he was going to set his sister up… I loved this book, and I know Insufficient Mating Material is a book you will not want to miss either.~ Rose, Romanceatheart.com


What is it like, exactly, when two gods go head to head?

Stellar wit, wonderful characters and amazing research into basic and not so basic survival techniques make for a very real and relatable
environment for the prince and princess. This was without a doubt one
of my favorite reads of 2006! ~ Kenda Montgomery

Interspecies Cooperation

I'm almost finished rereading WIZARDS AT WAR, the latest in Diane Duane's "Young Wizards" series. In this novel the teenage protagonists of the series, Kit and Nita, have to work with other wizards to save the universe from an abnormal proliferation of "dark matter." Their team comprises four Earth-human adolescents (including Kit's non-magical sister), a humanoid prince from a distant star system, a giant bug, an intelligent plant who looks like an ambulatory Christmas tree, Kit's dog (who has some magical gifts), and a sentient laptop computer. The larger group of Earth wizards includes whales and cats as well as human people. This delightful picture of interspecies cooperation reminds me of Madeleine L'Engle's A WRINKLE IN TIME and its sequels. L'Engle's human characters, at various times, work with cherubim, a unicorn, a friendly snake, assorted extraterrestrials, microscopic creatures within a small boy's body, and three angelic beings disguised as eccentric old ladies. James White's books set in a hospital on a space station show the protagonist, a human doctor, treating patients from many different planets. I enjoy stories that feature human beings and varied types of aliens seeing behind their mutual strangeness to the "soul," rejoicing in both their likenesses and their differences.

C. S. Lewis' OUT OF THE SILENT PLANET takes the hero, Ransom, to Mars, which he finds inhabited by three different intelligent species. A Martian native expresses amazement at learning Earth has only one. How, he asks, can we objectively evaluate our own thought processes if we can't compare them to thought that "floats on different blood"? I use this phrase in the title of my literary survey DIFFERENT BLOOD: THE VAMPIRE AS ALIEN from Amber Quill Press (www.amberquill.com).

Lewis' friend J. R. R. Tolkien says in "On Fairy Stories" that one of the universal human wishes fulfilled by fairy tales is the desire to communicate with other species. The talking animals in folklore vicariously heal the wound of our separation from the other creatures in our world. I find similar consolation in stories of friendship or love between human characters and members of intelligent nonhuman races. The Star Trek principle of IDIC, "Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations," celebrates bridging the gulf between species to form multi-species alliances, friendships, or intimate bonds. Which raises the question of how faithfully we live out this ideal in our mundane lives. Do we science fiction and fantasy fans typically rejoice in the other races and cultures on our own planet as wholeheartedly as we hope we would rejoice in elves and extraterrestrials? I must freely admit that most of my appreciation occurs at a distance; I grew up in a suburban WASP environment and have lived mostly in that kind of cultural context throughout my life. Therefore, my images of the ethnic groups with which I don't come into frequent contact tend, I'm sure, to be romanticized.

Susan Kearney News

Hi,

I'm pleased to announce I just sold two more books to Tor. In 2008 SOLAR HEAT will be available , my sequel to ISLAND HEAT and in the future this series will connect to my Rystani warrior series that began with THE CHALLENGE.

And I'm also now writing romantic suspense. The first book KISS ME DEADLY will be out this summer and I'll be writing the sequel this year. I'm very pleased to be writing in two genres. It keeps me fresh as a writer. Right now I'm having a blast with SOLAR HEAT. The book is back in space and my heroine is trapped, the hero is searching for her. It's time for her to save herself!!


Guess I'll get back to writing.
SueK.

More than you want to know!

Folks:

I've been very busy this week with mundane life, but also several writing projects active at once.

But I got a nice surprise that might interest some of you Trek fans.

There's a new e-zine, Sci Fi Studios Magazine just started. And I'm in the first issue!

Long story:

A few years ago COMMUNICATOR MAGAZINE -- a newstand slick focused on Star Trek -- was in the process of doing an article on me as part of a features series. They did one on Shirley Maiewski -- long time head of the Star Trek Welcommittee who died recently -- and had just done one on Joan Winston when the Magazine folded.

I saw the fellow who ran COMMUNICATOR at a con or two, did some panels with him, and he still had hope that COMMUNICATOR would re-launch. But so far it hasn't.

However, he is now involved in the new e-zine for Sci Fi Studios (which is connected with a lot of Hollywood pros who love Trek, endorsed by Rod Roddenberry, too) , and they contacted me to do an interview by email which I did. That was months ago and I'd all but forgotten it.

Last week, I got an email announcing the first issue - almost didn't go look at it - found a minute, browsed over, and Lo! There's a picture of me composited from a still taken during the interview I did which is in the documentary Trekkies2.

The interview with me is there, too.

Here's the ISSUE ONE of the new online magazine

http://scifi-studios.com/magazine/magcover1.htm


http://scifi-studios.com/magazine/ is the index page.


http://www.scifi-studios.com/magazine/content/view/75/26/ is the article itself.

This website is unique and a ground-breaker. They are Industry pros who are reaching out to involve FANS in the creation and production of actual, real SF the way we like it.

I really hope some Alien Romance writers get involved. I just have too many projects on my desk right now to be able to DO what I'd like to see done on that website.

So take a look at it.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/

101 Uses for Email Spammers

This is a blog about writing.
This is a blog about how authors sometimes use unusual sources for characters' names.
This is a blog about how great minds think alike.

Now that I've set the stage...welcome to my latest insanity. We all get email spam. Nothing can really turn a good day on a nasty edge then to be trying to get a manuscript done, waiting for feedback from your beloved critique partners, logging into your email program and you sit there for five frikkin' minutes whilst oodles of spam downloads and is snagged--one by one--by your spam filter.

Dink-kaching. Dink-kaching. Dink-kaching. (My spam filter makes little noises so I know it's actually earning the bucks I paid for it). Dink-kaching. I usually at this point go to the kitchen, brew another cup of cappuccino and return to my desk just in time for the last of the dink-kachings.

Then I noticed something while I was scanning the spam folder just in case a lovely fan mail note was erroneously dink-kachinged: spammers have started using some really neat-o peachy keen fun names as senders.

I've started saving them. Do I have a problem or what? But I've started saving them because I thought at some point they might make a fun addition to a book as a character. It would certainly save me the time and headache of creating a name.

Because, you see, I spend a lot of time creating a character's name. I listen to its melody, its cadence. I work with is masculine/feminine principles. I want it to correctly reflect my character's, well, character.

So imagine, if you will, just what these lovely characters would be like (and I'd LOVE to see your feedback--give them stories and careers and post them here!):

Headley Knoblock
Paneling L. Crib
Ceased H. Comfy
Fox O. Ethereal
Dillon Furze
Myopic U. Romeo
Repetitive H. Neurons
Hoose J. Rochester
Shocking H. Separates
Hensel F. Chowdhury
Nosedives H. Cursory
Preppier S. Barometers
Hunter Valentine (I really like this one--I think he'd make a great hard-drinkin', gun-totin' PI!)
Puppet C. Zambians
Parsifal Gandara
Nails H. Quitted
Bluford Q. Longmire
Zvonko Belvin

and that's just in the past month and it's not even all of them.

Brilliant, eh?

So in my whimsy I email author-buddy Susan Grant. And guess what? (Here comes the Great Minds part). She's doing the same thing! She's not only saving spammers names but she already USED one in an upcoming release. The character? Tibor Frix.

Now it's up to you to make some good use of annoying spammers. Tell me--in ten sentences or less--about Zvonko Belvin and Nosedives H. Cursory, et al. Let's see how creative you can get (but keep it short, eh? Ten sentences or less).


Admiringly yours,
~Linnea
www.linneasinclair.com

The best swordfighting scenes

What do Pierce Brosnan in Die Another Day, Roger Moore in Moonraker, Sean Connery in Highlander, Chris O'Donnell in The Three Musketeers, Catherine Zeta Jones, Anthony Hopkins, and Antonio Banderas in The Mask of Zorro, and Liv Tyler in LOTR have in common?

I found this fascinating!

According to Richard Cohen in By The Sword, the sword fighting consultant for all those great movie swordfighting scenes was Bob Anderson. A tidbit that interested me most was that it was Bob Anderson himself in the Darth Vader costume during that steamy light saber duel with Luke in The Empire Strikes Back.


Apparently, in order to keep the steam-effect from freezing Han Solo, the stage had to be kept very hot indeed, which was especially uncomfortable for a man in a helmet and long black robes.

None of this --movie trivia-- is especially helpful to me in my research for a swordfighting hero for my next alien djinn romance, but it gives me a new respect for Hollywood, and a new perspective on the "romantic" versus the "swashbuckling" versus the "pain of it" schools of movie swordfighting.

My next title is Knight's Fork. It's not about a Retiarius! Although it is Rhett's story.

Best wishes,

Rowena

Shooting Star...Ruben's crash

Ruben set the angle to enter the atmosphere and searched for his water bottle. It wasn’t in its usual place and he recalled that he had forgotten to fill it before he left Oasis. He’d had other things on his mind. He’d have to go aft to find some but the prickling on the back of his neck kept him in place. With yoke in hand wondered why he had not been hailed from below.
“Anything on the com?” he asked.
“I’d be sure to let you know,” Eli replied.
She was definitely pouting.
Surely they had some sort of security set up on the planet. He opened his hailing frequencies.
“See if you can raise someone,” he instructed.
“I have,” Eli replied.
“Do it again.”
Next thing you know she…it…was going to expect presents.
“Standard hailing frequencies,” Ruben added. At least he was doing his part. There was no way he could be coming in unannounced.
“Warning,” Eli said. “Unknown craft approaching from below.” A shrill jangle from the com let him know that she…it…wasn’t making it up.
“This is Shooting Star calling the planet Lavign,” Ruben yelled into the com as he punched off the warning beacon. “Repeat Shooting Star calling Lavign. Request landing coordinates.”
Nothing. Ruben did a quick visual of the deepening sky. He was coming in at a glorious sunset. He could just see the curve of the sun dipping over the edge of the planet and the orange-pink brilliance of the sky above it.
It reminded him of Oasis. Clean and pure.
“Are you sure there’s something out there?” he asked.
“Yes. But if you don’t believe me you can check for yourself.”
His com showed a blip. There was another craft out there, somewhere. It should be close enough for a visual but a crafty pilot could hide in the glare from the sun and use it’s reflection as a cloak.
He’d done it himself, many a time….
“Repeat Shooting Star calling planet Lavign. I am unarmed and seeking coordinates for landing.”
No response. The sun, now gone, gave way to a clear black sky.
“Show me the geopoll.” Ruben barked out.
It was a handy tool to have when smuggling, especially when he was trying to avoid interaction with the Senate outposts. Infrared under the three dimensional image showed sparse population of human and animal. The terrain was rolling with mountains showing in the distance. No industry showed of any kind. There were no lights sparkling from below to show the location of a city and no power blip to show an energy source.
The night skies, brightly lit with millions of stars, gave the appearance that he could reach through the plexi and gather a handful to keep. The absence of light below gave the illusion that they were close and tempting, a treasure to be collected.
Maybe he should have done some more research before he took off on his quest to find his brother. It made more sense than just going on his gut…
Another alarm went off with a whoop. “We’ve been locked,” Eli said calmly.
Someone was targeting him. Where was it? What was after him?
Ruben didn’t have time to think about it as the single blip on his screen suddenly split in two. He’d been fired upon. He pulled the Shooting Star into a quick roll to the port side and the ship responded gracefully.
From the corner of his eye Ruben caught a quick flash as the missile passed on by and exploded in the atmosphere. The light from the blast bounced off something solid.
There was another ship out there. His screen showed the blip was somewhere above him.
“My sensors indicate that the other ship is now above us,” Eli said.
“Yeah, I already figured that out sweetheart.”
What he wouldn’t give to have Shaun sitting up in the turret gun right now. The empty co-pilot seat beside him reminded him more of his solitude than he cared to admit. Maybe he should fix it, once this ride was over with.
He flipped on the screen that gave him a visual link with the turret and pushed the yoke forward so the screen was aimed towards the atmosphere above.
He saw it on the screen. The absence of light. The craft that was after him was as black as the night sky. Deliberately. Whoever was flying it did not want it to be seen. . It was a clever idea and would be handy on a cloudy night but tonight when the stars were dazzling in their brilliance the craft blocked them from view.
So what was the problem? If it was planetary defense then why the need for camouflage? They were within their rights to protect their skies from invaders although some might have issue with it.
Kind of hard to argue the point if you were dead however.
The back of his neck told him that it was not planetary defense. Something was going on here. And just maybe it was related to what he…felt…about his brother. He came here looking for answers and obviously someone did not want the questions asked.
“Look for a place to land,” he said.
He needed to get away from his attackers. And he better do it quick before whoever it was figured out that he was about to fly up…
Too late. Ruben caught the impression of a dive but it was hard to track the ship visually once it started its counter measures.
“Warning. Warning. Attack imminent,” Eli said.
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
He should have taken it out when he had the chance. But it wasn’t as if the Shooting Star was a Falcon and fully loaded with armament.
The blip on his screen told him his pursuer was still there, and he’d better do something quick.
Where are you?
Ruben didn’t bother with a visual check as he armed his missiles. All these years and he’d never used them. He never had a reason. Shaun and the turret gun had gotten them out of more scrapes than anything. He couldn’t even say for sure the last time he’d bothered to check the proton chambers.
It was time to make his move. The blip was behind him now and coming fast.
Too fast…Ruben’s curse exploded from his lips at the exact same time that he took the yoke and kicked in a quick burst of hyperion. Another second’s delay and he’d be a meteor shower, falling to the planet below.
The Shooting Star had taken a hit.
He was losing pressure in the cargo bay.
“Pressure leak. Cargo bay.”
Ruben slapped a button on the com. That would shut her up. He didn’t need any help communicating with the Shooting Star. He knew exactly what she was capable of.
“Come on baby,” he urged the ship as he fought for control. He knew the Air was purging behind the sealed doors and also knew that if he’d been in the stratosphere that he would be nothing more than an imploded mass of metal right now.
He was going to have to ditch.
But not without a fight.
The hyperion burst had taken him out of range but not for long. He knew the mysterious dark ship would be closing in on him for the kill.
“I hope you’ve got something left sweetheart.”
Ruben punched the dials on his com. He blew his spare tank, knowing that the gases would form a harmless cerulean cloud in the pristine oxygen of the planet. It would also make his attacker think he was on his last legs, which he was…
So why should I let them…they…it…
Who are these guys?
He couldn’t have more than a few seconds left. Ruben jerked back on the yoke and the Shooting Star pushed her curved nose into the Air.
She’s heavy…
Ruben watched the blip on his screen as he silently urged his craft upwards. He knew he only had one chance before she gave out on him.
NOW!
Ruben threw the lever above his head as his pursuer flew into the cloud, right beneath and behind his position. He felt the shudder as the cargo hold separated from the module that held the cockpit, his personal quarters and the mechanical operations of the Shooting Star.
Like a bomb the hold fell, straight out of the sky, its trajectory right on target.
“Yes!” Ruben whooped as he felt the explosion beneath. It was more than he could hope for.
The answering shudder from the Shooting Star was not part of the celebration. Alarms sounded, more noise to distract him.
“Shut up!” Ruben barked.
It had to be shrapnel. The noise was enough to kill him. If he survived this…
After I survive this…
He was going to do some serious work on his systems. Maybe he should go ahead and take the next step in his voice data. Let Eli talk sexy to him. Maybe even give her a feminine name so she…it…could whisper sweet things to him while he was in cryo.
“You’d be waking up in a state too,” he said out loud as if to assure himself that he was still alive. For the moment. “And there’d be no one available to warm your sheets.”
Yeah, that gave him something to live for…
He didn’t have time to admire the ball of flame that shot up from the ground below as his enemy exploded upon contact.
“Sorry,” Ruben muttered as an apology to the inhabitants below. It was all he could offer at the moment. He had his own crash too avoid.
As if he could. He summoned the geopoll again with the flip of a switch. There was a clearing ahead. Unfortunately it was in the same vicinity as the crash. So now he’d have it to avoid, along with the dense forest and the mountains that took a sudden rise.
“I hope there’s no one out for an evening stroll,” he said.
If there was, they were in for a show. Ruben said a silent prayer as he lowered his emergency landing gear. What was left of the Shooting Star was designed for a quick getaway and a bay landing. Ruben was certain of his skills and knew his craft like he knew his body, but a drop like a stone out of the sky landing was something that he’d never tried before.
He only had one chance to get it right….
“Come on baby,” he urged as he saw the treetops getting closer. If only he could make it to the clearing he had a chance of not ripping her belly out.
He felt the popping of the tree tops as he skirted along and then dropped lower, willing the craft on just by sheer will power.
And then just as suddenly he was there and realized he’d run out of room faster than he thought. He was headed straight for the ball of fire that was all that was left of his enemy.
He jerked her nose up and the engines stalled. The Shooting Star fell to the earth, landing on her tail with a thud before she toppled over.
Ruben catapulted from his chair and slammed against the co-pilots seat before being thrown on the com. Pain exploded in his side and in his ankle as his eyes tried to focus through the plexi on something dark and strange looking huddled on the ground as he felt himself falling towards the earth with his ship. The entire clearing was aglow with the light from the fire but for him, the light was fading fast. The impact of the ship hitting the earth threw him to the deck and the world went dark.

Star-Crossed Lovers

In the latest ROMANTIC TIMES, I read about MaryJanice Davidson's forthcoming mermaid novel. Her heroine is only half mermaid and therefore can appear human and function on land. Romance between mermaids and human men isn't always that easy, though. The heroine of the movie SPLASH magically transformed into an apparently normal woman, but her legs turned into a tail whenever she got wet. The Little Mermaid in Hans Christian Andersen's classic tale made a much rougher choice. She had to sacrifice her voice for legs, and every step felt like walking on knives.

In the absence of magic to transform a mermaid to a human woman (or her lover into a merman), the two would never be able to remain together, since they couldn't survive in each other's natural environments. I've just read a Silhouette Nocturne vampire romance, FROM THE DARK, by Michele Hauf, in which the heroine is a witch. In this fictional world, witches seem to comprise a subspecies of humanity. Witch blood is poisonous to vampires. Therefore, the hero and heroine are kept apart by their biology. Naturally, Hauf devises a way to overcome this barrier.

The Romeo and Juliet scenario, of course, the theme of lovers separated by a deep-rooted antipathy arising from their different backgrounds, is a perennial favorite among romance plots. Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet actually had everything in their favor, aside from that silly family feud. They grew up in the same city, followed the same religion, and sprang from the same socio-economic stratum. If their parents had renounced the enmity between their houses before it was too late, the young couple would probably have enjoyed a successful marriage. Tony and Maria in the modern adaptation, WEST SIDE STORY, have more serious difficulties, coming from rival ethnic groups, but at least they live in the same city at a similar income level. For a truly tragic example of a love affair destroyed by differences in background, look at SOUTH PACIFIC. Both Nellie Forbush and Lt. Cable initially reject the people they love because of racial factors; Nellie's rich planter has fathered half-Polynesian children, and Lt. Cable's innocent Liat is Tonkinese (or possibly half, fathered by another French planter -- the movie doesn't go into details of her background). In James Michener's original book, TALES OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC, Nellie's quandary is more wrenching and her reaction more blatantly racist; her would-be fiance has had multiple children by several mistresses of different races, and Nellie mentally applies the N-word to the Polynesian mistress. The ethnic barrier proves insurmountable for Lt. Cable, who rejects Liat and subsequently gets killed by the Japanese. Nellie comes to realize love is more important than the prejudices she has been "carefully taught," so she achieves a happy ending. To be fair to Lt. Cable, his dilemma really is more difficult than hers. Nellie joined the Navy for adventure and will have little difficulty in setting down new roots as the wife of a planter on a tropical island. In writing home to her family and friends, she can remain vague about her husband's previous "marriage." Lt. Cable would have to choose between abandoning his career and family to "go native" or taking poor Liat back to Philadelphia to face the contempt of his upper-middle-class social circle. Michener's short novel SAYONARA portrays a still worse scenario, a tragic love between an American soldier and his Japanese wife, whose marriage makes them outcast from both cultures. Their suicide affects the protagonist, an American officer also serving in occupied Japan, so deeply that he is forced to embrace his own love for a Japanese woman despite the cultural obstacles.

But suppose a hero and heroine come from such radically different worlds, literally, that they can't possibly form a romantic union? To produce a happy ending rather than a tragedy from this kind of plot, the author has to find a method of overcoming the barrier between them that doesn't look like a cop-out. This is a difficulty I often wrestle with in writing paranormal romances: If the obstacles keeping the lovers apart are convincingly serious, how can I invent a convincing solution to bring them together without, effectively, leaping over the crisis and starting the next scene with the equivalent of "once I got out of that pit..."?

Invective and Elimination -- soooo Romantic

Folks:

The last two posts here are very typical of what writers in general spend their time thinking about -- invective (or anthropology and linguistics) and Elimination (or The Five Life Functions that define what is alive and what is not).

But what's that got to do with Romance, alien or otherwise?

Ah, but what is romance?

Do you suppose Romance is the 6th "Life Function" -- that all living things (even retro-viruses) do something during sex (or asexual reproduction) that pertains more to the spiritual dimension that the physical?

In fact, would anyone agree that Romance has nothing to do with sex?

It might be postulated that in many ways, Romance has little if anything to do with Relationship. It's possible to be catapulted into the state called "In Love" without the other person responding in kind. Being "In Love" (receptive to Romance) is a very personal thing, not necessarily shared.

I think on this blog we call an Alien Romance blog, we haven't paused in our headlong discussion to define ROMANCE, nevermind alien.

So what exactly is Romance?

Is it perhaps a state of mind in which an individual is capable of putting aside their personal, ego-centered individuality, blurring or softening the shell around "self" and joining with "other" and through "other" joining with the whole universe? Is "Romance" the joining with the Ineffable?

Is Romance a spiritual state or process in which a higher union is possible - a kind of union which actually isn't very functional in our everyday reality (people "in love" aren't usually very productive at work) - a kind of union which feeds the spirit rather than the body?

And if the spirit is a thing that needs "feeding" -- (i.e. participates in the Life Function called Nutrition) - is it possible that feeding the spirit is as necessary for the continuance of Life as the other 5 "Life Functions"?

We say that when we die, the spirit leaves the body.

What happens when the spirit dies?

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/

Part Deux: Swearing in Alien Tongues

Is everything okay?

An innocuous question; one posed daily, if not hourly in our society. Yet several years ago, answering that question almost put a friend of mine in the midst of a full-blown melee.

You see, he was in a restaurant in a foreign country and was asked by the restaurant owner (via an interpreter) if “…everything (meal, wine, service) was okay.”

Not being fluent in the local language, my friend responded by making the good ol' American 'okay' sign: his thumb and index finger forming a circle, the other three fingers extended.

As the proprietor bellowed and tables almost overturned, my friend realized he'd evidently made a big mistake. He had. In his present locale, that hand gesture was synonymous for a lower body orifice, and not a pleasant orifice at that.

For all intents and purposes, he'd just called his host an…well, you know what he'd called him.

When I write my science fiction romance novels, I think about things like that. Not lower body orifices, mind you. I think about what we in this country, on the planet, deem as insulting. And how that might translate to the culture I've built for my novels.

The first lesson I've learned from the above example is that profanity is not planet-wide. What's okay in America may well be a reason to riot in Rio. Though admittedly, it was what the gesture stood for, and not the gesture itself, that was found so offensive.

Which brings me to the question I always ask myself when I'm world building: Self, what would this alien culture find offensive, and why?

It's rather a nice question to ask yourself as well, as you embark on your SF&F world building. Because answering it will make your worlds and your characters that much more complete, that much more alive to your readers.

In general, those that reside on this planet we call Earth find the following categories offensive and fertile fodder for foul language: blaspheming a revered deity, excrement, sexual acts, illegitimacy, body parts relating to excrement and sexual activity, and sexual activity with culturally unacceptable participants, including oneself.

All fairly obvious and self-explanatory to us here on Earth (and if you want to explore the matter further, the tome most oft cited is Geoffrey Hughes' Swearing: A Social History of Foul Language, Oaths and Profanity in English, Penguin USA). But we're not writing about here on Earth. We're writing about Rigel-V and Tatooine and the Skolian Empire and Moabar. Or maybe the Vash Nadah or the Khalar.

So we need to understand what those people in those places value, or don't, in order to understand how they swear.

Couldn't they value the same things we do? Sure. But why stop there? Moreover, why would they value exactly the same things we do? If the fictional culture you're creating is a carbon copy of Freehold, New Jersey set but set on the planet Gryck-2, then, in my humble opinion, you're cheating your readers. People don't read SF because they want to be immersed in the common. They read it to explore the uncommon.

If you read C.J. Cherryh's Chanur series, you'll see that one of the most common insults the feline race known as the Hani has is to call another Hani “an earless bastard.” And it isn't the bastardy that's the serious part of the insult—it’s the earless-ness. Ears, and the adornment of ears, are symbolic of success. (Being owned by cats myself, I can confirm that ears and tails are sources of great pride.)

So what does your fantasy or sci fi culture hold dear, and what do they disdain?

If parentage is taken lightly, then calling someone a bastard will most likely not be effective (this is true of some aboriginal cultures here on this planet). If there are no restrictions on sexual practices or partners, then perhaps your character could start a fistfight by calling the bad guy a monogamist.

How would those who spend their lives in the space lanes—perhaps are even born in space—view those who've never left the planet? “Dirtsuckers” is a term I've used derisively in my books, showing a prejudice by the space-born against the planet-born.

The entire issue of prejudice fueled the culture, and many of the insults, in my Gabriel's Ghost. The Taka are a furred race that, for the most part, work only in the lowest-paying and demeaning jobs. Prejudice against them, by humanoids, is common in the world of Captain Chasidah Bergren and Gabriel Ross Sullivan:

Sully stepped up to the worker. “Pardon, brother. We seek a Takan brother with urgent family news.”

The man barely glanced at Sully as he ran his hand through his thinning hair in an exasperated motion. Chatter still came from the podium speaker.

“What’s that? Hang on, I got some religious guy here needs to find a furry.”

The term 'furry', inoffensive to us, is a slur here.

But the Takas aren't the only species looked down upon in Gabriel's Ghost, as Chaz knows when she's speaking to Captain Philip Guthrie:

[Guthrie]: “No. The Farosians. With a Stolorth Ragkiril. We know that. How you would get involved with them, how you would get involved with that I cannot understand.”

‘That’ meant a Stolorth. A Fleet-issue sentiment of disgust.

As readers of Gabriel's Ghost learn, Stolorths are feared. Takas are simply dismissed as lesser beings. But both are recipients of prejudice, and often out of prejudice are insults born.

Blasphemy is born out of devotion. What gods or goddesses do your characters revere? What edicts has their religion placed on them? Is there a place, like hell, that your characters long to send their enemies? Or, if your characters are star-travelers, is it sufficient simply to sneer, "Oh, go suck dirt!" in order to be insulting?

A caution on using invented words: Oh, grzzbft! tends to sound more comical than threatening to English-acclimated ears. That doesn't mean you can't utilize your alien language in order to create alien profanity. Just try to anchor it to something the reader can identify with—an alien word or concept already used in the story, for example. Or use the 'comparative' method I noted in my previous article on constructing alien languages.

I used both methods in my upcoming Games of Command—which is, by the way, considerably lighter in tone than Gabriel's Ghost—so I wasn't quite as worried about the giggle factor:

She heard the smart click of the cabin door lock recycling. She dove under the desk, fitting her small form into the kneehole, and shoved her com badge down the front of her shirt. If it beeped now, she was toast.

Cabin lights flicked on. Heavy footsteps moved across the carpeted floor as the door swooshed closed.

Damn! Shit! Sonofabitch! Sass ran through every swearword she knew in five languages. Frack! Grenzar! Antz-k’ran! Trock!

And

“I’d love to launch a raftwide mullytrock, but then we’d have every other damned jockey in straps burning bulkheads. ’Course, that would work too. RaftTraff wouldn’t know which one of us to send the sec tugs after first.”

Mullytrock. Definitely Lady Sass. He remembered Ralland at fourteen getting his mouth washed out with soap for saying that.

Don't ignore the foul-language factor when creating your world. Take some time to see how and why and when we on this planet swear and integrate that knowledge with your alien or fantasy culture. Your readers--and your characters--will thank you. After all, your heroine does need something appropriate to say when she drops a sonic-wrench on her toe.

~Linnea
www.linneasinclair.com

Worldbuilding with my head in a bathroom fixture

Did we ever seen anyone go to the toilet on Star Trek (TM)?

I mean that in all sincerity and with the greatest of respect,
and in the best possible taste.

Jacqueline's first rate posting about servants has stimulated me to
consider other necessary matters that world leaders would like to do
--or get done-- silently, invisibly, without fuss or flap.

Snort!

Once upon a time, the King of a large, modern, Western country
came to visit one of a major auto-maker's design facilities. Both the Gents' and Ladies' bathrooms on one floor were closed to the public and reserved for their visiting Majesties' exclusive convenience.

As I recall the tale as it was told to me, their Majesties availed themselves of the opportunity (Royalty always goes when the opportunity presents itself, or is respectfully presented), took the entire entourage in with them (the host had assumed that the entourage would wait outside, and go afterwards), and conversation continued uninterrupted by any acknowledgement whatsoever that the setting was temporarily less formal.

My source has completely forgotten ever telling me this. He says I imagined it. I never forget a good potty story (but I do have strange dreams).

Bathroom scenes are part of my world building. The logistics of necessity are important to my fashionista heroine when she is marooned on a previously uninhabited island in INSUFFICIENT MATING MATERIAL. She warms up to the hero considerably when he takes the time to fashion a decent toilet seat for her.

There are bathroom fixtures I've considered that would probably never get past an editor of romances. Just like only villains in Regency romances have bad breath, no one breaks wind in a spaceship, and there is no mechanism to deal with a problem that even aliens ought to have... I would have thought.

It's simply not heroic to back up to an interior, miniature porthole.

If water might be a precious commodity in outer space, much might be done with suction and air pressure (I suppose). Also recycling. One has to think of physics, and chemistry, and gravity, and logistics.

Assuming that all romantic aliens are humanoid... now I pause to think of the alien who kept his genitals in his knee caps... and if one could eliminate waste through ones feet, that could be convenient, depending where one lived, but again, it would not be romantic.

I've never been sure about fictional bathrooms on spaceships that appear out of nowhere at the push of a button. Walls move. Space is created with no discernable impact on the size of the living area. Solid bathroom fixtures appear. How? Is the bathroom like Dr. Who's Tardis? I could accept a shower, but not a jacuzzi, I guess. But, then, I am not a plumber.

Why push a button? What about a Clap-On Crapper? What fun if the alien-romance's human heroine were to clap her hands in delight over some unrelated matter, and the toilet would shoot out of the walls, slosh and retreat, and reappear until she had the wit to stop clapping!

Can any reader point me in the direction of a well designed alien loo?

Best wishes,
Rowena
http://romanceatheart.com/interview/rowenacherry.html

Shooting Star

Here's an exerpt from my December release Shooting Star.
It was parade day. It was also his birthday. The boy, impatient with the maid who dressed him, broke away from her constant straightening and list of instructions and ran through the luxuriously appointed apartment to his mother’s room.
His little brother was there, clinging to her skirts with his thumb stuck deep into his mouth as always. The boy’s face brightened at the sight of his older brother.
“Ben!” he said in his baby voice as he popped his thumb out and then back in.
Their mother gently touched the golden brown hair of the boy at her side and then removed his hand so she could kneel to welcome the older son.
“Happy Birthday Ben,” she said and swept her son into a warm hug.
“Is the parade really for me mother?” Ben asked.
“Yes. Your father and the people want to honor the day of your birth,” she said.
No need to tell the boy that it just an excuse for his father to placate the people and give them another show of his strength. With twenty-one sons, all of which were to be held in high esteem by the population, there was a constant celebration and parade through the streets of the capital.
“You’re father will come for you and honor you on this day,” the mother continued as she checked to make sure that the innocent face before her was clean and the clothing was appropriate. His eyes, so blue, looked up at her with childish excitement. She straightened a wayward curl over his forehead.
Not that it really mattered what the boy looked like. His father, the esteemed leader of their world, would stop at the appropriate place and display the boy before the people. He would be announced as the twelfth heir to the throne. This day only his mother would recognize the insignificant ranking of her son’s birth. She was nothing but a lesser wife who was gifted to the emperor by her father as part of a peace treaty. Her youthful beauty and grace were prominently displayed at the time. She was welcomed into the emperor’s bed, compliantly did her duty and then gifted him with another son.
Perhaps if she had given him a daughter it would have been a novelty and she would have earned a higher place in the order of wives.
Instead she bore another son in a long succession of sons. He was another trophy to the never ending greatness and sexual prowess of the emperor. And because the emperor had noticed her son do something exceptional one day during his warrior training the emperor was pleased and graced the almost forgotten wife with a visit and as the result another son, Stefan Andreas, was borne and declared the twentieth heir to the throne. And another wife had given him number twenty one. There would probably be more. Why even bother to count them after the heir and the spare both born to the same wife. The first wife. The honored wife.
“Did you have your breakfast?” she asked. It would be a long day for the boy. An exciting day.
“Yes mother.
“Good.” She smiled at him. He face held the promise of masculine good looks. The softness of childhood was giving way to the angles and planes of manhood. He had the same look as her brother, dead these many years, with his hair of golden brown and his bright blue eyes. And young Stefan looked just like him also.
How dear her brother, Stefanas’s, memory was to her after his death so many years ago in the planetary wars. His loss had devastated her father and the result was the treaty and her life as a gift to the conqueror of their planet.
“It’s time to go,” the mother said. She took Ben’s hand into hers and with the other took the hand of his brother and led them to the balcony that over looked the main thoroughfare of the capital city.
In the distance the shield wall that protected the capital could be seen. It shimmered beneath the assault of the two suns that were at their zenith in the bright yellow sky. The people were grateful for the shield wall; it protected them from their enemies. They were also grateful for the strength of their emperor and his armies. After all, without him they would be at the mercy of the universe.
Or so the emperor told them.
All the wives gathered on the common balcony that faced the street. Their apartments were all linked together by the balcony on one side and a private courtyard on the other. They all came forth, dressed in their best, with their children at their sides. All came forth to celebrate the birthday of son number twelve, Rubikhan Benjamin, born to the mighty emperor and his fourth wife, the Princess Rowena of the Planet Kalember.
The banners proclaimed it. The heralds proclaimed it. The broadcasters proclaimed it, placing the proper spin on all of it for those who were unfortunate enough to have to watch from their homes. The emperor is great. The emperor is strong. Long live the emperor.
“Doesn’t the emperor look great?”
“Isn’t the Princess Rowena beautiful, even if she is getting on in years?”
“How handsome the young Prince is growing.” The very image of his father. Or so they were told to report. All of the young prince’s were the image of their father. Thus his difficulty in telling them apart the broadcaster thought to herself. No room for such rebellion. Not if she wanted to succeed. She read the script as it ran across the screen before her.
“The young Prince is now twelve years old. It is reported by his tutors that the Prince Rubikhan Benjamin is exceptional in all of his classes, especially his weapons training. He has a natural ability that astounds those that watch him.” The broadcaster checked her screen to as the last sentence that she read seemed different than the usual rote that she was required to repeat at each birthday. Yes, she had read correctly. A sentence had been added. The young prince must be exceptional to have something different added to his publicity release.
“We look forward to seeing him lead our warriors someday,” she went off the routine script with a genuine smile.
The camera’s focused on the balcony and the women and children gathered there. Seven wives and twenty sons all lined up. They were all there but the eldest. He had moved on to be with his father a long time ago.
Rowena and her sons occupied the second apartment. She was second in political ranking only to the first wife. The first wife had given the emperor his heir and three other sons. Her fourth son was only a few weeks younger than Ben. The boy looked at Ben with his pale, sour face. Could he be jealous? He had his own honors coming in just a few weeks after all. Rowena took a half step forward to shelter her son from the vicious looks coming his way while she tried to remember the boys name.
Dyson. His name was Dyson. Chubby cheeks, weak blue eyes and white blonde hair. How could she forget his name? Was it because he looked so much like his mother?
“Look Mother,” Ben said.
The heralds were passing, carrying banners with her son’s name. Next there was a hover pod with a soldier on board. He was being honored for some great accomplishment. Rowena stole a look at the great monitor hanging on the side of one of the buildings. It showed a close up of the soldier with the subtitles of his feats. The soldier seemed bored as he slowly drove the small hover craft down the street lined with wildly cheering patrons. But he did wave to the crowd, which drove the gathered mob into frenzied screams of celebration.
Next there were the various officers and the current top celebrities. It was getting close to the arts awards day. The top runners were all on open hover pods, wearing their best smiles as they blew kisses to the crowd. One especially handsome actor flashed his famous smile and the women gathered along the street below screamed in appreciation at the treat.
“Where’s my father?” Ben asked. Impatient as always, he stepped closer to the balcony’s edge and looked towards his father’s residence, ignoring the honorees that were lined up right below his nose. Dyson stepped forward also, blocking Ben’s view.
Rowena’s face remained composed. She would not show her aggravation with the child. Since they were close in age he shared a tutor with Ben and it had become a competition instead of a class.
Rowena had advised Ben to let it be. It would pass. The boy’s dishonesty would show itself, just as his mother’s had, at least to the other wives. She had born the heir. Why did she always feel the need to remind them of it?
“He’ll be here,” Rowena assured him.
How many times had Ben actually seen his father? Twenty, maybe that she could remember. There was never a time when the boy had been with him, one on one. It had always been in passing. There would be a comment on his growth, a question about his studies and the typical urging to keep the boy’s focus where it should be.
Today would be different however. Today Ben was twelve and he would get to go with his father to the governmental palaces and share dinner with him while his father told him his plans for the future. He would be introduced to the powerful on the planet. He would be honored by all who came into his presence.
Today would be different. Her son was special. Rowena knew it. She had watched him, taught him, he would excel. He would be noticed. He would earn his place by his father’s side. He would accomplish great things. He would see the things that needed to be changed and he would change them.
After today, things would be different.
Rowena bent over Ben’s shoulder and inconspicuously pointed towards the east.
“There he is,” she said into his ear. Ben’s hands tightened on the balcony rail, his knuckles white with the strength of his grip.
How could the emperor be missed? His hover pod was, of course, riding higher than the rest. It was bigger, as expected; it needed to be because of the body guards, the huge black newfs that never left the emperor’s presence and the personal driver. The sides of the hover pod were covered with clear plexi to protect the esteemed leader of the people and the top was covered with an ornate crown like molding, indicative of the high position of its passenger. It was hard to see exactly who was inside but Rowena knew who it was. Who else could it be?
The heralds stopped below the balcony. Soldiers and security officers lined up. The stairs were cleared. The hover pod stopped and the emperor stepped out onto the platform that had been placed there, just for that purpose.
He waved to the cheering crowd and proceeded up the steps with the two huge newfs following. An assistant brought up the rear. Under his arm he carried a large clear celpad and stylus, which was no doubt the only way he could keep track of all the details of the day.
The emperor looked dashing yet elegant in his uniform. A man for the people. The protector of the planet. A loving father intent on visiting his son.
Rowena placed her hands on Ben’s shoulders and without a word he stepped back, holding himself at attention as he’d been taught. They waited for his father.
The emperor waved to the crowd once more as he found the summit of the stairs. He took a few steps and then stopped. The newfs quickly sat down behind their master, patiently waiting for the next subtle command.
Ben’s father stopped in front of Dyson.
“So you are turning twelve?” he said.
“Yes sir,” Dyson responded with a bright smile. It wasn’t a lie. He was turning twelve. In just a few days.
Ben’s shoulders tensed under her hands. Rowena squeezed her fingers over the tense muscles. Patience my son…Rowena’s eyes darted towards the assistant who stood at attention behind the emperor and implored him with her lovely blue eyes.
The man shrugged his shoulders after he checked his celpad.
Dyson’s mother’s face held a self satisfied smile.
He has the wrong child…
Who would dare to point that out? Who among this was brave enough to risk their lives to tell the emperor that he had made a mistake in front of the entire population?
Surely he would realize his mistake? If Dyson had any honor he would tell it himself. If Dyson’s mother was the woman she pretended to be, she would and could smooth it over and turn it into a victory for the emperor. Not only did he care for Rubikhan Benjamin but he cared for Dyson, whatever his other name was, also. It would and could endear him to the people. Why didn’t she see it?
Because it was her son being noticed. Not Rowena’s. Why was she so vindictive? It wasn’t as if Rowena got any of his attention. She was long forgotten, as she had hoped to be. She couldn’t stand the man. The thought of him sickened her. Yes he was handsome, yes he was strong, and yes he was seductive. But he was also a shallow pool, without even so much as a ripple given out towards those who should be close to him.
Rowena didn’t dare make a sound lest she seem jealous, or weak. She had to remain strong and without emotion. It was the only way they would survive the day. It was the only way they could survive the rest of their lives. They could not show emotion. Doing so would only weaken their position and their position was tenuous at best. Did not the man even know who had mothered which child? Could he not recognize the mother at least and then conclude the son?
Politics ran deep in the colony of wives, just as it did everywhere else in the universe.
“Then let us go then and celebrate,” the emperor said. He took Dyson’s hand and led him to the rail. He lifted their joint hands together in a signal of victory. The crowd seemed confused but cheered as they always did.
They had no choice in that.
Hand and hand the two went down the steps to the hover pod with the canines and the assistant following, as they always did.
Rowena felt the trembling of Ben’s muscles beneath her hands.
It didn’t show. His posture remained impassive and his gaze focused on the crowd below.
Be strong my son…
They remained so, all of them on the balcony until the hover pod disappeared from sight in its continuation of the parade.
There were looks of sympathy from the lesser wives. There was a smile of victory on the first wife’s face. They all moved inside until all that remained on the balcony was Rowena, Ben and Stefan.
A servant, quietly sympathetic, took Stefan inside.
“I don’t understand,” Ben said finally as the first sun dipped behind their building, creating long shadows that contrasted greatly against the orange hue of the sky. “It’s my
birthday,” he continued with a sigh.
“He made a mistake,” Rowena said. The all powerful, all knowing, had made a mistake.
“Doesn’t he know me? Doesn’t he know who I am?”
How could she explain it? How do you tell a boy that his father doesn’t really care? That it’s all for show, and pageantry and pomp. There was only one son that concerned him. The heir, which even now had his own room close to his father so that he may learn best how to rule.
“You and Dyson are close in age. Perhaps he got the dates confused.”
“But my name is everywhere,” Ben pointed out. “He would have to know it is my birthday, not Dyson’s.”
Not if he didn’t know the difference between them. And not only did he not know who was who, but his assistant didn’t know either. After all, he had been the one whispering in the emperor’s ear.
Justifying it didn’t excuse it. A father should know his sons. He should know all of them.
Rowena didn’t know what to say.
“Why didn’t you tell him it was me?” Ben asked. He took a step forward, removing himself from contact with his mother. Her hands reached for him, then dropped as Ben stepped to the balcony rail and gripped it once more.
A gentle breeze, herald of the coming sunset ruffled the banners that proclaimed his name. Even now they were being removed from the parade route, the workers busily efficient so that nothing of this day would remain. After all they had to prepare for the next one. They had to get ready for Dyson’s.
“You didn’t tell him,” Ben said. His voice cracked on the words. Whether from emotion, or just the fact that he had begun the change into manhood, Rowena couldn’t tell. The shoulders remained straight and the spine rigid as the boy looked out over the street.
I didn’t tell him…

Differences or Defects?

Recently Gallaudet University, a distinguished college for the deaf in Maryland, revoked the contract of its prospective president partly because she learned American Sign Language in adulthood instead of early childhood. Many leaders in the deaf community regard deafness as a unifying characteristic of a subculture, rather than a disability. If I understand their position correctly, as a matter of ideological principle they object to the privileging of lip reading over sign language and the automatic assumption that all deaf children should, if possible, undergo surgery to enable them to hear. (I'm not sure whether this principle applies only to people born deaf or also those who lose their hearing at an early age.)

I'm reminded of H. G. Wells' classic story "The Country of the Blind," a riff on the proverb, "In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." Just the opposite proves true for the sighted protagonist from the outside world stranded in an isolated community of people whose eyes atrophied generations ago. Since they are active at night, when it's cool, and sleep in the heat of the day, the hero loses whatever advantage his sight would have given him. Instead, the blind people think he is deranged when he talks about "seeing." They decide the strange lumps ("eyes") under his brows cause delusions by pressure on his brain. In this environment sight, not blindness, is a disability.

The Gallaudet case, like Wells' story, highlights the problem of distinguishing between a disability and a value-neutral difference. Left-handedness used to be viewed as a defect; left-handed children were retrained in school to use their right hands. If dogs had human intelligence, they would consider us profoundly disabled because our noses are so feeble compared to theirs. If dolphins could talk, they might express pity for our near-deafness in being unable to hear ultrasonics.

Suppose a race of aliens settled on Earth, beings similar to our species but communicating through telepathy? They would consider us defective or disabled for our lack of telepathy. If a device or surgical procedure existed to make human beings telepathic, people who rejected this gift might be regarded as foolish and pitiable. Yet some people might refuse telepathy on principle as undermining their uniquely human culture.

More immediately plausible, what will happen when advanced genetic engineering becomes commonplace? As many SF authors have speculated, those who choose not to have themselves or their offspring "improved" might be treated as inferior, even subjected to social and financial penalties (e.g., inability to buy health insurance). A recent story in the MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION envisions a future when an immortality drug is readily available. Those who refuse the treatment are viewed as outcasts. Furthermore, if they choose to bear children (the immortality drug causes sterility), they become criminals, because of course a world of immortals has no space for additional people, and therefore reproducing is illegal.

Normality, difference, disability—where do we draw the distinctions?

Eye of the Beholder/ Place of the Servant

Folks:

EYE OF THE BEHOLDER

Linnea made a very important point in the blog entry before this one.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

When I saw the title, I thought surely she would address the recent comment by a Moslem cleric in Australia that the rape victim is to blame, not the rapist. But she went in another, perhaps even more important, direction.

Because we've been raised in a visually oriented society -- even before we got our first TV set, there were comics and a weekly trip to the movies! -- we tend to adopt as our personal yardstick the standards promulgated by the media.

Humans are hardwired to "belong" -- to mark ourselves as part of some group or other for protection and emotional support. One way we do that is to adopt whatever crazy nonsense the group has agreed on as our own personal philosophy.

Once a group has formed such a shared belief or standard, that standard persists for generations. That's why it's a good thing that youth rejects everything their parents treasure, then re-adopts certain select beliefs in their 30's forming the new establishment their children have to reject.

By successive approximations, we should eventually generate some yardsticks that really work.

Well, that process has, in another part of the world that is out-breeding my kind, produced a shared and solemnly believed system which STILL believes the victim is the cause of violence.

Europe for thousands of years, and the US until recently, actually did believe that. To us, today in our modern society, the idea that the victim is the cause of violence is ridiculous, dangerous and offensive.

Why have we changed? I submit that the modern Romance Novel (including AR) is a contributing factor in promulgating a value system (not originating or conceptualizing, but promulgating) in which Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder.

If it is true that Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder, then the idea that a rape victim is the cause of rape becomes something so absurd it can't be addressed in words.

What stirs a rapist to violence? (thousand novel premises in that, especially AR premises!)

If Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then perhaps that which is so reprehensible that it must be punished, dominated, denigrated, and destroyed is also in the eye of the beholder?

And we enter the murkly realms of subjectivity where anyone's opinion is as reliable as anyone else's.

Where are the objective yardsticks in human life? (I have a few answers. I suppose you have your own.) These are story-generating questions.

Before I saw Linnea's provocative post, I wanted to talk about another subjective experience that has to be shared to become useful -- one that is very often a vital ingredient in really hot romance.

THE PLACE OF THE SERVANT

Most of us haven't grown up surrounded by servants. We've all read a lot of Regency Romances and historicals where "servants" are a dynamic plot element. And we've seen THE BRADY BUNCH and HART TO HART and other shows where domestic help becomes "part of the family".

So we have an image of "The Servant" that is not real, not tactile. In the USA we had "slaves" to perform "servant's work" for a while, and then rejected the entire "slavery" concept. But there are a lot of romance novels set in that era that are important reading experiences.

There are two ideas to "The Servant" lurking in the eye of the "un-served" beholder: that the servant was "looked down on" -- a member of a lower class, someone you don't mix with, or sit at table with (DRIVING MISS DAISY); that the servant did work that is inherently degrading, or "minimum wage grunt work" not worthy of The Master.

I'd like to relate two personal experiences -- let you look through the eye of this beholder.

I learned the meaning of SERVICE in a very personal and tactile way through these two experiences.

At one very high profile convention full of celebrity speakers, I was classed as a celebrity and provided with FIRST CLASS "service". I had a "lady's maid" who chose, touch-up ironed, and laid out what I was to wear that day, and prepared the bathroom for my shower at night so I didn't ever have to think a thought about CLOTHING or APPEARANCE. I just ignored that entire part of "life."

I had a "personal gofer" (like a secretary) to keep track of where I needed to be when, who I had appointments with, press conferences, speeches, everything to do with moving me from place to place - and even providing food, and refreshments. This was a couple cuts above the usual fan-gofer assigned by some conventions to speakers. It was a completely different EXPERIENCE OF REALITY.

The other experience that drove that lesson in good and hard was a time when I was invited to participate in a Think Tank meeting with an international figure.

The meeting was held at a prominent New York Men's Club (this was before it was illegal to bar women; they had an absolute rule there, no WOMEN. But my driver and I got in because we had these really high class engraved invitations.)

We weren't allowed into the "smoking room" but got to look in because at that moment no one was there. Goshwow. We were escorted to the depths of the plush and silent building, a thousand lightyears from the throbbing din of Manhattan's streets.

So we got to the meeting room in the back -- picture the President's Cabinette meeting room. It was like that. Mahogany table a mile long, carpets ankle deep, drapes from Buckingham Palace, Original Oil Paintings belonging in a museum, ever-so-tasteful lighting. A silence so deep you could disappear into it.

I must have lived like that in a prior life. It was the first time in this existence that I actually felt totally at home!

But the tangible shock came during the meeting when the wait staff served coffee and refreshments.

This wait staff was 100 cuts above the folks who helped me out at the convention. These guys were PROS -- top of the top. I've never encountered anyone like them since, and I've been in some hoity-toity places and been served with white gloves, towel over the arm, waiters wearing suits I couldn't afford!

What happened? What did I learn?

Nothing happened. And that's what I learned -- the VALUE of nothing.

The coffee orders were taken without interupting the flow of conversation around the table. The exact correct order (beyond top quality) appeared somehow before me -- I never saw or heard or felt or was aware of the men moving behind the row of chairs at the table.

Refills appeared just as magically.

The crockery was taken away just as silently. It was there. It was gone. NOTHING ATTRACTED ATTENTION AWAY FROM THE CONVERSATION.

It was a stunning experience. A tactile experience. My beholding eye was never the same after that.

In both instances, I discovered that when the trivia of mundane existence is lifted away, productivity goes up a thousand fold.

I discovered just how much output-potential is wasted on the fiddling around in daily life -- and when that is gone, all that output-potential focuses on the job in hand and suddenly huge, complex, amazing accomplishments become EASY. And more, things get done right that would, without that Servant, have been done wrong or not-so-good.

I learned that it isn't a waste of our tax dollars to hire the BEST White House Staff servants.

But more than that. I learned that The Servant is not a lower being, not someone exploited, not a lower class person, not something separate from The Job At Hand.

The Servant contributes to the success of The Job At Hand, is an essential and integral part of the accomplishment. Without that utter INVISIBILITY, the silent step, the careful rhythm of movement, the intense precision of that service, The Job At Hand (in my case a Think Tank fact-finding briefing) could not have been done with such effectiveness.

If that's true of such a small thing as that meeting -- or the convention where the same thing happened -- imagine how very great the effect has to be on International Affairs?

Or Interstellar Affairs.

It is this aspect of Service that I've found missing in many Romance novels. The real REASON for the existence of "Service" and what great talent and training it takes to succeed at the profession of "Service."

I think that missing ingredient is the result of the authors themselves never having experienced being SERVED at that tremendously high level. Or having taken lessons (gosh where would you go to get that kind of training?) in how to SERVE at that extreme level of society.

QUESTION: could machines, even R. Daneel Olivau, ever produce that "relieved of mundane trivia" effect? Is it just that the thing got done for you -- or is it that it was done by a human being who knows how to mute or bury his/her psychic signature?

And I do think that's the key to the 100 times more impressive Service at the Men's Club -- that's what those waiters did. They muted their psychic signatures. They were not "presences" in the room. They checked their personalities at the door.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/

Eye of the Beholder

First of all, I know that's somewhat the title of a really great Julie E Czerneda book, but that's not what I'm going to blog about today. Rather, I'm going to yammer on about the perception (misperception?) that romance novels are peopled with flawlessly beautiful and handsome characters.

I can tell you that mine aren't but there may be several of you who then squirm in your seats, thrusting impatient hands in the air like a bad imitation of Arnold Horshack from Welcome Back Kotter (am I showing my age here?), anxious to point out to me that Captain Trilby Elliot made no bones about the fact that she found Rhis attractive. Or that Admiral Branden Kel-Paten was so smitten by Tasha Sebastian that he wrote her love letters for nigh on ten years or more.

And my answer to you would be: So?

The fact that two characters in my books might find each other irresistible does not unequivocally mean either is a candidate for a fashion model career. It just means that two characters in my books found each other irresistible. Period. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Don't assume (and you all do know what they say about ASSUME, don't you?) that irresistibility means perfection. I happen to know more than one long time married couple who still gaze longingly into each other's eyes...and none of them would qualify to grace the cover of Cosmo. Or GQ.

Because beauty is, you see, in the eye of the beholder.

What I strive to do in the romance parts of my books is also bring the reader to understand all the other factors that make one character appealing to another: belief systems, personality, bravery, loyalty, sense of humor... it's all part of the package. In fact, I've even had my characters comment on occasion that yes, they know of others who are physically more attractive than the hero/heroine. But it's all of the elements of that person that make him or her beautiful to the other.

So just as we're often cautioned to not judge a book by its cover, don't (pre)judge my characters by whatever stereotypical misinformation you've heard about the romance, or science fiction romance, genre. Open the book and get to know the characters for yourselves--with all their faults and foibles that make them, yes, very beautiful.

~Linnea

Insufficient Mating Material (excerpt)

Insufficient Mating Material
by
Rowena Cherry

copyright Rowena Cherry

ISBN 0-505-52711-1; LoveSpell 1/31/07


All rights reserved.
This uncorrected excerpt may contain errors and other text not found in the final printed novel and is not for sale. Please don’t share the text with anyone without first receiving permission from the author to do so.


Damn them! Prince Djetthro-Jason eyed the masked males and the unpleasant array of implements they were preparing to use on him.

I haven't told them everything, and I'm not about to. No way am I going to invite anyone to take a laser to my privates. Ahhh, Fewmet!

The "battlefield analgesia" was wearing off. During the duel that he'd begun as Commander Jason and ended--defeated--as Prince Djetthro-Jason, he'd felt almost no pain despite the damage Tarrant-Arragon had inflicted.

Now, his massively bruised thigh throbbed heavily, his neck muscles ached, and his jaw...it hurt even to think about his jaw. Perhaps worse--but less so by the moment--was the damage to his alpha-male machismo as he lay strapped down, stark naked, in his enemy's operating theater, preparing his mind for surgery without anesthetic. Also for "the fate worse than death" which was to come.

If Tarrant-Arragon had observed Great Djinn tradition, the duel they'd fought less than an hour ago ought to have been to the death.

Why hadn't Tarrant-Arragon killed him then and there? To the victor went the Empire, the Ark Imperial, and gods-Right to any female he wanted...and they both wanted the same female.

Damn it! Even if he wanted to stop, I should've fought on after he crippled my leg and shattered my bloody jaw. Why didn't I? What's left for me?

What indeed?

I'll be the Djinn equivalent of a broken thoroughbred stallion put out to stud. It's fairly obvious why Tarrant-Arragon made an excuse not to finish me off.

The Great Djinn were nearly extinct. In twenty years' time, Tarrant-Arragon's and Djinni-vera's children would need true-Djinn mates, all entitled to the silent D-prefix to their royal Djinn names. That's why!

When the "fate worse than death" had been spelled out, it had been sheer bravado to mumble that he wanted to marry Princess Martia-Djulia.

Maybe I do. Maybe I don't.

It hurt how much he still wanted Djinni-vera, who'd been the last Djinn virgin in all the Communicating Worlds, and betrothed to be his, until Tarrant-Arragon abducted her by force and took her virginity.

What consolation would it be to have Tarrant-Arragon's sexy, fashionista bitch of a sister in his power and in his bed instead?

Djetth winced at the savagery of his thoughts about Martia-Djulia. Shards of pain shot along his broken jawline.

"Well, Djetthro-Jason, are you ready to be carved up for your new identity and your new life as my little sister's glorified love slave?"

From somewhere out of Djetth's line of sight, Tarrant-Arragon taunted him, stressing the part of Djetth's real name that he'd used until his cover as "Commander Jason" was blown and he was overpowered and arrested.

Djetth did not turn his head. The pain in his face and head was intolerable enough without moving.

"Ahhh, I do believe that Our Imperial surgeons are ready to do away with that distinctive jagged scar on your cheek," Tarrant-Arragon crooned. "And screw together your jaw."

What else might they do while he was under the laser and the knife? While his face was open, might they carve out a sensory gland or two? Implant a tracking device? Use his broken jaw as an excuse to weld a mask over his head?

Prince Djetthro-Jason would be a latter-day "Man in the Iron Mask" if they realized how closely he resembled Crown Prince Tarrant-Arragon. Which he would, without his scars, his colorful contact lenses and his long, blond-dyed hair.

Djetth glanced at the treacherous, turncoat 'Rhett, who'd been his bloody useless "second" at the duel, and who was still hanging around.

What for? Damn him. 'Rhett was too much the intergalactic statesman for his own--or anyone else's--good.

If the patient lost consciousness, Tarrant-Arragon could decide that the chances for galactic peace would be better is Djetthro-jason were neutered...one way or another. Given the secrets 'Rhett knew, 'Rhett might agree.

"No--" Djetth groaned with the unexpected agony of trying to speak. He wanted to refuse anesthetic again. How he wished there was somebody present who he could trust!

A door swished open.

"Does he have to be in such pain?" The cause of all the trouble spoke from the doorway. She sounded on edge, as if she felt his pain telepathically.

Djinni-vera! No longer his Djinni. By conquest, by the irrevocable exchange of vows,and finally by her own choice, she was Tarrant-Arragon's.

By All the Lechers of Antiquity, how he loved her! At that moment. For coming. Mentally Djetth qualified his thoughts. Djinni-vera might not love him now, but she was honorable to the core. Tarrant-Arragon wouldn't dare do anything dastardly in front of her.

As she glided to his surgical table, Djetth looked at her wildly, helplessly, with mute appeal, hoping that she would read his mind and aid him this one last time.

Djinni-vera's amethyst eyes widened as if she had Heard him and understood. Her gaze averted, she reached out and dropped a gauzy white cloth of some sort over his monstrously inappropriate erection.

To others, her action might have looked like public modesty on her part. Djetth assumed that Djinni had read the part of his mind that was worrying about the striking tattoo that only showed up in the dark or when he was suitably excited.

Thank you, he thought. Please help me. Stay.

She nodded, and took his fettered hand with her undamaged left. "You've been macho about this too long, J-J. Why won't you let them put you to sleep?"

"Careful, my love," Tarrant-Arragon said, moving possessively to her side. "You can never call him J-J again. Nor may you use any of his other damned traitor's aliases. Not J-J, not Commander Jason. Traitors cannot be seen to survive their attempts on my life. Commander Jason is officially dead,and everyone--including Martia-Djulia--must believe it. From this day forward, he's Prince Djetthro-Jason."

"What a mouthful..." Djinni began; then her changing expression told him that she must have read a thought-pun he couldn't resist. "Djetth!"

She frowned sternly.

"I know you Great Djinn males can't help thinking of sex all the time. But it's not helpful, Djetth. As long as you have your satuurnid gland, you're dangerous."

My Favorite Earthling (instalment #3)

Readers may remember that Sue's last chapter ended with the gorgous tycoon and weekend National guard pilot (call sign Prince) sitting in the pilot's chair of the crashed alien spacecraft, wondering if he'd been detected.


Excerpted from MY FAVORITE EARTHLING
by SUSAN GRANT
copyright Susan Grant 2006

MARCH 2007
ISBN 0373771924; HQN books


This uncorrected excerpt may contain errors and other text not found in the final printed novel and is not for sale. Please don’t share the text with anyone without first receiving permission from the author to do so.


Chapter Three

Keira, Queen of Sakka swung her plasma sword at an imaginary opponent, working through a series of choreographed moves designed to hone and strengthen the body and bring focus to the mind. Her long thick hair whipped around her shoulders with every slice of the heavy sword in her gymnasium deep within the largest palace in the galaxy. To her left and right massive columns soared to the ceiling, the space between them open to various chambers—a meeting room, her bathing hall, an entertainment alcove where she could take visitors and or watch troubadours perform. She took little interest in the rest of the palace, but this was her sanctuary and she’d had it decorated it in every color opposite the reality outside the thick castle walls: a world of ice and towering glaciers, a land of white, ice-blue, and steely gray, where it snowed almost all year round except for a fleeting summer.

Sometimes she wished she could wall herself off from the rest of the palace in much the same way.

The captain of the Palace Guard, the hulking eunuch Tibor Frix, stepped through the door. She’d known him almost her entire life. Not once had she ever seen him look anything other than as he did now: immaculate in a flawless uniform and gleaming boots. He snapped his fist over his chest and dipped his head in a bow. “The visitors have arrived, my queen.”

“Send them in.” Gripping the heavy plasma sword in a two hands, Keira whirled on Prime Minister Rissallen and the individuals who had accompanied him: the commander of the Coalition army, several unhappy looking officers, and the highest ranking members of parliament. The usual cronies.

Tibor Frix stepped out of the way, his hooded eyes ever-watchful as the prime minister stepped forward and crossed his arms at the wrist over his chest, bowing low.

She took a moment to catch her breath. “Rise.”

“I’m afraid I have disturbing news, Your Highness.”

“Speak in terms I can use, Kellen.” Rissallen’s lips twitched. He hated when she called him by his given name. “‘Disturbing’ means nothing to me.” She held her sword up to the cold winter light filtering through the skylight and admired the sparkle of tourmalian. Then she sliced her sword through the air. It made a humming noise as it arced in a half-circle. The green glow of plasma reflected in the men’s nervous eyes. Simultaneously, they took a step back. Except Supreme Commander Neppal, who regarded her as if she were a useless figurehead.

Wasn’t she? After all, these men came to her only under the most unusual circumstances—and never to ask her advice. They fed her the information as if worried they’d upset or...disturb her...and had done so ever since she took the throne as a child, thrust into the role after her entire family died in a tragic accident.

But even though they often kept her ignorant of their silly facts, she frightened them, and she liked that. As long as she inspired fear, she maintained her power over them. If they ever lost their fear of her...

Don’t think of that. You’re strong, a warrior. Keira stabbed and parried an imaginary opponent, finishing with a vicious lunge at the Supreme Commander’s heart.

Neppal didn’t even flinch. She moved forward until the pointed tip of the blade made a hissing sound as it pressed ever so lightly into the officer’s gaudy, beribboned uniform. Pinned over his heart were medals and commendations that he’d probably earned but, regardless, his condescending attitude irritated her.

Her mouth tipped in a smirk as she withdrew the blade and noticed the fleck of charred fabric around the tiny tear. That is for thinking you are better than me, you arrogant bastard. But she said coquettishly, “Oh! I must be more careful. You’ll be visiting your tailor later, won’t you?” She dusted a hand over the officer’s broad chest. “I’m sure it can be repaired.”

Dark brows lowered over angry eyes but Neppal knew better than to stare her down. A second later he turned his eyes to the floor. Good boy.

“Taye!” Keira snapped her fingers to summon her favorite attendant. The slender, baby-faced eunuch took the sword and replaced it with a scented towel which she used to blot perspiration from her face. It had been a brutal workout. Her skin gleamed, her muscles trembled. She’d worked her body to the limit, and gods, it felt good. She wanted nothing less than total control over her body, and so she pushed it, sculpting it, emulating the warrior queens of the distant past when being a queen probably meant something. Meant something more than being a gorgeous creature bred to produce princes and princesses. An heir factory: that’s what she was to them. A breeder. All because she was the last of her line, and they wanted more. If it wasn’t a sin, the Coalition would have cloned the holy Sakkaran bloodlines by now to be done with her. Her pedigree was probably the only reason she was still alive. As the last surviving member of her family, the Coalition needed her—needed her because her ancestors were gods to trillions of religious citizens and no one wanted to risk taking that away and destabilizing the Coalition, especially when murderous Drakken hoard was breathing down their necks.

But that’s why she had generals around. It was their job to play war games with ships and guns, not hers.

Keira tossed the towel over her shoulder. Taye rushed to retrieve it. The men followed her through an arched doorway to an expansive polished crystal table. Sheets of gold trapped inside the crystal reminded her of autumn leaves kicked up in the wind. Fall was a short season on this world, like every other season that wasn’t winter. In fact, she’d missed autumn this year completely. First there had been summer, then, oops, fall had sped by before she’d next had a chance to step outdoors.

Blink, and the seasons other than winter were gone. Now it was too frigid to venture past the palace doors. The cold of this world had long ago seeped into her heart. Maybe it was why she cared less and less about venturing outside. Or perhaps having to be accompanied everywhere by Tibor Frix and his merry band of eunuch guards had taken the enjoyment out of it. They were present at all times, except when she had to relieve herself, and only because she’d protested.

She was the last of her line. What did she expect?

Her smart-chair floated away from the table, and folded around her comfortably when she sat in it. The officials waited until she was seated before they did so. Goddesses first. “Sit, gentlemen, please.”

She threw a longing gaze at the door to her private chambers. Steam floated out of the room as the attendants prepared her post-workout bath. She should be soaking in cloud-bell scented water, not putting up with these insufferable men who wanted to talk about the most boring subjects imaginable.

“Your Highness, the news we bring you today is troubling,” Neppal said, dragging her glare away from the irksome prime minister. The supreme commander was the leader of the entire army with an ego to match. Good thing it was never proposed that she take Neppal as her mate. What a disaster that would have been. “There is a new and serious threat to the Coalition. I have confirmed reports of an encounter between a planetary acquisition force and a rogue planet at the edges of civilized space. The intelligence minister in fact was working on this when he met his tragic fate. The world is known as Earth, and they appear to maintain a substantial battle fleet. We cannot as yet determine the types of vessels, nor the technological level, but we have teams working on it.”

Tibor Frix interrupted. “Is the palace at risk?” The sharpness in his tone caught Keira’s attention. He rarely spoke up, but his eyes were focused like lasers on the commander.

“Absolutely not. Their fleet formed a defensive barrier, preventing the acquisition force from landing, but made no move to attack. We are still the larger power by far, but they are respectable in their own right. That we didn’t know about them before is the issue that disturbs me. Where do their loyalties lie? This we must determine.”

“But they’re nothing but a frontier world,” Keira exclaimed. “Country bumpkins. Yet you act as if they have the power to swing the balance of power in the galaxy.”

“They do.” The warning in the commander’s dark eyes made her shiver. “If they were to align themselves with the Drakken.”

Keira went very still. She refused to admit to fear, and she’d rather die than do so, but the mere thought of Lord-General Rakkuu bringing his army to the palace gates stabbed fear deep into her heart. Not only would he want to conquer her Coalition worlds, he want to conquer her. He was growing old, but he had a son nearing adulthood, she’d heard. It was said the boy would likely grow up to be worse than his sire.

“No more talk of the Hoard,” she commanded. “Earth will join us. You will find a way to make it so.”

“I’ve called an emergency session of parliament,” Rissallen. “In light of this threat to our national security, it would reflect well if you attended.”

“Attend...” He wanted her to go into that chamber? Keira fought a wave of dizziness. The thought of the cavernous room, the noise of many voices... Her head spinning in confusion, the grief choking her, the fear. She could not. It would be all too reminiscent of when she was summoned before a full session of parliament the day she learned of her family’s fate. She’d felt so small, so frightened. Helpless. She’d never again set foot in those chambers.

She tossed her hair and sniffed in disdain. “I have no patience for politics. Send me summary.” Which she’d have Tibor summarize even further, while her attendants gave her a post-bath massage or painted her toenails. Every government communiqué was condensed by Tibor. He was invaluable. Without him she might actually have to pay attention to what was going on. “You are dismissed.”

The visitors bowed low, mumbling the usual respects, and left.

Only Tibor remained behind, silent, ever-watchful. “What?” she demanded when he continued to ponder her. She couldn’t tell if there was censure in his scrutiny or pity. If he didn’t agree with her aversion to politics, so be it. She wasn’t going to change for him—or for anybody. She had her reasons for doing things, and they were private. She had no desire to share her inner thoughts with anyone, especially a man.

She shoved away from the table and stood, sending the chair spinning. It collided with a display shelf and sent a priceless vase crashing to the ground. What did it matter? Everything was priceless around here. They’d find another trinket in the museums. Unlike people, objects could always be replaced. “Taye,” she yelled.

The boyish eunuch scurried forward. “How may I serve, My Queen?”

“Bring me my daggers.”

The eunuch returned with a set of ancient throwing knives. She snatched the box and stormed into her private chambers. The only way she could ease her apprehension was to work with weaponry.

A breath exited as she hurled a dagger at a padded wall. She selected another. The knife went hissing through the air. It landed in the same spot as the first, shattering the ivory hilt. Another replaceable object, she thought, hefting another dagger.

Keira kept burying daggers in the wall until she’d exhausted her supply—and herself. Muscles trembling, she raised her arm to throw the last knife when the communication screen taking up half of one wall distracted her attention.

The screen was illuminated, signaling in incoming visual.

Damn politicians. What more could they possibly want to bore her with? Furious at the annoyance, the invasion of privacy she whirled on the screen. “Display message!” The visual came to life.

She stormed forward. “I thought I made it clear that I’m not interested in—”

The sight of the gorgeous man slouched in the cockpit of a fighter craft brought her up short. Their shocked eye contact was instant and intense, and for one dizzying moment, the room around her faded away, the sounds becoming muffled. In those few beats of her heart, she didn’t know what to say or think.

Swiftly, the trespasser’s shock slipped into curiosity and a dark, amused, flicker of male appreciation which made her acutely aware of how form-fitting her workout wear was when damp. In his gaze, she felt naked, a sensation that was unexpectedly, breathlessly, and infuriatingly arousing. “How dare you?” How dare he what? She didn’t have any idea, but she felt utterly...invaded. By the gods. “Identify yourself immediately!”

Keira gripped the dagger and strode forward to confront the trespasser, intending to make her displeasure perfectly clear.