Reflections of Life, Part 5 by Karen S. Wiesner

Reflections of Life, Part 5

by Karen S. Wiesner

In looking back over the course of my life as an author who's looking forward to becoming an artist in retirement, I've learned to slow down and reflect on the past, savor the present, and look forward to the future. Interspersed through these ruminations, I'll include some of my own most apropos sketches.

In Part 4, I covered strategies I implemented to restructure my life to bring better balance. As of this writing (April 20, 2023), I can see the end of the road before me. At my current rate of output, it's conceivable that I can finish the last three books in my last two series within the next year. In learning each day to reflect on where I'm going and what it took to get me there, I can also see just how far I've come in learning and relearning how I approach life, how I complete tasks, and accomplish the things I want to do in my time remaining. Instead of starting each morning (after the obligatory shower and coffee that have always been my initial protocol) by jumping headfirst into a mile-long list of the constant and relentless daily checklist of projects awaiting me, I now have--even by ordinary human standards--a manageable amount of tasks to complete each day.

When I avoid crash and burn habits by starting each day with study, prayer, and reflection, I actually sleep better most nights as a result. This feat isn't something I could have handled in the past, when I carted around a semi-trailer sized head full of tasks that needed nose to the grindstone diligence in order to check off each day. The thought of leisurely getting to work after beginning a day with contemplative endeavors would have been pure torture for me back when I believed I needed to fill the limited number of hours I was given each day with ACCOMPLISHMENTS.

I won't lie to you. I have backslidden. I struggle whenever I see my daily "To Do" lists grow. Amidst embarrassment, amusement, frustration, bewilderment, and even shock that I didn't see it as it was happening, I'm directed and redirected and prodded gently back to the path where I can slow down, start each day off right with morning reflection that sets the tone for the day I have, and decides whether or not I sleep well.

The part that astonishes me almost more than any other about all this is that I've discovered I actually accomplish more these laidback days than when I'm scrambling to check things off my list, causing myself so much stress I lay awake most of the night with a brain that just won't shut off. Rinse and repeat in an endless, vicious, boneheaded cycle in which I'm returned by factory reset to where I started.

Karen Wiesner Sketch: Reading in Bed

Research has shown that there’s scientific benefit involved in practicing appreciation on a day by day basis. In a study published in the Journal of Personality and Individual Differences, Rutgers University Psychology Professor Nancy Fagley Research has shown that there’s even scientific benefit involved in practicing appreciation on a day by day basis. In a study published in the Journal of Personality and Individual Differences, Rutgers University Psychology Professor Nancy Fagley suggests that people focus on and value what they have, spend time outdoors, and. "...reflect on the positive aspects of our lives, value our friends and family, relish and savor the good times...”

I've also discovered that the faster my pace in life, the busier I am, the less I find myself enjoying any part of my life. Think about that word "enjoy". It implies taking pleasure in something, experiencing appreciation and satisfaction in things, and benefitting from the act of savoring and relishing as opposed to viewing the blur of my life as it goes speeding by, leaving me coughing or even run down in its passing dust. There are also strong connotations of reverence and veneration in the word "enjoy". Daily reflection has taught me that humans can only honor and respect the countless blessings that make up our lives by allowing the whole of our beings--physical, mental, and spiritual--to slow down to enjoy them.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Crossing Genres

A publisher called Obsidian Butterfly is assembling an anthology to be titled "NecronomiRomCom," comprising Cthulhu Mythos romantic comedies:

Obsidian Butterfly

Working on a story to submit to this project reminded me of a panel at this year's RavenCon about mixing genres. A panelist asked what would be the most unlikely combination of genres. Of course, many mashups of classic novels with horror exist, such as PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES, SENSE AND SENSIBILITY AND SEA MONSTERS, and LITTLE WOMEN AND WEREWOLVES, but I'm not sure they count, consisting mostly of slightly revised texts of public-domain originals with horror content tacked on. Paranormal romance and various permutations of historical, SF, or futuristic romance have become recognized subgenres in their own right. Historical mysteries are also commonplace, as a natural outgrowth of the quest for fresh settings in which to place unsolved murders. Historical fantasy and horror aren't much of a stretch, either. Mystery is compatible with many other genres, and a romance subplot can be included in almost any kind of fiction. Randall Garrett's Lord Darcy series combines alternate history, fantasy, and mystery. Effective, credible crossovers of that kind require the setting and the magical rules to be clearly and consistently laid out for the reader, with no cheating.

Novels of secret histories that transform famous people of the past into fighters against supernatural evil demand more suspension of disbelief. Authors have made Abraham Lincoln a vampire slayer and Queen Elizabeth the First a hunter of demons. A duology by Cherie Priest, MAPLECROFT and CHAPELWOOD, pits Lizzie Borden, in her reclusive later years, against Lovecraftian monsters. (In this version of her life, she really did kill her father and stepmother, but only because they were possessed by eldritch entities from the sea.)

The Cthulhu Mythos seems to be a favorite candidate for genre-blending. The anthology SHADOWS OVER BAKER STREET merges the worlds of Lovecraft and Sherlock Holmes, a not terribly unbelievable combination. There's at least one anthology of stories set in a postapocalyptic world where HPL's extradimensional monsters have conquered Earth. Plunging into the realm of the absurd, SCREAM FOR JEEVES, by Peter H. Cannon, retells several of Lovecraft's best-known stories by inserting P. G. Wodehouse's characters and style into them. Probably the most incongruous cross-genre mashup I've ever encountered, however, is an anthology titled THE CALL OF POOHTHULHU--H. P. Lovecraft meets Winnie-the-Pooh.

Or how about colorful Lovecraftian board books for small children? A Mythos alphabet book is one of several cute products from the "C Is for Cthulhu" project:

C Is for Cthulhu

Has anybody here run into an unlikelier combination?

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

NIL Protection

Happily, my title for today's rag bag of copyright-related news from the legal blogosphere is not as nihilistic as it ("NIL Protection") may sound on first glance.

N.I.L. is the acronym for "NAME IMAGE LIKENESS", but before I get to the names and likenesses part, I'd like to share something I read in translation (I assume) on an Italian law blog concerning photography that was an epiphany for me.

The philosopher Herbert Marshall McLuhan once stated: ‘Photography, photo-graphy [sic], means writing with light. Photography, cinema, confer a kind of immortality, a pre-eminence on images and not on real life’. 

In my opinion, which is based on following copyright protection issues since the early 2000s, the intellectual property rights of photographers seem to be the least understood and least respected by internet users.

The concept that photographers write with light is an eye-opener. Check out the website of Mitchel Gray http://mitchelgray.com/ with Herbert Marshall McLuhan's definition in mind.

Once upon a time, in November of 1996, Mitchel Gray's photograph of an extraordinarily handsome gentleman was on the cover of Men's Health, to which I subscribed because I hoped that reading men's magazines would help me write in the male POV. I bought the limited rights to that photograph for the cover of FORCED MATE for the e-book and POD versions.

One of the most newsworthy cases in recent years is that of the photographer Lynn Goldsmith, who claimed that Andy Warhol infringed her copyright in a particularly sympathetic photographic portrait of the late musician sometimes known as Prince.

Last week, seven of the nine Supreme Court Justices agreed with the photographer that it is not "fair use" to take someone else's photograph, duplicate it, colorize it, and call it transformed into something new. (My words).

NPR writer Chloe Veltman  discusses the Supreme Court's decision in the case of the photographer Lynn Goldsmith vs the Andy Warhol Foundation. Her explanation is well worth reading, especially if you ever wanted to snag a photo from the internet to copy, or colorize, or monetize.

https://www.npr.org/2023/05/18/1176881182/supreme-court-sides-against-andy-warhol-foundation-in-copyright-infringement-cas

"Under copyright law, fair use permits the unlicensed appropriation of copyright-protected works in specific circumstances, for example, in some non-commercial or educational cases..." Chloe Veltman explains.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor for the majority opined,

"Goldsmith's original works, like those of other photographers, are entitled to copyright protection, even against famous artists....Such protection includes the right to prepare derivative works that transform the original."

Dissenters feel that the world is a "poorer" place if Andy Warhol wannabes cannot cut corners by taking other people's works and making minimal alterations. Read Chloe's work for the perhaps-surprising revelation of which two SCOTUS justices fear that creativity will be stifled if (my words follow) those who write in light cannot protect their rights and their work from permissionless riffers and samplers.

The "writing with light" article can be found here:

 https://www.ictlc.com/the-publication-of-images-a-grey-line-between-privacy-and-data-protection/?lang=en

Italian intellectual property law bloggers Vittoria Mazzotta, Francesca Tugnoli, and Eleonora Margherita Auletta for ICT Legal Consulting discuss the publication of images and the grey line between privacy and data protection. Perhaps, the crux of the matter is the possible requirement that a person whose image is being exploited for the financial benefit of others ought to have the right to give --or withdraw-- permission for such exploitation.

https://www.ictlc.com/the-publication-of-images-a-grey-line-between-privacy-and-data-protection/?lang=en#_ftn1

That's mostly about images, but what about names and likenesses? Not to mention voices (which I will not mention, having discussed deep fakery a few weeks ago).

For the law firm Venable LLP, legal bloggers Sharoni S. Finkelstein and Alexandra L, Kolsky explore how AI (artificial intellience) wants your name, image, and likeness... especially if you are a celebrity. Naturally (pun intended) AI would prefer not to pay for the privilege, but there are protections for your NIL.

Read all about the right of publicity, Lanham Act protections, and enforcement issues here:

https://www.venable.com/insights/publications/2023/05/artificial-intelligence-wants-your-name-image

Readers may be disturbed to read about what applications such as "Reface" can do in violation of the rights and privacy of the person whose likeness and body may be exploited.

As an aside, one might wonder if a Reface-type process is used when implausibly buff and ripped (Superman-style) bodies are used with a fairly flattering head/face portrait of a vigorous but senior public figure who is seeking office.

Use of a catch-phrase, if it is associated with a celebrity, might also be an infringement of NIL, as might the use of lookalikes or soundalikes in advertising campaigns.

As the Venable bloggers point out (amongst a great deal more information):

"In 2020, New York expanded its right of publicity laws to specifically prohibit certain deepfake content. Second, the right of publicity specifically applies to commercial uses. The doctrine might stop AI users from profiting from celebrity image in the advertising and sales context, but creative uses—like deepfake memes, parody videos, and perhaps even uses of AI-generated NIL in film and television—may fall outside the scope of the right of publicity."

Under most countries' laws, ignorance is not a good defence.

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

SPACE SNARK™  

http://www.spacesnark.com/  

http://www.rowenacherry.com

EPIC Award winner, Friend of ePublishing

 

 

 

Reflections of Life, Part 4 by Karen Wiesner

Reflections of Life, Part 4

by Karen S. Wiesner

In looking back over the course of my life as an author who's looking forward to becoming an artist in retirement, I've learned to slow down and reflect on the past, savor the present, and look forward to the future. Interspersed through these ruminations, I'll include some of my own most apropos sketches.

In Part 3, I went over what brought about the strong sense that I needed to slow down as well as a few of the initial strategies I implemented in my struggle for balance in my life. After I decided a critique partner was crucial for me, ticks were made in my progress toward what I could accomplish in my remaining time writing. I was now able to return to my "To Be" list. I began to realize I needed to rename it my "To Be or Not To Be" projects. This time, I took off the list the books I didn't feel I had enough material to complete, nor did I believe I could brainstorm and bring about more, certainly not enough to bother undertaking them. Thus, the graveyard of books I was burying expanded. I grieved. I slowly and surely worked on my final two series to complete, one book at a time (for the most part anyway).

Oddly, in this process, I was also beginning to heal. I saw my editor/publisher and author relationship improving. Mutual compromise and finding a new way to accommodate my editor's suggestions, picking my battles with her, went far, but I also needed to humble myself in ways I never would have attempted in the past. I would have jumped ship and struck out anew instead.

Karen Wiesner Sketch: Braided

The quality of my new work also surprised me. I began to feel my books were even stronger than they were in my heyday, though as I said, my editorial skills feel like they're in decline due to aging…or other reasons I'm not entirely sure I want to define.

At this point, just how very tired I'm becoming was brought home to me. All those years of balancing a hundred different projects at the same time over the course of a year had taken their toll. Inconceivable to me in the past, when I actually thought about what I would write on my death bed, I could now see a point in time when I would retire from writing…when I would do something else instead of writing. Even I'm stunned that all of this was actually cathartic for me. It needed to happen, and not just for my own well-being. I actually began to want it to happen, which wasn't something that "sat easy" with my family and friends, who seemed to see this as a kind of death sentence for me instead of the new life I viewed it as.

One last time, I went back over my "To Be or Not To Be" project list and buried a few more stories that I knew I didn't have it in me to finish. I had only two more series to finish, and even less requirements to resolve them, considering that a few of the titles in them both were cropped. As a concession to what could have been some great tales in their own right, I started incorporating some of the ideas from those lost stories into the remaining books in the series. 

Next week, I'll cover the progress I've made in restructuring my life to bring better balance.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/ 

When Do Conspiracy Theorists Make Sense?

Cory Doctorow's column in the May issue of LOCUS discusses what we'd probably think of as paranoid conspiracy theorists, vehemently protesting imaginary global plots against our lives and liberties, who in Britain are often informally labeled "swivel-eyed loons."

The Swivel-Eyed Loons Have a Point

Of course, we do have to distinguish the paranoid looniness from valid concerns. As he says, we all want to "save the children." Most of us, however, want to save them from "real threats who never seem to face justice," while the swivel-eyed loons obsess about "imaginary threats," e.g., "adrenochrome-guzzling Satanists."

Some issues about which he suggests they have valid points:

Automated license-plate recorders, presently used in London, really can constitute "a form of pervasive location-tracking surveillance." That kind of power has been used in the past to target "disfavored minorities" and organizations regarded as suspicious.

While “'Climate lockdowns' are a product of a conspiracist’s fevered imagination," it's nevertheless true that COVID restrictions have sometimes served as a pretext "to control everyday people while rich people swanned around having a lovely time." The powerful were happy to promulgate regulations they didn't consider to apply to themselves.

The "post-ownership society" fearfully anticipated by some conspiracists has already begun to infiltrate the economy. Our Kindle books, music files, and other software don't really belong to us; we lease them from companies that can delete them at will.

What about the futuristic promise of a cashless society, when institutions such as credit card companies will be nearly all-powerful gatekeepers? "Access to financial services is a primary means of extralegal control over whole sectors of the economy."

Doctorow's article offers several other alarming examples.

However, he exaggerates about the demise of DVDs. Yes, we can still buy movies and TV programs (and music) in physical media that we permanently own; they aren't likely to disappear anytime soon. (The choice of renting DVDs from Netflix will go away later this year, though. Sigh.)

"We live in a fraught and perilous time," he reminds us, "and powerful people really do want to capitalize on this situation to enrich themselves at our expense." How can we enjoy the benefits of technologies such as those mentioned in his essay while avoiding their threats to our privacy and autonomy?

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Failure Is An Option

My title for today --which is American "Mothers' Day"-- is a downbeat twist on Gene Kranz's famous quote that "Failure is not an option."

 

There are plenty of inspiring words about the refusal to fail, for example:

https://www.azquotes.com/quotes/topics/failure-is-not-an-option.html

 

All credit to legal blogger Daniel Kaufman who writes for the Baker & Hostetler LLP AD-ttorneys Law Blog for sharing a link to the top ten marketing failures of our time and also a link to the museum of failure.

https://www.watchmojo.com/video/id/10864

When I started this blog, roughly fifteen years ago, I chose Sundays as my day to post because I thought that most holidays are celebrated on Sundays and at the time it seemed to me that there might be a marketing advantage to promoting my novels on holidays.

I was probably mistaken on both counts!

On the other, hand, while digressing about calendars, the Copyright Alliance has a lot of great stuff scheduled for May. 

https://copyrightalliance.org/events/

And now, back to failures and strategies for recovery.

Daniel Kaufman tells a personal tale of being on the receiving end of a tactless marketing pitch by email, but also of the power of a prompt and well-crafted apology.

Here:

https://www.adttorneyslawblog.com/ftc/holidays-and-marketing-may-not-always-be-a-perfect-match/#page=1

 

And here:

https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=4d6bcc03-a433-4c88-ac31-1bb84b829ae7

 

"Mother’s Day is of course not the only holiday that can create such challenges for marketers and those who receive their messages. Father’s Day is the easy parallel, but let’s not forget Valentine’s Day, which also has the potential to have some real impact on people who might not want to receive such messages. There have been countless other email campaigns that have gone horribly off the rails, most notably a campaign ten years ago that involved a photo company sending emails to new parents congratulating them on their new bundle of joy. The email was supposed to be sent to a limited number of recipients who had recently purchased birth announcement..."

Is failure an option? Does anyone elect to fail? 

 

Probably not, however, one does choose to forgo a final proof-read, or to cut and paste a mailing list, or to take another short-cut, or to live by the credo that it is easier to ask forgiveness after the fact than it is to ask permission in advance. 

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2018/06/19/forgive/

As a copyright enthusiast, I must point out that when it comes to potential copyright infringement, it is always preferable to obtain permissions, waivers, licenses etc. Just saying.

Have a happy day.

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

SPACE SNARK™  

http://www.spacesnark.com/   

http://www.rowenacherry.com

Reflections of Life, Part 3 by Karen S. Wiesner

                                          

Reflections of  Life, Part 3

by Karen S. Wiesner

In looking back over the course of my life as an author who's looking forward to becoming an artist in retirement, I've learned to slow down and reflect on the past, savor the present, and look forward to the future. Interspersed through these ruminations, I'll include some of my own most apropos sketches.

In Part 2, I discussed what it took to bring about change in the crash and burn lifestyle that dominated most of my adult life. On a daily basis, I began to sense the gentle nudge that led to the restructuring and reallocating of my energy and ease in juggling multiple projects at once. However, I can't move forward with this reflective essay without adding that the years of COVID hell were strong contributors to what truly seemed like the mighty falling and the dwindling effectiveness of my previously relished Super Powers. Like many other authors who struggled to produce anything salable during those aghast (in this context, an odd but fitting word) years, I produced next to nothing until at last light again penetrated the emotional void of my blackest period of existence. I saw distinct changes in my writing, from the quantity I was capable of producing right on down to the quality of the material. Some of these changes were for the better, others most certainly for the worse.

Ultimately, I came to the point where the only way to cope with my drastically altered form was to say "It is what it is", and move forward the best way I could. I had to learn to accept the new me, which most days seemed like a weaker, pitifully lessened, shell of myself. What came next was the aftermath of battles fought and lessons learned.

Karen Wiesner Sketch: Innocence Light and Dark

I went through the projects I'd once upon a time fully anticipated completing during my lifetime and evaluated whether I would or even could complete them after all. I started with the ones I'd already faced issues with in attempting to outline. In the course of my career, I'd realized that if I could finish an outline for a story, I would be able to write the book to my satisfaction. The first step was to remove those uncertain projects from the "To Be" list. A huge chunk of wannabe books fell by the wayside in this endeavor. On the plus side, I was able to finish within the next year two of the four series I had left to complete.

I also started gathering backup against having to endure further revision nightmares. I wanted to ensure as far as I possibly could that the body of material I submitted to the publisher I intended to keep for the rest of my career was as solid and flawless as I could make it. Over the years before my crisis, I'd begun to forsake critique partners for two very distinct reasons. The first reason is practicality. Simply put, I wrote too much and too fast to ask any critique partner or even a whole team of them to do so much for me. I think a crew, each member taking on a full-time job with handling even just a few of my books at a time, would have been required through most of my career. I did have a variety of critique partners, most of the time more than one, all put on different projects, but eventually it became harder to find ones I really trusted and believed were equal to the task. (I apologize if that sounds conceited, but…yeah, being practical, that was the way things stood.)

My second reason for not having critique partners for every single project was exactly what you may have guessed from that last paragraph: I got big-headed enough to assume in those later years before my crisis that I didn't need any helping making the majority of my books better and stronger. I thought I could do it completely on my own. Live and learn, but I have now found one single reliable critique partner that I'd worked with on and off in the past. I trusted her implicitly then, and even more so now that I find my once honed and sharp editorial skills becoming a bit more lax than even I'm comfortable with. Since my output has also been diminishing rapidly in these crisis years, I hoped I wouldn't overwhelm her with critique projects. I admit I definitely would have done that if not for the fact that the pipeline of my book releases has become hopelessly clogged during this time, stopping almost altogether in the course of the last five years as my only publisher has taken to renovating her entire backlist of books with new cover designs, fresh formatting, and updated promotion.

Next week I'll go over other strategies I implemented to restructure my life to bring better balance.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Do-Overs

A vintage short story that was filmed as a TWILIGHT ZONE episode features an elderly millionaire who wants to relive his life, with his memories intact, for the thrill of making his fortune all over again. He stikes a deal with a demon and is duly returned to his home town in the early 20th century. Unfortunately, the past turns out to be less golden than he imagined, and, most important, he forgets to specify having his youth restored. Therefore, he suffers a heart attack and dies for lack of modern medicine. As he faces death, the demon taunts him about his request that he keep his memories: "Can we help it if your memory is lousy?"

The hypothetical question often arises, "Would you live your life over again, knowing what you know now?" Occasionally pondering that fantasy, I definitely would not accept a do-over from childhood or even my early teens. Go through all that again, with the added horror of being treated like a dependent child while having the mind and memories of an adult in my seventies? No, thanks! In the movie PEGGY SUE GOT MARRIED, a middle-aged woman reverts to her high-school self with her memories intact, faced with the decision of whether or not to repeat the choices that led to marrying her present-day husband, from whom she's currently separated. After reliving part of her senior year (spoiler), she reawakens to her reasons for loving her husband and, upon returning to the present, decides to stay with him.

Would I repeat my life starting from, say, my marriage at the age of eighteen? In T. Kingfisher's latest horror novel, A HOUSE WITH GOOD BONES, the narrator returns to her grandmother's house (now her mother's), where she lived for part of her childhood and teens. Upon waking up in her old bedroom on the first morning, she experiences a disorienting moment of terror that her entire life since the age of ten has been a dream, and she'll be condemned to repeating high school, college, and graduate school—and writing her PhD dissertation all over again. I can identify with that nightmare. I'm not sure I'd have the stamina to struggle through all my university courses and the rewriting of my dissertation from scratch, although I might perform better in my advancement-to-candidacy oral exam with the memory of my previous blunders. On the other hand, I would have a fair chance to avoid most if not all of the worst mistakes and wrongdoings of my first lifetime. And yet, knowing I'd have to relive some painful events that are outside my control, would I want to face them again?

A further concern: If I repeated my life from my wedding day on, we might end up without all the children we've had in this timeline. Alternate history novels often include real people from the primary world but in different roles from the ones they played in our version of history. Although that's an entertaining trope I enjoy reading, in fact it's a vanishingly remote possiblity. A minor change in the timing of a sexual act could more likely than not result in the conception of a different individual. A difference of a month would, of course, definitely do so. Given a point of departure in the 19th century—say, the familiar scenario of the South winning the Civil War—virtually none of the people alive today, at least in this country, would ever have been conceived. On a lesser scale, the same result would happen in a family after a point of departure in one couple's married life. In Jo Walton's novel MY REAL CHILDREN, the protagonist faces a moment of decision in early adulthood when she decides whether or not to marry the man whom she's been dating. That decision splits her life from then on into two separate timelines, one in which they marry and one where they don't. In her final years, she remembers both lifetimes and families she's had. One interesting aspect of this novel, by the way, is that neither timeline is our own history. One alternate world turns out worse, the other better; in a further intriguing twist, the protagonist's personal life is happier in the dystopic world than in the optimistic one.

So if a genie offers to grant me a wish to re-do my adult life, I think I'll turn it down. That scenario would hold too many risky variables.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Copyright Alliance

My internet is out, and heavy thunderstorms are impending, so I will keep this short.

The copyright alliance has some excellent resources for creators, and membership is free for creators.

https://copyrightalliance.org/member-resources/

https://copyrightalliance.org/creator-homepage/copyright-courses/

There is also a petition to support songwriters.

Up to $800,000,000 is owed to songwriters from streaming and has not been paid out, and songwriters

have no clue when they will receive their money.

https://www.change.org/p/support-songwriters-demand-a-decision-on-hundreds-of-millions-in-royalties-owed

 

All the best,

 

Rowena Cherry

Reflections of Life, Part 2 by Karen S. Wiesner

Reflections of Life, Part 2

by Karen S. Wiesner

In looking back over the course of my life as an author who's looking forward to becoming an artist in retirement, I've learned to slow down and reflect on the past, savor the present, and look forward to the future. Interspersed through these ruminations, I'll include some of my own most apropos sketches.

In Part 1 of this article, I talked about feeling directed to find a better balance in my life. One of the first things required in order to bring about very necessary changes in my crash and burn lifestyle was the crushing of my ego. I've spoken before in my writings of the worst experience I've ever had with editing a project. Specifically, when I completed my Arrow of Time Chronicles (a massive science fiction saga) over the course of two intense years, I truly felt that I'd written my pièce de résistance. I believed it was the best thing I'd ever written up to that point. I was on top of the world. I couldn't wait to have my masterpiece published and in the hands of my readers. The editing process took place over the course of several months as all four books were released back to back.

As a little background to ensure full understanding before I continue, in the span of my writing career, I've written for at least 25 different publishers big and small, at first because it was the only way to get my horde of books out to the world as quickly as possible, considering how fast I wrote. Following a few years of the worst luck possible with some of my publishers who, frankly, "did me wrong", I decided to place all my books with a single publisher, the only one at that time I actually trusted, and still do. One after the other and sometimes in huge batches, I pulled my books from my other publishers, revised and reformatted each of them, and gave them to this one publisher, who, initially, reissued the majority of them very quickly, all while also publishing my brand new works.

From my very first book published in June 1997 to the one just before Arrow of Time Chronicles, the revisions handed down to me from any of my numerous editors had been mild up to this point, amounting to a few typos needing correction or sentences that required reworking for clarity with each book. With my first two writing reference books, editors wanted me to add certain sections, which meant drafting new material to coincide with a feature they wanted to see displayed in the manuals. All told, none of this was serious. Structurally, from the start of my career, all my books were solid and polished even before I submitted them. I possessed the editorial skills to make them so.

To this day, I'm not a hundred percent sure why this particular project caused such a rift between me and my publisher (who was also my editor for all my submissions). Even after the arduous, soul-tearing editing was completed, I still believed the four books in Arrow of Time Chronicles were some of my best to date. The agony I suffered through four excruciating times with each of the books in that series decimated me in ways I couldn't have previously imagined, given my editing history. I left the process limping and bleeding each time, my spirit ground to ash. My confidence took such a violent blow, I never wanted to write again because it meant inviting further attacks that would surely come during editing. While I couldn't and wouldn't do anything as drastic as quitting writing, all the spinoff books I'd planned to write in the Arrow of Time universe, once the four-book set was published, were summarily canceled. I couldn't take the risk that this series had been the cause of the damage that wreaked havoc between me and my publisher.

Karen Wiesner Sketch: Agony

As I said, I didn't quit writing altogether, but I did know I needed and wanted to make changes. In the span of my career, I've started 16 series, varying in length from three to twenty-three books in each. At that time, all but four of the series had been finished previous to this crisis. There was no way I could abandon those final four series without providing satisfactory resolutions. 

Over the next two years, I worked hard rebuilding my relationship with my editor, who was my only publisher now. While I can't take full blame for the problems between us, I know I did my share of harm. Chief among my issues was that my ego and (what seems like now) certainty that my every word was golden needed to be checked with humility and the willingness to compromise. These two lessons were hard fought battles for me, both internally and externally. In the process of learning them, I also undertook the heart-rending job of culling my list of upcoming projects.

Next week I'll talk about what brought about the strong sense that I needed to slow down.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Telepaths and Language

One panel I attended at this year's RavenCon was about communicating with aliens. I brought up the question of whether a telepathic species would have a spoken language or the concept of words at all, which was then discussed at some length.

Touch telepaths such as Vulcans don't count. A society could hardly exist if people had be touching each other to share feelings or thoughts, so Vulcans naturally have a language. I'm thinking of a species whose members would communicate by short-range thought transmission, needing to be in each other's physical presence or at most within line-of-sight. In my opinion, they would have no evolutionary reason to develop language. They wouldn't need words, let alone speech, because they would form mental images of whatever they're "talking" about. Somebody on the panel raised the issue of what kind of environment would cause them to evolve telepathy as their chief mode of communication. It would have to be a world where both hearing and vision would be unreliable for that purpose.

Stipulating such an unusual environment, why would they develop words? People wouldn't even have names; they would identify each other by mental images of the person they're "speaking" to or about. If they eventually encountered interstellar travelers from Earth, the telepaths would probably consider our mind-blindness a pitiable handicap.

In order to develop science and technology, however, this species would have to invent language sooner or later, if only a written one. A society beyond the hunter-gatherer level requires keeping records, communicating at a distance, and transmitting information to future generations. One panelist suggested a universal mental "cloud" all members of the species could tap into, like a worldwide telepathic mainframe. Such a phenomenon, though, would go far beyond the short-range, person-to-person telepathy I'm considering. A species such as the latter couldn't create what we'd think of as civilization without writing or the equivalent. That step would be harder than simply inventing the alphabet would have been in our world. In a society without spoken language or even the concept of speech and words, the invention of written or electronic communication might require a genius on the level of the creator of algebra or calculus in Earth history.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Falsity

I came upon "falsity" within a copyright-related Law Review article about the protected speech, and I was intrigued.

Is "falsity" a lesser known synonym for "falsehood"?  Apparently, not quite. Intriguingly, one of the major meanings of "falsity" is"incorrectness". Another is "insincerity".

An interesting explanation is offered here:  https://grammarist.com/usage/falsehood-falsity-falseness/

I infer that Galileo Galilei was the unfortunate recipient of the attentions of the Inquisition for falsity, because what he stated about the relationship between the Sun and our planet was contrary to correct thinking (received wisdom) at the time. Of course, the Inquisition was interested in stamping out heresy, and Galileo was obliged to recant. There is also an interesting story about how he claimed that his tormentors "doctored" evidence against him.

As the French have said for centuries,  "plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose."

A contemporary techo-fib equivalent could be, "my blog was hacked".

Also, and still with reference to Galileo, he claimed that the sun did not orbit the Earth. One might call that a negative proposition, and one can never prove a negative. That is a link about black swans and unicorns.

With regard to unicorns in the fossil record (completely off topic), wouldn't the premise rely on the supposition that unicorn horns are made of a substance that can be petrified? Rhino horns are made of keratin (like hair and finger nails), and does not fossilize well.

Similarly, one probably cannot prove that one medical precaution --that almost everyone takes-- prevents a certain outcome (death) because there is a dearth of identical subjects who abstained from that precaution.

plus ça change.... and all related to "falsity" or "falsehoods".

High time I got to the copyright-related legal blog on the Law Review by Benjamin E. Marks for Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP which is a masterful analysis of free speech and false speech, and if, when, and whether there is a difference.

https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=6507e780-1a6e-4cb7-9788-a314ea6d2697

It is about free speech and media freedom, which was of great interest to certain authors' associations a few years ago, but much less so since 2021, and discusses what are--and are not--protected forms of speech, such as the apocryphal ejaculation of "Fire!" (verbal sense) in a crowded theater, newsgathering, FOIA, protection of witnesses or news sources, suing news publications, and more.

Angela Hoy of WritersWeekly has some fascinating news on media freedom, which you can check out here: https://writersweekly.com/in-the-news/042923?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=writersweekly-com-112119_67

And, did you know that it is possible that your blog has been used without your permission or knowledge to develop AI?  Scott Rosenberg of Axios elaborates:

https://www.axios.com/2023/04/24/ai-chatgpt-blogs-web-writing-training-data

Yes indeed. If someone were to ask chatwhateveritis to write a love scene in the matter of Rowena Cherry, where would the bot have got the vocabulary and candence? Not that love scenes are my forte. I would not recommend copying them.

Legal blogger Richard L. Hathaway of the tongue-twister legal firm Kane Russsell Coleman Logan PC explains the perils of using AI (as previously suggested) and then trying to copyright your enhanced work.

https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=52e40b3c-ad2f-4375-a451-6ffb8d6421f6

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

SPACE SNARK™  

http://www.spacesnark.com/  

http://www.rowenacherry.com

Reflections of Life, Part 1 by Karen S. Wiesner

Reflections of Life, Part 1

by Karen S. Wiesner

In looking back over the course of my life as an author who's looking forward to becoming an artist in retirement, I've learned to slow down and reflect on the past, savor the present, and look forward to the future. Interspersed through these ruminations, I'll include some of my own most apropos sketches.

For the last several years, I've felt directed toward finding a better balance in my life. There's no denying I've spent most of my time on this earth cultivating a crash and burn lifestyle--in my work and "play" activities. Those who know me would agree that I can only be described as a person who gets things done (emphasis and attitude in that phrase, please). In all honestly, I took great pride in my accomplishments at many points in my life before I was laid low. You will see that--and even some smugness--reflected in these reminiscences. I apologize and ask for you to indulge me just this once, as this is something of a capsulation of my entire life, and I have little more to show for myself than these brief achievements. I'm forever reminded of the countless, plentiful desert periods in my life when I was absolutely certain I was a fraud without a speck of talent, natural or otherwise. Those by far supersede any glimpse of self-worth.

In any case, during my "leisure", I've been known to read in excess of 400 books in a single year. Yes, you read that right, and, yes, I know there are only 365 days in a year. In my work, which has been writing (professionally for the last 26 years) I've actually been compared to a computer. Only that accurately describes how quickly I process and perform my tasks. Whereas most writers can finish a novel or two a year and rare ones can produce one or two more than that, I've spent the majority of my career completing at least five full-length novels (ranging from 60,000 to 100,000 words plus) and five novellas (nearly all close to 40,000 words long) every single year.

If I had to be honest, I'd admit that I barely broke a sweat most of the time I was accomplishing these feats. In fact, reading and writing books was only part of what I was doing at any given time. Along with writing books, every year I made promotion of my published works a full-time job, along with leading a few writers' groups in which I coordinated numerous endeavors. I also wrote countless freelance assignments for many magazines, cranked out weekly or monthly columns for various publications, wrote blurbs, and critiqued and edited the material of other authors, as well as designed covers for my books and those of fellow authors.

Karen Wiesner Sketch: Still Life with Books

My secret: Early in my writing, I formulated an approach to writing that I've documented step by step in my reference titles. This technique allowed me to "work in stages" and accomplish so much more than I would have if I'd written each book from start to finish, back to back, one at a time. Essentially, I was always writing multiple books at a time, each in distinct stages of the writing process. For the most part, that technique ensured that I avoided burnout altogether. More accurately, I was able to sidestep it, provided I gave myself at least three vacations a year, each lasting 2-3 weeks long and forcing me to curtail all writing activities during them.

As long as I took those vacations as prescribed, I could indefinitely juggle the heavy workloads I assigned myself the rest of the year. Most often, I indulged in my favorite pastimes during my recuperation times: Reading and playing videogames. Here, too, I hit it hard. As befitting a crash and burn personality like mine, I would spend most of my waking hours, staying up late, playing a game or series of games or plowing through a shocking amount of books from my To Be Read mountain. This was the only way I was able to cope with the stress of just how much I was accomplishing in a year's time. Mind you, if I took my vacations when I needed to, for as much time as I needed to, I barely felt the weight of my work at all other times. In these 26 years, my running tally is 146 books published, 152 books written, and, incidentally, nearly 130 awards nominated for or won. This is the testament to my dedication in accomplishing all my writing goals.

As anyone can imagine, breaking this lifelong habit of crash and burn was nearly impossible. As I said at the start of this essay, I've felt myself being directed and redirected, gently, sometimes almost imperceptibly, for years. It wasn't a lesson I learned all at once, but it is one I had to relearn countless times it really stuck.  Many sentiments fit how it felt to be taught something I assumed I'd mastered only to fall back into the same bad habits that are seemingly my own unique factory resets: Embarrassment, amusement, frustration, bewilderment, even shock at my own ignorance and blindness as to what's happened to bring me back to square one.

It's unfortunate that, to get me to the point where I even agreed to submission in the first place, I had to be broken and re-broken. Strangely, I've come to enjoy (in some ways, at least) the slow-down--I, who once considered herself with no small amount of pride, the Mighty One with Super Powers.

Next week I'll talk about what it took to bring about change in the crash and burn lifestyle that dominated most of my adult life.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

RavenCon

You can read about the 2023 RavenCon, held in the Richmond, VA, area this past weekend, here:

RavenCon

The guest of honor was Esther Friesner. I watched her "Ask Auntie Esther" presentation (consisting mostly of funny anecdotes about life in writing, publishing, and fandom) and part of an interview. She's as entertaining in person as her stories and anthologies are (e.g., the CHICKS IN CHAINMAIL series she edited). Another special guest, horror host "Count Gore De Vol," of course costumed in vampire regalia, acted as MC for the masquerade contest. Although I didn't recognize the sources of most of the costumes, I enjoyed seeing them anyway. The only child entrant played a role I did know, Luna Lovegood from the Harry Potter series. The most unusual costume, I thought, was "Jor-El in the Fortress of Solitude." The contestant wore a cardboard diorama of the interior of the ice fortress on his head. His actual face, in white makeup, emerged through an opening in the back, with a tiny figure of Superman looking up at him. The intermission featured entertainment by a filk music group called Dimensional Riffs, whom I liked. (For one thing, most of the lyrics were clearly understandable, often not the case with instruments drowning out vocals in some groups' performances.) They sang Star Wars and "Firefly" material.

My husband and I appeared in a session on creating memorable character names, which I thought went well. Recommendations of resources for finding or generating names, plus lots of discussion about what not to do.

Some panel highlights: "Raising Children in Space," including both generation ships and extraterrestrial or extrasolar planets. "Should We Be Genetically Altering Humans?", ranging from correction of genes that cause severely disabling or life-threatening conditions to radical redesign of human embryos. Both of these had actual scientists on the panel with solid information and substantive issues discussed. Same with "Writing Believable Aliens." The panel on how not to think about women characters, focusing more on reader response than on strategies for writers, was interesting but not quite what I expected. The "Mary Sue" concept, since it figured prominently in the printed schedule's panel description, took up a lot of time, and in my opinion the panelists sometimes applied it too broadly and not quite accurately. Some interesting discussion anyway. An archaeologist gave a presentation on medicinal and magical plants found in "spell bags" (usually, in fact, pots rather than bags, which don't last very well) in burials of shamans. She showed slides of plants and the burial sites, with skeletal remains. The lecture explored two different sites, one in England and one Native American burial from the eastern U.S. She barely managed to fit all her material into the allotted time; I wish the talk could have gone on longer.

Same hotel as last year, spread over three different buildings on a beautiful, green campus. Buffets were available for breakfasts and dinners, fortunately. We heard from those who ate lunch in the "tavern" that service was painfully slow. Typical of a convention hotel, sigh. Luckily, there is also a "grab and go" food counter, although their selection is limited. The location is within less than half a day's drive from us. We had nice weather for the most part; the predicted Saturday rain didn't turn out to be much. On the whole, a satisfactory weekend at a not-too-big con.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt