Reviews 60 - How The Multiverse Got Its Revenge

Reviews 60

How The Multiverse Got Its Revenge 

We discussed creating a World for a series of novels spanning multiple alternate Universes here:

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2021/01/worldbuilding-for-multiple-alternate.html

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2021/01/worldbuilding-for-multiple-alternate_19.html


How The Universe Got Its Revenge by K. Eason has a title that seems as if the novel would be a model for how to apply the considerations highlighted in those two posts.

I read the novel with great anticipation, and was just a bit disappointed because of my expectations.

The novel is not disappointing.  It's well done, for what it is -- a lot of combat scenes glued together with some plot and some vaguely sketched Relationships.

But I could imagine what a grand novel it would have been had it been a lot of Relationships challenged and welded together by some vaguely sketched combat scenes.

But for what it is, this is a very good book.

Most readers will enjoy How The Multiverse Got Its Revenge by K Eason - even without reading the prequel.

I read it in small snatches because (well, life, you know) but every time I had a half hour, or thought I would, I came happily right back to this book to see what happens next.

The book is well written, powerfully plotted, but skips around point of view among several sub-groups of the main characters in the previous novel. It shows clearly how their team has remained intact, even though they split up physically at the end of the previous adventures.  They won, and "retired' to new lives.

Only - well, life happens.

Now they are back at saving the Multiverse as they know it, with several species of people trying to form and hold profitable alliances.  The narrative does not dwell on the politics -- you grasp the sparse sketch of the politics instinctively.  It is a nicely set up situation that showcases the main characters combat abilities -- in skirmish after battle, after danger after near-miss.

So in a vague way, this novel does illustrate what happens when you mess with the Multiverse as these characters did in the prequel.  But I didn't see that it really lived up to its title about the nature of reality, the nature of life, the definition of "person" and the adversarial relationship between Reality (or THE Multiverse) and a small group of unlikely friends and allies.  

Given the title, Multiverse, I expected more modern science, math and theoretical physics explaining what the Multiverse is doing, why it is doing it, and what these characters can do about that.

Why "revenge" -- why is "the" Multiverse so petty, small, childish, petulant, and impotent?  Only the truly impotent seek "revenge" so why would some Macrocosmic All regard this ragtag band of political adventurers as a threat to be swatted back at?  None of those questions are addressed or answered or even sketched.

The definition of "revenge" is not addressed. That's what I kept coming back to the book looking for.  It isn't there. The characters are (mostly ) good people pitted against people who somehow intend to destroy the comfortable existence of good people. That might be revenge - or maybe not. The theme is not clear.

So if the title alone attracts you, maybe you should read the prequel HOW RORY THORNE DESTROYED THE MULTIVERSE, or wait for the sequel and read all 3 at once.

But you won't get any real Romance out of it.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

The Power Of Thoughtful Questions

 "I ask questions for a living..." Larry King responded to an interviewer of perhaps the most famous interviewer of our generation.  

Larry King also shared some of his guiding principles, such as that an interview is about the interviewee, not about the interviewer, therefore he "left ego at the door". He "never brought [his own] opinion to [his] interviews." He believed in asking concise questions, and giving his guests an uninterrupted opportunity to answer.

Writers can learn a lot, craftwise, from public figures who ask questions for a living. 

While Larry King asked questions to edify and entertain and broaden the horizons of his viewers and listeners, asking questions of a different sort is the basis of an attorney's craft. Asking questions is also a critical part of a teacher's Socratic method to stimulate critical thinking and draw out ideas. The right questions, at the right time, and in the right order can often achieve what no amount of argument will do.

There is an anecdote in "Doesn't Hurt To Ask" by Trey Gowdy in which Gowdy gently roasts Senator Tim Scott for having a vanity license plate US SENATOR 2. Senator Tim Scott responds with a question: "How many times were you stopped last year by the police...?"

Off topic, but maybe vanity license plates that convey a helpfully reassuring message to law enforcement ought to cost no more than regular plates. Maybe somewhere on the back of a vehicle, it should be possible to have the photos of the licensed driver and co-driver of that vehicle.  If the need to ask to see License, Registration, and Proof of Insurance are the most dangerous part of a traffic stop, shouldn't those documents have an RFID chip that the police could read before approaching the driver's window?

One of Gowdy's chapter titles, likely to appeal to writers, is "A word is worth a thousand words".  That might be an oxymoron for the ages. Deep!  Another great insight from Gowdy's years as a prosecutor is that there may only be two witnesses to a murder. One is dead. The other is the defendant.

Another truth is that almost every human likes to talk a lot more than they like to listen. That gives huge life advantages to anyone who likes to listen, or likes to ask incremental questions and is willing to actively listen to the answers.

For authors perhaps wanting a refresher in character development, or the use of dialogue while in the POV of the questioner, Trey Gowdy's "It Doesn't Hurt To Ask" might be a goldmine. As Gowdy says, "Asking the right question is a devilish way to turn the tables."

All the best,

Rowena Cherry

SPACE SNARK™ http://www.spacesnark.com/ 

Digital Feudalism

In Cory Doctorow's early January LOCUS column, he discusses in considerable technical depth the surveillance and privacy (or anti-privacy) policies of big tech companies, mainly Apple but also others such as Facebook and Google:

Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor

He draws an extended analogy with the medieval feudal system. Private citizens besieged by cyberworld bandits have no practical recourse but to ally themselves with "warlords" who offer protection through powerful security measures unavailable to ordinary users. Behind the nearly impregnable walls constructed by the warlords—Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, etc.—we can consider ourselves fairly safe from encroachment by predators. Safe from everyone, that is, except the warlords themselves.

Doctorow's example of Apple's "feudalistic" practices: "For more than a year, Apple has engaged in a covert, global surveillance of its users through its operating system, which automatically sent information about which apps you were running to Apple, and which gave Apple a remote veto over whether that program would launch when you double-clicked it." The corporation might claim this feature protects users from malicious software, but it doesn't prevent Apple from blocking any software it chooses, whether harmful or beneficial. Furthermore, Apple also locks out programs consumers might use to turn off the surveillance and blocking feature.

The article cites various examples from other major corporations. It also explores entanglement between big tech and government, with the state claiming the right to mine data collected by technology giants. How chilling to contemplate that "the US government viewed the tech companies as host organisms to be parasitized at will, a force that would mobilize market investments to erect a vast, expensive surveillance apparatus that the state could then wield at bargain-basement prices."

If the only thing that stops Apple or any big tech lord of the manor "from blocking you from running legitimate apps – or from gathering information about your movements and social activities – is its goodwill and good judgment," what can we peasants do? Doctorow, of course, has some suggestions, but they're solutions no individual or small group of consumers can implement on our own.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Worldbuilding For Multiple Alternate Universes Part 2 - Find Some Crazy Ideas

Worldbuilding For Multiple Alternate Universes

Part 2

Find Some Crazy Ideas

Part 1 - Star Trek Fan Fiction
https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2021/01/worldbuilding-for-multiple-alternate.html

We pointed to Star Trek as an example of a TV Show whose fans created fanfic -- some writers attempting to replicate the aired-Trek universe exactly, while others embroidered freehand to create alternate-Trek universes, from which other writers spun off alternate-alternate-Trek universes.

Of course, no matter how hard they tried, fanfic writers never could replicate the aired-Trek characters and ended up with "original" Spocks, Kirks, McCoys, and Scotties (and Uhuras and so on).

Seeing that, other fanfic writers just plain grabbed the archetypes and spun themselves original characters - sometimes using the aired-Trek names, and sometimes adding new characters, or just creating.

Some of those writers soon "went pro" and sold their own original science fiction for professional publication.

You might be surprised to discover how much fiction has been published (in various genres) "inspired by" aired-Trek.

Once inspired, a writer just doesn't stop.

So at some point, the writer originates material that requires several universes, parallel or perpendicular, branching from, and time-line-corrupted -- possibly just a dreamland the Character negotiates.

All of the Main  Characters' adventures as they splash through alternate universes and try to figure out "what the hell is going on" and "how do I get home from here?" -- all while rescuing each other from dire predicaments and sharing quiet moments of bonding -- have to be living a coherent path through their personal lives.

That means the essential theme has to be replicated in all the alternate universes they cross, and their responses have to generate further events (because line) consistent with the underlying premise of the alien universe.

You'll need a lot of material to create such alternate realities and lend them verisimilitude.

OK, so where do you get those crazy ideas from which to spin insane universes for your characters to traverse?

The solidity of your worldbuilding is even more important because it is not the focus, or the reason the readers are turning the pages.

Romance, and yes, Science Fiction, actually focus on the Character Arc - how the Character changes because of the impact of the plot events.

So the important thing about the Setting (which alternate universe they are in) is what they think is happening - much more than what is really happening.

What is really happening can be information the writer has but never imparts to the reader -- or even to the Characters.  What is really happening is the stuff of which sequels are made.

What the Characters think is happening is the most important element in both Science Fiction and Romance because from those inferences, the Characters will launch their responses to Events.  That's how Johnny gets his fanny caught in a bear trap -- the novel is about Johnny's adventures getting it out.

Show don't tell how the Characters responding to an incorrect take on the meaning of Events leads them to do things that just make matters worse.  At the 3/4 point, you can let it dawn on the poor blokes just how wrong they've been, so the "worm turns" and attacks the real problem.

The real problem will yield to that head-on attack, but if you leave out some information, the real problem will die down for a satisfying ending, but then re-grow from deeply buried roots, and attack again -- making a grand sequel.

To sketch out a story-dynamic of this type, the writer has to stockpile material -- sometimes for years and years.

The adage is "write what you know" -- but who knows life on another planet, or how any couple can achieve a "Happily Ever After" in this turbulent world?

The whole point of reading Science Fiction and/or Romance is that you don't know.

That's what makes an "adventure" -- not just that the Characters don't know, but that the writer doesn't know before writing.

But it is also true that the desk drawers (and hard drives) of writers are littered with abandoned books half-written and shelved.

Those projects become abandoned when the writer had to stop writing to do research.

Or it might be that the writer didn't stop writing to do research -- and as a result created a whole universe that just won't work at all.

The way to avoid both kinds of research problems is to be an eclectic and omnivorous reader, and stockpile heaps and heaps of useless information, ideas, points of view, emotions, and all the alternatives that humans have already created down through the ages.  And then just forget it all.

Absolutely forgotten - barely recognize if you ever see it again, forgotten.  No way you could verbalize any explanation but you fully understand it on a non-verbal level.

Once "forgotten" this kind of information forms a compost heap to fertilize the freehand invention of whole universes.

As needed, the writer wallops out a few words to "describe" (or more accurately, evoke) the entire alternate universe the Characters pass through on their adventures.  Two or three vivid details, a symbol, a souvenir or wound, and BAM, they are gone into the next alternate universe.

So what do you research to find bits to shovel into your compost pile of universes?

Actual reality makes a good start.

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2017/05/index-to-worldbuilding-from-reality.html

Theory, theme, ideas, bizarre occurrences (don't get me started on UFO stories!) and yes, even politics and religion, make grand sources of crazy ideas.  Romance writers need to read a lot of non-fiction on psychology, anthropology, sociology, and history.  Science Fiction writers need to read lots of science, peer-reviewed journals, but most importantly "junk science" and pie-in-the-sky theory at the tabloid level and the serious (but made-simple) kind of science reporter level.

Science Fiction Romance writers need both. The reading predates the writing by at least 10 years, if not 20, so start in elementary school.

Biographies are a good starting place, as you can discover which sciences enchant you most by reading the life story of those who have degrees in those fields.  And you need to read lots of biographies to be able to craft a Character Arc that will make your Characters seem real to your readers.

So a fiction writer stocks their compost heap with non-fiction.  A corollary to that is also true: a non-fiction writer stocks their compost heap with fiction.

Here is a non-fiction best seller -- stuffy academic topic; best seller status on Amazon in 2020 -- that weaves Sociology, with Politics, Anthropology, and the theory of governing HUMANS (not non-humans, mind you, so you have a lot of elbow room to create here).

It is a book ABOUT academe, but not academe itself.

It suggests a relationship (which may not be true for humans but might for some alternate universe non-humans) between the flights of fancy of academic philosophers inventing new Disciplines and courses in them, and the everyday "real world" you and I live in.

Maybe there is such a relationship, but it isn't configured the way this book suggests.  Or maybe, hitherto in human history, there has never been such a relationship, but today's academics are creating that relations (so in an alternate universe, what if they succeed? What if they fail? What if the whole thing turns on them?)

Here's the book, and its description from Amazon:

Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity―and Why This Harms Everybody

Print:
https://www.amazon.com/Cynical-Theories-Scholarship-Everything-Identity_and/dp/1634312023/

Kindle:
https://www.amazon.com/Cynical-Theories-Scholarship-Everything-Identity-ebook/dp/B08BGCM5QZ/

------blurb from Amazon------
Have you heard that language is violence and that science is sexist? Have you read that you shouldn't practice yoga or cook Chinese food? Are you confused by these ideas and wonder how they have managed to challenge so quickly the very logic of Western society? In this probing and intrepid volume, Helen Pluckrose and James A. Lindsay document the evolution of this dogma, from its coarse origins in French postmodernism to its refinement within activist academic fields. As Pluckrose and Lindsay warn, the unchecked proliferation of these anti-Enlightenment beliefs presents a threat not only to liberal democracy but also to modernity itself. Only through a proper understanding of the evolution of these ideas can those who value science, reason, and consistently liberal ethics successfully challenge this dangerous and authoritarian orthodoxy.

--------end blurb------

Here's a quote from one of the early reviews:

------quote------
....This book gives a detailed history of the movement to destroy liberal principles and replace them with Wokeness. It makes what is happening on our streets make sense. It explains the absurdity of things like the videos going around as I write this, of restaurant patrons being harassed by thugs screaming in their faces and demanding that they make a show of obedience and fealty to the mob.

-----end quote------

This book details a neat way of looking at history -- the evolution of IDEAS -- and it lends itself to Romance so very easily.

Take a couple, one holding one view on this matter, and the other holding the opposite view, each used to hanging out with people who reinforce their views.  What does she see in him?  What does he see in her?

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/08/what-does-she-see-in-him.html

But love conquers all, right?

Can such a couple survive without killing each other, or themselves Romeo and Juliet style?

The essence of story is conflict -- and I can't see anyone reading this book without fulminating with conflict.

If the topic doesn't  catch your attention, go on Amazon and put this paper copy book in your cart, then watch what Amazon recommends would interest you.  Find a topic you can fulminate over, read some of the books Amazon recommends (check ABE books for used copies, you likely won't want to keep), and then just forget the whole thing.

In a few years, you will "have an idea" for a novel.  Your idea will sprout from the compost heap of balderdash, bravado, and homespun nonsense you read and forgot years and years previously.

This non-fiction best seller contains the material for two, maybe three, whole alternate universes for your Characters to tromp through and fight about (and for, and against).  Don't ignore these kinds of books, and don't sell them short as source material for your compost heap.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Dry (Tax)

 "File and furnish a copy of Form 1099-NEC on paper or electronically by February 1, 2021."

So says the IRS. That's new, and different. Does it affect you?  It might, if you are a writer. Writers who make a profit from their writing in three out of five years are deemed to be professional writers (as opposed to hobbyists).  

 

Writing for profit might make you a small business owner, and as such, you should have an EIN (employer identification number). An EIN is a good idea, because you want as few persons as possible to know your social security number. For more information on getting an EIN free:
https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/employer-id-numbers

If you do business as an LLC (even a single member LLC), you need to file an annual report with your state, and pay a nominal annual filing fee.  You may  also need to file informational filings. 

 

In past years, authors would file a 1099-MISC  (line 7, the Non-Employee Compensation box) with any lawyer to whom you'd paid any amount, and to any non-incorporated business or individual (perhaps a webmistress or a researcher or a cover artist) that you'd paid $600 or more.
 

Also--which may come as a nasty surprise to authors and their fans--if you paid $600 or more (or equivalent value) in prizes and awards to a lucky contest winner, you have to file an informational return about that.  I am not clear if that is still 1099-MISC or 1099-NEC.
https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/am-i-required-to-file-a-form-1099-or-other-information-return

 
For 2020, the Non Employee Compensation box is gone from the 1099-MISC. Instead, you have to use Form 1099-NEC. You can get the forms free from the IRS, online if your equipment qualifies, or by mail if you file paper.

https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/order-products

With the 1099-MISC, you had until Feb 28th to file.  Now, you have to get your forms in the mail and postmarked by January 31st (except the USPS is not going to be doing any postmarking on Sunday Jan 31, so the deadline is Monday Feb 1st this year.)

The info is a little confusing about whether payments to lawyers still go on 1099-MISC or 1099-NEC. The Taxpayer "Relief" Act of 1997 appears to have been written by lawmakers deeply distrustful of lawyers, but all should comply with the super onerous requirements!

Resources:
https://www.thebalancecareers.com/hobbyist-vs-pro-tax-guidelines-for-book-authors-2799859
 

https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/self-employment-taxes/tax-tips-for-freelance-writers-and-self-published-authors/L1v0lGVru

http://www.eclectics.com/articles/taxes.html

https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-1099-misc
https://www.irs.gov/instructions/i1099msc

https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-1099-nec

Disclaimer, I am a writer of fiction and opinion. None of this is intended to be legal or tax advice. If in doubt, please consult a professional or the very helpful people available at irs.gov.

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

SPACE SNARK™ http://www.spacesnark.com/  http://www.rowenacherry.com

 

Sufficiently Advanced Technology

As we know, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" (Arthur C. Clarke). Conversely, many magical events in older fiction can be duplicated today by mainstream technology. A century and a half ago, someone who witnessed a translucent human figure floating in midair and emitting eerie moans would unquestioningly recognize it as a ghost. Now we'd respond with, "Cool special effect. I wonder how they did that?" Just such an apparition appears in Jules Verne's 1892 novel THE CARPATHIAN CASTLE, on the cusp of the shift between the two probable reactions. The local people think the vision of a dead opera star at the titular castle is her spirit, when it fact it's produced by a sound recording and a projected photograph.

In George du Maurier's 1894 novel TRILBY, the villain, Svengali, uses hypnotism to transform an ordinary girl who's tone-deaf into a famous singer. She can produce exquisite melodies only in a trance. When Svengali dies, she instantly becomes unable to sing. At the time of the novel's publication, little enough was known about hypnosis that this scenario doubtless looked scientifically plausible. Now that we know hypnosis doesn't work that way, Svengali's control over Trilby seems like magic, and to us the story reads as fantasy.

Several decades ago, I read a horror story about an author who acquires a typewriter that's cursed, possessed, or something. He finds that it corrects his typos and other minor errors. Gradually, this initially benign feature becomes scary, as the machine takes over his writing to an ever greater extent. He narrates his experience in longhand, since if using the typewriter he wouldn't even be able to demonstrate an example of a misspelling. At the time of publication, this story was an impossible fantasy. Now it would be merely a cautionary tale of a word processor with an excessively proactive auto-correct feature. From the beginning of J. D. Robb's Eve Dallas science fiction mysteries, set in the late 2050s and early 2060s, almost everybody carries a handheld "link," a combination communications device and portable computer. When the earliest books in the series were published, that device was a futuristic high-tech fantasy. Now the equivalent has become commonplace in real life. But another tool Lt. Dallas uses in her homicide investigations still doesn't exist and remains problematic. Police detectives employ a handheld instrument reminiscent of Dr. McCoy's tricorder to gather data about murder victims. One of its functions is to pinpoint the precise time of death to the minute. That capability would seem to run counter to the intrinsic limitations arising from the nature of the decomposition processes being analyzed. Therefore, the exact-time-of-death function strikes me as irreducibly quasi-magical rather than scientific, something the audience has to accept without dissecting its probability, like the universal translator in STAR TREK.

The distinction between science and magic can get fuzzy when nominal SF has a fantasy "feel." Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover series takes place on an alien planet inhabited partly by descendants of shipwrecked Terran colonists. Strict "hard science" readers might not accept psi powers as a real-world possibility, however, and the common people of Darkover regard laran (psi gifts) as sorcery. Anne McCaffrey's Pern series, also set on a planet colonized by migrants from Earth, features fire-breathing, empathic, teleporting, time-traveling dragons. Although these creatures have an in-universe scientific explanation, they resemble the dragons of myth and legend. Robert Heinlein's novella "Waldo" blends SF and what many if not most readers would consider fantasy. The title character lives on a private space station because of his congenital muscular weakness. Yet he overcomes his disability by learning to control his latent psychic talent under the guidance of an old Pennsylvania hex doctor who teaches Waldo how to access the "Other World." Incidentally, "Waldo" offers an example of how even a brilliant speculative author such as Heinlein can suffer a lapse of futuristic imagination. Amid the technological wonders of Waldo's orbiting home, Heinlein didn't envision either electronic books or computer games; a visitor notices paper books suspended from the bulkheads and wonders how Waldo would manage to play solitaire in zero-G.

I've heard of a story (can't recall whether I actually read it) whose background premise states that, in the recent past, the wizards who secretly control the world revealed that all technology is actually operated by magic. The alleged science behind the machines was only a smoke screen. If such an announcement were made in real life, I wouldn't have much trouble accepting it. For non-scientists, some of the fantastic facts science expects us to believe—that we and all the solid objects around us consist of mostly empty space; that the magical devices we used to communicate, research, and write are operated by invisible entities known as electrons; that starlight we see is millions of years old; that airplanes stay aloft by mystical forces called "lift" and "thrust"; that culture and technology have advanced over millennia from stone knives and bearskins to spacecraft purely through human ingenuity—require as much faith in the proclamations of authorities as any theological doctrine does.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Reviews 59 - People of the City by Marshall Ryan Maresca

Reviews 59

People of the City
by
Marshall Ryan Maresca

Here is a non-stop action series we've discussed before,

https://www.amazon.com/People-City-Maradaine-Elite-Book-ebook/dp/B0852PDDC1/










https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2020/01/reviews-51-shield-of-people-novel-of.html

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2020/06/reviews-53-fenmere-job-by-marshall-ryan.html

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2019/06/reviews-46-police-family-love-by.html

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2018/05/reviews-34-by-jacqueline-lichtenberg.html

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/06/reviews-16-thorn-of-dentonhill-by.html

And I do recommend the whole series, as a study in "worldbuilding" -- even though it is not Romance Genre or Fantasy or Paranormal Romance.

It has a couple of "love story" threads, but they get buried in the detritus of action-action-action.

As in much fantasy-action, the fighters get badly injured but recover quickly, much more quickly than is realistic.  This casts a "comic book" atmosphere around the "Magic" so that "Magic" is just a way of imposing your personal will on the world, the adolescent male wish-fulfillment-fantasy.

But Maresca uses Magic as only one small thread of the tapestry he is weaving before our eyes.  Watch his future novels built on this foundation -- and use your imagination to figure how, if you and your readers explore such a "world," you could illustrate LOVE CONQUERS ALL.  The problems Maresca is setting up are exactly the type that love is best at conquering.

With PEOPLE OF THE CITY, Maresca brings to simultaneous climax all the threads begun and richly colored, woven and showcased in the previous Maradaine novels.

I do seriously recommend reading them in the order in which they were published, as it is actually one, continuous, long story -- a story-arc -- that behind the non-stop action-action format, leaves us with many serious issues to consider on a fundamental level.  And that is what fiction has traditionally been for -- challenging pre-conceptions, prejudices, and assumptions while at the same time provoking thoughtful consideration of other  explanations for how things are which lead to how things might be "....if only."

The essence of science fiction is the three ingredients, "What if...?" "If this goes on ..." and "If only ..."    When mixed with science, these three thinking processes lead to ideas that have never been promulgated before.

With this blast of novels centered on the city of Maradaine, Maresca uses political science, psychology, sociology and anthropology (and Magic) as his "science" ingredient, spending all 12 of these novels explaining "the problem" and setting that problem against a detailed survey of the sociological organization of a city based on neighborhood gang rulerships of territory, drug cartel rulership of imports, people-trafficking, a righteous constabulary, a corrupt constabulary leadership, a King with major political problems, a Throne in question, and a university struggling to teach two antithetical theories of the universe - Mechanics of Machines and Science-vs-Magic.  There are also mandatory Magic-user monitoring and controlling organizations called Circles which one enters upon completing certain University training to obtain "power."

But as with humans (and these people are human, though different, and with races and cultures unfamiliar to the reader), it is all about "power" --  physical, psychological, knowledge itself, or magic (or the knowledge of magic) and psychological power of trickery, illusion, misdirection.  Apparently, Magic is an individual endowment one is born with, but acquiring power takes real work plus some arcane tools nobody really understands or has ready access to.

We, as readers, can see the analytical thinking of engineers applied to investigating how these magical tools and substances can acquire, store and deliver raw Magic-power, but the denizens of this complex world can't see it.

Except, one suspects in the distant past, they did see the combination of science and magic, and came to a bad end.  Thus in the era of "The Maradaine Elite" there is a young generation beginning to awaken to this combination, willing to explore the possibilities to gain enough "power" to counter the corruption destroying their City from the top down.

The title page of PEOPLE OF THE CITY indicted the next book, coming soon from DAW Books, will be titled THE VELOCITY OF REVOLUTION -- a title combining a scientific mechanical concept "velocity" which has both speed and direction, with "revolution" which likewise has mechanical implications but is often used to discuss changing political leaderships.

It sounds like a very clever segue into a story about combining Magic and Science -- and that is a combination I find endlessly fascinating.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com