Karen S. Wiesner: Oldies But Goodies {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: Fantastic Beasts Original Screenplays by J.K. Rowling

Oldies But Goodies

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: Fantastic Beasts Original Screenplays by J.K. Rowling

by Karen S. Wiesner

Quite a few years ago, a trend started going around writing circles that was in direct opposition of everything I'd ever taught about going deep with characters. In this trend, writers were advised not to include more than basic information about main characters, allowing readers to fill in the blanks and make the characters whatever they want them to be. Can character development can be fluid enough to allow something like that without compromising everything vital in a story? In a word, no. Individual character choices directly influence outcomes. If a character isn't well defined, motives and purposes are constantly in question as well as in flux. Readers are more likely to say "Sucks for you" to characters they can't invest in, let alone care about enough to root for. Ultimately, characters that have little or no impact on readers make for a quickly forgotten story.

Personally, I want a good balance of character and plot development in any story I invest myself in. With most of the new stuff coming out, I'm not getting that. So I've been re-reading the books that have made it onto my keeper shelves in the past. To that end, here's another "oldies but goodies" review.

I'm taking a risk here, reviewing a wonderful book series that was literally destroyed by politics, misunderstandings on both sides, and shockingly vicious social media squabbles. My excuse for going ahead with it is: 1) I don't believe anyone or anything should be censored, particularly books, and 2) if I resigned myself to only enjoying art (in whatever form it comes in) created by artists I actually agree with the political opinions and private lives and actions of, I might as well give up art although. While I unfortunately absorbed some of the controversy surrounding this series because it was impossible to avoid it altogether in using the internet and to live in a world where the people around you have very strong opinions, for the most part I've managed to separate myself from it. I love the world of Harry Potter so much, there was no way I was going to let differing opinions on a topic that had nothing to do with the stories keep me from reading, watching, and playing the games designed around this magical world. Just in case anyone wonders: The screenplay format wasn't a deterrent either. While it's not as rich as a novel, it worked.

Fantastic Beasts actually takes place well in advance of the Harry Potter series. Here, the famous or infamous, depending on your point-of-view, Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore is a middle-age man. We knew about Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them, the title of the first Fantastic Beasts screenplay and the movie that was made from it, because it was a textbook Harry and his classmates were using to study magical creatures. The author of the textbook was Magizoologist Newt Scamander, and that's the main character in the screenplays and films of the Fantastic Beasts series.

The first screenplay and movie took a little bit of time to grow on me because it was so drastically different. Set in the USA, New York, where the American division of wizards Magical Congress of the United States (MACUSA) is headquartered, the series includes a host of unlikely but compelling characters. Stories hinted at within Harry Potter come to life here--ones that I've always wanted to know more about--more than any, Dumbledore's history. Here, we get much more detail about his family life, his romantic liaison with infamous dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald (very tastefully done), the life changes that resulted from those experiences, and his role at Hogwarts.

Dumbledore, Credence, Newt, and his unlikely and initially reluctant sidekick, baker Jacob are strong, loveable characters with easy to emphasize with motivations and goals. Also of note is Queenie, a compelling secondary character with unique talents and a sweet, simple faith in love. Her sister Tina would have been another intriguing character, but her place in the story was upset after the first screenplay/movie--again, based on real-life politics that drastically and indelibly altered the series.

In the second installment, The Crimes of Grindelwald, we start to learn who Dumbledore's former boyfriend is, what he believes, and what motivates him to violently change the wizarding--and the No-Maj (non-magical) or Muggle world--forever. In the movie, Johnny Depp played the role of Grindelwald brilliantly. The third installment, The Secrets of Dumbledore, was written by Rowling with Steve Kloves, who wrote screenplays for seven of the Harry Potter films. The role of Grindelwald was later filled by another favorite actor of mine Mads Mikkelsen. {Damn you, social medium politics and controversy!}. In Secrets, Grindelwald's madness comes to a head. We learned a lot in the suspenseful, shocking story, some closure was provided, but not everything was tied up neatly in this screenplay/movie.

Originally, the Fantastic Beasts screenplays/films were supposed to be a trilogy, but even before the release of the third film, that grew. The final two installments were to "consist of a sequence of events that occurred between the years of 1926 and 1945", according to Rowling. Political strife and media controversy on multiple fronts had a deep impact on the future of the screenplays and films. By late 2022, the movie company had reported it "was not actively planning to continue the film series or to develop any films related to the Wizarding World franchise". A year later, the director David Yates offered a half-hearted "...at some point, we'll be back." Rowling and the producer hadn't weighed in at that point. I imagine the author was terrified to open her mouth about anything at that point. Not long later, Yates confirmed the franchise had been parked, development discontinued. So fans will just have to be satisfied with the endings provided in the third screenplay/movie.

It makes me very sad that hate, prejudice, and intolerance can cause such devastation even in an imaginary world, tainting beyond redemption something that started out so good.

You'll see more of my reviews for Oldie But Goodies that you might also find worth another read in the future.

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/

Becoming a Dark Lord/Lady

Is it possible to be a good Dark Lord (or Lady)? The term "good" in this context is ambiguous. It can mean competent, skilled at certain tasks, fit for his, her, or its purpose. Or it can mean morally and ethically virtuous. We could call Shakespeare's versions of Macbeth and Richard III "good characters," meaning they're well constructed, believable, and entertaining. But we wouldn't label them morally good. A character could be a good Dark Lord or Lady in the sense of a convincing example of a powerful villain (from the reader's viewpoint) or an expert in ruling villainously (within the fictional world). Could a dark ruler be morally good, though, or is that concept self-contradictory?

I recently read THE DARK LORD'S DAUGHTER, by Patricia C. Wrede. Fourteen-year-old Kayla is snatched from our world, along with her adoptive mother and brother, by a man who informs her she's the only child of the late Dark Lord of a realm reminiscent of the fantasy worlds in her brother's favorite movies and video games. To Kayla's dismay, everyone seriously expects her to deal with opposition and assert her power by exiling, torturing, or executing people on the slightest pretext. How can she hold her unwanted position (while working to learn enough magic to return herself and her family to Earth) without transforming into a villain? Surprisingly even to herself, she comes to care for some of the people under her nominal rule and can't just abandon them without trying to fix the more dysfunctional features of the lair and throne she has inherited.

THE DARK LORD'S DAUGHTER reminds me a bit of Ursula Vernon's CASTLE HANGNAIL, whose heroine, Molly, isn't drafted into her position but deliberately applies for it. She answers an ad seeking a wicked witch to take over a castle in need of a master or mistress. The minions of Castle Hangnail, desperate for someone to rule the estate so they won't lose their home, gradually warm to this twelve-year-old girl who does have magic but otherwise barely qualifies. To become the castle's permanent custodian, she has to check off a lists of achievements, including such tasks as smiting and blighting. Some people deserve a mild smiting, and blighting weeds in the herb garden qualifies as a dark action without crossing the line into true evil. Along those lines, Molly manages to fulfill the "wicked witch" role without becoming a bad person. Just when she's on the verge of approval as the official sorceress of Castle Hangnail, though, an unexpected visitor exposes the deception she perpetrated to get over the threshold in the first place -- but no more spoilers!

In case by any chance you've never read the Evil Overlord List, here's that exhaustive inventory of things a supervillain should never do:

Evil Overlord List

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Santa's Mammogram

Why Santa Claus? Why a Mammogram, and not an MRI?

Obviously this is an extended metaphor, it might even qualify as an allegory. Santa Claus is a probably not real, he does not fly around the world in a reindeer-powered sleigh, and his progress on Christmas Eve is not accurately tracked by NOAA. NOAA does not track anything accurately, some might say.

Now, if Santa were a well-fed individual, subsisting on a circumpolar diet, with generous fat reserves in his chest, he might be susceptible to various cancers, including cancers traditionally associated with lady parts.

Santa has a problem, but he does not realize the extent of it. He feels that some thing is wrong. He is having hot flashes and violent temper tantrums, he has bouts of excessive weeping, and a pimple under his blouse that keeps erupting.

He has some free time, it is, after all, the slow part of his year; he has no urgent deliveries to make. So he goes for an unpleasant test. What he does not know, and what the technicians and scientists do not tell him is that, of the 1218 sensors in the machine, 365 of them don't work. That is 30%.

His mammogram looks rather like this, with the green bits being accurate reads, and the red clusters or dots being made-up data based on the surrounding areas.

Rather than repair the sensors, or invest in a new machine, the scientists simply calculate what the missing images ought to show, based on an average of the data shown from sensors fractions of an inch on either side of the dark area. Santa's problem might be existentially worse than the radiologist's reading suggests, or he might have much less of a problem. 

What a great plot for a science fiction novel, if one were simply to extrapolate the scenario to something more important, such as a long distance assessment of whether or not Mars is habitable, or what lurks in the alleged water under the alleged ice on Europa, the so-called ice moon of Jupiter!

You would not believe that such a situation could be tolerated in a health care context, or in the arena of high level global policy making, but Katie Spence has reported on allegations by certified consulting meteorologist Lt. Col. John Shewchuk that data from non-existent temperature stations is informing our national obsession with flatulence (by the way, ants methane emissions are worse than cow farts, but almost no one talks about ants) and much more.

Moreover, if bugs fart copiously, why are we being encouraged to eat bugs instead of beef? 

For edification and fun, I highly recommend an internet seach of bug farts. There are insects that use their flatus to stun and disable their prey, and beetles that --if swallowed whole-- can produce a fart deadly enough to make their predator retch them out to freedom.

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

SPACE SNARK™  

http://www.spacesnark.com/   

http://www.rowenacherry.com

 

Karen S. Wiesner: Oldies But Goodies {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Club Dumas by Arturo Pérez-Reverte

Oldies But Goodies

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Club Dumas by Arturo Pérez-Reverte

by Karen S. Wiesner

Quite a few years ago, a trend started going around writing circles that was in direct opposition of everything I'd ever taught about going deep with characters. In this trend, writers were advised not to include more than basic information about main characters, allowing readers to fill in the blanks and make the characters whatever they want them to be. Can character development can be fluid enough to allow something like that without compromising everything vital in a story? In a word, no. Individual character choices directly influence outcomes. If a character isn't well defined, motives and purposes are constantly in question as well as in flux. Readers are more likely to say "Sucks for you" to characters they can't invest in, let alone care about enough to root for. Ultimately, characters that have little or no impact on readers make for a quickly forgotten story.

Personally, I want a good balance of character and plot development in any story I invest myself in. With most of the new stuff coming out, I'm not getting that. So I've been re-reading the books that have made it onto my keeper shelves in the past. To that end, here's another "oldies but goodies" review.

Most people know about this book under its other title in a very different format: In 1999, a highly recommended horror film directed and produced by Roman Polanski was released titled The Ninth Gate, starring Johnny Depp and Lena Olin, who both give brilliant performances. The 1993 novel was beautifully written by Arturo Pérez-Reverte, set in the world of antiquarian booksellers--a topic the author apparently hadn't gotten enough of in his 1990 work The Flanders Panel.

Hired to authenticate a rare manuscript Lucas Corso, a book dealer, soon finds himself led on a harrowing investigation in search of copies of a fictional rare book known (in English) as Of the Nine Doors of the Kingdom of Shadows. The author was burned at the stake, given that the book is said to contain instructions for summoning the devil. Corso is thwarted in his journey, as you might expect, by devil worshippers, obsessed bibliophiles, a horny femme fatale with an ulterior motive, and an obscure woman who actually seems to be helping him but may have an agenda of her own if she is what she suggests--a fallen angel who'd wandered for millennia looking for him. Corso finds multiple copies of the book, none of them exact matches. Some of the plates bear the initials "L.F." and those form a complete set of nine without duplications. Corso realizes that, together, the nine illustrations are the summoning ritual--however, one is a forgery. But which one?

From start to finish, this one is a thrill-ride of suspense and fascination, from the details included for forging a 17-century text, to the unfathomable obsessions of book collectors and the lengths they're willing to go to to obtain their crown jewel, all the way to the unexpected life of a book dealer willing to go to hell (maybe literally) and back all on the quest of extraordinary literary discovery. You can't go wrong with this book or the movie. It might be a good time to give either a replay.

Next week, I'll review another Oldie But Goodie you might find worth another read, too.

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/

Art Versus Life

A work of art (specifically, literature, including poetry such as song lyrics) does not necessarily reveal the life or personality of the artist. Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers didn't make a habit of committing murders. Stephen King has probably never met a vampire or an extradimensional shapeshifter, and although he incorporated his near-fatal traffic accident into the Dark Tower series, I doubt he actually encountered his gunslinger Roland in person. Robert Bloch, reputed to have said he had the heart of a small boy -- in a jar on his desk -- was one of the nicest people I ever met. As Mercedes Lackey has commented on Quora, she doesn't keep a herd of magical white horses in her yard. Despite the preface to THE SCREWTAPE LETTERS, it seems very unlikely that C. S. Lewis actually intercepted a bundle of correspondence between two demons. And, as a vampire specialist, I could go on at length (but I won't) about the literary-critical tendency to analyze DRACULA as a source for secrets about Bram Stoker's alleged psychological hangups.

C. S. Lewis labeled the practice of trying to discover a writer's background, character, or beliefs from his or her work "the personal heresy." Elsewhere, writing about Milton, he cautioned against thinking we can find out how Milton "really" felt about his blindness by reading PARADISE LOST or any of his other poetry.

The Personal Heresy

An article by hip-hop musician Keven Liles cautions against analyzing songs in this way and condemning singers based on the contents of their music, with lyrics "being presented as literal confessions in courtrooms across America":

Art Is Not Evidence

Some musicians and other artists have been convicted of crimes on the basis of words or images in their works. Liles urges passage of a law to protect creators' First Amendment rights in this regard, with narrowly defined "common-sense" exceptions to be applied if there's concrete evidence of a direct, factual connection between a particular work and a specific criminal act.

This kind of confusion between art and life is why I'm deeply suspicious of child pornography laws that would criminalize the broad category of "depicting" children in sexual situations. A description or drawing/painting of an imaginary child in such a situation, however revolting it may be, does no direct real-world harm. Interpreted loosely or capriciously, that kind of law could be read to ban a novel such as LOLITA. Would you really trust a fanatical book-banner or over-zealous prosecutor or judge to discern that the repulsive first-person narrator is thoroughly unreliable and that his self-serving claims about his abusive relationship with a preteen girl are MEANT to be disbelieved?

Many moons ago, in the pre-internet era, a friend of mine who wasn't a regular consumer of speculative fiction read my chapbook of horror-themed verse, DAYMARES FROM THE CRYPT. To my suprise, she expressed sincere worry about me for having such images in my head. Not being a habitual reader of the genre, she didn't recognize that the majority of stuff in the poems consisted of very conventional, widely known horror tropes. Even the more personal pieces had been filtered through the "lens" of creativity (as Liles puts it in his essay) to transmute the raw material into artifacts, not autobiography.

In case you'd like to check out these supposedly disturbing verse effusions, DAYMARES FROM THE CRYPT -- updated with a few later poems -- is available in a Kindle edition for only 99 cents, with a cool cover by Karen Wiesner:

Daymares

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Clichés Don't Count

Clichés aren't copyrightable, and rightly so. It would be unjust and inconvenient to deprive the populace of the right to express an inoffensive idea (even an over-used and unoriginal idea) that has been in common use for generations.

Clichés are sayings that are true or may be received wisdom, but they have been repeated so often that there is no freshness or surprise to them. They are an intellectually lazy form of expression... unless twisted into the premise for a "fractured fairy tale", or a country song with clever "bent phrasing".

Examples of Fractured Fairy Tales for children. There are also adult fairy tales with a twist. Some are very fine indeed, but you will need to find links for yourself.

"He Stopped Loving Her Today" by George Jones is a fine example of a twisted Country trope or Country cliché.

One of my "go to" --or favorite-- legal blogs is the Incontestable Blog. This last week, legal blogger Jenevieve J. Maerker of  Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP discusses the lack of copyrightability of a word such as "rock star" in the titles of musical works.

https://www.finnegan.com/en/insights/blogs/incontestable/fifth-circuit-finds-speculation-and-cliches-not-enough-to-make-musician-plaintiff-a-copyright-rockstar.html#page=1

The Fifth Circuit, at least, will not count a similar song as presumptively copyright-infringing unless it meets the level of "strikingly similar", in other words, so similar that the similarities cannot be explained except by copying. More leeway would be given if the plaintiff could produce photographic proof that the defendents had access and opportunity. 

The Incontenstable article is well worth reading in full. I tried to avoid spilling all the beans.

I wonder how the Circuit would have reacted to "My Sweet Lord"/"He's So Fine".

Clichés that annoy me in television advertisements include "Game-changer". Watch out for the phrase. It suggests to me (but of course, I could be mistaken) that the same lazy-minded employee at an advertising company sold the same verbiage to different clients. 

Another entirely unnecessary cliche that distracts me so much that I have no idea what the product is, is the stopping of air-borne undesirables "in their tracks". So, here is my earworm:   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMDFv5m18Pw

If you are able to master the Comments process, I'd love to know if there are cliches in TV adverts that annoy you. It seems that, in order to comment, you may be "Anonymous", but if you are anon, the moderators have to approve your remarks as being specific to the topic and not blatant self promotion; or you can give your name and your url; or you can be logged in to a Google account.

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

SPACE SNARK™  

http://www.spacesnark.com/   

http://www.rowenacherry.com

EPIC Award winner, Friend of ePublishing for Crazy Tuesday   

Karen S. Wiesner: Oldies But Goodies {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: A Stir of Echoes by Richard Matheson

Oldies But Goodies

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: A Stir of Echoes by Richard Matheson

by Karen S. Wiesner

Quite a few years ago, a trend started going around writing circles that was in direct opposition of everything I'd ever taught about going deep with characters. In this trend, writers were advised not to include more than basic information about main characters, allowing readers to fill in the blanks and make the characters whatever they want them to be. Can character development can be fluid enough to allow something like that without compromising everything vital in a story? In a word, no. Individual character choices directly influence outcomes. If a character isn't well defined, motives and purposes are constantly in question as well as in flux. Readers are more likely to say "Sucks for you" to characters they can't invest in, let alone care about enough to root for. Ultimately, characters that have no impact on readers make for a quickly forgotten story.

Personally, I want a good balance of character and plot development the any story I invest myself in. With most of the new stuff coming out, I'm not getting that. So I've been re-reading the books that have made it onto my keeper shelves in the past. To that end, here's another "oldies but goodies" review.

A Stir of Echoes by Richard Matheson was published in 1958. It's hard to imagine this amazing supernatural horror is actually that old. Matheson probably needs no introduction to most readers. He's a legendary author and screenwriter of fantasy, horror, and science fiction, best known for I Am Legend, a personal favorite of mine.

In A Stir of Echoes, Tom Wallace's life is about as ordinary as it gets. I vividly remember reading it the first time and marveling at 1950s blasé parenting when Tom and his wife leave their new baby alone in the house and go across the street to party with the neighbors. Back then, baby monitors weren't really a thing. I suppose it wasn't a big deal back then. Everyone felt so safe. Not a world I can really imagine.

In any case, Tom is an ordinary man with an ordinary life until something weird happens to him and latent physic abilities are awakened inside him. Suddenly he's hearing what's going on in the minds of everyone, living and dead, around him. He finds himself the unwilling recipient of a message from beyond the grave.

I love one of the reviews of Matheson himself as the author (San Jose Mercury News): "Matheson is the master of paranoia--pitting a single man against unknown horrors, and examining his every slow twist in the wind." So accurate when it comes to the brilliance of this author.

The 1999 film adaptation with the name "Stir of Echoes" was fantastic, starring Kevin Bacon and providing the jump-out-at-you visuals that best serve this better-than-average ghost story. One of the other nice things I like so much about this story is that it's short. These days, everything you read is either really short or really long, almost no in-between. Sometimes you just want a streamlined, yet fully fleshed out story with vibrant characters that gives the reader no more and no less what's actually needed to tell a gripping tale. I highly recommend this classic, and the good news is you can probably immerse yourself in it and be out within a couple days.

Next week, I'll review another Oldie But Goodie you might find worth another read, too.

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/

Technofeudalism

Cory Doctorow advances the position that capitalism isn't evolving into socialism (as classical Marxism predicted) but into a new form of feudalism:

Capitalists Hate Capitalism

His explanation of the difference between "rents" and "profits" is new information to me (being a bear of very little brain where economic theory is concerned, anyhow). "Rent" in the technical sense used by economists means "income derived from owning something that the capitalist needs in order to realize a profit." It's passive income, so to speak. In Doctorow's example, the manager of a coffee shop has to compete actively with other shops to attract labor and customers. The landlord who owns the building, though, receives money from rent no matter who occupies the space.

In these terms, a gigantic storefront such as Amazon, to which all the individual sellers pay rent, exemplifies "the contemporary business wisdom that prefers creating the platform to selling on the platform" -- "technofeudalism." Doctorow offers several examples, e.g., draconian noncompete agreements forced on employees, the expansion of IP rights to absurd degrees such as the author who attempted to own the word "cocky," and patent trolls whose "only product is lawsuits."

One related abuse he doesn't cover in this article but discusses elsewhere is the universal software marketing practice of not selling electronic products outright but "licensing" them. A "buyer" of a Kindle book, for instance, doesn't literally own it like a hard-copy book, for Amazon can remove the text from the customer's device at any point for any random reason. Granted, this probably doesn't happen often (I haven't experienced it), but the only way to avoid that risk would be to refrain from ever connecting that device to the internet again -- hardly practical.

By Doctorow's title, "Capitalists Hate Capitalism," he means, "They don’t want to be exposed to the risks entailed by competition, and feel the goad of that insecurity. They want monopolies, or platforms, or monopoly platforms." Unlike in many of his essays, in this one he doesn't suggest hypothetical remedies but simply describes a problematic situation.

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Karen S. Wiesner: Oldies But Goodies {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson

Oldies But Goodies

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson

by Karen S. Wiesner

After I finished my last writing reference, I'd started to hear about a trend going around writing circles. In direct opposition of everything I'd ever taught about going deep with characters, writers were told not to include more than basic information about main characters, allowing readers to fill in the blanks with their own details and thereby making the characters whatever they want them to be.

I don't believe character development can be fluid enough to allow something like that without compromising everything vital in a story. Individual character choices directly influence outcomes. If a character isn't well defined, motives and purposes are constantly in question as well as in flux. Ultimately, characters that have no impact on readers make for a quickly forgotten story.

Personally, I want a good balance of character and plot development the stories I'm willing to invest myself in, and I'm not getting it with most of the new stuff coming out. So I've been re-reading the books that have made it onto my keeper shelves in the past. To that end, here's another "oldies but goodies" review.

Before I Go To Sleep, published in 2011, was written by a then brand new author, S. J. (Steven Johnson) Watson, an audiologist for National Health Service, where he wrote the novel between shifts. The psychological thriller shot to the top of the bestseller lists and was made into a film in 2014 by Ridley Scott.

Of a technicality, there's nothing supernatural about this book enough to warrant it being reviewed on the Alien Romances Blog where the focus is "science fiction romance, futuristic, or paranormal romances in which at least one protagonist is an alien or of alien ancestry". However, there's something distinctly eerie about this tale--namely, the condition the main character Christine Lucas's is suffering from. Anterograde amnesia is absolutely chilling to me. It's very much as if an alien comes each night while the victim goes to sleep and steals everything he or she knows, feels, has experienced, and lived. I can't imagine anything else that could be worse. Good and bad memories, the myriad emotions associated with them, our areas of individual expertise and passions, and the experiences that make up the tapestry of our lives are vital to who and what we are. Without them, we're little more than lost--to everyone and everything. Imagine not knowing who you are, who you love, who loves you, what you've done, whether you're a good person, a bad, or something in-between. That, to me, is the very definition of horror.

In this novel, Christine wakes up every day of her life a blank slate and has to reconstruct her own identity--either through the one who tells her he's her husband, her son, her journal, or the doctor who's secretly helping her recover her memory. What makes this story so tense and alarming is that, in a situation like this, a person is forced to trust evidence that can so easily be manufactured as well as relying on the ones around them--despite the uncertainty that's constantly in the back of the mind. Do these individuals really know me, care about me, have my best interests at heart? Should I trust anything they say or do?

The first time I read this book long years ago, I gulped it like I was so hungry, I couldn't get enough. I'd never encountered anything like this before, didn't know the first thing about anterograde amnesia, and it was hard to imagine that it was something that could actually happen to someone. Frankly, it blew my mind. I also watched the movie, which was a close rendition of the story in the book, but I actually enjoyed it more, I think, because Nicole Kidman put in such a good performance as a frail but determined woman who's walking a short tightrope from one day to the next.

The second read recently wasn't quite as positively radical. This time around, I noticed that I found the writing style annoying and, cruel as it seems, it was very hard to actually like the heroine. Compassion, given her situation, was a given, but she acted in a way that set me on edge. The best way to say this is, I just would not have acted the way she did, if I was in that situation. Or at least I don't think I would. I hope to never know for sure. In any case, this story is a nail-biter and a page-turner that's very unique even in a sea of other psychologic thrillers. It's definitely worth a read, or a re-read.

Next week, I'll review another Oldie But Goodie you might find worth another read, too.

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/

Guest Author Post

This week we have a guest blog, in Q & A form, from multi-genre author Karen Hulene Bartell:

"What inspired you to begin writing?"

IMHO, reading is the inspiration for and entry into writing.

Born to rolling-stone parents who moved annually--sometimes monthly--I found my earliest playmates as fictional friends in books. Paperbacks became my portable pals. Ghost stories kept me up at night--reading feverishly. Novels offered an imaginative escape, and the paranormal was my passion.

An only child, I began writing my first novel at the age of nine, learning the joy of creating my own happy endings…However, I got four pages into my first “book” and realized I had to do a lot of living before I could finish it!

So here I am all these decades later, still creating my own happy endings…

"What genres do you work in?"

More often than not, I write paranormal romances, but I also write political-suspense thrillers and frontier romance.

"Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?"

Mostly, I “wing it.” Occasionally at the end of a day, I’ll make a brief outline of the action I want to write about the following day, but overall, I’m a “pantser.”

"What is your latest or next-forthcoming book?"

Actually, I have two books coming out this spring. Kissing Kin was released March 13, and Fox Tale will be released April 8.

Kissing Kin Overview:

Maeve Jackson is starting over after a broken engagement—and mustering out of the Army. No job and no prospects, she spins out on black ice and totals her car.

When struggling vintner Luke Kaylor stops to help, they discover they’re distantly related. On a shoestring budget to convert his vineyard into a winery, he makes her a deal: prune grapevines in exchange for room and board.

But forgotten diaries and a haunted cabin kickstart a five-generational mystery with ancestors that have bones to pick. As carnal urges propel them into each other’s arms, they wonder: Is their attraction physical…or metaphysical?

Fox Tale Overview:

Heights terrify Ava. When a stranger saves her from plunging down a mountain, he diverts her fears with tales of Japanese kitsune—shapeshifting foxes—and she begins a journey into the supernatural.

She’s attracted to Chase, both physically and metaphysically, yet primal instincts urge caution when shadows suggest more than meets the eye.

She’s torn between Chase and Rafe, her ex, when a chance reunion reignites their passion, but she struggles to overcome two years of bitter resentment. Did Rafe jilt her, or were they pawns of a larger conspiracy? Are the ancient legends true of kitsunes twisting time and events?

"What kinds of research do you do for your Western novels?"

I enjoy researching all my novels. In fact, I’d say it’s one of the parts I like best about writing, but the research for Kissing Kin, Book II of the Trans-Pecos series, was especially complex--as well as physically demanding and a whole lot of fun!

Why do I describe Kissing Kin’s research as complex?

A big reason is that the manuscript underwent several iterations before being published. The first version was a story about two generations linked by Covid and (via journals) the Spanish Flu of 1918. However, publishers passed on it, saying readers were sick of pandemics.

Because the second version would have been part of a series set in Colorado, I changed the location, names, and family relationships. I also adapted the story to fit the series’ outline and removed the flu, but that version didn’t fly, either. My third attempt is the version being released March 13th, which required further revisions and, occasionally, restorations. Try, try, and try again…

Greed and a checkered family history shaped the property lines for Kissing Kin, where some of the characters swindled the land from its rightful owners. This aspect led me into a hornet’s nest of legal research: warranty deeds, quitclaim deeds, squatters rights, and a process called adverse possession. Both Texas and Colorado are ‘notice’ states, which means that recording documents legally notify the public of property transfers. But the state laws differ, and I had to research both sets of laws, rewriting the second version with Coloradan laws, and then redrafting the third version, while reverting to the Texan laws.

Karen’s “legal” advice 101: Warranty deeds are better than quitclaim deeds, but recorded warranty deeds are rock solid--unless squatters rights and a process called adverse possession come into play. Then you have a legal fight on your hands--as well as a thickening plot…

Kissing Kin is mainly set in a vineyard. As vintners, farmers, and ranchers know, nature can be cruel. Pierce’s Disease attacks grapevines from Florida to California, where insects called sharpshooter leafhoppers spread the bacteria. I’d never heard of Pierce’s Disease. I have no background in vineyards, and I have a brown thumb. Plants would rather die than live with me. Because of my total lack of knowledge, I had to research the disease, its carriers, and the way to control it.

I learned a new, nicotine-based pesticide eradicates the leafhoppers. I also learned from my grandmother’s hand-printed recipe book, that she treated chicken lice in the 1930s by painting their roost perches with nicotine-sulfate. Apparently, nothing’s new under the sun.

PTSD was another new area of exploration. Two of Kissing Kin’s characters suffered from its symptoms, which wreaked havoc on them--as well as their relationships.

However, the most entertaining research included picking and stomping grapes in two central-Texas vineyards. (I love hands-on (and feet-on) study 😉)

Why do I describe Kissing Kin’s research as physically demanding and a whole lot of fun?

After learning how to prune the vines and harvest the grapes, I did a Lucy-and-Ethel grape stomp--which was sloshing good fun! Of course, the best research was the wine tasting that followed the stomping!

"What are you working on now?"

My WIP is Silkworm, a political-suspense thriller set in Taipei, Taiwan, that portrays a US Senator’s daughter caught between two men, two cultures, two political ideologies, and the two Chinas.

A love triangle is the metaphor for Taiwan and China (the two dragons) competing for geopolitical and technological accords with the US. As mainland China seeks to recover the third of its lost provinces–Taiwan–Rachel Moore struggles to escape the triple nightmare of impending war, a marriage of convenience, and an assassination plot against the man she loves. Silkworm weaves their stories with the trilateral events currently erupting in Southeast Asia.

"What advice would you give to aspiring authors?"

I’ve received little writing advice. However, I started life as an actor and received an immense amount of advice for that career.

The best advice I received was to keep at it--in that case, acting, but the same words apply to writing. Keep at it. Don’t quit. Keep honing your craft and, eventually, you’ll succeed.

The worst advice I’ve received was from an editor--translation: a frustrated author—who demanded I indiscriminately follow her redrafting of my manuscript in an attempt to overwrite my style with hers.

However, my advice for writers is to R E A D! Read everything that interests you. Read when you’re bored. Read when you can’t sleep. Read at the beach…in front of the fire…in bed…waiting for doctor appointments…

Then begin reading genres that are similar to the style in which you’d like to write. Analyze what works and what doesn’t. Find common denominators or rules of thumb between the characters or plots. What makes memorable characters? How does the author maintain the story’s fast pace or add to its suspense? Decide specifically what you like about each author’s style.

Next, start writing about what interests you. Express yourself as honestly as possible. Write about what you know, what you’re familiar with—even your childhood. Keep a notebook. Jot down ideas as they come to you!

Finally, start drafting a story that “grabs you.” Push through that first draft to the end, no matter how painful. (There’s a magic wand called rewrite that allows you to complete any half-baked thoughts later.) The point is to finish the first draft. See it through. Only then should you go back and develop your story.

Occasionally, you’ll find that the story--and even the characters—will seize the pen (AKA your imagination) and draft the story for you!

Sometimes, it’s good to take a vacation from your manuscript. When you return to it, you’ll find your thoughts will have gelled and expressing them comes more easily.

Then rewrite. If necessary, rewrite again and again until your story accurately expresses your message.

Finally, polish your prose. Go back and read each line out loud. The ear catches what the eye misses. Refine your words and phrases until they sparkle.

Before you know it, you’ll have found a genre, even--dare I say it?--your style!

How did I start writing? My first published books were cookbooks—now, thanks to Google, recipes appear online in milliseconds. Cookbooks may no longer be your entry into the published world, but I still recommend writing non-fiction before fiction, be it via textbooks or any form of technical writing.

"What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?"

Website – Author Website

Connect – Contact

Buy Links –

UNIVERSAL LINK: Universal Link

AMAZON: Amazon

GOODREADS: Goodreads

APPLE: Apple

BARNES & NOBLE: Barnes and Noble

Social Media Links –

Facebook: Facebook

MeWe: MeWe

Twitter: Twitter

Goodreads: Goodreads

Website: Karen Hulene Bartell

Email: info@KarenHuleneBartell.com

Amazon Author Page:Amazon

Instagram: Instagram

BookBub: BookBub

LinkedIn: LinkedIn

AUTHORSdb: AUTHORSdb

A Bad Week For Security

Last week was a bad one, at least for my discretionary (aka writing) time. 

As writers, we are under pressure to promote, which means populating social media sites, making lots of friends, supplying bio material for widespread publication in our books' back matter. All this information sometimes means that the answers to poorly-chosen (and one does not always get a choice of the questions) security questions could be extrapolated...assuming that the original answers were truthful.

The trouble with secret lies is that they are not easy to remember. One needs to keep an imaginary-family tree taped to the back of one's desktop, maybe, populated with imaginary cousins and grandparents, first born children with middle names, imaginary best men and bridesmaids, wedding and honeymoon destinations, street names, first car makes and models and so forth.

If everyone did that, there would be less point for would-be identity thieves to bother with Facebook or LinkedIN, because even if they discovered the true information there, it would not answer bank security questions.

Back to the tale of woes from last week. By email, I received log-in security codes that I had not requested from three social networking sites that I have not visited in years.

I also received a call from a house cleaner whom I was not expecting, telling me that she would be late for an appointment that I had not made, facilitated by a site with whom I had fulfilled my six-month contract a month ago and cancelled renewal. To cancel the appointment to which I had not agreed might have cost me well over $100.

Two banks, a brokerage house, and a professional organization sent me warnings about scams of various sorts.  Happily, those were generic, unlike the alerts from the five or six separate identity-theft-protection vendors to which I subscribe.

My caller id showed me that some of the spam calls that came in with their tell-tale whoosh noises during the week claimed to be from a former employer. I tried to return one of those calls, unfortunately. I also gave a carefully worded piece of my mind to the fifth caller in one day who claimed to represent my television company, but could not name the company that provides my visual entertainment.

I've had to file a fraud report, close down a credit card, log in to sites I don't like to visit in order to change multiple passwords, and change credit card auto-pay information.

The one ray of sunshine was that a lawyer pointed me to an entertaining Forbes article: 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/lawrencelight/2021/09/11/the-home-title-theft-baloney/?sh=706bb28a242d

I've also gleaned some tips, many of them obvious.

If there are financial sites that you visit, bookmark them or use your History. It's best to avoid looking for a link online, especially a "sponsored link", because bad actors can buy a sponsored link and redirect the unwitting to a spoofed site. What's more, "sponsored" links tend to show up higher on the search page than legitimate ones.

However, if you must search and click, before you log in (and perhaps expose your user name and password to a villain), check the Home Page and see whether or not the site has a Privacy Policy. 

It used to be the case that spoofers and scammers could be relied upon to misspell something or to use bad grammar. Alas, AI helps the bad and the good. Nevertheless, an url to a fake site might contain odd domain extensions. Pay attention to the faint print in your page-bar.

Be suspicious if the site does not take you to what you expect to see, and you are asked to call a telephone number shown on the screen. Call the number on your statements, or at least verify the publicly listed number for the business, do not use the number on the screen.

Some of the AI bots that answer telephones for reputable sites will ask you to identify yourself by typing in your user name and password (using the numbers on the keypad). Don't do that. Don't agree to voice recognition, either. Sometimes, the bots will want to use voice recognition without your consent, and if you are prone to sinus infections or laryngitis, this will be a problem

Only download software when you know that you are on the legitimate site you expect to be on, and if you have satisfied all the multi-factor authentication "hurdles" that you have set up.

A moderately sophisticated crook can deceive email or phone systems. We used to be upset when a call from a telemarketer appeared to come from our own name, or the "From" line in an email spam is ones own name. These days, they could write in the name of a loved one, or an employer, or one's bank, or even one's doctor. So, if "your bank" emails or texts you and asks you to transfer funds, don't respond in the most immediate and convenient way.

Never feel pressured to act immediately when someone asks for money or information.

Don't forget, those "Hello, Grandma," phone calls still happen, but nowadays, with AI and deep fakes, your car-crashing grandson might actually sound like your living relative.

Finally, readers are being scammed on Amazon, and no doubt on other reputable and technically impressive sites where books can be published without human-to-human interaction.

According to Authors Guild, when a well publicized book is about to be released for sale, scammers call on AI to create artificially-written versions, or "summaries", or "companion books" referencing the same title and author-name but with low quality fake content.

Authors of memoirs and autobiographies are recent victims of AI, where the original work is copied, recycled, rewritten with the same facts expressed in synonyms. In other words, it is plagiarized. It is obviously not fair use, and because it is AI, it cannot be copyrighted, but that does not stop the nuisance, the reputational harm, and financial harm to readers, authors, booksellers, and everyone else in publishing.

All the best,

Rowena Cherry

SPACE SNARK™ 

http://www.spacesnark.com/   

http://www.rowenacherry.com

EPIC Award winner, Friend of ePublishing for Crazy Tuesday   

Karen S. Wiesner: Oldies But Goodies {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Ghost Prison by Joseph Delaney

Oldies But Goodies

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Ghost Prison by Joseph Delaney

by Karen S. Wiesner

After I finished my last writing reference, I'd started to hear about a trend going around writing circles. In direct opposition of everything I'd ever taught in my writing series about the crucial need to go deep with characters, writers were being told that it's best not to include more than basic information about main characters, not even providing last names for them--this supposedly allows readers to fill in the blanks with their own details, making the characters whatever they want them to be.

In my mind, this is a big mistake. How can character development be fluid enough to allow something like that without compromising everything vital in a story? Individual character choices directly influence outcomes. If a character isn't well defined, motives and purposes are constantly in question as well as in flux. Ultimately, characters that have no impact on readers make for a quickly forgotten story.

I want a good balance of character and plot development in the stories I'm willing to invest myself in, and I'm not getting it with most of the new stuff coming out. So I've been re-reading the books that have made it onto my keeper shelves in the past. To that end, here's another "oldies but goodies" review.

The Ghost Prison by Joseph Delaney is said to be a tangential installment of his wonderful The Last Apprentice Series (reviewed here: 

https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/search?q=The+Last+Apprentice), and it's clear by the language that it's set in the same world. Billy Calder may well have become an apprentice of the Spook John Gregory in another life, but in this story he's simply a 15-year old orphan boy who seizes the opportunity to gain independence from the Home for Unfortunate Boys by taking a job as a castle prison guard. He's given almost no training. After waking up late for his first shift, he rushes to the prison from the orphanage. His supervisor isn't pleased. Beyond that, night in the prison is anything but boring, given the number of supernatural prisoners that have to be tended to. An illness removes his boss and leaves Billy in charge, forced to take over horrifying duties he doesn't have the experience or skills to handle.

This short tale published just before Halloween in 2013 is intended for 4-7th graders, but don't let that stop you. Why should they have all the fun? This story is one that anyone who loves a good chiller will enjoy just as much as I did. Billy is a plucky Pip-like kid who doesn't give up or give in easily, even when it might be wise to just run for his life and not look back. Scott M. Fischer's black and white sketches all through the book are perfect accompaniments to the fun, suspenseful text. This is a story filled with a well-developed, brilliant personality that allows you to share directly in Billy's conflicts and root for him to triumph.

Next week, I'll review another Oldie But Goodie you might find worth another read, too.

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/

45th International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts

I've just returned from the ICFA in Orlando, with perfect weather all four days (five counting Sunday morning departure). This year's theme was "Whimsy." Author guests were urban fantasy writer C. E. Murphy and poet and fiction writer Mary Turzillo. Special guest scholars were a husband-wife pair from Senegal, Mame Bougouma Diene and Woppa Diallo. He was present in person, and she delivered her luncheon address over Zoom. I bought a copy of Turzillo's story collection COSMIC CATS AND FANTASTIC FURBALLS, a delightful "litter" of science fiction stories involving cats. I especially like "Chocolate Kittens from Mars." At one of the two luncheons, a free book given away was a poetry collection by Turzillo and Marge Simon (a constant contributor to the horror zine NIGHT TO DAWN and the cover artist for my collection DOCTOR VAMPIRE), which I picked up. At C. E. Murphy's author reading on Thursday night, her two selections impressed me so much I ordered the books as soon as possible, ROSES IN AMBER (a "Beauty and the Beast" retelling) and a funny shapeshifter romance, SOMEBUNNY TO LOVE (under the name "Zoe Chant"). I'm pretty sure that's the only were-rabbit romance I've ever read, and the were-rabbit is the heroine.

I participated in two sessions, a group "Words and Worlds" author reading and a panel on Vampire Humor, which I organized and moderated. In the "Words and Worlds" time slot, I read a short section from "Therapy for a Vampire," one of three lighthearted stories in my e-book collection DOCTOR VAMPIRE, and all of a humorous fanfic, "Support Group," in which my vampire psychiatrist, Roger Darvell, leads a therapy session for a group of vamps from popular culture. You can read it free here:

Support Group

People laughed in the right places, and I received some gratifying comments later. The vampire comedy panel discussed numerous books, movies, and TV programs, with lively input from the audience.

The Lord Ruthven Assembly, our vampire and revenant sub-group, chose a new president. After the business meeting, we viewed the rather odd and lesser-known Hammer movie VAMPIRE CIRCUS. Popcorn was served. Then our resident film historian, Lokke Heiss, delivered a brief presentation (with slide show) on "why NOSFERATU is not an Expressionist film." Our book and media awards for both 2022 and 2023 were announced at the Saturday night banquet: Nonfiction, A HISTORY OF THE VAMPIRE IN POPULAR CULTURE by Violet Fenn and CONTAGION AND THE VAMPIRE by Simon Bacon; fiction, A DOWRY OF BLOOD by S. T. Gibson and THE GOD OF ENDINGS by Jacqueline Holland; other media, INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE (TV series) and THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE DEMETER (movie).

Some other highlights: This year's version of "50 Shades of Nay," the panel on consent in speculative fiction, didn't focus on interactions among fictional characters, as I'd expected. They apparently covered that in previous years. Instead, they mostly discussed issues that arise among authors and readers, which I had never thought of in those terms -- does the reader "consent" to encounter certain potentially traumatic situations in fiction, and when are trigger warnings appropriate? They even mentioned a whole website for readers who want to be forewarned, which covers many more tropes besides animal deaths. (Unfortunately, one has to register to be able to read the material.)

Does the Dog Die?

A panel on editing practices in fantasy and SF included a retrospective on Lester and Judy-Lynn Del Rey of Ballantine Books and how they ignited the modern fantasy boom. The panelist presented a chart showing the "Tolkien score" of various authors, that is, how many tropes similar to elements in THE LORD OF THE RINGS their works contain. Cool! A session labeled "Psychology and Wonder: The New Uses of Enchantment," rather than focusing on the psychological effects of fairy tales on children as I'd expected (although they did get into that toward the end), delved into suggested procedures for counseling Donkey in the Shrek series with techniques from various contemporary schools of psychology. Also a lot of fun.

My plane arrived in Baltimore on time Sunday; however, it landed without my suitcase because a batch of luggage for that flight had been left behind in Orlando. After much waiting around, I filled out a report, and we drove home. Southwest delivered the errant bag early the next morning. Too bad it couldn't have walked onto the plane on little feet by itself, like the Luggage in Pratchett's Discworld series.

Happy Spring Equinox!

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Before I Eat Snakes... (Mad Cow and Me)

The Red Cross won't take my blood. No matter how overdrawn the blood banks are, some blood is just too muddy to be accepted as a donation to those who desperately need a transfusion.

As you might infer, my post today is an opinion piece, anecdotal, unscientific and bordering on a rant... and inspired by some of the legal blogs I've read this week about "Green-washing" in advertising.

One such blog is by David Mallen of the law firm Loeb & Loeb LLP, and appears to discuss one State's objections to bovine flatulence and the claims of a farming enterprise that they are going to reduce their greenhouse gas footprint to net zero, or some such thing.

https://quicktakes.loeb.com/post/102j2cu/advertising-aspirations-for-reducing-environmental-impact-invites-charges-of-gree#page=1

My understanding was that greenhouse gases were at a rather higher level when dinosaurs roamed the earth, ate massive quantities of vegetation or each other. In fact there is an article (by Eyder Peralta) that reports on an amusing theory that dinosaurs farted themselves to death. It seems apocryphal. It has been debunked.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/05/07/152203680/scientists-estimate-dinosaurs-passed-enough-gas-to-warm-up-the-planet

Nevertheless, there was a virtuous cycle to Jurassic carbon levels. Plants grew faster in the presence of extra plant food (or carbon dioxide). See the science fair project for proof.

Maybe, instead of eating bugs and snakes, we should grow bumper crops of lettuce, and hardy and prolific dandelions, and cactus. It could break "Big Pharma" because it could prevent a lot of very profitable lifestyle diseases and maladies.

The trouble with snakes is that they eat their own kind. They are cannibals, and the trouble with cannibals is that they go mad and die young. That is an over-generalization, of course. One example is KURU.

There have been studies on the acquisition and grim progression of prion diseases, such as by Johns Hopkins:https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/prion-diseases

There is also a provocative study about the source of one of Americans' most favorite breakfast food. http://www.cresa.cat/blogs/sociedad/en/sobre-porcs-i-levolucio-dels-prions/

Unfortunately, pigs are omnivores, which means that they will eat their young, and others. The other possible reason that Leviticus banned the eating of pork is that they are vectors for human tape worms. 

 

The Bible also has something to say about eating snakes. 

https://evangelicalfocus.com/zoe/2165/eating-reptiles

So, before I eat snakes, I would turn vegetarian while I wait for at least a two-generational study of what becomes of snake-eaters over time. Maybe they could serve snake at Davos and Greenbriar, or, they could start by feeding fillet of a fenny snake to humanized mice. 

By the way, see the Comments on the Witches Brew, the comments are (IMHO) better than the commentary, but I used the link for the quote from The Scottish Play.

As for my blood, it might have 50-year old prions in it, still, from the possibility that I might have consumed a portion of a cow that had been fed the unnatural diet of feed enriched with Scrapie-infected sheep bits and bobs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bovine_spongiform_encephalopathy 

 

Obviously, that is ridiculous (about Mad Cow Disease and me), but my reservations about snakes in my diet, even if they really do taste like chicken (and they say that about alligator tail, too) is reasonable, look what a witches' brew they are of diseases:

https://www.merckvetmanual.com/exotic-and-laboratory-animals/reptiles/viral-diseases-of-reptiles

 

All the best,

Rowena Cherry

SPACE SNARK™ 

http://SPACE www.spacesnark.com/  

http://www.rowenacherry.com