SAME BUT DIFFERENT: Building Memorable Characters while Breaking Boundaries

I’m going to be in Tampa, FL next week, teaching a characterization workshop at the Wizards of Words conference, so I thought I’d toss out a few of the ideas and concepts I’ll be using. Because this is the Alien Romances blog, I’m going to confine myself here to the speculative fiction genres. In the Tampa workshop, I’ll be talking all across the board.

So, what’s makes a memorable character in commercial genre speculative fiction? What can an author do when crafting her male protagonist, her female arch-villain, her you-name-it, not-of-this-universe sidekick and make that character seem real enough that the reader wants to add him, her or it to her holiday card list?

One of the first thing you have to know when writing fiction is that there is no one perfect, one-size-fits-all answer. You’re never going to create a character that everyone adores. It’s just not going to happen. What you should be trying to do is craft a character that the readers of your kind of story will understand, relate to and either want to befriend or kill. Figuratively, speaking.

That means you have to understand 1) the expectations of your reader and 2) the expectations of the genre. What makes a protagonist work in a cozy mystery might not be the same thing that works in a quest fantasy.

Readers (and agents and editors) often say they want something new and fresh, but it still has to be new and fresh without the constraints of the genre because people—readers—are creatures of habit. You walk into a Chinese restaurant, you expect to be served Chinese food. If the waiter plops Baked Ziti with Bolognese sauce in front of you, and a glass of chianti, you’re not going to be happy. (Well, the glass of chianti would make me happy no matter where I was, but I digress…).

It’s the same thing with genre fiction. Fantasy stories—let’s stick with quest here—are often populated by characters in medieval type garb, bearing medieval type weaponry and espousing medieval type philosophies. That doesn’t mean you can’t write a quest fantasy unless you write medieval. It means know when you’re working to type, and know when you’re working against it. Know the expectations of the genre before you go and break them because readers seeking a fantasy quest story will expect a certain type of character—they’re actively seeking that type of character to identify with. Chocolate is supposed to taste like chocolate, you know?

But, ah—then—there’s black raspberry chocolate chip. Same thing but different. Fresh, original and yet the same. (And if you don’t know where to find black raspberry chocolate chip, which I recently discovered whilst visiting my brother-in-law in Columbus, Ohio, go to http://www.graeters.com/ . But I digress…)

So how does a writer create a black raspberry chocolate chip kind of character in a fantasy story or a space opera adventure? First, know the expectations. Second, morph ‘em.

Notice I didn’t say obliterate ‘em. I said morph ‘em. Stretch them, push them, warp them while at the same time keeping a basic essence that readers of that genre will resonate to.

Two examples: Lisa Shearin’s characters in her MAGIC LOST, TROUBLE FOUND (and its 2008 sequel, ARMED & MAGICAL), and Elaine Corvidae’s characters in WINTER’S ORPHANS and sequels (PRINCE OF ASH, etc.). I’m using these because they’re fantasy and yet very different from each other. But both have intensely memorable characters.

Shearin’s female protagonist is a sorceress/private detective named Raine Benares. Raine’s not the most accomplished sorceress and is prone to act first and think much, much later. But bumbling magicians in fantasy are nothing new. But ah, Raine’s family is also part of organized crime. A medieval mafia. Now, that’s original backstory for a fantasy character! The impetus for much of what Raine does—and the impetus for how other character’s react to her—is solidly built on the fact that she comes from a lineage of pirates and thieves and con-artists.

Shearin does other fun, memorable things with her characters. The setting is dragons and dungeons but her characters speak in a contemporary, very snarky manner. (Why do we always assume and create fantasy as if it was OUR past? It’s the character’s present and who’s to say they can’t have contemporary-sounding slang expressions?)

Shearin also takes the usual notion of goblins and makes them sexy. Yes, they’re still scary and yes, they have fangs. But they’re down-right sexy. Raine even has a goblin lover.

Same but different, you see?

Corvidae’s SHADOW FAE TRILOGY, which starts with WINTER’S ORPHANS, takes the usual medieval and/or wooded setting for a fantasy with elves and sidhe and other fae and sets them in the city. A dank, dark, Victorian-era industrial waterfront city, in fact. There are elevators and hansom cabs. There are brick factories—sweat shops—belching smoke and unwashed workers. There are chimney sweeps. And there’s magic.

One of her key characters is wheelchair-bound. Her fae smoke cigarettes.

Corvidae takes a number of fantasy expectations and morphs them, and morphs them well. And wins numerous awards for doing so. (I also recommend her barbarian—yep, BARBARIAN—fantasy/magic series that starts with TYRANT MOON. Don’t think “Conan the Barbarian” or you’ll be doing yourself a disservice.)

The other thing you’ll notice is that Corvidae matches her world, her setting to her characters. Her setting fully supports her characterization. That’s why a reader becomes fully immersed in the books.

The key to creating memorable fantasy and SF characters is to craft a character that in essence meets the needs and expectations of the genre while at the same time offers a fresh and original perspective on that type of “person.” Shearin’s Raine Benares could have been just any old sorceress who finds a magic amulet of great power. It still would have been a fun story. And Corvidae’s Mina Cole could have been just another orphan unaware of the fae powers inside her. It still would have been a fun story. But Shearin and Corvidae made sure Raine and Mina were so much more than that. They broke boundaries, they took the given expectations and made them different. They created memorable fantasy characters.

~Linnea

http://www.linneasinclair.com/

Don't judge a book by its cover!

Linnea sent me an email with a copy of her cover for Down Home Zombie Blues (see below) Yes there is a resemblence between her cover and my Shooting Star cover.

Which means two great minds in two different art departmens at two different publishers think alike. I have to admit I liked the Red cover for Down Home Zombie Blues also because it reminded me of the heat in the story. The temperature in south Florida where the story takes place is hot and so is the chemistry between Theo and Jorie. I got to read the story before it hits the shelves and it is great!

Its also funny that Linnea mentioned that her publisher is moving her into the romance market. I recommended Games Of Command to one of my readers and finally found it in Sci-fi. I automatically thought romance because of the relationships she builds in her stories. Great world building, great romance and great covers. It all sounds like a complete package to me.

The Dilemma of Free Will

The October-November issue of the MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION includes a story called "The Star to Every Wandering Barque," by James Stoddard. It begins, "The age of conscience arrived on a Thursday evening in June." Some unknown force (God? benevolent aliens? we aren't told) instantaneously transforms the minds and emotions of every person on Earth. People experience a quiet joy in the beauties of the universe. They feel kind and forgiving toward everyone. In the following weeks and months, all military forces are disbanded, individuals and nations with abundant resources eagerly share with the less fortunate, and money eventually becomes unnecessary because people's needs are fulfilled by willing, rational cooperation. Representatives from all countries work together to address the remaining problems such as disease and natural disasters. Politicians and media outlets tell the truth. (Now, that sounds like a real miracle.) In theological terms, we might say that the effects of Original Sin are obliterated, making everyone perfectly unselfish. Reading through this warm, moving story, I kept waiting for the punch line. What's the catch, I wondered? Surprise, there isn't one. The story ends with the launch of Earth's first starship: "Now. . . we're ready."

And yet this tale raises an unsettling question: Does every individual on the planet spontaneously respond in the same positive way to the mystical experience that begins the story? Or has a powerful entity actually rewired their brains? If the latter, isn't that a violation of human free will? Or would it more closely resemble providing medication to a person suffering from mental illness, thereby restoring the patient to normal and effectively setting him or her free to find his or her true self?

Aldous Huxley's classic BRAVE NEW WORLD portrays a society of perfect happiness brought about by conditioning individuals from birth to be content in their assigned roles and harmoniously related to everyone around them. As you'll remember if you've read the book, a few characters begin to question this ideal world. One of them asks why everyone isn't designed as an Alpha (the group with the highest intelligence). The World Controller replies that an experiment along that line has been tried. A group of Alphas were settled on a deserted island to form their own community. They were far from content, fighting constantly among themselves. The novel inquires whether it's preferable to be perfectly happy as a scientifically designed unit in a planned society or to have free will even at the cost of potential unhappiness.

Behaviorist psychologist B. F. Skinner seemed to think free will was overrated, if not an illusion to begin with, as illustrated by the provocative title of his book BEYOND FREEDOM AND DIGNITY. The fictional counterpart to this treatise is his utopian novel WALDEN TWO, which presents an experimental community of perfectly conditioned people as a thoroughly positive thing.

Venturing into theology, we've all read explanations of the world's miseries in terms that attribute them, at least in part, to human free will. The Deity presumably considers sin and unhappiness a rational price to pay for giving our species the dignity of free choice. Mark Twain, in one of the essays in his posthumous collection LETTERS FROM THE EARTH, seems to think free will is overrated, too. He sardonically asks why anyone would prefer a watch that's sure to go wrong over one that can never go wrong. Would the Creator—or a group of super-powerful, benevolent aliens—be justified in overriding our freedom of choice in order to make (as an old hymn says) “all men good and wise” and presumably happy? Or does the freedom to make our own mistakes constitute an essential part of being human?

The 4 of Swords - Gestation

Folks:

This is the 4th blog installment (see previous Tuesdays) on the Tarot.

Updated and expanded compilation of all these Tarot Just For Writers entries is now available on Kindle:
The Wands and Cups Volumes and  the Swords and Pentacles Volumes, are now all available separately on Kindle.  The 5 Volumes combined are also available on Kindle as one book, cheaper than buying them individually.
The Not So Minor Arcana: Never Cross A Palm With Silver Aug 30, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0108MC26O

The Not So Minor Arcana: Wands Sept. 1, 2015  99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106RVPKU

The Not So Minor Arcana: Cups Sept. 11, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106SATX8

The Not So Minor Arcana: Swords  Sept. 17, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0100RSPM2

The Not So Minor Arcana: Pentacles  Sept. 21, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106RVKF0

The Not So Minor Arcana: Books 1-5 combined Sept. 24, 2015 $3.25
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B010E4WAOU

This series is designed not for the beginner or the advanced student, but for the intermediate student and specifically for writers doing worldbuilding..

-----------------

As you brought your idea-energy through the Three of Swords, you made the commitment to this project -- whatever it is.

For a writer it's a story. In order to write this story, you must not-write all the others in your idea-file. You are going to invest the irreplaceable capital of your life, the hours of your day, your creative juices, into this one project and therefore not in any other.

Completing this project will change you, your identity, and narrow the field of choices before you for the rest of your life.

As it is for an actor who becomes "type cast," your life will never be the same again You have "lost" something, or sacrificed something, narrowed your options in order to bring this artwork into existence.

Swords represent thoughts, decisions, words, and deeds - actions.

The project that is committed to in the Three of Swords could be a marriage, having a baby, adopting a child, buying a house, being your parent's executor, buying a car, saving to take a trip around the world after you retire, choosing a major in college, taking a magical Initiation, floating a loan to open a business, etc.

Any project requires commitment for success, and therefore requires forsaking all other projects. You make that sort of choice when you choose to take this particular incarnation -- a choice you can't change until it's all done and over with and you get to go back and start over (in Kaballah reincarnation is the norm). But you don't start over free and clear -- you still have this life on your record. And in this life, you still have consequences from past lives to deal with.
If you have not been capable of commitment before - the 4 of Swords may be a totally new experience for your soul. (writers: consider the dramatic potential in that!)

In the Three of Swords the field of action is narrowed, focused, brought to a white-heat of intensity. The energy is squeezed through an aperature and comes out fast and hard -- visualize a wide river squeezing down to spill over a narrow waterfall.

Now visualize that waterfall hitting a pond, and spreading out into a wide placid lake.

That wide, placid lake is in the process that the 4 of Swords represents - the action of growth.

Or take the reproductive analogy, gestation. There is flirting (Ace of Swords), courtship (Two of Swords), Commitment/marriage/consumation (Three of Swords), and now in 4 of Swords, pregnancy, gestation. A long, quiet time of growth.

Writers often say, while they are spending ridiculously long hours at the computer, that they are "with book." It is a compelling, absorbing, monopolizing experience, just like being pregnant.
In the chapter on the Three of Swords, I noted --

"The Jacob's Ladder diagram, the basic structure behind the Tarot deck, is a cascade of 4 interlaced Tree of Life diagrams (see The Biblical Tarot: Never Cross A Palm With Silver) - one diagram for each of the four "worlds" or levels of reality represented by a Suit.

There are four Worlds of the Kaballah, four letters in the Divine Name, four variables necessary to create a Boolean algebra and four forces that hold the world together (the forces physicists want to combine into a Unified Field Theory).

Our manifest reality has three spacial dimensions and Time. See my reviews column

(http://www.simegen.com/reviews/rereadablebooks/

for January to June 2007 for a series on how the Soul enters manifestation through Time."

The core non-verbalizable meaning of each Minor Arcana Tarot card is a blend of the Gematria (or numerology) behind the number of the card and the "World" or Suit of the card.

Other disciplines, such as astrology, have symbols that represent such combinations of symbols.
For example, astrologers associate the Fours of the Tarot with the kind of influence they expect of the planet Jupiter: growth, inclusion, benevolence, The King on His Throne dispensing Justice, making treaties, including foreigners in relationship.

Jupiter is associated with Saggitarius -- the natural 9th House -- which is all about higher education, foreign travel that "broadens" the mind, philosophy, and a jovial sort of pure honesty that comes from affably including everyone in your Identity.

The 9th House (and thus Jupiter) is about the thought processes of other people, of society, of the group minds you belong to. The 9th House and thus Jupiter is about the expression of the philosopical and religious values of society -- the larger group you, as an individual, must include yourself in -- and be included into.

Four is the foundation of our "four-square" manifest reality. Therefore, when you bring energy down to the level of FOUR, you hit a resonance that induces vibration in every level of reality, and every level of your life.

Think of a perfectly tuned guitar. Pluck one E string and the other E string resonates -- i.e. picks up energy and begins to vibrate and produce sound even if you didn't touch it.

That's how the universe as a whole works. Touch one thing -- other things on the same wavelength absorb energy by induction, without being touched.

In the case of the guitar, the medium that transmits the energy is air. In the case of the universe, it's something else -- maybe "soul" would be the best name, maybe ectoplasm or phlogiston -- but it's the substrata of the universe.

For more on how this musical analogy works with the structure of fiction that lets authors convey emotion to readers/viewers, see my April 2007 review column:

http://www.simegen.com/reviews/rereadablebooks/2007/

So here in the 4 of Swords action sets off ripples that reach to the four corners of the the world.
Swords are Actions. The "action" that can be expressed in the 4 is GROWTH.

Growth is a thing you do when you're apparently sitting still (kids grow during sleep; people sit still to study and grow mentally).

Thus the image on the 4 of Swords is the warrior retired from the field of battle but he's not actually doing nothing. He's healing. Healing grows new muscle and skin, new bone. What's been cut away in Three Swords regenerates here in a new form - scar tissue, stronger, harder, more durable - i.e. Strength of Character.

As the novel you are writing grows, the pagecount gets longer and longer. But you still don't have a novel to send to market. It's just growing. You feel like you're standing still.

Think of the large, placid lake receiving the waterfall. More and more water enters the lake, spreads out, and grows the lake. There may be fish living in the lake, more and more fish as the lake gets bigger. Birds, insects, other animals come -- the lake LIVES, but it is stillness incarnate.

After you buy a house, there is a long period of stillness where you are adjusting the budget to include that mortgage payment. Fewer dinners out, movies, plane trips. Life quiets down -- but assets are pouring into equity in the house. That's the stage of 4 Swords.

After you have a child, life likewise becomes more "quiet" amidst the noise -- assets are pouring into raising this infant to school age.

After you get married, there's the quiet period of growth in Relationship that precedes the first real fight (5 Swords).

After you choose your major in college, there's the quiet period of long hard study days when all the rest of your life gets put on hold (except for frat parties of course -- eventually, you'll see that period as "quiet" too).

After you open a business, there's the long hard pull when you put all your strength into building the business but see nothing much happening.

After every major life-choice, there is this FOUR period of stillness during growth, a stillness that is pregnant with potential.

And that stillness can become so wearing that you begin to feel you've made the wrong choice in the Three of Swords process.

Every last bit of your life blood and substance is pouring into this project, and you see no change, or (as in pregnancy) you're so exhausted from it that you can't wait for it to be OVER already!
That is the point at which you know a good part of the energy you've poured into your project is energizing the entire universe -- like trying to heat the house with the windows open to a snowstorm.

Every choice, every action, every thought, every decision echoes throughout all reality like the guitar E string induction process.

Every single flickering thought affects all of creation -- that's the theory behind the Jacob's Ladder diagram which is the foundation of Tarot. Your efforts are indeed moving the whole world. That's not my theory, just my way of stating a pervasive Kaballah theory to get you ready to take the leap into advanced Tarot study.

Consider how much easier it is to do anything in a group that's focused on doing what you're doing -- Weight Watchers' meetings, Breast Cancer support groups, political rallies, exercise classes. Their thoughts are energizing you as your thoughts are energizing them.

In a novel plot, the writer has to handle this 4 Swords-process carefully because the apparent stillness can get boring.

If your plot explores 4-Swords stage in too much detail, you can generate a "hung hero" (a protagonist who can't do anything to change his situation.) The trick to handling the 4-process part of a plot is to let the protagonist LEARN -- (i.e. include; Jupiter) -- learn a philosophical point of view, learn how another person feels, learn some hidden truth of the situation -- all of which eventually changes his/her own plans.

Let your protagonist "include" more in his/her world-view and grow because of it, and your reader will not get bored. (In script writing, this is called the character Arc.)

When GROWTH has become complete, gestation is finished, the last final exam is taken, the first year of declaring a profit is here, you've written The End, then Tarot readings will produce the FOUR OF SWORDS REVERSED.

That huge placid lake fed by the floodwater runoff over the waterfall -- gets too large for its basin and spills over the next cliff down the mountain, or breaks its banks and becomes a river heading out across a meadow, cutting a new valley in the world.

Because of the nature of GROWTH (Jupiter), the transition from absolute stillness to furious activity can be a powerful, even violent, outburst - like a busting balloon. This happens if the transition has been resisted too long and too much energy has poured in.

The Four of Swords stage of activity -- the building of potential energy by pouring all resources into a project -- can end gracefully if it ends at the right moment.

That moment is often marked on the unseen or psychic level by the return or splashback of the energy that bled away into other 4's out at the ends of the universe.

Remember the E strings on the guitar transferring energy by induction? When some of that energy that moved from the struck string to the unstruck string comes back to the struck string, it's time for the next note in the song.

When the Universe starts to give you feedback on your efforts on any project which is in the stillness phase of growth, it's time to start moving again.

Three years after you buy a house, you've gotten some raises, made some extra payments on the mortgage, paid down your credit cards -- now go out for dinner and a movie, take a vacation, support a charity, become active again.

When you've written THE END, go celebrate, then dig in to the rewrite phase and start looking hard at current markets to shape the material for them.

When the baby finally enrolls in kindergarten, go job hunting with an eye to a new career.
But now that growth is finished, don't expect to move on without meeting opposition.

The opposition met in the 5 of Swords will test the validity and completeness of this gestation process -- have you produced something of value or only grown soft, fat and lazy?


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

The Down Home Zombie Blues gets a Facelift

Inevitably, just when I finish a bunch of promo shhhhtuff for my upcoming release, The Down Home Zombie Blues, I'm informed by my publisher that I have a brand new cover in a completely different style and color. (This is Welcome To My World of Being An Author, Part 10000...). All those bookmarks and business cards I ordered with the old red cover? Ads I bought in magazines--all showing the old red cover? Ka-ching. Ka-money down the drain. Okay, not completely. I was blessedly fortunate to catch two mag ads just before "closing date" and stayed up into the wee hours redoing them with the new cover (one of the advantages of being a graphic artist AND an author).

But all the promo material already OUT THERE... Ah well.

I really like the new cover. I liked the old cover but Bantam's trying to reposition me into the romance market and I think the new cover accomplishes that. (Do you? Post your thoughts.) At least, it's BLUE. I always wondered why I had a red cover for a book entitled THE DOWN HOME ZOMBIE BLUES. (I know--red sells, but still).

Here's the new cover:

and the old one:


I've been told the new cover will be the template for all future Linnea Sinclair covers, so that's kinda of cool (I think--do you?).

I have redone the book video posted on my site but not the one on MySpace. I'm deep in deadline hell on SHADES OF DARK and there's only so much artwork I can get done in one fell swoop (working with large art files is very time-consuming and makes my computer utter strange grunting and groaning noises...)

So that's Monday's scoop, from where I lounge, poolside, at the Home For the Perpetually Confused.

Hugs all, ~Linnea

Want sex... with Wolverine?

Of course, I am not in a position to offer you the Hugh Jackman mutant character, but he's a better example of a man with an abnormal hand than the prosthetic or bionic hands of Darth Vader and cool hand Luke Skywalker.

If you look carefully, you'll find characters with warhands in all my books going back to my 1995 copyright of Forced Mate, and to Mating Net in 2004, but they are not heroes, and no heroine is asked to go to bed with them.

Are romance readers ready for a hero equipped like some species of male crab, (where the claw used to beckon and threaten is larger and more brightly colored and more sharply serrated than the other claw)?

Well, are you?

Male readers, this question isn't really aimed at you! But I'd be happy to know if you could identify, and whether you think having one big hand with spikes sticking out, and a erectile leathery cuff-frill (imagine having a umbrella on one wrist) would interfere with your prowess in the sack.

I need to know right now because in the book due to my editor tomorrow (I have revision time) I have to either give the hero of the next book a warhand, or else explain why he does not have one.

Back to the Future

I'm back. The past month has been hard. I've been out promoting my historical release, Rising Wind, trying to finish up Twist and spent a lot of time sitting in the hospital with my dad who got suddenly sick. He's fine now. But my time, so precious, suddenly got away from me.

Time is like money. You spend what you got. My former boss used to compare life to a ride. Everyday you get on the ride. Every day you pull a ticket out of your pocket. One day you reach in your pocket and there's no ticket. No more ride. You're out of time.

So I'm having all these time dilemnas while writing Twist,a time travel story. Yep, ran out of time. My deadline is today and I still have another 10,000 words or so to write. Luckily my editor gave me a bit more time to finish it. Time which is cutting into my next deadline.

I often wish I could stop time when I'm writing. Just long enough for me to get the book done so I could do some other things. Like unpack all the boxes piled up in my office from the move last summer. To finish all my crafty projects like quilting and scrapbooking. To go on trips.

If only I had more time...

Changing into Aliens

The latest vampire novel I've read is a YA book, MARKED, by the mother-daughter team of P. C. Cast and Kristin Cast. In this universe, vampyres (as it's spelled) are openly known to exist. Their representatives place the Mark on the foreheads of fledglings, teenagers destined to become vampyres—if they survive the Change, which spans several years. The young heroine, once Marked, has to enroll in a boarding academy for fledglings. This kind of vampirism is not spread by biting. A quasi-scientific explanation postulates that in a small percentage of adolescents, the hormonal surges of puberty trigger a change in strands of "junk DNA," initiating the person's transformation. This book offers an imaginative variation on the familiar vampire fiction conventions. I strongly recommend it.

The "alien" aspect I see in this story is the process of turning into something no longer completely human. The heroine undergoes mystical experiences and finds herself possessed by strange urges, while grappling with new powers and vulnerabilities as well as adjusting to a new environment. The ordeal of becoming a creature one no longer recognizes, of course, befalls every adolescent to some degree. We may not transform as radically as caterpillars into butterflies, but we still struggle with the changes that come over us at that stage of life. It's been pointed out that a major appeal of the movie I WAS A TEENAGE WEREWOLF is that it symbolically represents something that happens to all teenage boys. A similar point is made in its usual inimitably witty fashion by a BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER episode in which Xander gets involved with a gang who've been possessed by hyena spirits. When Buffy tries to describe Xander's alarming behavioral aberrations to Giles, Giles replies with something like, "He's turned into a teenage boy. Obviously, you'll have to kill him." I sometimes refer to our grown sons' adolescent years as “turning into a werewolf,” the period when a formerly pleasant, cooperative child becomes an almost unrecognizable creature. In Jacqueline's Sime-Gen universe, young Simes literally transform into alien-looking creatures by sprouting tentacles and gaining strange new powers (strange in the eyes of Gens, anyway).

In creating alien protagonists, recalling the confusion of our teenage years may help us get inside the minds of our characters. After all, the term “alienation” is often applied to the turmoil many adolescents go through (in our culture, at least—see THE CASE AGAINST ADOLESCENCE, which I recently discussed, for an alternate view). And for those of us who've long since attained adulthood or even middle age (or beyond), today's youth may seem to inhabit a different realm, a world of the future with technology and dialects we have to learn as foreign customs and second languages. Bridging that gap may offer clues about how it would feel to communicate with aliens.

Dragoncon

I am off to Dragoncon in Atlanta. Please stop by our booth, Bump In The Night Central to say hello, win prizes and talk about books.
Hope to see you there.
Susan Kearney

Three of Swords - Commitment

Updated and expanded compilation of all these Tarot Just For Writers entries is now available on Kindle:
The Wands and Cups Volumes and  the Swords and Pentacles Volumes, are now all available separately on Kindle.  The 5 Volumes combined are also available on Kindle as one book, cheaper than buying them individually.
The Not So Minor Arcana: Never Cross A Palm With Silver Aug 30, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0108MC26O

The Not So Minor Arcana: Wands Sept. 1, 2015  99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106RVPKU

The Not So Minor Arcana: Cups Sept. 11, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106SATX8

The Not So Minor Arcana: Swords  Sept. 17, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0100RSPM2

The Not So Minor Arcana: Pentacles  Sept. 21, 2015 99 cents
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0106RVKF0

The Not So Minor Arcana: Books 1-5 combined Sept. 24, 2015 $3.25
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B010E4WAOU

This series is designed not for the beginner or the advanced student, but for the intermediate student and specifically for writers doing worldbuilding..

Bet you were wondering what the Tarot Suit of Swords has to do with Alien Romance!

Or with Romance in any form.

Well, there it is. Commitment.

Most Tarot decks portray the entire suit of Swords as dire and terrible. The Three is shown in the Waite Rider deck (drawn by a woman, but designed by a man) as a heart with three swords piercing it -- blood dripping. Other decks are even worse.

The "best" the Swords has to offer is considered to be the 6 which we will discuss later, and then you'll see the six is not so hot.

With each of the not-so Minor Arcana, (i.e. the numbered cards) there are two major components to the "meaning" or "significance" -- the number and the suit.

The Number and Suit (or World) combine to establish the abstract, non-verbalizable, meaning of the variable represented by a card. And that non-verbal meaning establishes the meaning of the Major Arcana that are connected to the Minors by the Jacob's Ladder diagram. That's why I call the numbered cards the "not so" Minor Arcana. They are actually the source of all "meaning" in Tarot.

The Jacob's Ladder diagram is a cascade of 4 interlaced Tree of Life diagrams (see The Biblical Tarot: Never Cross A Palm With Silver) - one diagram for each of the four "worlds" or levels of reality represented by a Suit.

There are four Worlds, four letters in the Divine Name, four variables necessary to create a Boolean algebra and four forces that hold the world together (the forces phycisists want to combine into a Unified Field Theory).

Our manifest reality has three spacial dimensions and Time. See my reviews column (http://www.simegen.com/reviews/rereadablebooks/ for January to June 2007 for a series on how the Soul enters manifestation through Time.

I learned of the concept of the Soul entering reality through Time in a Chabad course http://www.chabad.org/ on Kabbalah, mulled it over for a year, read dozens of books, wrote columns on it, am booked into a conference to teach it, and I still don't understand it. But I keep trying.

On the Tree of Life diagram, the Major Arcana fit onto the connecting spurs between the numbered Sepheroth. There is only one set of Major Arcana images, but each one functions in each of the four "worlds" differently. So there are four complete sets of meanings for each Major card. So there is no way to tell which of the Worlds a Major is expressing in a given reading.

Students of Tarot argue endlessly about what symbols go onto which card or what number a given Major Arcanum should be -- and some people feel that one deck is more responsive or sympathetic to them personally than another because of the art, the inking or the symbolism or the magical conditioning they've imbued it with.

These issues can be easily penetrated by understanding that the cards represent points on the Tree of Life diagram. It simply doesn't matter, in any objective way, what you put on the card. It only matters that you, yourself, can tell them apart. Therefore subjectivity reigns supreme in the matter.

Take some pieces of paper and scribble numbers on them and you can make a Tarot deck. It only matters that you know what each card represents and where it fits in the dynamic process of energy flowing down from the Creator to ultimate manifestation. So your deck will work just fine up to your own personal limitations.

The artwork is put on Tarot cards for those who don't understand the Tarot in terms of this structure that underlies all the universe. (Well, who does???? We all need a little symbolic help here.)

So let's trace it out on the Tree diagram.

The Threes can be reached directly from the Aces by the Major called THE MAGICIAN. Or Three can be reached through Two via THE FOOL from One to the Two and then THE EMPRESS across to the Three. And you can get out of the THREES through the LOVERS and THE CHARIOT.

In this series of explorations of the Tarot cards we are following the path down the Tree that is usually called "The Lightening Flash" -- so we will move down in numberical order from One to Ten.

The 3rd Sepherah (or zone on the Tree of Life) is called BINAH, is often associated with the astrological symbol Saturn, and can handily be thought of as the gates of life and death. This is the portal through which you are born -- and the portal through which you go when you die.

That's both symbolic and actual, but for the most part the 3 of Swords card turns up representing a psychological state.

That state is very well described by the word "commitment." It is a point of "no return" -- a moment that will always be remembered as the "before" and "after" moment. "Before I met your mother, I had so many girl friends I couldn't remember their names!"

Some times this 3 of Swords moment is felt as a loss - a death. Sometimes it's felt as a new start, a gain, a birth.

To leave some place is also to go someplace else. You can grieve over the friends left behind -- or reach out to the new people you find yourself among.

How you experience the passage through that portal is a matter of your own personal choice. And remember, the whole Suit of Swords is about choices. Choices are actions, as are thoughts and words. The Sword is the symbol of cutting in half or dividing. And that's what choosing is.

So the Three of Swords represents a choice about who and what you are.

The essence of the Gates of Life and Death is very simple. In order to "be" anything at all, you must "not be" everything else. Identity (a subject much explored in my column for The Monthly Aspectarian archived at http://www.simegen.com/reviews/rereadablebooks/ ) rests on the principle of dividing or distinguishing one thing from another.

And that distinguishing process is the process of moving energy down the Tree into manifest reality -- at the numbered points the energy divides and separates like white light spreading out into a rainbow.

In order to be red, you have to not-be green. In order to be Jacqueline Lichtenberg I have to not-be George Bush. In order to be happy, I have to undersand that what I am is defined by what I am not. What I am-not is also, ultimately in the "place" I came from, part of me.

You see what I mean about the Tarot representing ideas, concepts and notions that simply can not be conveyed verbally? You'll sprain your brain wrapping it around these concepts, but they are very useful for understanding any fictional character's internal conflict which generates his external reality and its inherent conflicts -- leading to a bang-up resolution of that fictional character's story.

The Three of Swords for a fictional character is that moment of adjustment when the character resigns him/herself to not-being everything else. "Foresaking all others" do you take . . . ?

Now consider the process of writing a novel.

In the Ace of Swords moment, you began the action of creating words.

In the Two of Swords moment, you saw your first words appear, the first character you put onto the page turned around and looked you in the eye. Shock of seeing part of yourself outside yourself stopped you -- or tumbled you over, out of control, with no way to predict what would happen.

Once you take that tumble off the balance point of the Two of Swords you are subject to the laws of psychology just as a circus tumbler is subject to the laws of physics.

If the action is begun with enough power in the Ace, you move right on through the Two smoothly and suddenly find yourself diving through the portal of the Three.

Once through that portal, there is no way back. You have become NOT everything else. Something vital has separated from you. You have divided yourself off into you and your characters.

In the writing of a novel, the Three of Swords is the moment of total commitment when you comprehend just what completing this project will cost you.

How long will it be? How many years of your life (usually about 5) will you spend living inside it until it's finished? How deep into your own psyche must you delve to find the words? How much of your true self will the readers see exposed? What will you see coming out of yourself that you never believed was in there? How hard will it be to sell this project and get it into print? How will you ever find time to answer the fan mail? Or will you have to go into hiding (Rushdie comes to mind).

The Three is also the moment when you see what you might get if (and only if) you can finish this project, despite the cost. How much money? How much fame and glory? How many people's hearts will be touched?

This book is the legacy you're leaving your children - will they find it saying how much you love them? Will someone, somewhere, come to understand you and themselves better for it? Your great-grandchild maybe?

And that's the essence of the Three in all the Suits; what you pay for what you get. What you leave behind in order to become what you will be.

Once you've written this book, you become the author of this book and can never not-be that author. Everyone who has ever written anything knows that feeling. It's like giving birth. The thing you have written is now separate from you -- and you are different for it.

So the Three of Swords is the moment when you strike a bargain and make the commitment to pay this price for that reward, knowing you might not get the reward, or might not want it once you've obtained it at dire price.

A child being yanked out of fourth grade to follow his parents across country to their new job FEELS only the loss of his friends, not the better school, nicer friends, and better university nearby.

An adult has a wider perspective and though he may feel the loss, he can imagine new, wider and more fruitful vistas ahead, and so the pain of loss isn't overwhelming or paralyzing.

There is a Child within every Adult who weeps for loss, screams in terror at stepping out of the balance point of Two, pulls back and cannot look ahead.

There is a Child within us all who can not make an Adult commitment.

To commit to an action, project or change is to renounce all that was and dive past the point of no return, an act of faith -- a soul taking an incarnation knowing the life pattern will be very hard, a couple pledging for better or worse, a pilot deciding to try to make it to the next airstrip rather than return against the wind on one engine.

The Three of Swords is frightening because it comes after that even more dismaying moment of balance in the Two of Swords. The Three of Swords is risk. The Three of Swords is fear. The Three of Swords is the fear of loss and the loss of fear all at once.

The Three of Swords is the bedrock of character.

These Three of Swords moments are the moments in life when our elders tell us we are building character. Strength of character is what carries one through the darkest moments of life. Will you do the right thing regardless of the pain, the cost, the risk?

And the Three of Swords is the moment, very near the beginning of the novel, when the main character faces his or her own "point of no return" -- the point after which the events of the novel must inevitably unfold all the way to the end. (Everyone knows that moment when it comes to sex, or running a red light.)

If that moment is well constructed, the writer has no difficulty completing the project. If that moment is flawed, the writer will likely bog down in the middle and not finish, or graft on some other novel's plot twist in the middle and barrel onwards to an ending that has nothing to do with the beginning. Real life doesn't let you do that.

Novels "work" for us as entertainment because they are shaped like real life. That shape makes the fictional impossibilities seem real to the reader.

One of the points where the writer can induce a reader to identify with a character is that Three of Swords moment where the fictional character is tested to near destruction, gives a primal scream to the heavens, and hurls himself through the portal of Three Swords. There's usually one at the beginning of the novel - and a more intense one near the 3/4 point, an epiphany.

Three is the gate that leads to life or (from the other side) to the realm beyond death.

Swords are actions, thoughts, decisions, habit patterns.

The Three of Swords is the act of commitment. That act may be a thought, a verbal admission of a feeling, diving off Niagra Falls, a bargain with the devil, or an act of faith. It is a deed which divides life into "before" and "after."

Whether the Three of Swords is experienced as "pain" or not depends on how "mature" your Philosophy (Wands) combined with your Sanity (Cups) actually is.

A strong character does not experience the pain as louder than the hope. A weak character does. Any reasonably sane person experiences both at the Three points in life, chalks it up to experience, and builds a stronger character, and a more mature person.

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

The Down Home Zombie Blues Book Video

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'll let you all have fun with the new THE DOWN HOME ZOMBIE BLUES book video. It resides on MySpace at the moment so if your ISP blocks that site, you can also find a smaller (nonMySpace) version on my site here:
http://www.linneasinclair.com/books.html

I did try to load the non-MySpace version to this blog but gave up due to technical limitations (mine).

The Down Home Zombie Blues by Linnea Sinclair

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What's neat about the book video is the music: well-known blues musician Traveling Ed Teja is mentioned several times in the book as Theo Petrakos's musical favorite (Theo's the male protagonist--a divorced homicide cop deals with stress via his guitar--in case you've just come to this blog and haven't read the teaser excerpts prior to this.)Ed graciously wrote the theme music for the video AND is putting together an official The Down Home Zombie Blues song collection, which will be posted on a special site: ZombieLight Orchestra

His "Blue Light" and "Blue Dime" have a special meaning to the book (and to Jorie!). Here's another sneak peek of the book:

(excerpt from The Down Home Zombie Blues by Linnea Sinclair)

Theo stood, restless energy unsettling him. He wanted to stay awake in case she needed something, but to just sit there and listen to his mind think—and his heart break—was driving him crazy. Hurry up and wait had never been his strong point, which was why he liked detective work. He could always find something to do.

But here, too much had happened, and so much of it had been out of his control. He needed to refocus… Yes. He grabbed his guitar case. Duty belt and weapons were carefully placed on his nightstand. Boots came off. He propped his pillow against the wrought iron headboard and brought his guitar into his lap. The well worn Brazilian rosewood was smooth and cool under his fingers—and very familiar. He dug out his slide, then picked aimlessly at a few strings until a blues refrain he’d been toying with came to mind. Zeke had been busting his butt for over a year now about his reclusive ways since his divorce. You still singing “The Down Home Divorced-Guy Blues”? was Zeke’s constant taunt.

So Theo actually started writing the song. He closed his eyes and let himself sink into the sassy notes of the music, keeping time with one foot against the blanket. He hummed the melody softly—he was still working on the lyrics.

The tension leached from his neck and shoulders. He went through the refrain twice, then something made him open his eyes. He realized the room had grown quiet. He no longer heard Jorie’s voice or her tapping on the screen just on the edge of his hearing. That’s because she’d turned, her eyes wide in question.

Skata. He should have asked if playing his guitar would bother her.

“Sorry. I’ll stop.” He shifted forward to put the guitar back in its case.

“No. That’s blissful.” A small smile played across her lips.

“I don’t want to disturb what you’re doing.”

“I’ve done all I can for now,” she said, and rubbed her hand over her face again. “Until the zombies take a new action, I can only watch and wait.”

“And the Tresh?”

“I’m no threat to them until the zombies wake again,” she continued. “And since they know more than I do about the Sakanah, they may not consider me a threat at all.”

Theo could hear the strain in her voice at the mention of her ship. He wished he had answers for her, but that, too, was out of his control.

She motioned to his guitar. “Please. It sounds so nice. And I need something else to think about for a little while.”

Was that why she let him kiss her? Was that just part of the playacting they’d started—-he’d started—-earlier? And he had started it, he admitted ruefully.

But somehow, no, he didn’t think she was toying with him. And he hoped it wasn’t just his male ego making that claim.

He glanced at his watch: two-ten. He pulled another pillow against the headboard, then patted the mattress. “Come, sit with me.”

It would be temptation, Jorie next to him on his bed. But playing his guitar would keep his hands occupied. Because after what had happened in the hallway, he knew if he touched her again, he wouldn’t be able to stop.

She pulled off her boots, then climbed across his bed on all fours, looking almost childlike, an impish smile on her face. She settled next to him and drew her knees up, wrapping her arms around them.

He found himself playing Traveling Ed Teja’s “Blue Light”, because it was soft but upbeat at the same time. Somewhere in the middle of the song, Jorie’s head came to rest on his shoulder. He smiled to himself and kept playing, going through the song a second time, then segued into Teja’s “Blue Dime.”

He plucked the last few notes softly. She’d curled up against him, her knees resting against his thigh.

He put his guitar and case carefully on the floor, tucked the G-1 under his pillow, then turned off his bedside lamp and drew her into his arms. She murmured something unintelligible. He smoothed her hair back from her face and she settled into slumber again.

Theo listened to her breathing, the muted clicking of her computer, and the rustle of the night breeze through the fronds of the palm trees outside.

It was Christmas, and somewhere, sweet voices were singing, silent night, holy night…

While all of unholy hell waited just beyond his door...


Enjoy! ~Linnea
www.linneasinclair.com

Pets and small children in SF

Many new writers are taught not to include pets and small children into their Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy stories. Supposedly, the inclusion of pets and small children in adult fiction detracts from the story and especially the Romance. However, if you’re writing Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy, you would have pets and small children because you’re writing about their world and their reality.

I disagree. In my opinion, including pets and children as secondary characters makes the story more realistic and believable. They flesh out the background of the world-building. After all, pets and children are a natural and normal part of our lives, aren’t they?

Robert A. Heinlein incorporated pets and children in his Young Adult Science Fiction. Classic examples are PODKAYNE OF MARS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podkayne_of_Mars
and THE STAR BEAST http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Star_Beast

In David Drake’s Honor Harrington series, http://web.telia.com/~u54504162/honor/index.htm
Honor is one of the few people adopted by a Sphinxian treecat an intelligent indigenous species. This occurred when she was a child, a rarity among treecat adoptions. She has dubbed her 'cat Nimitz. After conducting considerable research on them, she has eventually become one of the foremost experts on treecats.

Andre Norton’s http://www.andre-norton.org/books/date.html
Beast Master series of books takes the relationship of humans and their pets to a higher level of an equal partnership and blending of physical and psychic abilities. In her Moon of Three Rings, the aliens have a “circus and pet show” where the animals are equal partners in their presentation of their acts.

In the Liaden Universe books by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, http://www.korval.com/liad.htm
cats are honored pets within many of the Liaden households. In I DARE, www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0441010857/blookangarue/107-2494529-45437/blookangarue
the cat plays a major role in bringing down the villain of that tale.

For the second book in my Sidhe trilogy, DOWN CAME A BLACKBIRD, www.atlanticbridge.net/publishing/blackbird.htm
Indio’s eight-year old daughter Socorro stows away on the mining expedition spaceship with her pet kitten, Licorice. The miners on the spaceship voted to hide their presence on the ship from the scientists and captain because they didn’t want to have to cancel their mission in order to return her and Licorice to the space station.

Readers and book reviewers have written to me to express how much they enjoyed the different scenes with the kitten. Especially, the chapter where Kevin has created a cat spacesuit and has to put it on the struggling kitten. Needless to say, blood is shed in this chapter and none of it belongs to the cat. LOL.

In THE HUNTRESS, www.king-cart.com/cgi-bin/cart.cgi?store=linda018&cart_id=2724621.20752&product_name=The+Huntress&return_page=&user-id=&password=&exchange=&exact_match=exact
my award winning Erotic SF novel, the alien hero Rulagh is an exo-biologist working for the Interstellar Humane Society. He’s on Earth to handle the animal control problem of the chupacabras, the feral descendants of alien pets left behind by UFO tourists eighty years ago. In addition to killing off wild chupacabras, Rulagh and Sonia wind up adopting two orphaned chupacabra pups.

Here’s a scene from THE HUNTRESS where Rulagh teaches Sonia how to handle the baby chupacabras and bond them to her.

THE HUNTRESS: EXCERPT

Rulagh squatted in front of the cardboard box and removed Suma, the chubbier one of the chupacabra pups. He cradled her against his chest and stroked her belly. She gave a delighted meep and stretched her body like a courtesan begging for attention.

Sonia lifted a tentative hand and stroked the baby chupacabra’s soft belly. Miniscule scales tickled her fingers. The puppy was too small, too trusting for Sonia to feel afraid of it.
Rulagh’s quiet voice deepened into a raspy whisper. “Now’s a good time to give them their first blooding.”

Sonia pulled her hand away as if she’d been bitten. She peeked at the tips of her fingers and saw no bite marks. Her heart skipped a beat. Chupacabras was Spanish word for goatsuckers. “First b-blooding?”

Rulagh cocked his head and flicked his tongue at her for a split second. “It’s nothing to be afraid of. The feral ones were never taught how to control their bloodlust. They’re omnivores. They need meat and plants, not just blood to ssurvive. When the first blooding is done properly, it binds them to you for life.”

He thinks I’m afraid. Was she? Sonia pursed her lips. No, she wasn’t, not with Rulagh hunkered down on his heels calmly cradling one of the pups in his arms like a baby. She slanted a defiant look at him, picked Anga up and tucked the tiny body into the crook of her arm. The pup snuggled against her with legs splayed apart, coiled her tail around Sonia’s wrist and gazed up with glowing red eyes. The feathery soft crest on Anga’s back and head tickled Sonia’s arm.
Rulagh hugged Suma to his chest, extended his fore claw and crooked his finger. “I promise you, after the initial cut you will feel no pain.”

She held out her right hand. He inserted his claw into the tip of her index finger with a swift, delicate touch. It felt like a needle had pricked her. A bead of blood formed on her finger. Anga turned her head, flicked her tongue out and stared at the blood on Sonia’s finger. A shiver rippled through the pup’s body.

Sonia stuck her finger in the pup’s mouth before she could change her mind. No way was she going to act like a sissy for Rulagh’s amusement. Anga latched on to the finger eagerly. A contented croon burbled from her throat while she sucked with innocent greed and clung to Sonia’s finger with her paws. Anga’s tongue had the same sand-papery feel of a cat’s.

A slightly deeper croon burbled from the other pup. Sonia risked a look and saw Suma sucking on Rulagh’s finger with the same greed. He pulled his finger out of the pup’s mouth. It gave a sad meep. “Now we sswitch.”

Why was he doing this? Why didn’t he just bond the puppies to him and leave her out of it? If he planned to take them with him when he left the planet, it didn’t make any sense to bond them to her too, and then leave her behind. Did this mean he planned to take her off planet too? The implications, the possibility of being able to actually fly in his spacecraft whirled around in Sonia’s mind.

She tugged her finger out of Anga’s mouth and inserted it in Suma’s mouth while Rulagh placed his finger in Anga’s mouth. The pups sucked for about thirty seconds more and released the fingers with satisfied sighs. Their heads lolled back, they yawned and their eyelids slid shut.

Sonia followed Rulagh’s lead and returned her drowsy pup to its adoptive mother’s side. She rose to her feet and studied her finger. The pinprick mark had already sealed shut. “How often will we have to do this?”

“Once a week. As long as we give them blood as a regular treat, they’ll develop a taste for our blood only and won’t even consider drinking from anyone else.”

“What about when they get bigger, won’t they need to drink a lot more than just a couple of drops?”

Rulagh touched Sonia’s arm and stroked it with his blunted fore finger. “They won’t ask for more because by that time, they will love us too much and accept whatever amount we choose to give them.”

IMPLOSION ZONE www.loose-id.net/detail.aspx?ID=531
is my newest Erotic SF novella. It’s also the sequel to FLARE ZONE, which debuted in the FANGS anthology at Loose Id. IMPLOSION is scheduled for release within the next two weeks at Loose Id.

In addition to trying to find and arrest the serial killer who’s terrorizing the space station, Maris and Pierce have their hands full acting as godparents for Kayle, a week old A.I. (Artificial Intelligence).

Kayle is eager to prove himself by trying to solve the mystery of the serial killer with the help of his friends, the children who are supposed to be helping him learn how to socialize properly with others. Kayle is frustrated by the limits placed on him because he’s still considered an A.I. child. He hopes to be able to upgrade to AdminNET level instead of being restricted to only KidNET Internet access at the station.

Here’s a short excerpt from IMPLOSION ZONE where Kayle and his friends wind up in the middle of danger on the deck where spacers and stationers are fleeing in a panicked stampede from a undead vampire on a berserk rampage.

EXCERPT: IMPLOSION ZONE

Kayle hadn’t anticipated this vast warren of space where the five-level-high ceiling curved into the distance. Gantries loomed two and three levels high, holding the lopsided weight of the massive robotic cranes that loaded and unloaded cargo. Every fifty yards, holographic message boards rotated and showed constantly changing data updates about arriving and departing ships, stock market reports, prices of commodities, and job openings.

Dockworkers monitored the loaders. Ship captains, cargo-masters, and stationers exchanged loud and raucous discussions over availability of passenger and cargo space. Assorted spacers on shore leave strolled to and from the side corridors where various shops, restaurants, sleazy bars, gambling parlors, and sexual entertainment houses catered to their needs and vices.

Suli stood beside Jason. Her straight black hair flipped over her shoulder while she moved her head back and forth to watch the sights. Jason’s red hair and pale skin kept him readily visible in comparison with the normally dark-haired and dark-skinned population of the station.

Cataloging the immense variety of human coloration and body type still kept Kayle occupied each time he wandered about the station. He looked forward to increasing that visual database even further when Lilith and Caliban decided he’d matured enough to upgrade to AdminNET instead of KidNET.

Suli kept a tight, white-knuckled grip on Jin’s hand. He’d wandered off in the wrong direction right after they exited the tube-train. She’d freaked out when Jin disappeared from view, and wasn’t taking any chances on him getting away again.

Jason jammed his hands in his pockets. “This is fragging! I always wanted to see the docks, but my dad never had the time to take me here.”

Kayle turned to Abrized. “Are you sure this is the right place?”

The Avee child spun around in a circle. “Deck 10, Sector 13 is where Station Security said they found my second-father’s body.” He stopped. His nostrils flared and the blue feathers on his scalp rippled. He pointed to the left. “Och-Eoce blood scent is very faint in that direction.”

A high-pitched scream of endless fright scaled up. Echoes bounced off the walls in confusing tangents. Kayle damped down the background noise and turned his audio sensors up to full power in an attempt to pinpoint the source of the scream.

People stopped midstride. Heads swiveled in every direction.

Hooting sirens wailed overhead. Suli, Jason, and Jin stuck their fingers in their ears. Abrized sunk down to the floor and covered his head with his arms. Ramps retracted into docked ships. Machines loading and unloading shipping cans ground to a stop, their flexi-metal grips and extensions frozen in mid-motion.

The words RED ALERT! RED ALERT! followed by PLEASE PROCEED TO THE NEAREST EXIT POINT IN AN ORDERLY FASHION flared inside Kayle’s head. The same bland and frustratingly noninformative instructions scrolled across the holographic message boards in flashing red letters.

He opened his illegal backdoor link to Security Central to find out what information the police and station administration were holding back from public links in order to avoid any panic. His link shunted to an automated reply node. All lines are busy. Please hold until the next available line is open.

The booming, bone-shaking crash of emergency seals closing at both ends of Section 13 reverberated through the metal-plated deck. Garbled screams and yells exploded from around the left-hand curve of the dock. The cascading logic of chaos math failed to encompass the sudden storm of frightened humanity that exploded from every side corridor onto the dock.

A very faint whisper of smoke tainted the airflow. A mass of adult humans, all sizes and shapes, stampeded around the curving line of the corridor straight for Kayle and his friends.

Approximately forty-six percent of the panicked mob waved work tools and jagged lengths of pipe over their heads.

Sara’s Combat Law #6: Mobs are bad news. Panicked mobs are worse news. Avoid them at all costs.

Kayle blinked. Who programmed Sara’s Laws into my brain? Sara wasn’t even a sentient being. She was a minor science fiction vid heroine with a cult following that encompassed eighty-four star systems. He discarded the thought as irrelevant to the present situation.

Jason pointed at the rear wall. “Go that way. We have to get out of their way. Fast.”

Obviously Kayle wasn’t the only one with a working knowledge of Sara’s Laws.

Suli tugged Jin along with her and ran toward the wall. Jason pulled Abrized to his feet. They raced after Suli and Jin.

Jin’s toy clattered to the deck and rolled backward. He yanked his hand free from Suli’s hold, ducked under Jason’s arm, and barreled past Abrized’s grasp to retrieve his prize.

Adult legs blocked Kayle’s view. He pelted at a sharp angle that cut across the deck a few feet ahead of the river of panicked humans and caught sight of Jin.

Tears streaked the little boy’s face. Eyes wide with fear, he squatted down on the deck and hugged his toy to his chest, making his body as small as possible.

Sara’s Combat Law #2: Don’t be a hero, but if there isn’t any other choice, go for it.

Between one step and the next, Kayle morphed from his Avee shape into a shimmering flexible panel with feet. He lunged forward, grabbed Jin, and wrapped his flattened body around the little boy in a protective bubble. The mob crashed into them. Legs, hands, and feet kicked and pushed Kayle and Jin in random directions like a soccer ball bouncing across a playing field.
He rolled to a stop. The thundering roar of feet slamming against the deck damped down into a faint vibration. He unfolded his body from the bubble shape, released Jin, and morphed back to his default form of a two-foot-tall silver humanoid.

***
In conclusion for today’s blog, my advice is as follows:

Don’t limit your horizons when you write Science Fiction and Fantasy. Include pets and children in your stories as part of the normal lives of your characters.
Thank you.

Barbara Karmazin
www.sff.net/people/selkiewife
www.myspace.com/barbarakarmazin
groups.yahoo.com/group/TheSensuousAlien/

The "gods of Tigron" trilogy (aka The Mating Books)

Cathy Clamp was one of the speakers on my Research workshop panel at the last RT. Her handout, and those of Jade Lee, Sandy Blair, Judith Laik, and my own can be found in the Useful Stuff area of my website

For me, the most memorable story Cathy told was of how she always takes every opportunity to see unusual things, and makes the effort to talk to strangers. So, last weekend, when I had the chance to go into a cockpit with the pilots of a plane, and to talk to them about how and where ground radar interrogates air traffic, I did.

Much to the consternation (I am sure) of the other passengers, I was in with the pilots for a long time. I learned about air ways and sea lanes, the trade winds and the jet stream, and solar winds!

There's nothing like talking with pilots (or any experts) about the right way to do this and that, in order to extrapolate how one might to the "wrong" thing, or get around the system.... which of course my aliens have to do.

Best wishes,
Rowena Cherry

(By the way, I take no responsibility for the "associated" links that youtube offers you once you have viewed the Mating Net video!)

Aliens in Disguise Among Us

Coincidentally with the release of the latest remake of INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS, about aliens who assume the identities of human victims, I've just read two novels on a similar theme: Hostile nonhuman creatures lurking among us who look (to the uninitiated) exactly like normal people. Both of these books, Melissa Marr's WICKED LOVELY and Karen Marie Moning's DARKFEVER, feature protagonists with the power to see faery creatures in their true form, to which ordinary people are oblivious. Moning's Fae are all dangerous, none of them beneficent toward humanity; the best that can be said is that some of them don't kill us. While some of Marr's Fae have a benign attitude toward mortals, many of them are cruel and most, at best, capricious. Both of these heroines' lives depend on not letting the faery folk realize their illusions have been penetrated. I'm also reminded of A. E. Van Vogt's WAR AGAINST THE RULL. The alien Rull, hidden behind their human disguises, can be recognized by touch, so refusal to shake hands is highly suspicious. And wasn't there a short-lived TV series in which the extraterrestrial invaders looked like the rest of us except for a small anomaly in their fingers?

Suppose you were one of those people who know hostile beings walk disguised among us? If you tried to warn the rest of the world about the danger, you'd be classified as delusional, because of course nobody else could see the reality behind the illusion. In fact, you yourself might suspect you're mentally ill (as Moning's heroine fears at first) until you meet others who share your frightening gift. A possible variation on the theme: What if you're one of the small minority who can see the aliens for what they are? But suppose you alone realize that the "invaders" aren't disguising themselves out of hostility, but out of fear. They have some good and innocent reason for hiding from the human population they're forced to live among. If you tried to convince your fellow "Sighted" minority of the aliens' innocence, most of them wouldn't believe you, and you would be doubly isolated.

New Cover

Hi Everyone,
I just got back from a vacation in Chicago and found out the Solar Heat cover has been changed. I will upload more photos soon. I visited a planetarium and have some cool pictures to share. But in the meantime, you can can have a sneak peak of my February paranormal romance.
Best,
Susan Kearney

The Two of Swords

Last week we looked closely at the Tarot Card the Ace of Swords, both as an ACE (a "one") and as a Sword, or a manifestation of the alchemical "element" called "Air" (which has nothing to do with what you breathe to stay alive.) Remember this is written for the Intermediate Tarot student, so some knowledge is assumed.

Updated and expanded compilation of these essays now available on Kindle:
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This series is designed not for the beginner or the advanced student, but for the intermediate student and specifically for writers doing worldbuilding..

With our point of view firmly fixed in the novel writer's perspective and the Alien Romance story in particular, let's see what the Two of Swords has to teach us.

If the Ace of Swords is the moment when you face the totally blank page and decide to write this particular story, the Two of Swords is the moment when the opening words are before your eyes.

All the Two's of the Tarot represent the fist division between the point where all is One and the point where the One subdivides.

Only when the first mitosis, the first cell division, has taken place can you have CONFLICT, and as students of the WorldCrafter's Guild Essence of Story course have learned, Conflict is the Essence of Story.

So after the first words flow out of your fingers, you stare at them and this character who has walked onto the page from somewhere inside you looks back and smirks. He or she is now a separate being with a rationale, goals, and a big problem.

At that moment, you, the writer, are in confrontation with your own subconscious mind, definitely your equal.

Thus the image on the Waite Rider deck's Two Swords is a figure holding two crossed Swords, Swords massive enough to unbalance the slim figure and tumble all into the waters behind.

Water, remember, is the symbol of emotion and is represented by the Cups of the Tarot. The Cups are all about the subconscious, or internal psychological conflicts. The energies driving Swords came down through Cups -- unbalancing at this point in the manifestation of that energy that first appeared in the Ace of Wands would represent a step backwards. That's sometimes necessary, but not usually much fun.

The Two of Swords represents that point of hesitation after the first move in a planned project. OK, it can represent the "cold feet" a couple about to get married experiences. It's a moment when opposing forces are equal and further action is impossible.

So staring at the first few words of your magnum opus without another word left in your head, what do you do?

You have decided to write this story or to launch this life-project, whatever it is. And now you've taken the first step -- "de-ciding" or cutting out the edges of the project to define it -- you discover that what you have generated is bigger than you are. The "di-chotomy" is more massive than the originator. Any disturbance can send the whole system out of control.

And that's it -- the pure essence of all the Two's -- a balance point which seems "safe" but must be left behind if the energy of the Ace of Wands is to propagate downwards into manifestation.

The essence of Two is balance and security. It's antithesis is what C. J. Cherryh calls, in her FOREIGNER UNIVERSE novels, "badji nadji" -- or "let the chips fall where they may" -- a statistical process that no one controls and no one can predict. Pure chance.

What you have created with your decision in the Ace of Swords is now manifest outside you and you can not control it.

That's frightening because Swords are sharp weapons that can do harm, just like words.

Fear is healthy, a sign of sanity -- but too much fear can kill you.

So there you sit before your creation afraid to move this way or that -- afraid to MAKE THE NEXT DECISION! Why? Because you can't CONTROL the result.

Well, some writers love it when the characters take on a life of their own and command the plot, and others just clamp down and stop telling the story. Still others will work with their alter-ego subconscious manifestations, make friends with them, and argue them into taking the plot-course that will get their message out (i.e. get the book published).

How you respond to losing control of something that has come from inside you will determine how the Three of Swords will manifest. How you habitually (Swords are habitual actions and reactions) deal with things you don't control will determine the shape of your life.

The most popular interpretation of the Three of Swords is "sorrow" and "loss." But that's NOT what it really is all about.

Within the Three is contained the Two, and the manifestation of the Three Swords is determined by how adroitly you finesse your way out of the situation of the Two Swords.

Now we come to the analogy of Acrobatics or Circus Flying, gymnastics, maybe High Diving.

The Suit of Swords represents Air. I've said that before. Some may argue that a different symbol in the card deck represents the alchemical element Air. Frankly, what symbol you draw to represent an element is irrelevant. The Alchemical Elements take their significance from the Tetragrammaton, the four letter Name of God, as I discussed under the Ace of Swords. I am using Swords to represent the third letter in that Name, the third level down Jacob's Ladder.

There is a Jacob's Ladder diagram and explanation of how that relates to the Tarot deck in The Biblical Tarot: Never Cross A Palm With Silver by Jacqueline Lichtenberg.

Pure energy enters manifestation in your Life by the ignition of AN IDEA (the Ace of Wands), and then that energy travels down the circuitry of your soul via the Tree of Life diagram. There are a number of Paths that energy can take. But let's try to keep this simple and at the intermediate level.

As the Idea energy ripens and becomes more complex, it leaps to the level of Emotions -- Cups -- and you get all fired up about the idea, seriously jazzed, whacked out of your mind by your own brilliance. Finally the energy leaps from Cups to the Ace of Swords where you decide to act on that Idea-emotion.

Notice how I've described this process dynamically -- energy flowing down complicated channels, gathering momentum and going faster and faster.

Now, in the Two of Swords it hits equilibrium -- a fear is faced.

If you CHOOSE (choices are Swords) to stop that energy at the level of Two Swords, the dynamic momentum pours and pours into the Two making those balanced Swords heavier and heavier and the consequences of moving one or the other worse and worse.

Trying to stay at that balance point (staring at the first words of your story) will eventually result in your falling over this way or that way, and anything can happen. But one thing is for sure. It's going to hurt -- just as a trapese artist will get rope burns hitting the net or a gymnast will be bruised by an ungainly sprawl.

Rope burns and bruises and making a fool of yourself in public by falling over is what the Three of Swords is usually interpreted as. But it doesn't have to hurt.

Any circus flyer or gymnast will tell you that nailing a landing is a joy beyond measure. So the trick of handling yourself through the Ace of Swords to the Two of Swords and then onwards is not to obstruct the momentum!

You swing through the Ace of Swords, plant your feet in the Two of Swords and push off in a mighty leap. You don't stop to think (thoughts are Swords too), you think on your feet. You talk and dance at the same time. You walk and chew gum. You keep going through the balance point. If you stop, you are in trouble.

The Two of Swords Reversed represents that moment when you are flying through the air, head over heels.

Now, fear.

Remember, above we touched on how Swords are thought, and one kind of thought that can leave us stuck at a balance point like the Two of Swords is fear, fear of losing control.

Fear is an emotion (Cups) -- but it has to be dealt with via Swords (thought).

Consider that if you know Newton's Laws of Motion, or if you're a practiced gymnast, spinning head over heels is not frightening - it's exhilarating. Experience and understanding of the process, of the forces operating on you, gives you confidence.

You know there's a measured uncertainty in where your feet will land. You know there's a chance you've miscalculated the push-off and you're going to fall over, or stagger. If you're diving, you know you may hit the bottom of the pool, or hit your head on the board.

You "know" (Swords; thought) the dangers, know what to do if any of them happen, know the probabilities, know the risk, and know the reward.

And so you're not afraid, not paralyzed, just cautious. But you are moving!

That's the Two of Swords Reversed -- it indicates that one of two situations is in progress: a) you lost momentum and sat still too long, but now you're moving, b) you didn't pause too long but pushed off and are now moving.

If a) then the Three of Swords will hurt. If b) the Three of Swords will sting a little but it'll be worth it.

Remember, "As Above: So Below" -- these analogies are not exact but they do hold. The spiritual level of reality works according to the same kinds of rules and priciples that obtain here below -- there is symmetry. (Two's represent that symmetry).

If you haven't read Marion Zimmer Bradley's circus novel, CATCH TRAP, I highly recommend it for an understanding of this process.

Circus Flying is an artform that uses mass and momentum to make visible certain spiritual processes which are the building blocks of all personal relationships, but most especially the love-relationship.

Swords are ACTIONS, so the Laws of Motion apply by analogy. The Two of Swords is a static equilibrium, but life works most smoothly as a dynamic equilibrium.

If you get caught in a static equilibrium (looking at the first few words of your story), eventually the energy flowing down your circuits from the Idea will dislodge you and the result will be a big mess you have to painfully clean up.

So when you come to that point of seeing your first words appear on the page, DON'T STOP. Keep going. Let the momentum carry you into the head over heels spin that feels so out of control. Practice that spin until you can nail the landing without a qualm. And the "landing" in writing a novel is the moment when you write "The End."

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

Close Encounters of the Zombie Kind: Teaser from The Down Home Zombie Blues

Since in my last blog we played with Jorie's reaction to Earth, I thought I'd share Theo's--our intrepid Florida homicide detective's--reaction to working with a Guardian Force team. Essentially, commandos from another planet. Now, Theo's trained. They're trained. But training can mean two different things when it comes to fifteen-foot tall mech-organic monsters. However, office politics never seem to change...

From THE DOWN HOME ZOMBIE BLUES by Linnea Sinclair

Coming from Bantam books Nov. 27, 2007

Theo had spent the last several years of his BVPD career interrogating people who lied—either by accident or design, out of fear, greed or stupidity. It was one of the first rules he’d learned as a rookie: Out here, everybody lies. Yet Theo wasn’t ready to brand Jorie Mikkalah a liar. At least, not quite.

She just wasn’t telling him the complete truth. Which fit in exactly with the corollary from Rookie Rule Number 1: Always know that you are never, ever being told the whole story.

He wasn’t. Not about the implant in his shoulder, not about the zombies and not about her plans. And especially not about whatever was going on with her team of space commandos.

He thought of that as he drove west on Twenty-second Avenue toward the mall. Jorie, still clad in her oversize sweater, was perched in the front passenger seat.

It was almost three forty-five in the afternoon. The ETA for the zombies was now less than an hour. A surge of adrenaline shot through him every time he thought about that. He tamped it down. Be calm. Think. He’d handled a zombie before, with far less preparation. He could do it again. His Glock was secured on his right hip, his zip-front sweatshirt keeping it and his gun belt with extra ammo hidden from sight. He’d also donned his black tac vest, very aware that something that could so easily trash a car wouldn’t be hampered by it. But he had to wear it—and his smaller Glock in the ankle holster. For extra protection, his assault rifle was racked in its usual place.

By comparison, the weapons the space commandos wore seemed strangely small and light. Jorie was decked out in much the same manner as when he first saw her: headset with its eyepiece (swiveled down for the moment), dual laser pistols, and various gizmos attached to a belt (all hidden by the sweater). Her high-tech rifle rested on the floor.

Oddly, it wasn’t their weaponry that was foremost in his mind at the moment. Their camaraderie—or lack of it—was.

He glanced at the passengers in his backseat through the SUV’s rearview mirror. There was a power struggle under way. He’d been with BVPD too long not to recognize one. But this one centered on him and the lives of everyone he knew.

A detective’s sixth sense told him he’d been off the mark in his initial appraisal of Commander Mikkalah. She was responsible for his kidnapping and that damned thing in his shoulder, but, despite that, he was beginning to see that Jorie did take people’s lives into consideration. That same sixth sense told him Rordan didn’t.

And that, he suspected, was where the lines were drawn. The players had chosen their sides.

On Jorie’s was Tamlynne Herryck, now wearing his old black and white Tampa Bay Lightning T-shirt over her sleeveless uniform top. Tammy, he’d dubbed her. But Jacare Trenat—Jack, wearing one of Theo’s Old Navy T-shirts—had sided with Kip Rordan. Theo didn’t speak a word of Alarsh, but he knew if he dubbed Rordan Pompous Asshole he wouldn’t be too far off the mark—though Uncle Stavros would probably call Rordan a malaka. Too bad he’d loaned Rordan his Bucs jersey. He hoped like hell he’d get that back.

Jack, it seemed, was doing all he could to get his nose far up Rordan’s butt. Though to be fair, Jack was young. Just a rookie. He had that bright, shiny look in his eyes that was a combination of a desire to please and a belief that he could save the world.

And Rordan, with his swagger, was just the kind of malaka a rook like Jack would admire.

Of course, saving the world—Theo’s world—was Jack’s job. If it hadn’t been his own world at stake, Theo might have found the entire situation amusing: intergalactic space commandos falling prey to petty office politics. He just hoped Jorie Mikkalah was up to the task of not only the zombies but whatever Rordan was planning as well.

He stopped for a red light. Jorie had been focused on her scanner gizmo since they’d left his house but she looked up at him now.

“Ten minutes,” he said, anticipating her question.

She nodded. “I need to position Rordan and Trenat first before we remove your people.”

“And Tammy?”

“Tammy?”

He inclined his head toward the Tampa Bay Lightning fan seated behind her.

“Lieutenant Herryck and I will take the opposite position. You can return to your structure. We’ll meet you back there in about one sweep.”

“Whoa, wait a minute.” The light turned green. He stepped on the gas. The SUV stuttered, then surged forward. “I’m part of this mission, remember? And it’s a long walk—”

“We’ll use the PMaT to transport back to the ship when the juveniles have been dealt with.”

Peemat? Oh, that damned thing that spins your guts out through your eyeballs, then puts you back together again as you go from Point A to Point B. A thought struck him. “Why do you need me to drive you to the park if you have that transporter?” It was certainly quicker and more efficient, though nauseating.

“Zombies track PMaT,” came Rordan’s answer from behind Theo. Another glance in the rearview showed a slight smirk on the man’s face.

Yeah, okay, so I’m a stupid nil. Theo returned Rordan’s reflected smirk with one of his own. “Skata na fas, malaka,” he said under his breath. Eat shit, asshole.

“Because all PMaT transits are unshielded,” Jorie said as if Rordan hadn’t commented. “Zombies have what we call a sensenet. Through that, they’re aware of surges created by unshielded tech. And they react.”

“But you said you’re going to transport back—”

“The zombies will be neutralized at that point,” she continued. “But to engage the PMaT in the proximity of a forming portal holds danger.”

Rordan said something in Alarsh, short and quick.

Theo saw Jorie shrug. Her answer was equally short and sounded—though he had no idea of the content of the exchange—casual, almost offhand. But her fingers were tight around her scanner.

He didn’t like not understanding their language. He liked it even less that Rordan understood his. He hoped this was just petty office politics and that they were all on the same side when it came to the zombies.

But he couldn’t be sure and he couldn’t ask. He could only remember what she’d told him earlier, denying—lying about— tampering with her tech to change what the zombies did. He gleaned from their conversations on her ship that’s what had turned Wayne, her agent, into a parchment Mr. Crunchy with moist eyeballs.

And here she was doing the same thing because Rordan—and intergalactic office politics—prevented her from saving lives at a crowded mall during Christmas week.

So Theo decided to do the only thing he could: tilt the balance in Jorie’s favor. He made his decision as he dropped Rordan and Jack at the far end of the park by the tennis courts, then Jorie and Tammy at the other, next to the baseball field. A quick trip around the perimeter announcing—via his PA system, with blue strobe going—the possible sighting of a rabid raccoon cleared away the few remaining joggers.

Theo pushed the traffic gates shut, then set the Park Closed sign in place. Jorie had told him to go home once the park was clear. But he was not going home until this batch of zombies was dead and that PMaT thing was spewing Rordan’s unworthy molecules all the way back up to the ship.

He turned the lumbering vehicle back toward the ball field, parked it just behind the row of low bleachers, and got out. Jorie trotted toward him, frowning. He leaned on the front of his SUV, arms folded across his tac vest.

“I’m staying.”

She glared at him. He glared back. When she flung her arms wide in exasperation and let out a now familiar sounding string of Alarsh curses, he knew he’d succeeded. A mixture of elation and relief washed over him.

Which ended a split second later when a discordant wail erupted from the scanner in Jorie’s hand—and echoed out of one dangling off Tammy Herryck’s hip.

Jorie favored him with one last hard glare—partially obscured by her eyepiece—as if to let Theo know he was now edging his way to the top of her shit list, then she thrust one of her small laser pistols into his outstretched hand.

“Opticals, remember?” she asked, teeth gritted. She swung her rifle around. “And legs. Stay with me.”

Opticals. Eyes. And legs. And writhing energyworms and long, flailing, razor-sharp extenders. He sprinted after her to where red-haired Tammy stood, rifle in one hand, scanner in the other, then stopped. Both women’s heads were bent over their scanners but, damn it, no one was looking around. Someone should be. He remembered the green glowing circle, the thing oozing out—impossibly—from its center. He turned, squinting through his sunglasses into the late afternoon light.

Something slammed him from behind, crushing him to the ground. Grass, dirt, and gravel were pushed into his face, and he heard his sunglasses crack. Then, with sickening clarity, Theo realized he could no longer breathe...