Changing Up the Apocalypse

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is "Resurrections: What trope/theme did you think (or wished) had "died" only to be recently resurrected?"

I don't often have it in for tropes. After all, they're simply story constructs and are neither good nor bad, any more than paragraphs and sentences are good or bad. Everything entirely depends on the writer and what they do with the trope. As we often talk about, there are no new story ideas - the feeling of freshness comes from the author and their voice. I recently saw a review of one of my books where the reader said I revitalized a tired trope. A nice compliment, but tropes can't get tired - they just get handled in tired ways.

Anyway, since the pandemic and apocalyptic themes are on our minds, I can talk about an apocalyptic trope I've never cared for. That's the one where civilization collapses and the people who rise ascendant are the brutal men. Women automatically become rape-imperiled property and Tough Men with Big Guns battle constantly. We see this all the time and it drives me nuts. As if women are simply perched on an unsteady tech platform that can at any time tip them into a lawless world where they're dragged by the hair into caves.

Spare me. As if they educated, capable, tough women of the modern world can't figure out how not to be helpless.

What's been interesting about the COVID-19 pandemic is that the skills emerging as critical to our lives and well-being aren't prancing around in leather and shooting big guns, but the simple hearth skills like baking and sewing. We've been baking our own bread, sewing masks we can't buy, adopting home-healing remedies since we can't hit the urgent care centers.

It makes sense, too, that when we lose access to the instant gratification of civilization, we are left to create our own. I think that, in a post-apocalyptic world, the people who can create stability and safety, with decent food and the comforts of a warm home, will be the true heroes.

Doesn't make for an exciting action flick, but... well, aren't we all discovering we prefer normal life? And baked goods. :-)

My Portals to Escapism

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Our topic here at the SFF Seven this week is: books vs movies vs games vs comics.

In ordinary times and in these pandemic times, my first escape when not writing my own books is to read books by other people. Currently I do all my reading on my kindle and I’m very eclectic in my choices, although science fiction, SF romance, paranormal romance and fantasy do predominate. I always have a large To Be Read list, both on the kindle already one-clicked and waiting for me to be in the right mood and also in a wish list of books I might try at some point. If I discover a new-to-me author that I love, I might end up reading their entire backlist in a big binge before moving on to anything else.

I also re-read books like Shield of Winter by Nalini Singh, which is one of my all-time favorites. Sometimes I go all the way back to my favorite Andre Norton books, or Anne McCaffrey’s, although I do tend to skim a bit when reading a book I’ve practically got memorized. I found myself re-reading Pat Frank’s Alas, Babylon earlier this year when the apocalyptic nature of our current situation became clear to me.  Randy Bragg’s trip to the grocery store on the eve of nuclear war, although different than what we’re dealing with, resonated, shall we say! I always remember the ladies watching him shop and commenting on his fifteen cans of coffee…

I also worked my way through the Flashpoint series by Mike Kraus and Tara Ellis, who were a new writing duo for me. Additionally I really enjoy Kate Morris’s Apokalypsis series, which led to me reading her McClane Apocalypse series.  Yes, I was definitely in an apocalyptic mood.

I guess I still am but as the pandemic deepens, I find I’m going more for scifi romance.

But having said that, my last two reads were This Is Chance! By Jon Mooallem, a nonfiction book about a woman reporter on the front lines at the 1964 Alaska quake, and other Anchorage citizens, and how they all coped. I actually knew two people who survived that quake, one of whom was inside the JC Penney’s store at the time. The other was standing outdoors and watched the ground running in waves and going up or down, with crevasses opening up around her. The book was an interesting read, definitely the 1960’s were another time, especially as regards women working outside the home. It was a bit jarring to be back in that era while reading the book, frankly. Then right before that I read In Five Years: A Novel by Rebecca Serle, which is a romance with one ‘time travel’ element. And before that was Paladin, a Galactic Gladiators novel by Anna Hackett, who is a must-buy author for me.

In the middle of all that reading, I also re-read the first few books in my own Badari Warriors science fiction romance series. I’m about to start on the next book, Ivokk, which will feature characters who have been mentioned off and on, so I wanted to refresh my memory.

The only thing I watch on live television any longer (which gets us to my second form of escapism – movies or TV shows) is cable news. For everything else, I go to the kindle and stream or binge watch. I enjoy the “skills-based” reality shows – all manifestations/imitations/spinoffs of Project Runway for example. I never get enough of those, maybe because I used to sew a lot of my own clothes and my daughters’ Halloween costumes and doll clothes, so I feel I can relate a little. Some of the shows are better than others but I enjoy them all.

Also Top Chef is a favorite of mine, although right now I’m struggling because the current season is in Los Angeles, filmed last year, and it’s jarring to see the contestants bopping around SoCal, going in and out of a Whole Foods grocery store with fully stocked shelves, eating at small niche restaurants that probably went out of business in March 2020…yeah, a bit hard to take.  Oddly enough, I haven’t fallen in love with any other cooking shows I’ve sampled. I did watch a few seasons of the one with Food Trucks but that got depressing to me. I watched the Great British Bakeoff with my daughter and her husband and am sad to say it didn’t grab me either. There must be some ‘magic’ to Top Chef that keeps my attention.

I loved Face Off, the long running SyFy show where special effects artists competed to create the most amazing things. I have a years’ long, mild crush on Tate, the Season One finalist and always wanted him to WIN, not come in second. Which he finally did triumph in the spin off Face Off: Game Face show and I was so happy for him. (Oh yeah, I’m a devotee of that program all right.)

I have all the seasons of Making the Team – Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders (or DCC as they’re commonly known), although right now it’s hard to fully immerse myself in the pro football world, since in my opinion the NFL will have to postpone the coming season, hence no need for cheerleaders either.

During the season, I do watch NFL games, although it’s hard for me to fully enjoy the game anymore, knowing what we know about concussions and CTE brain. I think I’m drifting toward abandoning the NFL if they don’t do better at safeguarding the players’ brains. But wow, when a play goes just right and the pass is caught and the runner gets into the end zone, it can be a thing of beauty…I especially love it when some burly defensive player catches an interception and lumbers (they always lumber) into the end zone…I personally hate all the reviews by the officials. It’s a game, let them play, you know?

Most of the time I forget who won the contest in any specific episode of an old season of a reality program like those, so I do re-watch seasons sometimes. I never remember jokes, who did it in mystery novels or the winners in these shows! So it’s all mostly new to me when I do re-watch.

I used to be a Dancing With the Stars devotee but gave it up about a year ago when the choices of who got eliminated became pretty obviously messed up in MY mind anyway, with good dancers who deserved to be there passed over in favor of some people who could barely put one foot in front of the other but who made ‘good TV’ I guess. Yeah, I was done caring. Although I did always love their Disney Theme nights. My all time favorite clip from DWTS is Riker Lynch's paso doble to "He's a Pirate."

I have Lego Masters queueing also but have yet to sample it.

I’m watching ‘War of the Worlds’ on Apple+ TV…grim but engrossing limited series. I SO want the French military commander and the astronomer to have a romance. I’ve convinced myself there’s definite attraction going on, but it’s not clear to me they’ll ever act on it in the midst of their End Of The World As We Know It situation. The series keeps me on edge inagoodway because they don’t hesitate to kill off people you thought would live and also to insert some pretty shocking plot twists. I also appreciate the European setting.

I’m not watching any other series right now although I have ‘Manifest’ episodes accumulating. Season one of that was intriguing.

I was a huge fan of ‘The Big Bang Theory,’ partly because I was a Caltech employee for years  and the series did nail what some Brainiac scientists can be like…they’d also refer to JPL sometimes, which is where I actually worked. (Caltech runs JPL for NASA.) It was absurd, it was amusing, it was frustrating…sometimes it was just so spot on…

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I find right now I’m watching a lot of reality series on the kindle that center around zoos and what goes on behind the scenes. There are a TON of those, some with multiple seasons. The variations between the zoos are fascinating to me. New York versus Tampa versus Columbus… I think the zoo shows are feelgood TV to me right now. Usually the animals get through whatever the crisis is or give birth to the darling babies, although every once in a while a much loved creature does pass away, which is always sad. The keepers are so attached to their charges, which is heartwarming. There are some dizzying time jumps – the babies are finally born, (blink) oh here we are six weeks later when they’re bigger, (blink) now it’s a year later….wow, the miracles of editing.

When it comes to movies, I have a lot of favorites that I re-watch, like “Aliens” and the 1950’s version of “The Thing From Another World.” I still have a cabinet full of hundreds of dvd’s but tend to buy the movie on the kindle if it’s available now so I can sit and watch it up close. I like musicals, action/adventure and obviously science fiction! I’m not much on the newer movies, although I’m going to watch the sequel to the Rock’s “Jumanji” this weekend. I loved the first one and of course I adored the Robin Williams version. Each film has its own charms. The last movie I actually went to the theater for was “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom”, with my teenage grandson.

I browse Netflix for movies and offbeat series to try…

I think with movies and scripted TV shows my basic problem is that as a writer myself, I want the plot points to stay settled. Don’t spend season two undoing every single thing I loved that happened in season one! Don’t have your sequel start as if the first movie never happened. Don’t give me movies with no romance…so I kind of gave up on scripted, open ended series and sequels. Also, while SyFy's ‘Killjoys’ managed to have its full five years of shows to tell the entire story, ‘Dark Matter’ and other shows I was addicted to got cancelled and I hate to feel cheated as far as “what happened to the characters???”

I’m not a gamer at all, although I find computer games fascinating to read about and to see discussed on social media. I’m not good at them either, which probably has something to do with my lack of interest! I’d rather read. Or write.

I read comics voraciously as a kid but I stopped when DC Comics started writing too many alternate universes and “Hero X actually dies in this issue!” plots. See my comments above about scripted TV shows undoing what had been done LOL. Just not for me! I have vintage Brothers of the Spear and Magnus, Robot Hunter in the Dark Horse compilations and I do browse through them on occasion and sigh for the old days a little…

I’ll add that many authors I know are doing jigsaw puzzles these days to pass the time. I thought it sounded like a great idea so I got a couple to try. In the old days when I didn’t have an empty nest we used to keep one going nearly all the time on the dining room table and people would work on it as they passed by. What I discovered to my surprise now is that (a) it’s not as much fun when no one else is working on it too and (b) OMG am I compulsive about wanting to finish the darn thing! Which is ridiculous but I just felt compelled to slog away at it – the one I was doing had beautiful tea cups in many pretty patterns and I found I wasn’t enjoying myself at all. It had become a chore, almost enough to fit on the weekly To Do List – “finish the darn puzzle!”. So I gave that up. Not for me apparently.

So there you have it as far as my chosen forms of escapism.

Speaking of which, I just put my boxed set of the first 3 books in the Badari Warriors on sale for $.99 so if you've been wanting to try the series for your escapism reading, here's your chance! Featuring genetically engineered soldiers of the far future, the Badari were created by alien enemies to fight humans. But then the scientists kidnapped an entire human colony from the Sectors to use as subjects in twisted experiments…the Badari and the humans made common cause, rebelled and escaped the labs. Now they live side by side in a sanctuary valley protected by a powerful Artificial Intelligence, and wage unceasing war on the aliens.

Buy Links: Amazon:    Apple Books:    B&NNook  Kobo 

Escapism

While out walking yesterday, I came upon this motley crew. These dinos each had a sign. Triceratops carries one saying, "Be cool. Sanitize." T-Rex says, "Wash your hands." We're finding all kinds of sidewalk chalk art - some of it really sophisticated stuff, some of it equally delightful is clearly drawn by our neighborhood kids. All of the artwork comes with encouraging messages. Someone's also been busy painting palm-sized stones in the neighborhood and leaving them scattered about for everyone to find and enjoy. So when we talk about my go-to entertainment, apparently my options are wider than I'd once believed. Still. When we thought up this exercise, it was pre-plague. I have a ranking system to accommodate my preferences for entertainment. It goes thusly.

1. Books
2. Games
3. Comics
4. Movies/TV

I've loved all aspects of being entertained and this list has been renumbered over and over through out my life, but I don't think books ever fell out of the number one spot. That said, I will say that this game is getting a lot of play right now because it is so topical. Don't go watch the game trailer. It's -- hard to watch right now.

 When the game gets a little too real, I retreat to World of Warcraft or to writing my own stories as a means of escape. And I'll tell you. Some days, there's nothing quite like a mindless decorating show on TV to fill you with a sense of ease and normalcy. Maybe because I get to hold a cat while I do it.

What's your go-to form of entertainment? Me...Bookscapism!

Well, this week’s topic couldn’t have come at a better time. We’re all stuck at home and consuming loads of entertainment. My household is in strict isolation due to our immune systems taking a hit from a different virus...EBV. What can I say, kids love to share! 

*mental note* no more sharing of food and drink

Being stuck inside takes a toll on the mind, so we’ve been breaking out every board game we own, having family movie nights with popcorn, and reading. But my all-time-fave form of entertainment?

If you’ve ever been in my house, or follow me on Twitter, you’ve seen my clutter. And by clutter I mean my multiple stacks of books. I can’t hide my book addiction and even though my husband used to make fun of me for my towering bedside pile, he now has a growing mini one! 

There’s also the ever-changing end table stack, this is usually where the library books rotate through.

Though the great watering hole for town library, school library, and home library is the side table in the kitchen. Because of course there should be a stack of books in the kitchen.

And the pretty-book stack, the ones that have recently been read or to-be-read (TBR) that are too pretty to put away.

But it’s the surprise stacks that I enjoy the most. These pop up in unexpected places, don’t stay too long, and sometimes parts of the stack reappear in a brand new configuration somewhere else! Right now there’s one on the stairs. 

Show me your stacks! Do you have a leaning tower somewhere? Or are you imbibing in my second favorite entertainment media…movies? We’re cruising through the Mandalorian, it’s movie-esque, and it’s amazing with gorgeous artwork in the credits!!

Escapism so needed atm

My brain is a weird thing these days. It's like I'm running on adrenaline all the time. I literally dream of grocery lists and how hard it's been lately be to get eggs and onions. (Eggs I understand, but onions? So bizarre.) At three in the morning, I'm wide awake and wondering if it's too late to buy a bidet. (Just checked Amazon. I can get one delivered in nine days, but it's pricey. Should I save the money for necessaries later on? Or get one and reduce our family consumption of toilet paper?)

Tucked in between that constant volley of panic, I'm now homeschooling my kids, who persist in framing this whole thing as a super extra long spring break, complete with sleeping in till noon and watching YouTube as much as is humanly possible. (Spoiler: that's a lotta YouTube, people.)

So with all that anxiety swirling, what do I have to say about the old books vs. comics vs. movies vs. games question?

Well, I frame it thusly: of those media, the only one that has even come close to cutting through my panic lately is games.

I think that has something to so with passive entertainment versus immersion. If I'm watching a movie or reading a book or comic, I can set it aside when my mayor or governor comes on with a news conference or my kids need help with the Pythagorean theorem or the Spanish word for beach. But with a good game, you really can't be interrupted by life. The game has objectives and time limits, and those NPCs are counting on you, dangit.

I've been playing a whole lot of Star Wars The Old Republic (an old MMORPG, and I love it to bits) and The Sims 4 on the XBox lately. I see a lot of folks playing Animal Crossing, and I remember playing that one a few years ago and thinking it was lovely and low-key. Stardew Valley is similarly comforting. Sometimes the kids and I all log on to World of Warcraft and go fishing together (virtually, of course).

Mostly, I wish I could thank all game makers for providing this alternate reality, a hundred thousand alternate realities, at a time when actual reality kind of sucks.

And you other creators -- writers and movie makers and artists -- thank you, too. Please keep doing what you do, because as soon as I can get a handle on panic-brain, I will be right back there, inhaling the good you put into the world.

This world needs all the good it can get.

My Consumption: Entertainment not TB

BROM: Lost Gods (a novel with illustrations)

Man, I love some of the topics my fellow bloggers choose.

"Books vs Comics vs Movies vs Games"

Yes, please. I'll take a bushel from column A and a tower from column B and...

It should be no surprise I love books. Hello, author here. Historical fiction, spec-fic, romance, gimme All The Books. Movies, I prefer action flicks but I won't turn down a good sci-fi. Mysteries and magical-realism? Yep, my ass is warming the seat. As for games, I can't call myself a "gamer." I'm more a Cribbage and Quiddler kind of gal. I've never played D&D (Gasp! I know! I think I lose my fantasy-author credentials for that.) Video games? Uh, no. I don't have the skills. Or the patience. Or the dexterity.

Now, comics...comics....~rubs hands with glee~

My love of comics/graphic novels comes from the evolution of learning to read. As ankle-biters, we start with picture books. Big pretty pictures and a dozen or so words per page. Comics have more pictures and about the same number of words on the page. I went from The Littlest Raindrop to Archie to Classics Illustrated. My Flash Gordon (the movie) comic survived traveling the world and my childhood. Asterix & Obelix taught me German. Monstress shares a shelf with Sandman and Snow, Glass, Apples. I really want to build out my mythology collection with more non-Western sources. (If you have suggestions, drop them in the Comments, please!)

I'm the fangirl who keeps checking my favorite webcomics to see if/when they're going to end up in paperback. So yeah, you could say I like comics. I am in awe of the talent of the artists, the colorists, and the letterers. My not-so-secret author wish is to collaborate on a graphic novel series. (Yo, Universe, puttin' it out there!)

Then there's the middle ground between the novel and the graphic novel: the illustrated novel. Has the word count of a novel, but way fewer pictures than a comic. Regardless, the illustrations are amazing. The Hour of Meeting Evil Spirits and The Child Thief are glaring across my living room at The Fairy Bible.

So, uh, there you go.

Hope you all are staying healthy, washing your hands, and practicing physical distancing. We like our readers and want you to hang around for a long time.

Which Should Jeffe Vote For?

Our topic here at the SFF Seven this week is: books vs movies vs games vs comics.

I suppose that, with everyone hanging out at home, social distancing all responsibly, we've all been indulging in our media of choice.

For me it's books and movies. I tried comics - grudgingly - and they just never quite grabbed me. In college a couple of my artist friends set to convincing me to love graphic novels. I still have the copy of Maus by Art Spiegelman that one gave me. I found the combination of drawings and stories powerful. One of my roommates took me out for dinner at our favorite Chinese restaurant as a bribe for me to sit and read a graphic novel. (One of the Dark Knights? I don't remember.) I enjoyed it, yes, and groked why he loved it. (Plus, the crab Rangoon was amazing.) But it never led to me picking up more.

Much later in life, I acquired the Sandman Box Set by Neil Gaiman, which I also love. At least, I love the first book, Preludes & Nocturnes. I confess - with a fair amount of chagrin - that I've never gotten around to reading the rest. It's not that I don't want to, it's just that... I haven't felt compelled. I've found it takes a while to wrap my brain into reading text that weaves around images. I enjoy it, but I love plain reading more.

Because it's not that I don't read at all. I've read 41 books so far in 2020, and I've read all or part of all the 2019 SFWA Nebula Finalists for Novels. (I'm still reading as I have until the 31st.)

Games... I just have never gotten into them. I don't know why. Could be for the same reason as graphic novels? I'd rather have text than images. Even with movies, I think I don't appreciate them visually like many film buffs do.

In fact, this is where you all can help me. I have no idea which game writer to vote for in the Nebulas, and have no way of deciding. Which should I vote for from these?

Best Game Writing 

Outer Wilds by Kelsey Beachum, published by Mobius Digital
The Outer Worlds by Leonard Boyarsky, Kate Dollarhyde, Paul Kirsch, Chris L’Etoile, Daniel McPhee, Carrie Patel, Nitai Poddar, Marc Soskin, and Megan Starks, published by Obsidian Entertainment
The Magician’s Workshop by Kate Heartfield, published by Choice of Games
Disco Elysium by Robert Kurvitz, published by ZA/UM
Fate Accessibility Toolkit by Elsa Sjunneson-Henry, published by Evil Hat Productions

Feel free to offer suggestions in the other categories, too. Cheers to you all!

The Little Things

At chez Too Many Cats, we're concentrating on the little things. Repotting plants, some of which have stowaways. (That's a frog in that pitcher plant. This is a problem because the pitcher plant will kill the frogs. We rescued this one, even though he didn't much want to be rescued.)  We're playing with felines, cooking, wiping down all the doorknobs and heavily used surfaces with disinfectants every day. We're taking more walks. The whole neighborhood is, it seems. I've seen more of my neighbors in the past few weeks than I've seen since moving in here over a year ago. The friendly quotient has gone way up. Everyone waves or calls hello, simply glad to have the access to other people, I suspect. We cross the street when we see one another coming so we can all keep that distance we're supposed to keep. 

And I write. At the moment, it's The Never Ending Synopsis from Hell. It's for a book that's finished. An agent has requested the full. Yay. It was a bit of a shocker because I hadn't realized I was subbing the MS when I participated in a workshop my local RWA chapter put on awhile ago. We sent in our first three pages of a story and it was critiqued by an editor or an agent. I honestly thought that was the end of it. So it surprised me a bit when I got an email asking for the full. Sure. No problem! I have the book right here -- aaand no synopsis. Woo. So that's what's on my mind. Little things. Story summaries. Frogs being digested by carnivorous plants. And, of course, here's what's on my lap. My coworker doesn't respect my personal space, much less social distancing.