Bats are a much-maligned animal. Long thought of as creepy or evil or diseased, a closer look reveals that the wide variety of bat species also possess an amazing array of attributes and perform all sorts of vital ecological roles: from pollinating bananas and mangoes to eating so many insects every night that they save [...]
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Blog: PowellsBooks.BLOG (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
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Note: Join us this Thursday, August 27, at Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing for an author event with Christopher Moore. Describe your latest book. Secondhand Souls is the sequel to my bestselling novel A Dirty Job, which was about a single dad in San Francisco who gets the job of being Death and runs [...]
Blog: Stacy A. Nyikos (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Science Fiction, Little House on the Prairie, gender, Ray Bradbury, Dune, Frank Herbert, The Martian Chronicles, Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie, The Island of the Day Before, Umberto Ecco, Add a tag
Ancillary Justice
Ann Leckie
science fiction
I am a closet-case sci-fi fan. Or, as multiple book reviews on this blog have probably revealed, maybe not so closet case. I looked forward to reading Ancillary Justice when I'd seen it won the Hugo and Nebula awards. I cut my sci-fi teeth on the likes of Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles and Frank Herbert's Dune in between installments of Little House on the Prairie. That is the seventies in a nutshell. And I figured, if Leckie could beat Andy Weir's The Martian, which I love, in the awards category, I was about to fall in love again.
Let's just say Ancillary Justice and I got off to a rocky start. It was not love at first sight. In fact, the novel frustrated me (incidentally, it was the same when I first met my husband).
Basic plot - a space ship decides to take revenge on the leader of the culture that made - and ultimately attempts to destroy - it (Ancillary Justice, not my marriage; it's still happily intact).
It's fascinating stuff. AI taken to a whole new level. However, the AI can't decipher female from male and so refers to everyone as "she". Sometimes, gender is specified, but then the ship reverts to calling said characters "she". For me, it made connecting with characters really hard. And that made me wonder, why does gender matters in story? Or rather, does gender matter in story? Should it matter? What does Leckie gain by making her story more or less gender neutral?
I haven't finished figuring all of this out, but I have come to the conclusion that for the story, by making everyone gender neutral, characters become sentient beings. That's it. They have flaws and quirks, but in remaining gender neutral, they never became much deeper than that. This may, in part, have to do with the boundaries of my hermeneutics. I live in a world in which, for the most part, the gender of any person I interact with, is clear. With that comes mounds of unspoken data. Without that, I have to rethink my world. That is what Leckie forced me, as a reader, to do in her novel. I had to see it through a different lens, a new lens, one I haven't completely finished sanding down yet, and won't, without further interaction.
The absence of gender imploded my hermeneutic structure of interpretation. It made me feel uneasy. And it's kept me feeling uneasy. And thinking. In other words, it's genius.
For more great reads, visit Barrie Summy's website. She's got a bushelful! Add a Comment
Blog: PowellsBooks.BLOG (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
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We asked our readers: What was the last book that you couldn't put down, that kept you up all night, that you couldn't stop recommending? We were delightfully surprised by the number of replies we received. Here are some of our favorites. We'll be posting more on a regular basis, so check back often. And [...]
Blog: Claudsy's Blog (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Writer, Life, Writing process, writing, Education, Writing and Poetry, Fear, Charles Dickens, Writer Resources, motto, Frank Herbert, doubt., Paul Atreides, Add a tag
Tension abducts the shoulders and arms. Fingers twitch ever so slightly as they rest on the keyboard. Eyes see only a blank desert before them, boding ill for any who traverse that lonely stretch of white.
Why is it that beginning a piece of writing looms, as guillotine over neck, waiting for the blade to drop? How can a simple exercise of putting words to paper or computer exact such a toll? Writers have debated the issue for years, probably centuries, and definitive answers remain elusive.
Having suffered from this debility a time or two—okay, read that as every day—I can only suggest my personal reasons for suffering and the relief measures I take to combat those reasons.
10 Reasons for Avoiding the Keyboard
- No one is interested in anything I have to say.
- What I have to say has no value.
- What’s the point of putting myself out there?
- I don’t have the talent that it takes to make it as a writer.
- This dream is a waste of time I could be using elsewhere.
- I’ll never gain approval from anyone for writing, so why do it?
- Getting something published takes too much time.
- I have too many other things to do with my time than sit here pretending to be a writer.
- So I have a story idea. It will never sell.
- Only my friends ever read my stuff. I’m going out and enjoy the sunshine instead of being cooped up in here writing drivel.
Did any of these sound familiar? I’d bet that you’ve experienced at least five of these in the past three months.
Doubt is a normal human response to anything that exposes us to criticism. After all, no one likes being criticized for anything. Avoidance is the common remedy for dealing with criticism. If a venture is never begun, never made available for others to see, no one has an opportunity to criticize you for anything.
Taking Charge of Self-Doubt and Fear
Children are taught both self-doubt and fear of disapproval when they’re seldom praised for their efforts. As an adult those who’ve lived without much praise for good performance, good effort, etc. constantly seek out the missing approval. That, too, is a normal human motivation.
This constant seeking of approval can lead down a road to success or continued failure. The signpost for the direction taken, I think, is the one that reads “YOU’RE HERE—FEAR”
If fear is allowed to control you’re actions, it controls your life and your freedom. Whether you become agoraphobic or not doesn’t matter. You’re still hiding inside a locked room—the one you’ve made for yourself and your aspirations.
I created a motto for myself today and shared it with another writer this morning. It is: “If you never begin, you never arrive.”
Will the world end if your story isn’t equal to one belonging to Dickens, Heinlein, King, or Hemingway? If your poem isn’t of the same caliber as 8 Comments on Whether Right or Wrong—Write, last added: 3/3/2012
Blog: Claudsy's Blog (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Writer, Life, Writing process, writing, Education, Writing and Poetry, Fear, Charles Dickens, Writer Resources, motto, Frank Herbert, doubt., Paul Atreides, Add a tag
Tension abducts the shoulders and arms. Fingers twitch ever so slightly as they rest on the keyboard. Eyes see only a blank desert before them, boding ill for any who traverse that lonely stretch of white.
Why is it that beginning a piece of writing looms, as guillotine over neck, waiting for the blade to drop? How can a simple exercise of putting words to paper or computer exact such a toll? Writers have debated the issue for years, probably centuries, and definitive answers remain elusive.
Having suffered from this debility a time or two—okay, read that as every day—I can only suggest my personal reasons for suffering and the relief measures I take to combat those reasons.
10 Reasons for Avoiding the Keyboard
- No one is interested in anything I have to say.
- What I have to say has no value.
- What’s the point of putting myself out there?
- I don’t have the talent that it takes to make it as a writer.
- This dream is a waste of time I could be using elsewhere.
- I’ll never gain approval from anyone for writing, so why do it?
- Getting something published takes too much time.
- I have too many other things to do with my time than sit here pretending to be a writer.
- So I have a story idea. It will never sell.
- Only my friends ever read my stuff. I’m going out and enjoy the sunshine instead of being cooped up in here writing drivel.
Did any of these sound familiar? I’d bet that you’ve experienced at least five of these in the past three months.
Doubt is a normal human response to anything that exposes us to criticism. After all, no one likes being criticized for anything. Avoidance is the common remedy for dealing with criticism. If a venture is never begun, never made available for others to see, no one has an opportunity to criticize you for anything.
Taking Charge of Self-Doubt and Fear
Children are taught both self-doubt and fear of disapproval when they’re seldom praised for their efforts. Adults who’ve lived without much praise for good performance, good effort, etc. constantly seek out the missing approval. That, too, is a normal human motivation.
This constant seeking of approval can lead down a road to success or continued failure. The signpost for the direction taken, I think, is the one that reads “YOU’RE HERE—FEAR”
If fear is allowed to control you’re actions, it controls your life and your freedom. Whether you become agoraphobic or not doesn’t matter. You’re still hiding inside a locked room—the one you’ve made for yourself and your aspirations.
I created a motto for myself today and shared it with another writer this morning. It is: “If you never begin, you never arrive.”
Will the world end if your story isn’t equal to one belonging to Dickens, Heinlein, King, or Hemingway? If your poem isn’t of the same caliber as Tennyson, Whitman, Brow
Blog: Eric Orchard (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: sketches, audiobooks, ipod touch, brushes application, dune, frank herbert, Add a tag
The last two weeks I worked a lot at an art store to make some money to help pay for a computer I just bought. I live on the edge of Toronto so there's a lot of travel time on the street car. I love the street car. During the last weeks I listened to an audiobook of Frank Herbert's Heretics of Dune and would sketch scenes or characters . They are really sketchy but boy, were they ever fun to draw.
This couldn’t have come at a better time. Thank you!
Glad you could get some use from it, Laurie. I have to do this for myself at least once a week. I figured I wasn’t alone in it.
Write well. I’m looking forward to seeing your new work.
Claudsy
Thanks. This is great for me right now as I am in the third month of daily writing and today I am at a loss for where to go with posts.
You’re more than welcome. I’m glad my posts are of use. If you’re stuck, you can always back up and regroup. If you’re using the daily prompt for inspiration, stop for a few moments and pull your personal take on it to the background. Then look at the prompt again as if you were someone else.
What would your parents feel, expect, etc. if they had to deal with the prompt? What about a friend from school? Would she/he feel or interpret the prompt as you do?
Sometimes when we imagine others’ reactions to something, we get a clearer image of how we’re interpretting that same thing.
Just a thought. Good luck.
Claudsy
ALL such relevant writer advice, Clauds. I really like your #2 and #4 relief measures. #2 is comforting as it is a “writing for the joy of writing feeling to it and #4 is inspiring and connecting, sometimes it’s good to get out of the “box,” otherwise known as “my head!” Thanks so much!
You’re more than welcome, Hannah. I always figure that someone out there has done something in particular, learned something helpful, before I get around to reinventing the wheel.If I find something that works for me, someone else could learn from it, or at least get a different perspective on the experience.
I’m glad to pass along some of my remedies for my own mistakes. I still make so many of them. I live to learn from them.
Clauds
Such a great, positive way to look at it, Clauds! Thanks!
You’re welcome, Hannah.