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Reading - Starborn Vendetta

Apologies for the lateness on this blog, life was happening. Hi. This week, not a very big post. That will probably come later. Instead, a l...

Sunday 24 March 2024

Short story – The Village; Part 1


 “Your mission is to head out to Beira. It’s a fishing village on the end of the peninsular which borders Loch Cailisport in the Argyll and Brute area of Scotland. We’ve received reports that an thick unseasonal fog has settled over the area. Civilian forces have sent in teams, but none have returned. Upon investigation of the outer area, we’ve found remains that suggest foul play. We’ve kept this under wraps to avoid alarming the public. You’re to enter the fog and determine its source. You’re to withdraw immediately if anyone is attacked by anything, and we’ll take further measures.”

That was the brief we were given, and as soldiers we followed the order to the letter, as soldiers did. As the vehicle – an Army Land Rover – trundled along, I checked over my AK47 to calm my nerves as we headed along the single-track road which led to Beira. It eventually lost its appeal and I glanced around at the squad I had become a part of. Four other privates including the driver, a Corporal, and a Lieutenant, all sent out from a forward base five miles from the fog boundary. They were a wide selection, but I was still the only woman in the group. It made me feel isolated, cut off even as the fog would cut us off from the outside world.

“So you’re scared?”

I glanced up. Private Guss Ferguson was a native of Scotland with a thick Glasgow accent, and was the most charismatic among us. I smiled.

“Wouldn’t you be? You’ve read the reports.”

“Eh, it’s all bull, ain’t it. Just some freak fog.”

“We don’t know that.” Lieutenant Jack Wight spoke in his upper crust accent. “It’s been deemed a serious matter. We’ve been ordered to investigate it.”

“I don’t get it.” the black-skinned cockney-voiced Private Daniel Cook. “There’re local troops, aren’t there? Berets and things. Why can’t they take a look.”

“Because we’ve the ones they chose.” said Adah Laghari, a man who looked and spoke like many another British Indian. “Stop complaining. We’re nearly there anyway.”

“Can it, you lot.” said the Corporal, a Londoner with a biting tone. “I’ll make it an order if I have to. That goes for you too, Simmons.”

The driver, Private Simmons, nodded. I turned back to my weapon, brushing a slight fall of dust from the barrel. I again wondered what had qualified me for this mission. I was just another soldier, like any other. A mere Royal Marine Private Helen Twotrees, no-one special. The others were no different from what I could tell.

We’re just soldiers, she thought to herself. Nothing more, nothing less. Just soldiers doing a job.

“We’ll be keeping in contact with the Land Rover via radio. We’ll radio in the moment anything happens. Understood?”

“Understood!” the reply was united.

The Land Rover stopped abruptly, and the Lieutenant gave the order to move out. We did, the doors opening and allowing we six to leave, with the Lieutenant ordering Simmons to wait for us and act as a radio relay for our field reports, and to call in if we hadn’t reappeared from the fog within two hours. To be honest, I hadn’t expected the fog to be quite as bad as it was. Standing in front of it in the high noon summer sunshine, the fog was an impenetrable pale wall. Standing in front of that fog, I could feel the chill.

“Radio text. 1.2.3. Call.”

We each called a number from one to six, and all radios tested green. We readied ourselves – the Corporal and Lieutenant in front and us Privates behind – and began moving forward into the fog. After everyone else had gone in, I hung back for a second, unsure of what to do or say. But I gritted my teeth and pushed forward into the barrier of cold vapour. I muttered the words under my breath.

“We’re just soldiers. Nothing more, nothing less. Just soldiers doing a job.”

Beira sits inside a natural harbour with steep slopes bordering it, and the fog had collected in that bowl as normal fog collects inside fields to eventually spill onto paths and roads. But this fog was different – its pale surface rippled and clung to everything, and nothing was inside. Walking into it was like walking into a pond, but instead of water coming up over our faces, it was cold and damp air that clung to me as if it was trying to pull me back. Inside the fog, we could only see a couple of feet in front of us, making a potential ambush both possible and dangerously likely to succeed. I was just keeping Cook and Laghari in clear view, with everyone else having turned into dark grey shadows.

While bright sunlight had dominated above, the light was turned to a dull grey. I had a vague impression of hedges on either side, the asphalt road surface beneath my feet, the utter deadening of sound a thick fog creates. Within a few paces, I heard a voice from up ahead.

“Switch to infrared.”

We did so, and I clearly saw five forms in front of me as we made our way down the hill. We already had our guns ready at the Lieutenant’s order, and as we descended the steep road, I tried not to envisioned anything that might leap from the fog to attack us, or who might be lining up an infrared sniper scope on our skulls. We eventually reached the edges of the village, coming to see the typical Scottish fishing cottages – slate roofs and stone walls with rough weather gardens around them. The road showed the wear of the weather, and I even saw scraps of lichen and moss along its centre, denoting a lack of traffic. We expected someone to appear before us, but no-one came.

As we came to the foot of the slope, any trace of houses vanished from either side as if we had passed into an open space, then a dark shape loomed in the distance. As we approached, we saw it was a fountain in the middle of the village square. There was no water flowing, making its sea monster motif seem out of place. Grass was also growing around its edge. The Lieutenant made a signal, and we formed a perimeter round the fountain. The Corporal then set up the portable radio and began trying to raise the Land Rover and its direct feed to Command.

“Hello. Team Zeta calling Command, do you copy?” a hiss of white noise filled the air, then he tried again. “Team Zeta calling Command. We have entered red zone. Do you copy?”

There wasn’t any reply. Only a continual burst of static. The Corporal tried retuning the radio, then spoke into the mike again. Again, there was no reply. Again the radio was adjusted, and again no reply came. I switched on my own radio, then winced as white noise stabbed into my ear.

“Sir, my radio’s not working either.”

The Corporal looked up in surprise, then we all checked our radios. None of them were working, all blanketed by constant white noise. Cook looked unsettled.

“It’s this damned fog. It’s blocking our signal.”

“Rubbish.” snapped Guss. “Fog doesn’t mess with radio signals like this. The truck’s barely a mile away by my reckoning.”

“Alright, you two, knock it off.” snapped the Lieutenant. “We’ve got a job here, and we’re sticking to it. We’ve got a two hour window if we can’t send a message outside this fog. That’s plenty of time. Cook and Laghari will search the town. Ferguson and Twotrees, you go check the harbour area. I’ll stay here with Wight and keep trying to raise Command.”

We all acknowledged the order with the usual ‘Sir, yes sir’, then moved off. Walking with Guss, I didn’t know what to expect. Walking through the fog, listening to the dead silence around us, it felt like walking around a padded cell. We were using the main street, and we soon came to the harbour. The fog was just as thick here as it was at the heart of the village, and as we looked out across the natural harbour and its human embellishments, we heard the gentle lapping of waves on a cobbled shore, oddly hollow without the talk of people and call of seagulls.

“Ever been here?” I asked.

Guss shook his head. “Neh. I’ve never been here before. Never heard of Beirn before I got the mission. Doesn’t look that impressive.”

“Doesn’t indeed. Hey, what’s that?”

“What’s what?”

“That.”

I pointed further down the harbour road. There, appearing as if from nowhere, was a figure. Their dark clothing made them appear like a living shadow in the gloom, and their shifting gait suggested something inhuman. I felt a terrible tension for a moment, but then relaxed when I saw it was only an old woman in black, wearing a wide-brimmed hat complete with veil. Clearly in mourning. Guss approached.

“Excuse me, Ma’am, we’re investigating–”

“Have you seen my son?”

Guss frowned. “Your son?”

“Yes.” the woman’s voice was weedy. “My son. He’s supposed to meet me here. I’ve been waiting nearly fifteen minutes.”

“I’m sure we can help find him.” I said. “Shall we ask around?”

A long silence, then the old woman replied. “There’s no-one else in the village. It’s strange, but true. No-one else here.”

“No-one?” Guss didn’t sound convinced.

“No-one. Not these past few days. Since the fog settled.”

This made me take notice. According to our brief, the fog had been settled over the town for nearly four weeks prior to our arrival. Even the most generous contraction couldn’t bring that down to ‘a few days’ for anyone with an unfettered sense of time. Guss spoke.

“You’d best come with us. You’ll be safer.”

Guss reached out and gently took the old lady’s arm, but then a noise came from above us that made us look up in alarm. It was like the cawing of a raven, but harsher and fuller – almost as if it came from a human. Our eyes were barely away for a moment, but when we looked again the old lady had vanished. We looked around, but no dark shape could be seen going into the fog.

“Well that’s weird for a start.” said Guss. “Come on, I don’t think we should be lingering here any longer.”

The two of us went back the way we came, and found the Lieutenant and Corporal still working on the radio. It remained dead.

“Anything?” asked the Lieutenant.

We reported our findings, including the woman and the noise we heard. The Corporal wasn’t impressed, hinting that the fog had played tricks on us. When Cook and Laghari returned, they also reported hearing the sound from the harbour direction, and had also encountered someone – a little girl in a black dress skipping down the lane. Laghari had tried talking to her, but she just said she was ‘looking for Nanna’ and skipped on despite their protests. It was then that the Corporal swore and slapped the radio set.

“It’s useless. Too much white noise. Dead as Bin Laden.”

It was Cook that spoke. “So what do we do? Go back?”

The Lieutenant's voice snapped. “No, we’re staying and doing our job. We’re soldiers, and we’ve got a job to do. We’ve got to find out what’s going on in this town, and that’s what we’re gonna do.”

“Can you hear something?”

This came from me. During the Lieutenant’s impassioned reply, I’d been hearing a background noise. Like a hum, or a distant engine. The Lieutenant looked angry at first, but then he started listening too. We all listened, and the noise grew until we all identified it as an engine. Cook looked nervous.

“Where the hell’s that coming from?”

“Up the hill.” Guss pointed. “It’s coming from the road.”

Before anyone spoke, the radio suddenly exploded with noise.

“–repeat, I’m under attack! I can’t shake them off! They just appeared out of the fog! Calling Explorer Team, I’m under attack, repeat under–!”

It was Simmons, sounding panicked. The Lieutenant rushed to the radio at once.

“Hello, this is Lieutenant Wight. Can you hear–!”

“Oh God! Oh God! They’re all over me! I can’t shake them.”

“What? What’s happening? Private Simmons, report!”

“God help me!”

The radio was once more consumed in static. Everyone looked at each other, then the roar of the engine began louder, and the twin beams of powerful headlamps stabbed through the surrounding fog. As we watched, the Land Rover barrelled across the square and went at full speed towards one of the surrounding houses. I caught a glimpse of scratches in its paintwork before it became a flying blur in the fog. The Lieutenant shouted, but it was too late. The Land Rover crashed into the front of a shop, smashing the window glass and catapulting forward into the serving area. Guss, Cook and myself rushed over quickly followed by the Lieutenant, while the Corporal and Laghari stayed behind.

When we found Simmons, he was in bad shape. The air bag had deployed upon crashing, but he was still bloodied and battered, and as we got him out of the vehicle with all possible care, we feared internal injuries. The Lieutenant ordered us to administer first aid while one of us would go back on foot to warn Command and get an immediate evacuation. Cook was chosen as the one to go back, and he immediately set off at a jog towards the road. After ten anxious minutes, we had the unconscious Simmons comfortable, but he was still breathing irregularly. Out of all of us, Laghari was one with medical training, and diagnosed internal injuries that might be fatal if not treated.

We waited, waited, waited. We expected any moment for Cook to reappear out of nowhere with troops, or to be inside a convoy ready to take us out of the fog. But no sounds came, either of footfalls or vehicle engines. Finally, we heard something from behind us. I turned, listened, heard the approach of booted feet going at a jog. We all waited, and soon a dark figure appeared from the fog. It was Cook. The Lieutenant stepped forward.

“Cook, what the hell are you doing back here?”

Cook stumbled to a halt, looked round the five of us, then blanched. “Doing back here? I haven’t stopped heading out of this fog, Sir.”

“That’s impossible. You went that way, towards the slope. Now you’ve come back from the the harbour area.”

Something struck me, and I ran off. I heard the Lieutenant shouting after me as I vanished into the fog, but I didn’t falter. I ran forward with all speed, felt grass, asphalt, cobbles under my feet. I soon saw dim shadows on either side as vague structures appeared from out of the fog. After a few minutes running, I found myself back on familiar ground, and as I came out into the village square, where the others waited.

“Private Twotrees, what the hell are you up to?!” snapped the Lieutenant.

“Sorry, Sir. I wanted to test something. I tried the same thing Cook tried. I took the road out of the village, but it’s as if I was looped back into the village.”

“But that’s impossible.” said Guss. “There’s only one road down, and no turn-offs leading back to the village from it. You both should’ve come upon the slope and left the village.”

The Corporal pinched the bridge of his nose. “Looks like we’re trapped. The radio’s out, our comms are out, the Land Rover’s out, and we can’t leave. Looks grim.”

“There’s something else, sir.” said Laghari. “When we picked up Simmons on the radio, we heard him shouting about being attacked.”

“Attacked by what?” said Cook. “Monsters? Zombies? Some trashy serial killer from a slasher flick? What?”

“Let’s look at the Land Rover and see.”

So we did, with Guss and Laghari staying with Simmons. We looked at the Land Rover, and between the damage caused by the crash there were other marks. Thin scratches in the paintwork as if something had clawed at the metal trying to get inside. Several of the windows were still intact, and even they showed scuff marks and the signs of scratching on the surface of the glass. It was unsettling, but the Lieutenant passed it off as damage from the crash. It was possible, I’ll admit, but it didn’t fit in with either Simmons’ cries over the radio or the fact that we now seemed trapped here.

“What is it?”

We all started. Laghari was standing just outside. The Lieutenant frowned.

“What is it, Laghari?”

“Eh? Didn’t you call for me, sir?”

We all froze, then dashed back to the fountain. Both Guss and Simmons had vanished, and the Lieutenant laid into Laghari for this seeming dereliction of duty on their parts. Laghari’s defence was that he had heard the Lieutenant’s voice calling for him, and that Guss had agreed to remain on guard. A few seconds later, we heard someone approaching, and Guss all but stumbled out of the fog into my arms. I helped him over to the fountain edge where he sat, and I saw the slight welt on his head that showed he had been struck.

Like Laghari, he claimed to have been lured away by a voice, but this time it was the voice of a child in danger, screaming for help nearby. It seemed just a metre away, so he had gone into the fog. Within seconds, he was lost, and then felt something hard like a stick or cane strike the back of his head. The Lieutenant wasn’t impressed, but before he could reprimand Guss, we were all struck dumb by a cry from overhead. It wasn’t a human cry, but a piercing scream or croak from the sky above us that had barely anything human in it.

Everyone whirled around, uncertain which way to look. The cry seemed to come from everywhere, and I didn’t know what to do myself. Finally, a great wind rushed around us and we all turned to see some large form descending from the fog.

It was a bird, at least in terms of having a body and two wings, but otherwise unlike any bird I’d ever seen in book, on television, or in real life. Its body was covered in ragged feathers, its wings twisted out and extended to twice its body length, its tail flared like a demented peafowl, its eyes glowed like fire, and its beak split into four points as it shrieked once again. We all stumbled back, and that was when Guss saw what the creature was clutching in its taloned foot. Simmons, limp in its grasp, blood oozing from a deep wound in his back.

“Simmons!”

Guss’ yell only served to make the creature shriek at us again, then it extended its wings and took to the air with a single beat, vanishing into the fog-laden sky. Guss rushed forward to where Simmons had been left on the ground, but after a few seconds he rose to his feet, shaking his head. Simmons was dead...

Sunday 10 March 2024

Short Story - The Cage in the Castle

 She stood on the end of the bridge, facing the castle in the distance, the fur on her snout rustling in the wind as the ever-present moon shone down on her semi-naked form, competing against the waning sun in the west. In her hand, the sword felt heavy from the blood of her recently-dispatched enemies. No point sheathing it now, it would rust her sheath. She took the bridge at a run, sensing the magicks supporting it begin to crumble as unwanted feet touched it. The grapple in her arm twitched and launched towards the battlements. The head caught, and she was lifted up and away as the stones fell away beneath her towards the crashing sea.

What idiot in their right minds would build an enchanted castle on an outcrop. The thought made the hairs on her back bristle. Given another few decades, the sea would wear away at its base and cause it to fall. Either that, or whoever controlled the castle would have to expend even more power to keep it floating. Even the High Ones dared not do that, though the moon's grace granted them so many boons. Clambering up onto the balustrade and dropping down, grinding stone and metal shifted near her. The stones statues were awakening, as she had been warned. A duck and run forward as a sword swung down. These were the granite guards, animated by the castle's occupant.

She ran along the top of a wall, launched her grapple once more, pulled herself out of range of swings. Glancing down into the courtyard, she saw more of the statues come to life, one great among them. It looked like a human male, several times larger than any male should have been, and it wielded a great mace which dragged along the ground and scarred the cobblestones. This must have been their captain, animated to command as they were to destroy.

"T'nod pots gnihcraes!" The guard captain's tone was harsh, horrible like the stone from which it was carved. "Llik no thgis! Rof rou redeal!"

What odd words they had in this place. Familiar, yet odd. A few more words, and she could speak if it she so chose. Maybe she would have to. They were shouting to each other in strange grunts and growls, almost howling like animals. Maybe they had been animals once. She reached the first of many towers that formed the core of the castle, looking up from where she hung from the guttering towards the central tower. At the top, hovering in the field of magickal energy, was the owner of the castle. There was little to be seen inside the cone of light, but it was a human shape. A form that was mortal, kept alive only by the stasis of the magic which preserved this castle.

She was about to leap to the next tower when something tugged at her. No physical force, no simple compulsion, but a sudden rush of attention. The need to be seen. Her head turned, eyes focusing on one of the smaller towers on the other side of the castle's structure. It looked positively dark compared to the other towers, shrinking and inconspicuous in their shadow. Why was there such a potent energy there, and why was it not tied into the rest of what was happening here? The figure above was always known as the one that kept the castle's inhabitants asleep and timeless, locking it away from the moon's gaze.

Leave nothing unexplored which catches your scent. That was what the Elder Fang had told her. She would investigate this, regardless of its seemingly inconsequential nature. She took to the walls and ran along their edges, unseen by the soldiers lumbering below. Pale imitations of their creators in form and function. Two walls, another tower to skirt round, yet another wall that this time she had to scale with grapple and claw. Finally she was at that strange little tower. None had spotted her, nothing had halted her. The tower looked so...dead. There were windows, but all were tightly barred. The only door was...at its base. Of course.

She slid down using the grapple, listening for any sign of attack. There was none. The door was not even locked. Strange indeed. She passed inside, saw the stairway leading round towards the top of the tower. It was pitch black, no light shining down this far from the top of the tower, itself in the shadow of the other towers and walls. The sea was audible through the walls, which were damp under her pads. it was the work of minutes to scale the tower.  When she reached the top, she stepped onto a cold platform leading towards a cage suspended above the tower floor far below. Someone was in the cage.

She approached with a slow step, and the figure in the cage looked up. It was a human. Which was impossible. Aside from those who resisted in unnatural sleep in this castle, humans had gone extinct long ago in the Great Hunt, when the Moon That Never Sets had emerged from its slumber. He looked pathetic enough to be one of those survivors, a thin ragged, pathetic excuse for a man dressed in a white robe and with a deep-set face half-hidden under a long mop of shaggy blonde hair. His lips moved slowly.

"Ohw...era uoy?"

Yes, those were the words she needed. She understood this language now. Like her own, like that of her people, but slightly altered. She could speak to him.

"T'nod eb diarfa. M'i t'now truh uoy."

The man frowned. "Lliw uoy...teg em tuo fo ereh?"

She nodded. Yes, this seemed the right thing to do. This man was radiating such energy, more than any produced by that thing at the top of the castle. The cage wasn't that sturdy, but the man was so weak even these feeble locks seemed able to hold him. She reached over and yanked the door open. Reaching out, she encouraged him forward. He took a few tentative movements, tried to rise, but then slumped again.

"Os...derit..."

He was exhausted, though from what seemed uncertain. She stepped inside, picked up the slight human form, and carried him out like a tired child. Now she was impaired. She could at least get the man outside the castle, outside this gigantic cage that was in the form of a castle. The cage may have been old and fragile, but the barred windows were strong. She had to go out the way she came. She trotted down the stairs, the slight figure held in one arm. She reached the door, sensed the stone fists raised to bear down on her. She launched the grapple, shot through them and braced herself against a wall. The stone fists crashed down on where she had been a second ago. She fired the grapple again, shooting up the wall as the creatures of the castle shouted.

"Redurtni! Llik! Llik!"

The young man sighed. "Esaelp od ton evael em."

She smiled. She wouldn't abandon him now. The walls were her playground, the castle would not stop her. The final rush across the moat would be interesting with the extra weight. The man seemed to be staring at her, but not with fear or disgust or even wonder. She managed to look at his face as she rested for a moment, and saw the emotion. It was gratitude. Finally they reached the outer wall, where she had entered. The soldiers were scaling the walls, approaching them. But her grapple couldn't reach all the way across. The young man slowly held up a hand, pointed down towards where the bridge had been.

"Tel em pleh."

There was a shuddering, then the bridge began to reassemble. Or perhaps...restore? Rewind? As if time had been turned back. Her grapple carried them down and she ran across the bridge, which collapsed behind her. She was back on the mainland before she realised. The young man was holding her with his weak arms, closely as if he really were a child. Then there was a mighty shuddering behind her. She turned, still holding the man, and watched as the castle began to crumble away into nothing. What had happened? Even the light was gone...

Her answer came unexpected. She felt a sudden shift in her arms, and looked down at the man. No longer was he young and frail, he was now aged to the point of appearing like a dessicated corpse. He slowly looked up even as his skin pulled back from age and dryness. His life was fading even as he spoke his final words.

"Knaht uoy."

She smiled sadly at the dead face. "No. Thank you."

The body was already crumbling in her arms. The castle was completely gone too, right down to its foundations. So it seemed she had fulfilled her mission. To lay low this last stronghold of their ancient enemy, to destroy the remnant of humanity which resisted the moon's grace. That young man, locked away from the process of time, had preserved the final humans. Now time had caught up with them all, and taken them all down. She shook her head slowly, checking and shutting off her grapple.

"So ends the age of humans. And our age is finally able to begin under the endless moon. And, young man, I'll at least remember you. You wanted to leave that tower, didn't you? You wanted this to end. Glad I could fulfil your wish." She sighed, shrugged her shoulders. "And now, home."

Sunday 3 March 2024

Introducing Author Talks: Season 2

Hi. Well, this is written in a bit of a rush, but it's an update for everyone. In my attempt to have something other than text to help show that I and my work exist, I've been creating a to-date solo podcast called 'Author Talks'. What became the first season happened over last year, and I've started the second this year. All it consists of so far is an introductory thing, and the first episode dedicated to a short story by H.G. Wells, 'In The Abyss'. I think this is a very good if rather wordy story with a fascinating twists. I'll include the YouTube link below. If you enjoy it, maybe check out the previous episodes, and the reading I did from my novel Starborn Vendetta, which is also available on my YouTube channel among other things. Enjoy!



Sunday 25 February 2024

Outside looking in - Reflection from the Cait Corraine scandal

This post is dedicated to the authors and books impacted by this scandal, listed here in no particular order.

*Voyage of the Damned -- Frances White

*So Let Them Burn -- Kamilah Cole

*The Poisons We Drink -- Bethany Baptise

*To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods -- Molly X Chang

*Mistress of Lies -- KM Enright

*The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon

*The Empire Wars -- Akana Phenix

*Knives, Seasoning, and a Dash of Love -- Katrina Kwan

*Iron Widow/Zachary Ying and the Dragon Emperor -- Xiran Jay Zhao

*Gods of Hunger series -- R. M. Virtues


This isn't my usual kind of post, but I feel moved to do it. For some little time, I've been half-following a recent scandal involving author Cait Corraine. Put briefly, Corriane created multiple fake Goodreads accounts, simultaneously posting positive reviews of their own work while review bombing the work of multiple BIPOC authors including Xiran Jay Zhao, Alana Phenix, Frances White, and many others. After attempts to resolve the matter privately failed, Zhao took the step of publicising the matter, which brought it wider attention and a groundswell against Corraine ultimately leading to them losing their book deal. A recent follow-up has seen Corraine blaming their behaviour on their medication, which is its own unpleasant can of worms and slap in the face of those who cop with mental illness, of which I'm one (that part made me feel almost personally insulted). Even this is a heavily simplified version of this fiasco.

On the one hand, I'm not in the best position to talk about this in a concrete way. I'm male and white, and while I'm neurodivergent and bisexual, I've likely had nowhere near the troubles these other authors had getting published. I likely had unconscious ethnic and biological biases working with me rather than against me (which shouldn't be the norm, but unfortunately still is), so my talking about this particular scandal can come off as the height of hypocrisy. But something about this struck me hard.

Looking at this play out and seeing recent developments, particularly hearing some further updates on the situation via this compilation video on Zhao's YouTube channel, it got me to thinking. Zhao makes valid points about racism not being just shouting slurs and showing outright hatred. It's the unconscious biases, the unthinking belittlement, the little things that are done through ignorance or rather than active malice. Ours is a world that for several hundred years saw a culture of colonisation and oppression, and while great strides have been made away from that, there is still that ingrained legacy.

And, perhaps the most difficult to admit, I had those feelings inside me. I'd had resentments and suspicions that were unpleasant to remember while I was trying to get myself a publisher. I'm hopefully beyond that now, but I have to remember them. And admit them to myself. They are part of the ugly side of me. The side that can be petty and spiteful, the side that contemplates hitting something so hard that it breaks, that might fly off the handle and become something horrific to myself. As stated above, racism isn't just overt actions. It's not realising that there is something like that in myself as well.

Of course, another recent scandal can't be completely ignored, that of the Hugo nomination snubs which appear to have been done purely to avoid political backlash from the host country. Done in such a clumsy and condescending way that it's a slap in the face of the world of fiction writing, where unfair situations in the real world should be challenged, and those challenges celebrated. It makes one depressed at the industry, especially as an author just starting out. But there is a silver lining to be taken from this. It was exposed, Cait Corraine lost their book deal, and while there has unfortunately been bile flung at those who decided to break this scandal when private resolution failed, there's also been support for those who were victimised by this. If you can, and I plan to when I'm financially able, please support the authors and their work.

Writers aren't a competition any more. We're a community. And people like Corraine undermine everything.

Sunday 18 February 2024

Updates, February 2024 edition


It appears to be the vogue at the moment to offer updates on work, life, the universe, and mostly everything else. I've been a little slow with the blog recently, due to factors that will be discussed below. But hopefully things will start to change around slowly.

First, personal stuff. I'm within a few weeks/months of moving into new accommodation, which will mean disruptions to my life and work patterns. I'll be mitigating as much as possible, but there'll still be an awkward phase of making do, which I've never been good at. The current accommodation has served me well, but it's really not holding up well. This new one will be newer, and more suited to my current needs and wants as a creator and human. Also, I've been beginning what is the first module of an Open University degree, which will help me in my future career both with my writing and with other jobs.

On a work front, things have been bouncing between being stuck in a rut, and going great guns. The damage to my external hard drive where my work was stored--after forgetting to do backups in six months--has resolved into a situation where I've got everything back, plus a new external hard drive thrown in. OnTrack managed to get that all sorted out for a reasonable price given that I sent them a small and delicate device. In better news, the first round of edits for the second part of my Cluster Cycle (sample of the first one out now right here) have come in, been seen to, and sent back to my publisher. And looking through that book again gave me an odd feeling of maturity. I was able to see where my plotting and explanation had faltered, where my grammar hadn't been up to snuff, and put those to rights where sensible and possible. One project that looked promising has sadly folded for the moment as it wasn't panning out, while another is looking more promising and more...me.

The most difficult thing has been trying to works and keep my self-balance during a period where the world is going through another phase of turbulence that isn't just a localized issue, but spreading into national and international environments. We are also entering a time of new technological advances which are bringing new challenges and threats which haven't been addressed legally as yet. The world is uncertain, more than occasionally shitty, worse than Heinlein or Kojima could have envisioned it in a way. But there are still reasons to say 'this won't turn grimdark'. I just need to remember them.

Here's to a new home, a new book, a new year, a new period of education, and hopefully peace somewhere in this crazy world so we can take a breath and reflect. Stay hopeful.

Friday 26 January 2024

Shada, or potentially SHady recycling of deAD And old projects

 What a contrived title. But hear me out.

Any fan of Doctor Who has at least heard of Douglas Adams's six-party Season 17 finale Shada. Due to industrial action at the BBC, the serial never finished production, and attempts have been made in the 1990s (narrated stringing together), 2003 (radio remake) and 2018 (part-animated remake) to bring the story back in non-text form. But Adams, who disliked the story anyway, found ways of recycling elements of his Doctor Who tenure in his own work. His original finale was reworked into Life, The Universe, and Everything, while a character from Shada was put into his first Dirk Gently novel with enough separation that he wasn't infringing copyright.

Hearing the saga of Shada, and how Adams recycled elements of his unrealized work in later projects, made me think about something of how I approach writing. While it's hard to 'take the L' as the phrase goes, sometimes you have to admit a project can't be realised. It won't work narratively, it's not what you want to do, you hit an insurmountable story issue that can't be fixed without breaking the in-game world beyond repair or rewriting from the top down. It may just be an idea that didn't get beyond the concept stage.

I realise that, in writing, some things inevitably get left at the wayside. It's just part of the process. Recycling other writing isn't just the domain of AI generation, but part of the creative process so long as you're recycling your own. There have been times when I've just had to drop an entire series because it wasn't working for whatever reason, however much that hurts the ego. If it's not working, or you no longer feel for it, why go on banging your head against a brick wall?

There are graduations of abandoned or not-working ideas. It can be something that only gets as far as jotting down a rough premise or a plan, which you leave aside and end up forgetting about. It can be the first paragraphs, or even the first chapters if it's long form, of a story that peters out for whatever reasons. In the worst case, it can be a series you wanted to carry through and complete, but it ended up just not going further than one and a little bit books. I'm not counting the author's death into this example, but a living author just not having the will to finish this work for whatever reason. Quality reasons, market trends, it just not sitting right, anything can trip up even what someone may think will be the defining magnum opus of their existence.

My Cluster Cycle series was, in part, a rapid scrabbling together of multiple abandoned story ideas with the overall concept of sci-fi tales based on old stories. How's that working? Don't know yet, the first one's only just released from a smallish American publisher. And it's early days. Another series I'm writing for them, an adventure series, had a big hiccup where I needed to just abandon a book completely as it was straying outside my own and my accessible knowledge base. I recycled some chapters of it in the penultimate book, so the research and some of the writing came in useful after all, but otherwise that story's lost to time. And I never really liked it anyway.

I'm sure there's plenty of other stories of authors who had to drop projects, or never really liked them and recycled any salvageable bits into their other projects. It's likely a more common story than many might want to admit. Authors, and I know this for a fact, have ten times more story ideas than they can normally put to electronic or physical paper in one lifetime. And sometimes they try putting those ideas to paper, and think 'This wouldn't work in a million years' and leave it in their notebooks to pick up later.

That's not a bad thing. Just because you can't realise one idea doesn't mean you can't realise them all. It just means that idea didn't gel. Sometimes, you need a few years, or a new premise, and something from that other project can be brought back into being.

Oh, and yes I've experienced Shada. I do like classic Doctor Who, and I was curious. Want my opinion? It's okay, I guess. I like the audio version best.

Sunday 21 January 2024

My favourite YouTube channels

This is an odd post, I suppose. Shouldn't I be promoting my new book left, right and centre? Well, yes technically, but I'm determined not to be that really pushy author. Plus I've been properly busy with other things. Instead, I've decided to give my readers a taste of the YouTube channels I've come to really enjoy. YouTube is both a source of entertainment, maybe something I'll use in the future, and a fascinating place to find new stuff. Here in begins a selected list of channels that I enjoy for one reason or another.

NOTE: For information videos, there is a strong temptation to take them with pinches of salt and cross-check. The channels I've mentioned below check out as very sound when I've done source cross-referencing. Also, I have stuff being uploaded on my own YouTube channel, so enjoy.

Proper Bird/Jinzee: A woman who got her start summarizing lore from The Witcher franchise, but has branched out into other areas. A channel with a criminally-low level of views and subscriptions, she's created really entertaining retrospective and analysis videos. Her side channel "Jinzee" covers her game twitch compilations, which are entertaining to say the least.

J Draper: A newer find, a London-based historian who covers...a lot of stuff. The two videos that caught my attention was her look at Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and how they influenced modern language through their preservation, and two videos on Shakespeare, one discussing his potential sexuality and one about how his plays were produced in their day. It is definitely something to enjoy.

Bernadette Banner: A dress historian who specialises in original practise reconstruction, Bernadette Banner has been going for some little time, and I found her in 2021 through her early analysis of costumes in period movies. Some of my favourites from her include her hair and beauty product experiments, her creation of a Worth-style 1890s gown, her illustrated corrections of terrible Halloween costumes and book covers, and some other random stuff.

Caitlin Doughty: Formerly known under the title "Ask a Mortician", Caitlin Doughty is a real-life mortician, green death advocate, and co-founder of the Order of the Good Death, and organization promoting green burial options and death awareness. Her video format has shifted over the years from answering direct death questions, to long-form videos on death-related subjects from disastrous events to personal stories. This isn't clickbait sensationalism, this is a real and personal look into death. Also has some truly incredible stories for authors such as myself to use with due care and respect for their origins. (Also fun fact, the WordPress encyclopedia doesn't have 'mortician' in its lexicon.)

Overly Sarcastic Productions: A find from 2018/2019, this channel is run by two friends, 'Red' and 'Blue', who respectively do mythology/folklore/story-based videos, and history videos. Their work is relatively sound, though sometimes they fall into common traps (JEEZ, WHY CAN'T ANYONE GET ANNE BOLEYN RIGHT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!!!!!! *deep breath*). Recommended if you want stuff like Norse sagas, common story tropes, history, influential figures, and some general shenanigans.

Lindsay Ellis: Someone I found by accident, who was sadly forced off YouTube by a despicable harassment campaign due to speaking her mind. She uploads her content primarily on Nebula, but her YouTube channel is still up and still has great stuff. From analysis videos of specific characters/films to general history, it's a great time. She's also now a published science fiction author.

There are other channels I might mention, but these are the biggies. These are the ones I really enjoy, and can imbue knowledge. Here's to the future, my own and everyone else pursuing creative and/or educational endeavours, and a year that is perhaps slightly...less...stressful.