Our Vast and Inevitable Death—S. Boyd Taylor

“Our Vast and Inevitable Death”, or OVID, as I like to call it, sprang from the collision of a variety of different ideas and memories. Tracking it’s genesis and evolution goes back not just years, but decades. You may find this surprising for a 750-word flash piece, but I do not. A lot of my writing is like this.

Let me start at the beginning: Somewhere around 1992, I read On the Beach, Nevil Shute's 1957 novel of what happens after a nuclear war. Basically, most of the world is dead, except for Australia -- no one had any reason to nuke them. So the last American submarines go to shore there, and everyone waits for the radiation that will eventually come in and kill them all. The book is about how different people react in the face of certain death, which is fascinating, and -- even though I was only 16 years old --  I swore I would one day write a Fantasy-genre paean to it.

The plan was to write a novel, of course -- specifically a huge, depressing, novel about villagers and soldiers and everyone else trapped inside a castle with the Boskee sitting outside, grinding away at the defenses with zero hope they could be stopped. Since I was 16, however, and as I had not ever written anything longer than 5,000 words, the novel soon fell to pieces and went off on tangents about completely unrelated things -- the moon crashing into the earth, the death of elves, blah blah blah.

But those damn Boskee would never leave me alone.

Fast forward about ten years, and I’m reading about Genghis Khan, and how he would slaughter every man in a city, if it resisted him (and sometimes even if it didn’t!). He was unstoppable, a force of nature. In the central square of Samarkand, the blood was waist-high from the beheadings. But for some reason, historians really seemed to like Genghis. One guy I read -- I cannot remember who -- kept going on and on about how he developed this huge communications network, and how quality of life improved for those under him, but I kept remembering all that blood in Samarkand. That stayed with me too.

And then one day not long ago, I’m trundling along, and I think -- I need a flash piece. I haven’t written anything close to standard Fantasy in years. Okay. So Fantasy.

How about I make it Epic Fantasy? Doing an epic in flash, that seems really tough. So I’ll need a huge war, people dying... Imagine here, if you will, the sound of gears clicking suddenly into place and the doors of an ancient tomb grinding open. And out comes Genghis Khan and the Boskee and On the Beach, and they all demand to be heard.

Suddenly there is Warlord Grig striding along the battlements ala the ghost at opening of Hamlet, and there is a conversation -- and then there are mountains with the name “Shan” after them (“mountain” in Chinese”) -- and then I am challenging myself to cram as much emotion as I can into this piece -- because emotion is the powerhouse of fiction -- and then, AHA, I know what I need, I know what will make this piece ring: I need a flash-forward!

Here’s my dirty little secret: I love flash-forwards. Too many people undervalue fiction in future tense. Heck, a lot of writing books skip it entirely, while they have an entire section on Second Person.

Cormac McCarthy does an excellent flash-forward in “Blood Meridian,” a really powerful scene where you find out that at three of the major characters will be dead inside a year. That’s where I really fell in lust with the technique and saw what it could do.

So I decide -- since it’s a powerful and rare technique, the flash-forward will be the emotional climax of the piece. The reader will see how everything plays out and how things progress, and then I will come back to the present for the denouement/falling action.

And then -- BOOM. It’s done. Standard editorial practices apply: a re-read later, then a first reader, and then submissions. And, wow, it turns out IGMS wants a story about the Boskee, Genghis Khan, and On the Beach. Who knew?

--S. Boyd Taylor

P.S. - The irony should not be lost on you that this blog post is almost as long as the story itself.

A Memory of Freedom—D.B. Jackson

Writing “A Memory of Freedom” was, in many ways, a journey of discovery for me. I have been writing about Ethan Kaille, the lead character in my Thieftaker Chronicles, for a couple of years now. The first book in the series, THIEFTAKER, was finished long ago, and will be released by Tor Books in July 2012. The second volume, THIEVES’ QUARRY is already in production. I have written several other short stories set in the alternate Colonial Boston I created for the Thieftaker series. But while I have known for some time the details of Ethan Kaille’s life, there have been certain elements of his history to which I hadn’t given much thought.

One of these was the simple question of how he first became a thieftaker. That was what I sought to figure out as I began writing this short story. I started off with a set of givens: Ethan has served nearly fourteen years at hard labor on a sugar plantation in Barbados for his involvement in a mutiny aboard a privateering ship; he is a conjurer, but he has eschewed spellmaking for years in part because he blames his conjuring talents for his involvement in the mutiny that ruined his life, and in part because he fears being hanged as a “witch,” a fate that befalls many conjurers in eighteenth century Massachusetts; he has returned to Boston broke, disgraced, alone and desperate to find some way to support himself; and while he is embittered by his past and all that he has lost, he has not yet given up his humanity. I also had some faint inkling of the small mystery that would present itself during the course of the story.

But as I started to write, I didn’t know how he would turn his current circumstances into a new life, nor was I certain how he would rediscover his aptitude for spellmaking.

Quite often, when working with characters who have become familiar to us, we writers give up planning and outlining, and simply trust that the characters themselves will tell us what we need to know in order to write their stories. That’s what I did with “A Memory of Freedom.” I don’t think I have ever known any character as well as I know Ethan, nor have I ever trusted a character so thoroughly. He didn’t disappoint me.

In the end, his embrace of a new trade and his return to conjuring allowed this tale to mark the transition from his old life to the new one about which I’ve written in other stories.

I should also take a moment to comment on the historical elements of this story and the Thieftaker books. I have a doctorate in U.S. history, and had long looked for a way to blend my fascination with history with my love of fantasy. In the Ethan Kaille stories, I finally have found the perfect vehicle for this combination. The Boston I have created for the stories and books is as true to actual history as I could make it, save for two rather significant historical conceits.

First, while there were thieftakers -- private citizens who recovered stolen items and, for a fee, returned them to their rightful owners -- in England throughout the eighteenth century, and while there were a few thieftakers in cities of the New World early in the nineteenth century, there is no evidence that anyone worked that trade in pre-Revolutionary America. There was no established police force in Boston at this time. The night watch was not an effective crime fighting force, and the Sheriff of Suffolk County had no officers working under his command. So it is quite easy to imagine that thieftakers could have worked the streets of the city. But as I say, there is no historical evidence suggesting that they actually did.

And second, as far as I know, there were no conjurers in the Boston of the 1760s. But I could be wrong about that.

-- D. B. Jackson

In the Fading Light of Sundown—Nancy Fulda

"In the Fading Light of Sundown" began as an entry in the yearly Codexian Idol story contest.  Codexian Idol is a beloved tradition in my online writers' group (which, if you haven't already guessed, is called Codex.)  Inspired by the popular tv show American Idol, the contest is run in three rounds.  In the first round, authors upload 500 words of a newly-written story.  The submissions that rank highest in the voting proceed to Round 2, in which the authors upload the next 1000 words, and the top-ranking stories proceed to the final round, in which the entire story is submitted.  Since the authors are writing the stories as the contest progresses, there's a sort of frantic scramble to keep up with your story as it proceeds from round to round.

Now, it so happens that my Nebula Nominated short story "Movement" began its existence as a Codexian Idol contest entry, exactly one year before I wrote "In the Fading Light of Sundown".  A lot of things went wrong for me in that contest.  I'd fumbled the opening of "Movement" a bit, and it got voted out in the first round.  This was good in many ways, because it helped me hone in on the critical conflict of "Movement" and put it right there in the opening scene; obviously a good decision given the way that particular story has taken off.

But... dang.  Getting booted out of the first round of Codexian Idol was a bit bruising to my esteem.

So when I wrote "In the Fading Light of Sundown", I took great care to introduce a vivid world, a character with heart, and a central conflict early on.  I also wrote the entire story during Round 1.  (This is legal.  It even says so in the contest rules.)  I'm often an organic writer, and I frequently go back and tweak a story's opening once I've finished the first draft and actually know where the plot is going.  Since Codexian Idol forbids you to change your first 500 words once they're submitted, the only way to be certain I'd gotten the opening right was to write the whole dang story at the outset.

The story seed for "In the Fading Light of Sundown" was a fabulous picture located by our contest coordinator.  The picture showed a boat, pulled up on a sandy shore, with roots sprouting from the planks and gnarling their way to the ground.  That picture became the basis for the Livewood and the central speculative premise of the story.  In choosing a character to sail my boat, I consciously chose to use an old man.  Why?  Because I was in the middle of writing several stories with young, spunky female protagonists, and I wanted to stretch myself.  With Tobis I was forced to tread new ground, look at life from a new angle and discover a kind of story I wouldn't otherwise have written.

I am very, very pleased with the way it all turned out.

--Nancy Fulda

Asst. Editor’s note: Ms. Fulda mentioned it above, but I thought I’d re-mention it for those that read quickly: her amazing short story, MOVEMENT has been nominated for a Nebula award.  The ending alone is strong enough to recommend it for a win, and that’s without considering the extremely well-composed beginning and middle. 

Here’s a link (in case you missed the one provided by Ms. Fulda in her write-up.

LINK

-- Scott M. Roberts

Free IGMS ebook - This weekend

The ebook version of the IGMS Awards anthology is going to be free on Amazon this weekend, from Saturday, March 24 through and including Monday, March 26th.

InterGalactic Awards Anthology Vol. I is a collection of stories from Orson Scott Card's award-winning magazine InterGalactic Medicine Show, spotlighting the winners of the magazine's readers' poll for best artwork and best short fiction.

Edited by Orson Scott Card and Edmund R. Schubert, this anthology also includes other popular stories from the magazine's six year run, as well as a new introduction by Peter S. Beagle.

Includes stories by such award-winning authors as Peter S. Beagle, Eugie Foster, Aliette deBodard, Marie Brennan, Alethea Kontis, recent Nebula-winner Eric James Stone, and many more.

IGMS Awards Anthology Book Signing

Orson Scott Card, Edmund Schubert, Dena Harris, and Scott M. Roberts were on hand at the Friendly Center Barnes and Noble in Greensboro, NC for a book signing on February 10.
The signing commemorated the release of the IGMS Awards Anthology and Orson Scott Card’s novel, Shadows In Flight.  It kicked off at 7pm.  Edmund and Dena talked about getting the anthology together for publishing, and about the search for good short stories.  Scott read a selection from his story ‘The End of the World Pool’ which appears in the anthology; then Orson Scott Card talked about Ender’s Game, writing, education, history…pretty much everything.
You can purchase the IGMS Awards Anthology from Spotlight Publishing, from Amazon (paperback | Kindle), or Barnes and Noble.










Orson Scott Card preparing to speak

Left to right: Orson Scott Card, Edmund Schubert,  Scott M. Roberts, Dena Harris

Edmund Schubert shows off the anthology

Dena Harris talking publishing.

Scott M. Roberts in standard, government approved,  authorial pose.

Contaminant Source Removed—K.G. Jewell

“Contaminant Source Removed” embraces the writer's aphorism "get your character in trouble quickly." The first draft of “Contaminant Source Removed” started when I wrote the first line that remains in the text: “It was the third spell that got Marco into trouble.”

With that promise of pending conflict, I bought myself a little breathing room to meet Marco and his world. As I got to know Marco, who I must admit, (unlike many of my characters,) reminds me a little bit of myself, it became clear to me his initial challenge was a going to be relatively mundane, personal one.

I have a mundane, personal challenge in my life: Keeping my space clean. Who likes to clean? Ok, bad rhetorical question, because there are folks out there who enjoy such activities. I am not one of them, and I'm pretty sure Marco isn't either. Given that, a magic spell that kept my space clean so I didn’t have to would be great. What could go wrong with that?

"What could go wrong with that magic" is an ingredient, aka trope, in many classic tales. (see, for example W.W. Jacob's "The Monkey's Paw".) “Contaminant Source Removed” is built around that ingredient: Marco casts a spell to clean his room, and finds out he’s what’s making it dirty. Wackiness ensues.

Some authors reject recycling classic ingredients, feeling they are tired clichés. I’m not one of those authors. I generally write fiction to be enjoyed, not pondered, and clichés, i.e. field-tested narrative devices, are useful structures around which to build new, hopefully humorous, quirks and insights with which to entertain the reader. In the type of fiction I'm trying to write, what matters is not where you are going, but how you get there.

Hopefully you agree.

DVD Bonus Tracks: Although the opening line remained through the (many) drafts of this story, many other were cut. Here’s a couple of my favorite bits that were cut during the critique and editing process for this tale:

· An early working title: Squeaky Clean. (Who doesn’t like a pun involving a hamster?)

· When Tommy and Marco are hanging out at the sleepover: Marco flicked the light on and off. Maybe he could send an SOS with the flashlight and get rescued by the coast guard. That had worked for Scooby-Doo once. (Who doesn’t like Scooby Doo references?)

· There was also an early-draft scene where Marco is at dinner with his folks, trying to cover up the fact he can’t go into his room. (This scene fully deserved to be cut, as it added nothing to the plot and wasn’t funny.)

By the way, I notice Edmund introduced this tale as “a fun YA fantasy.” While I don’t disagree with that characterization, I didn’t set out to write a YA tale when I sat down to write this one. As I see it, cleaning your room is a challenge for all ages.

-K.G. Jewell

lit.kgjewell.com

InterGalactic Awards Anthology - signing event

If you're in (or near) the Greensboro, NC area on the evening of Friday, Feb. 10, please drop by the Barnes & Noble at the Friendly Shopping Center. Orson Scott Card, Edmund Schubert, and Scott Roberts will be doing a signing, featuring Card's latest saga in the Ender universe, Shadows in Flight, and the new IGMS anthology, the InterGalactic Awards Anthology, Vol. 1. The signing starts at 7pm and ends when we run out of books. Hope to see you there.

The Lair of the Twelve Princesses—Amanda C. Davis

I tried to write this story three times, and like a typical fairy-tale idiot with the usual amount of wishes, I borked it up twice and had to fix everything in round three.

Summer, 2004. Take one. Two friends and I were excited about our new LiveJournals (those were crazy times! A digital Wild West!) and had epic fantasy on the brain following the release of the LotR movies. Solution: start a role-playing game, obviously. We wrote out character profiles and emailed them to each other.

Turns out we were all getting excited about completely different games.

I was a traumatized lady soldier. Brad was a knight of a holy order. Linda was a six foot tall blue elf.

Negotiations fizzled, and the RP never came together. I scratched out one page of mostly exploratory dialogue for Bay and her genie, then called Cali, and abandoned them in a folder for five years.

Winter, 2009. Take two. I'd been submitting stories for publication and in the process learned to love anthologies. Contributors' copies were the bomb. Send in a story, get a whole book? What a return on investment! I kept elaborate lists of anthology deadlines. Eventually I came across one that was looking for fairy-tale retellings.

I like twisting fairy tales. I like ascribing full motivations to the often-inscrutable, intentionally-cardboard characters that the Grimms delivered unto us, and I like shuffling genders, roles, and protagonist/antagonist status. For this story, I lit upon The Twelve Dancing Princesses. I thought it was interesting that the princesses were in charge of their own curse--not the damsels in distress, as they seemed, but the obstacles, the villains. (I'd written a flash piece along those lines recently, but didn't feel like I'd finished the job in 500 words.) It occurred to me that a female soldier might have certain advantages in the investigation over the traditional male one.

"Hey," said the lazy part of my brain (or, more simply, "my brain"), "you've already got a lady soldier. Just use her."

So Bay got a story, and the genie came along. I changed his name to Kalomel.

I got to six thousand words before I realized a) the story was about three times as long as I thought it would be and b) something wasn't working. Pieces of the plot weren't leading naturally to one another. I was procrastinating important scenes because they bored me. It didn't mesh, and I hated it.

The anthology closed. I loved Bay and whatever-his-name-was, I liked the core idea, but I was doing something wrong. I threw my half-done (yet somehow unconscionably long!) story into the False Starts folder and put it on my list of things to get around to when I had a chance.

I didn't quite stop thinking about it.

Spring, 2011. I noticed the excellent Sword and Sorceress anthology series was taking submissions.

"Hey," said my lazy brain, "you've got a swordswoman-and-sorcery story practically done! Just finish it!"

I spent two weeks in coffee shops rebuilding the story from the ground up. I actually did that thing where you cut the scenes apart with scissors and tape them back together. The genie became Khloromain. The plot fell into place. The length exploded to nine thousand words. Exactly two lines of dialogue remained from the 2004 material. (I feel like I ought to send a No-Prize to the first person who guesses them.) Sword and Sorceress responded with a kind, encouraging rejection, so I kept sending it out. Luckily it found a great place to land.

I don't regret spending all that time working on one story. In retrospect, that probably means it would have been a pretty fun RP.

--Amanda C. Davis

New IGMS Anthology Available

The new InterGalactic Medicine Show Awards Anthology, Vol.I is now available, directly from Spotlight Publishing (who has a limited number of copies signed by both editors, Card and Schubert (and only charges .99 cents for shipping)), and also from Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

InterGalactic Awards Anthology Vol. I is a collection of stories from Orson Scott Card's award-winning magazine InterGalactic Medicine Show, spotlighting the winners of the magazine's readers' poll for best artwork and best short fiction. Edited by Orson Scott Card and Edmund R. Schubert, this anthology also includes other popular stories from the magazine's six year run, as well as a new introduction by Peter S. Beagle. Includes stories by such award-winning authors as Peter S. Beagle, Eugie Foster, Aliette deBodard, Marie Brennan, Alethea Kontis, recent Nebula-winner Eric James Stone, Scott Roberts, James Maxey, Jason Sanford, and more.

Second Annual InterGalactic Readers’ Choice Awards

We are pleased to announce the Second Annual InterGalactic Awards. These awards are voted on by the readers in the following categories:

• Stories
• B&W Illustrations
• Cover Illustrations

In the first two categories, you may vote up to five times, ranking the stories and illustrations first through fifth place. For the cover illustration, you may vote only once.

Each subscriber can submit one nominating ballot.

The voting window will be open until February 27 and winners will be announced in the March 2012 issue.

Arkmind—Niall Francis McMahon

This was a cathartic process, as I will explain.

Frequently, my stories spring into my mind largely complete (from some darn place) but Arkmind was an exception. I wrote it the hard way – lots of thought, graft and even a little research, which is very unusual for me (correlative map of consciousness, anyone?)

I wanted to paint on a large canvas and create a tale detailing major events over vast distances and great expanses of time, whilst asking some fundamental questions along the way. I have always admired such stories and the scope they provide for reader and writer alike. Moreover, I had recently lost my father (three days before my 40^th birthday) and had been thinking a lot about life, time and bereavement. I had also been thinking about memories – specifically their subjective nature and the way in which they define and preserve us. I guess Arkmind is a synthesis of all those considerations and emotions.

The result, I believe, is a love story.

The concept of a sentient machine falling in love with a human being is nothing new. That the machine should subsequently sacrifice its immortality to live a human life is not new either. The originality (I like to think some exists!) lies in the manner in which Arkmind comes to appreciate life and its own place within the cosmos, something with which we all grapple. The character ‘Constance’ facilitates this process and acts as a metaphor for the human condition: in the end, with limbs or no limbs, sight or no sight, to what extent do any of us control our lives or perceive the reality of the world about us?

Finally, it is a story about death; confronting it, accepting it, overcoming fear of it – something each character achieves in his/her/its own fashion. My personal motivation here is obvious.

I wanted (needed) to write a positive tale which might leave the reader smiling, so I make no apologies for the sentimental finale. I believe a good story, even the most intellectual or esoteric, should contain an emotional payoff. Besides, you can’t beat a good, old-fashioned, happy ending…

--Niall Francis McMahon

Remains of the Witch—Tony Pi

For the 2011 Codex Writers Halloween Contest, I had received a story seed from another member: “reflection in a pool or other liquid”.  Aside from bobbing for apples, which didn’t inspire me, I was stuck on how water might be involved with the holiday. It seemed the wrong season for swimming.

Luckily, the phrase “other liquid” was an interesting ‘out’, and seemed like a good starting point for a brainstorm. Quicksilver. Tea. Ink. Poison. Milk. Honey. Oil spill. I had all the makings for a Mad  Hatter’s tea party, but no plot.

So I returned to the Halloween theme and found myself drawn to two of its icons: the witch, and the scarecrow.

That’s when the ideas collided, and I knew I would write about the melted remains of the Wicked Witch of the West, and a reflection therein. But whose reflection? The story would hinge on that.

From my brainstorming, ‘ink’ had suggested a letter, and I always wanted to write a tale told through epistolary. For me, the draw of the epistolary form is that the letter is an intimate glimpse into the relationship between two people. There are things the letter-writer must have courage to say, or else omit to save face. It can be a plea, a lie, the truth, flirtation, or trifles. I was more intrigued by the dark side of Halloween, so decided on a confession.

A winged monkey seemed fitting, but why would it resort to a letter to tell its tale? I had an answer that only raised more intriguing questions. I also really wanted to write about afternoon tea, after having my first two experiences just months before I began writing this story. Also fortunate was finding a copy of Michael Smith’s Afternoon Tea at home, a recipe book with the history of tea and proper etiquette.

The sum of those inspirations is Remue’s letter.

--Tony Pi

Letter From The Editor - Issue 26 - January 2012

Here comes issue 26 of IGMS. A lot of news items have surfaced since our last issue came out, the biggest of which was the signing of Harrison Ford to play Battle School commander Hyrum Graff in the upcoming Ender movie. Indiana Graff meets Hyrum Solo—exciting news, indeed. But outside of the three-ring circus known as Hollywood, we’ve got a few exciting news items happening right here at the InterGalactic Medicine Show.

First of all, the long-awaited InterGalactic Awards Anthology - Vol. 1 has just been released by Spotlight Publishing. It's a collection of the winners of the 2010 IGMS InterGalactic Awards Reader's Poll (both the stories and the artwork), plus popular stories from the years before the award was launched. Edited by Orson Scott Card and yours truly (Ed Schubert), it also features an all new introduction by Peter S. Beagle.

And speaking of the InterGalactic Awards Reader's Poll, voting for the 2011awards will begin next week. Look for the announcement when the polls open—and remember, you’re not just voting for the best stories and artwork published in IGMS in 2011; in all likelihood you’re selecting the featured stories for the next anthology.

While we’re on the subject of awards, this would be a great time to mention that the current issue of IGMS proudly presents the Grand Prize winner of the 2011 Hydra Contest for the best Brazilian speculative fiction. “Story with Pictures and Conversation” was written by Brontops Baruq (the author’s pseudonym) and originally published in the limited edition magazine Portal Fundação. It is an unusual science fiction story presenting the report of an unnamed official describing a child’s words and hand-drawn pictures created during an interspecies war—as well as a subtler one between her mother and father.

Our cover story, "Remains of the Witch," by Tony Pi, tells the tale of a flying monkey, Remue, who was taken under the tutelage of the Wicked Witch, only to find that role short-lived when the witch is killed by a bucket of water. But when Remue gathers up the puddle that was once her wicked teacher, she finds the witch’s power is not nearly at its end.

"Arkmind," by Niall Francis McMahon is a powerful science fiction story set in a world where a super nova has forced mankind to fling its seeds away from earth to seek new homes. En route one of the ship’s artificial intelligence achieves consciousness, but with all of the humans either dead or in very raw genetic form and still waiting to be incubated, the AI must follow its own bumpy path to understanding what consciousness actually means.

"Contaminant Source Removed" is a fun YA fantasy about a 12-year old boy named Marco who discovers the hard way that improvising with magic spells can lead to all sorts of unexpected challenges, while "Lair of the Twelve Princesses" by Amanda Davis is a smart retelling of the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairy tale as seen from the perspective of a the female warrior and her wish-granting imp, whom she continually vexes by refusing to ask for wishes that he grant.

Darrell Schweitzer interviews Carrie Vaughn, whose popular Kitty Norville novels have been an urban fantasy hit since their first publication in 2005. But did you know that she’s written four other novels, as well as some 50 short stories? See what else you’re missing in Darrell’s interview.

Last, but by no means least, we bring you a sneak-peek at Orson Scott Card's forthcoming novel, Ruins, the second book in his popular Pathfinder series, due out later this year.

Off with you, then. It’s time to start reading the stories…

Edmund R. Schubert
Editor, Orson Scott Card's InterGalactic Medicine Show

P.S. As usual, we'll be collecting essays from the authors in this issue and will post them here. Feel free to drop by and catch The Story Behind The Stories, where the authors talk about the creation of their tales.

Jared Oliver Adams Weighs In

…on the genre conversation regarding his story, Whiteface.

I asked Mr. Adams what genre he considered Whiteface to be.  His answer is below:

I'm intrigued by this question. I've actually spent some time thinking about it myself, because I submitted it to Writers of the Future and wondered if they perceived it as "not-fantasy-enough."

But, I'm a teacher, so I'll answer your question with another question. If you stripped George R R Martin's Westeros of its magic, would "Song of Ice and Fire" still be fantasy?

To me, the magic element in SoIaF is the least compelling part of his work (well, besides the explicit sex scenes), so I'm perhaps biased in this particular case. But, I think the fantasy element comes primarily in the world he built, the history and cultures. Because that's essentially a speculative, fantastical thing, building a world.

So, in that sense, I would call "Whiteface" fantasy, because the cultures never existed in reality. But then, maybe we need some more distinctive labels, because it's not fantasy in the same way "Way of Kings" is fantasy. I didn't recreate the physical laws that govern the world like Sanderson did. I aimed for a particular historical period, and set it in this world, then built my society.

I’ll just point out (to Mr. Eric Jerkface Stone) that the…authoritative answer is “fantasy.” 

--Scott M. Roberts

Asst. Editor, IGMS

Genre Musings and Whiteface

One afternoon, ensconced in the posh InterGalactic Medicine Show offices, fellow Assistant Editor Eric James Stone and I fell into a disagreement.

“What genre is Jared Oliver Adams’s Whiteface?” he asked.

I put a dollop of caviar on a slice of baguette while I considered his question.  “Historical fantasy.  Historical because it presents a culture similar to a primitive culture that might be found on Earth.  Fantasy, because even though they are humans, and their culture is analogous of a number of pre-historical societies, they are not factual.”

He mumbled something and fetched some crab dip.  He spread it on a Ritz cracker.  Plebian, I thought.  There are slices of crusty ciabatta right next to the dip.  Might as well put it on Goldfish as put it on an abomination like a Ritz cracker.

“It’s sociological science fiction,” he declared at last, crumbs tumbling from his lips, sprinkling his goatee.  And the divan I was stretched out upon.

I looked at him.  He blinked at me.  He did not offer to pick up the crumbs.

I signaled the maid.  While she swept up his mess, I asked, “How do you figure it’s science fiction?  There’s no science in it.”

“Anthropology is a science.  Certainly knowledge of previous cultures plays a part in Whiteface.”

“Anthropology isn’t at the center of the story.  Anyway, science fiction has rivets; fantasy has trees.  There are trees in Whiteface; there are no rivets.  Ergo…”

“That’s simplistic,” Eric James Stone said.  With his mouth full of crab dip and crackers.  “It’s a what-if story about human culture, and the culture does play a central part of the story.”

“All fiction is a what-if story about human culture,” the maid said.

We stared at her silently until she left.

“All fiction is a what-if story,” I said, resuming the conversation.  “It being a what-if story doesn’t make it science fiction.  If the beings depicted in Whiteface were described as aliens, then it would be science fiction.”

“The culture is alien.”

"The culture isn’t science.” I took a sip of aqua gassata.  “If Otter had made a point of studying other cultures in a kind of…nascent anthropology then maybe you could call Whiteface science fiction because science would be at the heart of the story.  But no—instead, the story focuses on the human connections between Otter, his wife, his son, their tribe, and the enemies of the tribe.”

“By that definition, the only science fiction is hard science fiction.”

“By your definition, some Westerns are science fiction.  For Pete’s sake, Auel’s Clan of the Cave Bear is science fiction!”

From there, the conversation devolved into fisticuffs.  An hour later as I held a nicely aged, perfectly marbled New York strip to my eye, and Eric swallowed mouthfuls of crème brulee to get his adam’s apple back in place, he said slowly,

“I seem to recall you once said that Monster Hunters International is science fiction.”

At least his mouth wasn’t full this time.  “Yes,” I said.  “Because of the focus on weapons  technology and the pseudo-scientific nature of the way Correia’s protagonists approach hunting them.”  I neglected to mention that I never actually finished MHI…

“And you think Peter Beagle’s Trinity County, CA is also science fiction.”

“Yes, and for the same reason.”

He shook his head.  “You are a moron.”

I threw my New York strip at him.

Nanoparticle Jive—Tomas Martin

I started writing the story that would later become 'Nanoparticle Jive' when I was halfway through my PhD in nanophysics at the University of Bristol. I don't know how many of you are familiar with the work that goes into a doctorate, but over the course of three hard years I gradually came to refine my definition of a PhD as a 'voluntary nervous breakdown with graphs'.

Research is a gruelling process that often requires long hours trying to make your experiment work, but it is the existential angst of not knowing  the right answer  that really got to me. When you start a science PhD, you are given a task - some small aspect of science that is unknown, no one knows how to solve it and it's your job to go away for 3 or 4 years and work it out. I was lucky enough to finish in just over three years, but I know people whose doctorate took far longer.

I studied physics at the university of Bristol, England, and started a PhD because it was related to a field I was extremely passionate about - solar power. My task was to research the modification of artificial diamond crystals with lithium, in order to make a semiconductor that could potentially generate electricity from heat. The eventual plan was to concentrate sunlight onto these crystals using large mirrors, giving a more scalable solution to concentrated solar power than the existing water-based turbine systems being built in deserts around the world.

Although using diamond sounds like it should be some expensive boondoggle, it is only natural, dug-up diamond that is expensive. In labs such as the one I worked in, it is possible to grow artificial diamond on a fairly cost-effective basis, using high pressures and temperatures to compress graphite, or growing diamond films using gas phase chemistry. For the first few years, the problem seemed impossible. I had many experiments that did nothing, and many days where I'd be in the lab for 10 or 12 hours without achieving anything.

I've always been a writer alongside being a scientist, and began to make my first few breakthroughs into the professional SF short fiction market as I began my PhD. The challenges of balancing slaving away in the lab on tiny slices of diamond in vacuum chambers with coming home and being creative was an interesting one. On the one hand, writing science fiction was a great outlet for my frustrations at the end of the day, but on the other hand the creative demands of trying to solve what seemed an insurmountable challenge at times left me drained of any desire to write. I was caught between two masters - science and art.

'Nanoparticle Jive' was a story that evolved out of that conflict. I'd already jotted down a few notes about the other part of the story - the reputation based economy, based on a short little story about the future of social networks. It also linked back into ideas I'd been reading about sustainability, the environment, and the economy, such as efforts by Nobel prize-winner Joseph Stiglitz and others to use something other than GDP to measure progress in a way that better reflected the world's needs. It seemed to me that social networks and the way the popularity of people on places like twitter and the blogosphere could easily work as a social currency, especially in a world where global warming and peak resources restrict the amount the economy can grow. People require such things as a sign of their status in the world, and even if the money dried up and capitalism struggled to a halt, I thought that those people who find their way into careers like investment banking would find other ways to get to the top of the status pile - which is where the idea of a reputation based economy emerged.

I began a story along similar lines, about a kid who is desperately trying to escape the poverty of his family upbringing by gaining reputation and becoming a famous DJ. The story had some game, it flowed nicely, but when I got about a third in, I ran out of steam. I needed more conflict to drive the story, something to give the main character Brendan a real choice. My fellow writers on the writers' forum Codex helped a lot to point this out when I had the story out for critique.

The struggles I was experiencing in my PhD naturally presented themselves as a solution. I began to craft that conflict between art and science into the main story, detailing Brendan's struggle to choose between selling himself out to gain the reputation he craves or pursuing an exciting scientific project. Once I had that conflict in place, the story fell into place, and I'm very happy with the result. I think it's one of my best works, and I hope you'll agree.

I received my doctorate in early October 2011, and left academia for a career in the renewable industry, where I can work hard in the day towards an achievable goal and still come home with enough brain space to write. A month later, this story was published in IGMS. That seems strangely fitting to the themes presented in 'Nanoparticle Jive.' In a way, I've made the opposite choice to Brendan about what I want from my life, choosing my art over science. In my case, I don't feel like I'm selling myself out. It's more like coming home.

--Tomas Martin

Under the Surface—Nina Kiriki Hoffman

I was taking a master writing class from Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch over on the Oregon coast, and one of our assignments was to write a story about a tsunami.  In Lincoln City, there are a number of blue Tsunami warning signs along the highway and the beach.  I did library research on tsunamis, and I also wandered the town, wondering what it would be like if a big wave rolled partway through it.

I had also been thinking about an offshoot branch of the magical family from my Chapel Hollow series.  Many members of this family have elemental powers.

I put the two together.  Unfortunately, I didn't get the assignment finished by the class deadline (I think we had two days to write it), but I did finish it.  "Under the Surface" is the result.

--Nina Kiriki Hoffman

Counterclockwise—Alethea Kontis

I had a dream last night that I attended NY Comic Con. It was a very nice dream. I lay in bed for a while after that dream, smiling. Eventually, I started thinking about all the work I had to do today: like writing the genesis essay for "Counterclockwise." I've been looking forward to this, because I had some great seeds for this one. You know, it's funny that we call them "seeds." One seed grows a plant. But a story is not just a plant. It usually takes many seeds that grow a story. The better analogy would be to liken a short story to a container garden...and something like the Ender series would be the pre-revolutionary grounds at Versailles.

So here are the fun little seeds that grew my pretty little container garden labeled "Counterclockwise":

SEED 1: A PENGUIN

"Counterclockwise" was originally written for the Codex Writers 2009 Halloween contest. (I tied for 3^rd place with Cat Rambo, losing to James Maxey. Again.) As you may or may not know, this particular contest is one that starts with one member giving another member a "seed" that he or she must incorporate into the story. Coming up with the seed is one of the best parts of this challenge. Receiving your challenge is the next best. Sometimes, the more complicated the seed, the easier the story is to write. My seed for this story was: In some way, shape or form, your story must involve a penguin. This didn't give me much to go on, but in many ways left me free to write a story I'd been dying to get on paper. That particular story was:

SEED 2: THE DREAM

As mentioned previously, I do have some pretty spectacular dreams. I wish I could record them and share them with you, because writing never does them justice. I've fought scorpion monsters and serial killers (and invisible Aliens alongside Luke Skywalker!), I've woken from a dream within a dream within a dream (worried that one would be reality and I'd wake up from that too), I've died several times (by fire, firearms, and an atomic bomb), and I've met some of the most amazing people (like an artist and his wife from Italy, and a monk whose gorgeous poem I totally plagiarized). I have the best Premium Channel in the world, and it's all in my head.

Prior to the Halloween contest I'd had this dream, of which I only vividly remember the very end. It was a well-dressed man in a pub of some sort, holding a white glove. He was meeting a beautiful young woman who sat at a table there. She did not recognize this man, even though he held her glove in his hand as proof that they'd known each other. I was hit with an incredible sadness as I realized: they live in opposing timelines, and this is the last time he will see her.

Yes, before you ask, this was long before the most recent season of Doctor Who. And no, I have never read The Time Traveler's Wife. Sometimes ideas--even the really cool ones--are just ideas. But I knew I had to write about these people, their incredible love, and that incredible sadness. Somehow. In some setting. That setting was:

SEED 3: DIANA WYNNE JONES

Ever since I read Witch Week as a kid (which I enjoyed far more than the first Harry Potter novel, btw), I have been obsessed with Guy Fawkes Day. I have always wanted to be in England on Bonfire Night--someday I still mean to go. Witch Week, if you haven't read it (and you really should) is based on an alternate present where Guy Fawkes successfully blew up Parliament in 1605, and in doing so split reality into a World That Could Do Magic and a World That Could Not.

I did some extensive Googling of the subject (as we authors tend to do nowadays) and discovered Change and Continuity in Early Cosmology by Patrick J. Boner. In it, Boner discusses at length the birth of a new star in 1604, the celestial "Fiery Trigon" that resulted, and Johannes Kepler's thoughts and debates about how this unique alignment of stars affected the social consciousness of the time. (It is speculated that a Fiery Trigon also occurred during the rise of Charlemagne, and appeared at the birth of Christ as the Star of Bethlehem.) I was fascinated by the whole thing. I lost hours upon hours on the internet. And yes, I do still have a sick desire to get my nerdy hands on a translated copy of Kepler's Mysterium Cosmographicum.

So: IF the Gunpowder Plot had been successful, in the presence of this Fiery Trigon, it stands to reason that something celestially and psychologically cataclysmic could have happened, like the world splitting into two. Perhaps it DID, and we found a way to fix it. Perhaps, instead of a World With Magic and a World Without, it split a pocket of London off into two worlds: one that lived forwards, and one that lived backwards in time.

What would these Secondary and Tertiary Universes look like? Would they have the same technological development as British Prime? No way, my worlds would definitely be a little more Steampunk. But my story would not be a story about the worlds. This was a love story. And thusly, "Counterclockwise" was born.

If "Counterclockwise" is like anything, I'd say that it feels most like Somewhere in Time. That soft-focus feeling is the feeling I had while having the dream. I remember loving that film, but I haven't seen it in years. I know, I should really read Bid Time Return one of these days.

Coincidentally, Matheson's Bid Time Return won the World Fantasy Award for Best Novel right around Halloween-time back in 1976...the year I was born. I wonder what exactly the stars were doing back then.

Happy Bonfire Night, everyone!

[PS - If you liked "Counterclockwise" and want to read more, there is a deleted scene which I will post in a password-protected blog on my website on Guy Fawkes Day. The password is what the denizens of Nodnol (Tertiary Universe) are called.]

--Alethea Kontis