Category: science fiction

Is it Still Monday in California?

personby Gillian Polack
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I’m so late today that I’m (almost) posting on your tomorrow… which was my tomorrow over 15 hours ago. It’s been a busy day and was a busy yesterday and I’m so tired that I want to use colloquialisms. I shall refrain, because Australian colloquialisms can read as rather rude to North Americans.

Yesterday afternoon I finished with my end of the proofs of the forthcoming novel, then I went to a book launch. Then I had an online meeting and we updated each other on antisemitism. There were other things, too, but I forget. I did all this with the eye problems and every minute the world felt funky.

This morning was a grocery delivery and an emergency printout of stuff for a friend (at which point my printer failed) and we have a weather shift (it being spring here) and so my joints reminded me they hate weather. All my joints. Why the little toe aching is more annoying than the back aching is something I cannot work out.

I ought to be celebrating receiving copies of the German translation of one of my favourite short stories. There is an academic comment on my sense if humour, so my sense of humour is officially an academic thing now. In German academia. This is important, because a French translation of another story, a while back, turned all the subtlety into sarcasm and the story was not funny at all.
I’m also giving a workshop for ConSYDeration in two weeks. ConSYDeration is part of the Sydney Fringe Festival and this is my first time even getting to the Fringe. Which means, of course, my next thing is to update my handout for the workshop because I forgot to add my list of publications. It’s not gratuitous advertising this time round – my non-fiction is directly relevant to the workshop.

And all this is why, in a few minutes, I’m going to make a cuppa and watch some William Hartnell Doctor Who for a bit. I have so much to do but my body tells me to be gentle. I might put a bit of cinnamon in my tea. Later I’ll do more of the things.

I have been considering my New year, which is way soon. If anyone wants either or both of my grandmothers’ honey cake recipes here, next week, just say and I will oblige.

Under “Corporate’s” Thumb

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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So last weekend I was trying to get a Covid vaccine and came up against a frightening development in our society. And no, it wasn’t the fact that after six years and change we are still dealing with this damn virus.

I have major travel plans in September, so I wanted to get the vaccine a couple of weeks before my trip so I’ll be at peak protection when I get on a plane. Travel plans have generally dictated how I schedule my shots, which I get every six months.

I checked the CVS website, but couldn’t find any appointments at the one nearest me. Then I checked Walgreens, and they had appointments through August 23, but not afterwards. The new vaccine drops in mid-September – while I’m traveling – so I assumed they weren’t going to order any more vaccines if they ran out.

So I made an appointment for August 22 at the closest Walgreens. Walgreens sent me 9 messages via text and email confirming my appointment and reminding me of it.

I showed up right on time, only to be informed that they didn’t have it. “But I have an appointment,” I said. The pharmacist looked at me like I was crazy for assuming I could get a vaccine when I had an appointment. He didn’t apologize, but told me I could complain to “corporate.”

I got a cancellation text 10 minutes after I left the drugstore.

I was furious, of course. Fortunately, a friend mentioned that a major grocery chain in her area still had vaccines, so I decided to check with Safeway.

Their website said they did and that they took walk-ins, so I walked over on Sunday afternoon to get one, only to discover that they don’t do vaccines in the last hour the pharmacy is open (no, the website doesn’t mention that).

But the clerk confirmed they still had the vaccine in stock. I asked if they would still have it Tuesday – I had plans on Monday – and she said maybe, but “corporate” might decide to have all the vaccines shipped back at any moment.

And that’s when it hit me, with that second reference to “corporate,” that big companies control a large part of our lives these days without us having any right to push back at how they do it.

I took the Safeway clerk at her word, changed my Monday plans, showed up when they started doing vaccines at 10 am, and got my shot from a very nice pharmacist. But “corporate” was still pinging in my head. Continue reading “Under “Corporate’s” Thumb”…

The Broligarch Misreading of Science Fiction

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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I did a podcast last weekend that focused on how the broligarchs miss the point when it comes to most science fiction, including the stuff they cite as influencing them. This was BCube Press podcast hosted by Cliff Winnig with myself and Wendy Shaffer as guests. You can watch it here on YouTube.

We had a great discussion, but there’s so much to be said on this topic, plus right now I’m reading Gil Duran’s new book The Nerd Reich, so I’m thinking a lot about what these technofeudalists are doing to undermine democracy based on their half-baked philosophy and complete misunderstanding of both science and science fiction.

(I’ll write about The Nerd Reich when I finish the book, but I can already tell you it’s worth your time even if you, like me, are obsessed with the subject and already know a lot of this. Duran is a journalist by training, so he marshals his facts and writes with clarity.)

Back when I was in college – an absurdly long time ago – there were four SF/F books (or series of books) that pretty much everybody read: the Foundation trilogy, Stranger in a Strange Land, Dune, and the Lord of the Rings. Those books didn’t get me into SF/F – that came later when I discovered the great feminist SF of the 70s – but they were part of the overall 60s-70s culture.

What gets me is that the broligarch crowd pretty much read the same books – and clearly missed the point of most of them – even though the oldest of those tech-adjacent guys is probably a generation younger than I am and many of them are millennials. And of course, Foundation and Lord of the Rings had been around quite awhile before my generation found them.

Now I’m not dissing those books. I embroidered a quote from Foundation on the backpack I carried when I went hitch-hiking across the country (“Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.”) I worked as a children’s book buyer for Grok Books (which didn’t have a great SF section, but did have that particular novel).

And I re-read the entire Lord of the Rings during law school finals every semester.

Dune was fun if you were smoking a lot of dope.

But you know, all those books were written before any of these guys were born. And there’s been a hell of a lot of good science fiction written since then. Yet these books still seem to attract their interest. Continue reading “The Broligarch Misreading of Science Fiction”…

Baycon 2026 report

personby Deborah J. Ross
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I don’t attend many science-fiction/fantasy conventions these days. Pre-pandemic, I often attended conventions on the West Coast, including Orycon in Portland, Oregon. I’d add a day or two on each end of the convention dates to get in a visit with my best friend from college and a dear writer friend. Ditto going south to Loscon in Los Angeles or Condor in San Diego, or larger conventions like World Fantasy or SFWA’s Nebula Awards weekend when they’re held on the West Coast. Sadly, both friends have died, so even before the pandemic, I found it harder to fly north. Orycon has closed, and I believe that Condo has, too. Nevertheless, I always try to make it to my local con, Baycon/Westercon. It’s within driving distance, although a bit far to commute, and it’s a vibrant, diverse community.

When I attend a convention, I do so as a professional author, so I almost always appear on panels, readings, and autographing sessions. Some conventions request that potential guests submit proposals for events. If panel topics are accepted, the guest then moderates them. This was the case for 3 of the 6 panels I appeared on (* = I proposed and moderated this panel). Here are descriptions, with a few notes on how the discussions unfolded. With only one exception, I have avoided using the names of panelists and audience members. All the opinions are my own!

 

The Reality of Fiction. We normally think of fiction as unreal, but quite a few authors talk regularly with their fictional characters about the story and where it should head. How does this work? How can knowing some of the psychology involved give us a livelier relationship with fictional characters? What wisdom for life might they impart when listened to?

I arrived a bit early, as is my custom, to find the panelists wondering who the moderator was and expressing their unwillingness to do it. “Okay,” sez I, “I’ll do it.” Therein followed a fascinating divergence between the tired, perennial question, “What to do when your characters won’t behave the way you want them to?” and how much your characters reflect yourself—is this a good thing or a bad thing?–versus my personal focus, “Where is the energy in the story? Character (Hamlet), plot (thrillers), ideas (mysteries)…and how difficulties with characters arise from mismatches between different elements.

 

*Writing our Nightmares. What horror, dark fantasy, and related genres can teach us about surviving personal and political catastrophes.

The idea for this panel arose from two incidents: Octavia Butler told me that she took the things that really scared her and put them on paper; in a horror panel many years ago, when I said I had enough nightmares in my life, the other panelists showed me how horror can shine a light in the darkest places. As writers, we have agency; as readers, we trust that the protagonist, no matter how vulnerable, has or gains power over their fate.

We talked about having lost many traditional methods of dealing with trauma, so horror as a genre offers catharsis via the story journey; the end is different from the setup. “Horror is safer than memories.”

Finally, the zinger trope: “Play nice or I’ll put you in my novel” (and you won’t come out unscathed)!

 

*Finding Our Tribe. Writers, readers, and fans share how storytelling creates communities of understanding, acceptance, and celebration of differences. From fandom as family to writing as a way of healing, stories transcend the fear and prejudice of our times.

My thought in proposing it was to celebrate how the science fiction/fandom community welcomes and celebrates those who feel they don’t fit in anywhere else. This could be folks “on the spectrum” (of autism), sexual and gender minorities, racial and ethnic minorities, geeks of all flavors, and so forth. Everyone in the room had a version of a “finding my home here” story.

The second aspect was ethnic or ancestral communities. I was fortunate to run into one of my favorite co-panelists, an Indigenous elder, and invite him to participate in the panel. He brought the perspective of tribal membership being integral to identity, the history of near-extermination, and the separation he experiences between his role as elder and teacher, and his love for science fiction not shared with fellow members of his tribe. He helped us to understand the difference between tribal and tribalism. Tribal affiliation nourishes community and deep understanding of collective history. Tribalism creates a distinct “in-group” (those we identify with) and an “out-group” (everyone else).

Three of us were Jewish, and the only thing we agreed on was that we don’t agree on anything except being Jewish (“two Jews, three opinions,” more like “twenty-five opinions with footnotes and appendices spanning 2,000 years of commentary.” You can join if you’re willing to study hard for a year and pass a board examination. Otherwise, “Are you nuts?”) Much laughter ensued.

 

*Escapism is Not a Dirty Word! Panelists and participants share their favorite comfort reading and how it informs, sustains, and gives us hope. Continue reading “Baycon 2026 report”…

The Importance of Fruit Cake

personby Gillian Polack
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I keep forgetting to introduce my books to you! Let me remedy this.

This week, someone (a very generous someone) posted about The Year of the Fruit Cake. They said lovely things about it and about my writing. While I ought to simply share the post, or at least repeat the words, this week I am terribly, terribly Australian. Just saying that someone said nice things is blowing my own trumpet in Oz. Tall poppy syndrome is one of our big cultural babies and so I cannot repeat things without feeling as if I need to be cut down. This is, of course, a really bad way of letting you know about my book.

The Year of the Fruit Cake won me a nice trophy and mentions in many places. I will never understand this, because it’s not that easy to read. It’s at the literary end of SF. I wanted to write about a difficult set of subjects (including perimenopause) and I wanted to do it with science fiction and I used so many of the things women experience at that time of life in Australia to shape the novel. Not just as the subjects dealt with in the novel, but in the storytelling itself.

When I went through perimenopause my body was unreliable, so the narrators are unreliable. Everything is personal.

My memory had blips, so my main character has major memory issues.

So many friendships had to be renegotiated, especially those with men and with younger women, who mostly had not idea of the magnitude of the changes and that hot flushes were not just an excuse to wield a pretty fan. Our society lacks story that explains these changes, so I turned one of my perimenoapusal women into an alien.

Eventually I discovered that one of the issues I and my cohort faced was gentle shifts along gender spectra. OK, not so gentle. Now I’m past it, my body doesn’t want to declare how very female it is one minute and that it’s increasing in testosterone the next. I have settled into being female, but not into being female in the same way I once was. The aliens in the novel with their twelve genders are closer to my physical reality than I like to admit. I gave them at least one shift that was delightful. I wish I could do the same for human women. Perimenopause was a nightmare for me, so I made those physical changes a nightmare for my alien-in-human-body.

Also, I wanted to write about othering. Australia is not good to older women, so I wrote about the process of becoming an older woman and having to find new ways of living in society. I had no idea the same thing (in a more extreme version) would apply to me right now as an Australian Jew. I had no idea that this year I would live in a year of Fruit Cake, with an uncertain future and a society I thought was stable turned chancy.

I entirely thought chocolate would remain important and I was totally correct about that, thankfully.

The novel is a slow read and I will never write one as difficult again… but I got some things far too right. I’m glad that one of them was chocolate.

Pocket universes and super heroes

personby Gillian Polack
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Eight years ago I spent ten days in Amiens. I had great aims and ambitions. I wanted to explore how World War I changed the people and the landscape. I did a lot of research in Australia early on, which was just as well, because my body was beginning to ache at the seams and I could only do half the research. I did that half, and I also did the related research for a novel. That novel is timely now, for all the wrong reasons.

It’s about the Green Children. There are medieval tales of the Green Children of Woolwich, and they are oddly consistent. I wanted to add a pocket universe to the story and turn it into fantasy with a little bit of scientific underlay. The best place to do this wasn’t in England, where the story came from. It was in the Zone Rouge in France.

I wanted to understand how Jewish superheroes would create themselves if they weren’t strangers in a world full of hate, but refugees in a tiny universe where they were the majority. I wanted to see the stupidity that comes with confidence and being the centre of things, and to put a non-Jewish superhero at the heart of the story, showing how she saw the world around her and how she dealt with some really bad cards. In other words, I wanted to reverse some of our assumptions.

Part of this was asking, “What would our world be like with magic?” I’m an historian and for me there is not one simple type of magic, but complex systems that interact and that change over time. In my novel I used some historical systems and some less historical, and added a couple that only belong in that other world. If there are many systems and if they’re not simplified for ease of tale-telling then they leave more chaos in their wake when they’re abused. Also, how would magic be regulated? I used the UK for the regulation of magic, because I could bring important and old families into the story. Also because it means I could play in the wonderful sandpit of alternate history in London. Imagine a history of England where Jews were brought back in the 15th century? I wrote a short story to explain a part of this, and it was a finalist in the Sidewise Awards, which means… it’s Alternate History, even though it has magic. I rather like this. The story is in Other Covenants.

I lived in London and I lived in Paris for a little, many years ago, and, historically, London is a lot more fun for the type of story I wanted to tell. Pop-up history, small churches with pits to hell… I needed to know that terrain. I know the church in question (and its history) and I know the streets in question. This is not just due to having lived there for a little, many years ago.  It’s because I used to teach students about medieval London at the Australian National University, and because I spent a whole day walking the whole of Cheapside because the maps of it showing it in the Middle Ages did not fit the modern maps. I took photos that document how and why Cheapside changed and can explain what this means to the wider City of London. I looked at the difference between Old Jewry, the newer Jewry where my family came from, and Golders’ Green. I walked all these places an took pictures, at various times.

A small US imprint published my novel as their first book. I never got to do a slide show of all the places and explain how the Somme and how London and Paris came together and how I used my historian-self to furnish the novel. Before the novel came out, I talked with a writers’ group about the layers of history in landscape and how war changed everything, using the Somme as a case study. Then COVID hit. Most novels published in the first two years of COVID are lesser-known. This doesn’t change the fact that my world-building for The Green Children Help Out was amazing fun.

What book should I introduce next week? Time-travel, magic in Canberra, non-fiction? I’m open to suggestions.

Misogyny on Steroids

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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We regularly see whining about why the world imagined by science fiction writers of the so-called Golden Age (i.e., mostly the 1950s) hasn’t come to pass. Where are the flying cars and jet packs? Why don’t we have settlements on the Moon?

And then, of course, we get all the hype around LLMs, as if it is going to become the artificial intelligence we were promised. (Pro tip: it’s not.)

The problem is, I think, that people have focused too much on the wrong science fiction, the technocentric and technophilic stuff that is convinced that computer tech is going to save the world.

Right now, the science fiction writer whose visions are closest to reality is Octavia Butler, particularly the world she wrote about in Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents. While that world is certainly not as much fun to contemplate as living on the Moon, it does have a great deal to recommend it in terms of how things might happen.

I’m fairly sure she meant it as a warning (or perhaps saw it all too clearly); certainly nobody except a few of the grifters currently in power wanted to see it.

Recently the creepy guy who leads the Groypers (and no, I don’t know what that means nor do I want to know) got on a podcast and said that all women – and that includes white ones and maybe even the Kristi Noems and Pam Bondis – should be rounded up and put into gulags, with the ones who would be good breeders (I assume he means the white ones, since he’s an extreme racist as well as misogynist) moved to a birthing gulag.

And that got me to thinking about another science fiction writer: Suzy McKee Charnas.

I mean, you’d almost think he’d read her four-book series, The Holdfast Chronicles, which takes place in a world that does just that with women and includes the racism as well.

I haven’t read those books in a long time, but I’ve just started to re-read them now because they are, in fact, relevant. In fact, I suspect they are even more relevant than The Handmaid’s Tale. Though I hope they aren’t quite as close to reality as Parable of the Sower.

I’m currently reading the first book, Walk to the End of the World, and I have to say that the male world she depicts is the kind of toxic masculinity on steroids that such men seem to want. I recall thinking it was too extreme when I first read it, but given current events, I’m no longer sure about that.

I wish Suzy was still with us to discuss that point. Continue reading “Misogyny on Steroids”…

Baggage

personby Gillian Polack
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I’m about to embark on a big essay. As a prequel to it, however, I want to introduce you to a book.

A-many years ago, when I was young and charming, I edited an Australian anthology called Baggage. It’s still in print, published by Wildside in the US. The Australian original was taken out of print when the collapse of Borders in Australia imploded the publisher. Every piece Eneit Press published was special (maybe excepting my novel – I cannot judge my own writing) and the loss of the press shut many doors for readers.

Why is Baggage so important to me today? I asked writers for stories of science fiction or fantasy that discussed the cultural baggage we all carry. I had an initial list of the perfect people to make the best anthology. It had two parts, since I couldn’t ask everyone at once. I emailed the writers on the first part of my initial first (obviously) and all but one of them agreed. The rest of the wonderful authors I had on my list don’t even know they were on my list, which I find sad. I still want to read stories by them. Every single story I was given by those writers is a treasure and thought-provoking and none of them overlap and they created such a fine anthology that I’ve been nervous about trying another.

These are not Jewish stories. For those most part, these are not Jewish writers. Yet the collection is one that will help anyone trying to understand about the current wave of antisemitism. How? It demonstrates, through story, some of the massive differences in the cultural baggage we each bear. What we carry, how we carry it, how much of a burden it can be and how different people see it quite, quite differently. It achieves all this through very well told story. Which means, if you don’t want to jump straight into theory and definitions and cultural analysis, you don’t have to. You can read some of the best short stories I’ve ever edited.

Then I’ll bring in the heavy stuff, either here or on my own blog. In this difficult few years, however, we don’t always need to confront. Sometimes we can simply read and enjoy and find our own paths from what we read. This is why I’m giving you a prologue, which is Baggage.

 

Things Happen

personby Gillian Polack
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I’m late!

This is because Australia is antisemitism central again and I’ve been dealing. You don’t need yet another post on Australia’s problems, so let me tell you the story of a book.

Some years ago, I wrote a novel. A publisher signed it up but said “This should be a duology.” I rewrote the first book and added the sequel. Then they went bust.

Shortly after, another publisher fell in love with the duology but said, “I want the rest of the story.” I did the rewrite and the last volume and it became a trilogy. The COVID hit and the publisher ran into so much trouble. I’m still with them for other books, but we agreed I should find a new publisher for the trilogy.

A US publisher has taken on the first volume. If it sells well, then the trilogy will finally emerge. I so hope it sells well. I’ve been quiet about it because this book was having so much bad luck. Not as much bad luck as my cursed novel, but still, much bad luck.

However, we are finally in a “Watch this space” moment. The cover artist has Ideas and the editor is getting back to me very soon.

When there is an official announcement, I promise to share it. In the meantime, it’s about time I talked about my other published work. I might do a series of posts, to remind myself of novels written and books published.

That gives you two reasons to watch this space.

History and fiction and time out from hate

personby Gillian Polack
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I found my missing post. Here it is!

I logged in, expecting to tell you how the hate in Australia (which began as antisemitism and is now extending) is so tightly focused that your best friend might be bullied and you might not see it. When I’m alone, that bullying eats up a chunk of my day each and every day. This last week, however, it was less than a minute of each day and it was not every day. I was able to talk work with colleagues. When I sat down here, it struck me that I don’t often talk about that side of my life.

I used to. I used to be the kind of irrepressible historian who got excited for everyone. I’m still that historian. I don’t get to talk about it so often, is all.

Instead of dwelling on the bad side of life, then, let me find one page of notes from one day of the conference (one in forty-five pages of notes from the conference) so that you can enjoy history with me. We all need time out from hate, after all and every single US reader here had a lot more trouble to handle in the every day.

Some of you know that one of my novels (Poison and Light) is about how future humans use the past to hide from a present they found uncomfortable. Right now, a group of Australian scholars is examining how people in Early Modern England (and elsewhere, but the papers I heard were on Early Modern England) use history to imagine the future. The discussion was wide-ranging. They talked about witches and about ghosts, about predicting disaster and about what happened when the disaster failed to occur, about pamphlets and politics and poetry. It was the perfect panel for fiction writers and an exceptionally strong example of why fiction writers should get to know Medievalists and Early Modern scholars. Every other minute I thought of a writer who should have been there, asking questions about the ghosts and about the politics. The worlds they explain and the concepts they explore help us understand what we write and help us write it the best we can.

How does this understanding work in practice? My notes have an outline describing how the chair (and the head of the research project, who of course I talked to afterwards and of course we’ve planned to meet to talk about the science fiction side of things) breaks down the concepts of Imagining the Future into categories that can be explained.

She spoke about writing that give models of temporality: utopias, dystopias, and the mundane. Think about how these categories fit modern science fiction. Poison and Light is half-dystopia and half mundane, because all of my fiction talks about the lives of individuals and so the mundane is important to them. China Mieville (to my mind) writes dystopias and so does Sheri S Tepper.

But who writes utopias? I can think of earlier writers, like Sir Julius Vogel. Help me out! Who is writing now and has written a utopia that brings history into the future? We were given the theory of Star Trek, because it claims to be in a perfected future (at least for humans) but the reality of Star Trek is not utopian. Star Wars is, however, dystopian. It’s much easier to find examples when one looks to television. But I want to talk about novels!

She then moved to scales of temporality, whether the novel is set near (Earth!) or far away (Poison and Light again, since it’s in a solar system far far away – I may have attended the conference as an historian, but during this panel I felt so seen as a writer). With TV, my mind goes straight to the Jon Pertwee years of Doctor Who and compares them with (of course) Star Wars … again.

Why is the near and far important? Because so much of historical writing is used to discuss this apocalypse, or that. How far is apocalypse from our everyday? Much further, if it’s not on Earth. And here Poison and Light fails. It’s set far away, but Earth faces apocalypse while the people on New Ceres pretend they live in the eighteenth century. (I’m seeing this now with the lucky souls who are not enmired in hate – they are the people on New Ceres, while most of us are, alas, on Earth.)

I keep thinking that this whole project can help me understand my own New Ceres universe. I’m writing a second novel set on Earth next year, where the 14th century and the 17th century and how we deal with post-apocalypse join the party. My project echoes the ideas of people hundreds of years ago as humanity faces a bleak present. Where some people find refuge in fancy dress, others find refuge in explaining the world through ghosts and looking at neighbours as if they themselves are the catastrophe.

The last category asks whose future it is. Is it personal and everyday? Is it national? Is it a global future (my New Ceres again), a human one… or is it post-human.

The experts were historians and literary historians and most of the examples (by a long, long way most of the examples) belong to our past. The categories were however, really handy for questioning and understanding science fiction. And now you know why I will not give up that side of my life. I have learned so much in such a short time, and my fiction benefits.

Every time universities lose these experts, we lose the benefit of their thought and learning… and our everyday suffers.

Let me go away and think about what our lives would be like if we didn’t have these little injections of learning to help us tell better stories. No, let me not. Let me go away and write more fiction, celebrating the worlds of both historians and writers.