Creative Copy Challenge

Shane, Sean, and David post ten words and you creative types bang out a little “cohesive, creative short story tying all the words together”. The creative copy challenge is an excellent idea and one that I hope you will all take up!

Here’s my … stab.

Adrenaline flowed through Jake’s system. It was a feeling that he both relished and feared. It meant that he was in just the kind of situation he had longed to be done with. A man like him didn’t really retire though, that just wasn’t in the cards.

He tightened his grip on the Kraton covered knife handle, feeling more than hearing his knuckles pop. He had gotten used to the adrenal high, but never the bloodshed that was so often required. Killing men, women and children for a living meant that he had to at least learn to shove the self loathing down into his gut….

Click here to read the rest and see what the rest of the crew did!

Speculation

I’ve been charged by my buddies at Flying Island Press to participate in defining sci-fi and fantasy. That’s a mighty big elephant to eat. My response on Twitter was “As far as what SF/F is or is not, in my case I sort of know it when I see it. Which is why I like the umbrella term speculative fiction.”

That was kind of a cop out, but defining things in 140 characters or less is a bit more than I’m up to before lunch. Now in a blog post I think I can take a stab.

Science fiction is incredibly broad as a genre. You’ve got everything from Jurassic Park to Ender’s Game. It can be gritty and “hard” where science is king and every jot and tittle needs to be explained and “realistic”. Or it can be soft and take place in such a far flung future that the science almost takes a back seat. Almost. I think that science needs to be an integral part though. There needs to be some aspect of technology or a rational explanation of the universe and its hard core mechanics that forms a significant part of the story.

For me character always comes first and the science might be a part of that character. A good example of that would be PC Haring’s Cybrosis. The main character is a cyborg and her tech is fully integrated into the plot of the novel as well. That’s not to say that the science necessarily needs to be completely accurate. When you’re supposing what the world might by like in a hundred or a thousand years the details are by necessity fuzzy. Most writers are no more scientists than they are wizards and research can only take you so far. Still it should be sound. Master that technobabble!

As big as science fiction is as a genre, I’d argue that fantasy is even larger. In SF, the distinctive element is, well, science. In Fantasy I’d say it’s the numinous. Most, if not all, fantasy has something of the spiritual about it. That’s not to say that it has to be religious (though I’d argue that most Christian fiction falls into the Fantasy realm), but it often speaks to things that can’t be observed or measured. The more important elements in the story, be they plot, mechanics, or character, should focus on the mystical or the transcendent.

A good example of that would be South Coast by Nathan Lowell. And that’s an interesting one too, since it takes place in a far flung future with space ships and the like. It has that in common with Star Wars. Both are Fantasy pieces since, imo, both have a stronger connection to the mystic than the motor.

The wonderful thing about these genres is that they lend themselves well to being crossed over/blended/mashed/folded/spindled. After all, the Dune series has elements of both. The Dragon Riders of Pern does as well. Science Fiction and Fantasy can easily be just like a Reese’s Cup, though that’s not everyone’s favorite candy bar.

So that’s my stab at a definition. Look for a post later today over at Flying Island Press to get more on the ins and outs of defining these genres.

A Charity Anthology

Some friends of mine are selling an anthology of stories to benefit the Office of Letters and Light, a charity affiliated with NaNoWriMo. It’s called From the Dark Side and you can find a number of excerpts and all the info you could possibly want to know about it here.

They’re selling an electronic version at the moment and eventually hope to put out a paper version down the road. All proceeds go to the aforementioned charity and you get twenty stories and poems in a variety of electronic formats on Amazon.com and Smashwords.com for $4.99. That strikes me as a good deal. I know a few of the writers represented and their shouldn’t be a bad story in the bunch.

I know I’ll be buying mine very soon. In fact they’re trying to break one hundred sales by Sunday, July 11 at 11:59 p.m. ET and I want to be counted in that number. They’re about a third of the way there as of my writing this. So go get yours! (As a side note I think they get a better cut if you get it through Smashwords.)

Celebrating Freedom

I hope you guys had an awesome 4th of July. You all had one, contrary to what some may believe. Only Americans celebrate the anniversary of their independence on this day. 😉

I know it’s been a LONG time since my last post. I’ve been a busy little bee and not much in a blogger mode. I did want to share something special with you though. As some of you may know I’ve been working on an electronic magazine called Flagship for a new publishing company called Flying Island Press I’ve helped launch alongside Zach Ricks, Jeff Hite, Philip Carroll, and J-P Losier. We had our launch date yesterday and it was AWESOME.

I know there are some of you out there that might not want to buy something sight unseen and I respect that. As a result, we’re giving away one story in both audio and e-pub format. If you buy the magazine, you’ll get this story and five more for $1.99 for just the audio or text versions or $2.99 for both. I think that’s an outstanding deal.

The story we chose was “Inciting Incident” by Blake M. Petit. Choosing was hard, but we felt his story was indicative of the tone and quality we were shooting for. We at Flying Island Press hope you enjoy them!

E-pub Version
Audio Version