Category Archives: Uncategorized

2014-10-12 · 22:43

Sunday

Today was a nice day.

I allowed myself to do nothing. I then felt guilty about it.

Having worked the late shift on Saturday I got up rather late today.  I decided to go into town. Cardiff Farmer’s Market is on on Sundays. It was great to see so many people there and sample the lovely food. If you live in Cardiff its well worth a visit.

After the market I went to Starbucks, then the gym,  and then Starbucks again on account of missing my train.

So I’ve supported the little guy and a multinational corporation – swings and roundabouts.

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2014-10-05 · 16:38

Fiction Within Fiction#2

Several weeks ago I talked about the lack of fiction within fictional works. Click here for the original. Now I’ve come to the conclusion that thinking of fiction within fiction is even more useful than I first thought. The reason: copyright.

I’ve tried to wrap my head around what is and isn’t allowed when it comes to copyright. There seems to be a disconnect between what is legal and what people have actually been cautioned for. Obviously uploading entire episodes of a series is illegal but reviews should be legal.

In my novel I want to reference various works of fiction. It seems so natural to me. If a character finds herself on a starship, or finds out magic exists, she is almost certainly going to talk about the fiction she knows. If someone told you that you have magical powers might you be tempted to say: “Hogwarts here I come!” or maybe refer to your mentor as “Gandalf” now and again.

These are the sorts of things I want to do. I thought of having the wizard say “You know its not too late. You can take the blue pill.” – meaning that my protagonist is given the option to forget she has magic and go back to her life.

I still can’t get my head round what is allowed. Does The Big Bang Theory, for instance, have to ask permission for every reference they make? Do they have to pay Sci-fi (I refuse to use their new spelling) whenever a character says ‘frak’?

I have no idea. This difficulty has lead to an interesting opportunity. I can use my novel as a proving ground for new ideas. Instead of the characters watching real shows they watch things I’ve made up. The particular favorite is a show called Guardians of Kronos.

Guardians of Kronos follows Sian Fry. Her job is to maintain the integrity of the space/time continuum as aliens attempt to disrupt history. Inventing concepts and characters is always fun. Its nice to be able to do it without having to work out all the ins and outs.

I did have one other idea which was to use Galaxy Quest; but to use it as a real show. I.e. In this universe. we have Galaxy Quest, Galaxy Quest: The Second Generation, Galaxy Quest: Babylon 9, Galaxy Quest: Valiant, and Galaxy Quest: Protector – and there was also a 1999 film spoof about this successful franchise….

….

A spoof called Star Trek….

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2014-09-28 · 22:37

Reviews

If you’ve ever read reviews of, well anything, you’ll know it can be a futile experience. Sometimes there are equal numbers of positive reviews as negative reviews. By the end of it you’re as confused as when you started. This is frustrating but it can be great for a writer.

It’s great because whatever we write someone will like it. At the very least we hope someone will like it. In one of my creative writing classes we were given a list of story titles. We were asked to say which of them we’d most like to read. Everyone was interested in a different story. This might seem a rather trite thing but it was useful.

I remember picking out Memories of the Space Age as the one I was most interested in. Though I haven’t read it yet – which I suppose rather undermines my point. It sounded so interesting because it suggested a post apocalyptic world.

The point of all this is simple. Everything has an audience. It still has to follow the basic rules of a story but no matter where you set it, or when, you’ll find someone who likes it.

And if all else fails…

You can just pretend that the cuddly duck, that you’ve had since childhood, really really likes it.

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2014-09-21 · 10:00

One Hundred

This is my one hundredth post on this site. So I’ve been bringing you poorly edited stuff for quite a while now! In all seriousness I do edit and proofread but something is always missed. Its a lot easier to notice mistakes made by others than it is ones you’ve made.

My novel, Rolling Shadows, is going well. This novel has been altered to within an inch of its life. If I was writing on paper I would have got through a small forest. Nothing has really been deleted in the processing of the novel but I am confused. I start to wonder if a particular fact was in the current draft or the previous draft.

The common wisdom is that on finishing a novel you should stick it in a draw for a few months. This enables you to forget all the story paths you didn’t take. You also need an editor who can point out all the story flaws. I try to be aware of these flaws because I like to nitpick. I try to think critically about what I’m writing. I want to find the flaws and fix them to deprive a review of saying how stupid I was.

One of the hardest potential flaws to detect is implication. This is when you give your character or star ship some ability and, without realising it, you imply another ability. An example of this would be Star Trek with its transporters and torpedoes. I assume you can see where I’m going with this. Yet it wasn’t until Dark Frontier that that was shown. Even then it didn’t become a standard tactic. It seems to me that that could, even should, be their standard tactic. Weaken the shields enough to beam a torpedo aboard and then boom.

This is even more difficult when dealing with magic. Where are the limits? In the Harry Potter series glasses can be fixed with a spell but not, apparently, eyes. Obviously eyes are far more complicated but couldn’t you conjure up something like contact lens?

There is no answer. My advice to anyone reading over their own work is to pretend its written by someone you don’t like. That way you might be more critical. I know that if Doctor Who does something stupid I’ll forgive it. Doctor Who is British, made in Cardiff no less, so I forgive its foibles. However if its a show I’m ambivalent towards, or even don’t like, I’ll use it as one more reason to hate it. I’m irrational that way.

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2014-09-14 · 23:33

Scottish Independence

On Thursday the Scottish people vote on whether to become an independent state. Living in Wales, and to my shame never having visited Scotland, this will have little effect on me. Whichever way this goes I think the fact that the SNP is even calling for this referendum says a lot. Even if Scotland remains a part of the UK I think this may be the start of some big political changes. Like I said I don’t get a vote – if Wales had the option to be independent I would vote yes.

The political system in the UK is problematic. Often times, assuming we vote at all, we vote simply for the party we hate the least. I know who I’m voting for next election – its not exactly the party I want but I’m voting for them so the party I absolutely don’t want doesn’t get in. It feels like being a starving man and only having the choice of food that will kill you or food that will make you ill.

I have heard it suggested that England should have its own Parliament. This would be a very good idea. At the moment Welsh, Northern Irish, and Scottish MPs vote on devolved issues. In essence my local MP votes on legislation which won’t effect his constituents because its handled by the Welsh Assembly. An England Parliament would do much to make the countries in the UK seem more equal. Without a separate English Parliament England feels, paradoxically, both about and, arguably, below the rest of the UK.

Since the referendum was announced people have come out as ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. Some elements of the ‘No’ campaign have seemed really silly. The government have offered more powers to the Scottish parliament if they stay – but if they go they get them anyway.  Also I saw that Barack Obama said that Scotland should remain, or words to that effect, which seems a bit rich for the President of a country that celebrates its independence every year. It makes me wonder what would have happen, back in the 1700s, if George III had offered the Americans representation in Parliament.

So in a few days we’ll know. As I said whichever way this goes I think big changes are afoot.

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2014-09-07 · 22:46

My Imagination

Klingons have ridges and Cardassians have spoons. A lot of aliens don’t even have that. The Centauri only look alien because their entire population, at least the men, have had bad dreams. Unless you factor in their… high numerical value… there isn’t much difference. The reason for this is obvious, casting persons are limited to hiring humans. A trip out of the solar system is a little beyond the budget of most television programs.

Actors like Andreas Katsulas do a great job in presenting alien characters. CGI just wasn’t up to the task back then. Even today it struggles with presenting characters. I don’t need to say the name do I? The film, the infamous film, and its sequels? It will remain nameless, was released 15 years ago. 15 years ago! Goodness me I’m old! I’m old enough, or rather was young enough at the time, to actually think the film was good.

Real actors are therefore the way to go. Film makers though are stuck between a rock and a hard place. I apologise to my writing teachers for employing a cliche – but damn it it’s true. Film makes either have an actor in prosthetics or fake looking CGi.

Consider the Gorn. In Arena the Gorn was played by a man in a suit and in In a Mirror Darkly Part II it was CGI – it is arguable which is worse.

I’ve just been reading Doors into Chaos, the third book in the Gateways series, and featuring the Gorn. I found it hard to imagine them. I kept seeing the CGI blob of their Enterprise appearance and not the ‘real’ creature. Perhaps this is understandable as I’m dealing with a creature I know from TV. However this seems to happen to me even when it is an entirely original piece of work. Yes, I think my mind is defective. When I try to imagine an alien in a novel my mind seems to bring up what it would look like if it was having to be put together for a film – stupid brain.

Sometimes I wounder if having humanoid aliens isn’t the best choice – even in books. If you have an alien that is very different from humans it is difficult to keep track of. You might be left thinking ‘Are they the ones with twelve tentacles or the ones with eighteen fingers the size of cocktail sausages.’ Maybe I just have a short… squirrel.

I’ve used that joke before. I don’t think it was funny then either.

From a story perspective aliens have to have some connection to humans. If we are too different, biologically, culturally, technologically, then there would be little or no interaction. If the aliens require arsenic to live we’re probably not going to enter into a dispute over planet everything-here-can-kill-you. Unless arsenic is of use to us in someway I don’t know – I don’t know a lot of things.

I was going to end with a great quote. It’s late and this is not a university essay so I’m not going to worry too much about exactitude. I’m going to attribute the quote to Dyson, not the vacuum cleaner man, the physicists. The quote is this:  ‘Intelligent aliens may not only be stranger than we imagine; they may be stranger than we can imagine.’

Goodnight.

or

Morning.

or

Afternoon.

I don’t know where you live so it could be any.

Good day.

Bye.

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2014-08-31 · 22:28

The Prom

As promised The Prom is now up. How you enjoy it. Please click here.

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2014-08-24 · 23:09

Darlings on the Firing Line

I’ve said it before and hope never to say it again. This time my novel will be finished. I’m moving stuff around. Several of the chapters, that will be in the final novel, have been chapter one.

The upshot of this is that a chapter might have been written to introduce a character but now they’ve been in the book for a while. In other words it is a mess! The mess will be sorted though! For my next novel, I’m going to plan it to within an inch of its life.

There will be some casualties of this novel. One of the original ideas was a talking Guinea Pig – he is gone. That is no great loss. However, as any author will know, there are also the darlings.

Darlings are a way that some authors describe passages of their work that they like but that don’t belong. It might be irrelevant, out of character, or a fundamental change in the story renders it unworkable.

You see my main character, Stacy Tanner, used to be 18. I was 18 when I started writing it. So I have a chapter about her high school prom. I decided to make her older, as I am older, as it fitted better with the story. The prom therefore is now back story and no longer belongs in the novel.

I’m sure I will find other darlings for the chop. I will put them here. I’ve almost finished looking over the prom chapter and it will be on this site by the end of next week.

Those of you in the UK I hope you enjoy the Bank Holiday tomorrow – I have to work. Damn it.

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2014-08-17 · 23:27

Predicting Technological Growth

In Star Trek: The Original Series the characters used large rectangular microtaps. With today’s technology a card that size might have a capacity of over six terabytes. Given the rate that Mr Spock sometimes switched disks it is clear the creators of the show didn’t have that capacity in mind.

This isn’t surprising. The first floppy disk wasn’t commercially available until 1971. It was impossible for someone in the 1960s to predict how data storage, and compression, might work in the future. For us today it is a little easier. I have used floppy discs, CDs, CF cards and, the various sizes of SD cards. Just in my life time I have seen technology change.

I like the technology, in the science fiction I write, to look as plausible as possible. This works but only to a point. If you asked an inventor, living two thousand years ago, to imagine a speed boat – what might they come up with? They might look into the best shape of sail or having a huge deck space for hundreds of oarsmen. They would have no concept of electricity or anything else that makes a speed boat work. My point is that one day we may discover something new. The microprocessor was a huge change from how computers worked before. What if their is some other change? That would throw any prediction off.

It’s not just computers. In Peter F. Hamilton‘s: Commonwealth Saga the characters enjoy virtual immortality. They can go through this process, rejuvenation, and basically become young again. Might we have this in the future? Given my limited, non-existent, knowledge of science it isn’t all that ridiculous. Cells in the body already replace themselves so what if you could do away with the degradation of that process?

Should I have immortality in my science fiction?

Ultimately science fiction seems to go down one of two paths.

  1. In the case of Star Trek we are ahead of them – with the notable exception of warp drive, phasers, artificial gravity, deflector shields, and… okay this is getting silly. Much of today’s household technology is ahead of Star Trek’s. Even in TNG the away team would describe stuff for Picard. Today most of us carry a camera where ever we go.
  2. On the other hand 2001: A Space Odyssey was set thirteen years ago and we still don’t have a moon base… damn it.

There are no real answers here. Perhaps all science fiction is destined to eventually be damned with this sentence: ‘Its of its time.’

Perhaps warp drive will be invented one day. Maybe a student studying at a university, somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse, – will one day wonder why the USS Voyage is so slow. In his universe a trip of 75,000 light years can be considered as a weekend get away.

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2014-08-10 · 22:53

He’s Dead Gym

I only went to the gym once this week. Ironic as I was telling you, only two weeks ago, about how I’d been keeping up with it. Once in the week is not too bad. Let me explain why I didn’t go again. No, there is too much, let me sum up. It was a combination of wanting to write a couple of chapters beforehand and, on the other days, late shifts.

And yes there was one other thing…

Yes I discovered a new you tuber Anna Akana. She’s funny and, yes I admit it, attractive. When writing is dragging a bit its easy to get sucked into something else! Anything else. I wonder what the displacement of HMS Victory is….

So maybe I’m wasting my life. What do you care? You’re not my mother! Well one of you is.

I shall now precede with a awkward segue.

…

A mother is the person who takes care of you when you’re young. In other words they are a guardian.

…

I saw Guardians of the Galaxy on Monday. Here’s seven thoughts about it. Why seven? Wouldn’t you like to know.

  1.  It was an enjoyable film. There was good action, it was well acted, and the 3D was great. I saw Avatar in 3D and was disappointed, both by the tech of 3D and Avatar, but here the 3D was good. Even in a simple scene of characters gathered around a bed it looked like some of them were closer to you than others.
  2. Not enough Karen Gillan. I’m bound to make this observation, being British, but I think it is a real shame. She didn’t have much to do in the film as Nebula. She wasn’t even at the level of a henchman from a Bond film. There was some attempt to giver her back story with Gamora – but it wasn’t fully developed. Confused Mathew, in his review, doesn’t even mention Nebula. She was hardly needed – Is it wrong that I was attracted to her even as a sci-Borg?
  3. The back story to Star Lord is that he was abducted as a child from Earth. He listens to eighties music but, other than that, there is little to differentiate him from the human looking aliens. The film gave no explanation of why a young boy was abducted. To me there was no point in this plot point. I know there are comics but I have to approach this just from the film. The film gave no explanation and I haven’t read the comics.
  4. Cliche plot – bad guy wants to destroy stuff. There is a muguffin that will help him do this and the good guys have to stop him getting it. However his full motivations aren’t satisfactorily explored.
  5. Helpless guards. This isn’t a nitpick and isn’t really worth mentioning but I want to. During the escape the good guys attack the prison guards. These guards are innocents. They don’t know what’s going on they’re just doing their jobs. It seems ridiculous, when we’re supposed to be rooting for the guardians, that they are indiscriminately killing the guards.
  6. Groot only says ‘I am Groot’ I got the impression they were trying to make him into a Chewbacca-ish character. Although he only said three words his friend, Rocket, understood what he meant and that really worked.
  7. While this film won’t win any awards for the story it was enjoyable. I look forward to seeing the next one but its not a desperate can’t wait feeling. Its more like ‘Whenever you’re ready. I have time.’

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