John Scalzi's ... Ghost Brigades

One thing I liked straight away about this book is that I found it in hardback in the library - always gives a book more depth and character - and the next thing was the cover art. I like! I like it in a boyish way, with a little of the same wow! gosh! factor of walking away from first seeing Star Wars on a big screen at age... ten? twelve? The cover has a space battle above a planet, anyway. Pretty generic, but it sets the scene. Inside back jacket tells me the artist's name is John Harris. Let me look him up... Aha. I see that he's illustrated for the likes of Allen Steele and Jack McDevitt, both of whom I've been reading in the past few months.

But onto the story. John Scalzi is a joker, which I learned from following him on Twitter. Read the opening of Ghost Brigades and you'll see an example... let me say no more. It was a neat trick, well pulled off. So far, I can see that JS is staying true to the war-in-space genre of the first in the series, Old Man's War (see my last post), expertly imagining future technology, alien technology, interstellar genocidal warfare, and what that might do to the human (and other) people who get caught up in the military mincing machine. This last part, the human story, is the only reason I would read the whole thing. What happens to people who live and breathe the disciplined and controlled application of deadly violence?

The world we live in is over-militarised, and I grew up in a town neighbouring one in which 'squaddies', ordinary soldiers that is, are trained, barracked and sent out to do our government's bidding, to do their dirty work. And from the few times I met those young, beer-inclined, very physical men, I've wondered what chance they ever had of enjoying a normal human life, if there is such a thing. They're trained to be tough, ruthless and to obey their commanding officers. Civilians stay in their comforable homes and feel horrified at the innocents being bombed, sometimes at the expense of their own tax money; meanwhile, the frontline soldiers often feel that they're paying the price for those civilians' comfort. There's something screwed up here; perhaps you can enlighten me and tell me why one group of people are turned into killers while the rest of us rest easy and veg out in front of TV.

Governments maintain armies to keep hold of their status and economic position, not essentially to keep you and me in beer and Pringles. (Is this turning into a rant? I'll stop here.) So thankyou Mr Scalzi for making me think a little. If your series is intended, in part, to be a meditation on the present state of affairs, I'd better keep reading until the end of Book Three to appreciate the fulness of your thoughts.

John Scalzi's Old Man's War

Did you ever read 'Starship Trooper' by Robert Heinlein? It was fun as a teenager to read. Starships (obviously), space marines with jet packs, laser guns, lots of battles. Then I thought, hey, the 'Skinnies' and the 'Bugs' that the trooper fights don't get much mercy. Aren't they kind of people too? Does this breed or reflect a kind of contempt for the 'collateral damage' and civilian casualties in the wars waged by the Western world on those so-called 'hot-beds of terrorism'? The debate over this novel was long. Heinlein was talking about the need to cultivate a citizen's willingness to serve his or her country.

Along came John Scalzi, and in his debut novel published in 2005, 'Old Man's War', tackles the same subject with a number of major twists and updates. I saw it in the public library and snatched it up - JS is one smart writer. I haven't reached the full expose of what's going on in his world, but it does look like he's asking the questions I had - Does waging war deface the warrior's humanity? Is it enough to say 'Violence is human!' or, 'It's necessary - we gotta defend ourselves' ?

It's a well-told story, with well-imagined characters, but liberally peppered with blood, gore and post-human stuff. Maybe I'll let you know what I think when I've finished it.

Other Authors

One blogging activity I'll be trying to do from now on is to mention the writings of other authors, particularly the independent or 'indie' writers like me who appreciate all the support they can get as they work hard to publish and promote their works amidst the cataract of books published daily. Doing this will strengthen the online community of writers and will broaden the scope of this blog. I may write some reviews.

So: in the last couple of days I've 'met' John A Ferguson, a Scottish writer of science fiction and fantasy stories. He's also a chemistry teacher, a Member of the Royal Society of Chemistry and an ambitious writer active in several mediums. You can find his Amazon author page here or his own website here  to see what I mean. I've just bought his short ebook story 'Kindred Soldiers' which portrays the moral struggle of a young soldier fighting in a futuristic interstellar war.

OK, enough for now, must get busy and read.

The Calling preview video

Here's a short promotional video I've done for The Calling. Thanks to the compelling artwork of Victor Habbick it looks great, and thanks to these short clips of the music of Iona, it sounds good too. OK, it's not professionally put together, and that's because I did it myself on Windows Movie Maker. Whatever you think of Microsoft, they give you a few useful programs now and again.

But I had a look at a few other authors' previews and this is the sort of format you see for a science fiction novel. I hope to put together a longer video later, in the style of a cozy chat with the author. Perhaps I'll play my own music track too! ("No, pleeeez, anything but that!" they cry.)

And if that doesn't work, follow this link to YouTube to see the video.

Towards Better Reading

I picked up a good read. "the Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time", Mark Haddon. The narrator is a youth with Aspergers Syndrome. It's partly funny, partly bleak, partly amazing to see how his mind works. If you want to understand what this syndrome is like, read this!

There's also a writer named Lisa Genova, (her bio says 'holds a Ph.D. in neuroscience') her first novel "Still Alice" narrated by a brilliant neurologist slipping into Alzheimers, and two others she wrote about autism and stroke. Brings these 'ugly' words to life in full colour. Very human stories.

And by the way, The Calling is in print over at CreateSpace. But (and this is where it shows how I'm a beginner on a shoestring) I would seriously like to find an editor willing to help me sharpen it up even more. Perhaps another author who would like some similar help. I've become aware that this issue, the non-editing of independently-published books, is probably the biggest downfall of indie authors like me, in general. It has lead to a mountain of low-quality ebooks and I don't want to add a single pebble to that!

'The Calling' is out there!

Now The Calling is released as an ebook with Amazon Kindle, and very shortly will be available in print with CreateSpace.

The Calling (for those of you just joining the show...) is a science fiction novel written for 8 to 12 year-olds. It will be the first in a series called Beyond The Elder Stars. You can click the link to the right to find out more... but here's a quick snapshot of the story:


The man who saved Valin Derojan's life has been kidnapped by callous raiders from space. To regain his lost honour, Valin must attempt a hopeless rescue.


Merratol, his headstrong younger cousin, is seeking to avenge the murder of her father, and stows away. So he must protect her too! But wait a moment, now who's saving whom?


In the process of the rescue, they are enlisted by an elusive band of freedom fighters and catapulted towards a galaxy-wide war. They are trained to use powerful rings controlled by their own minds. But that means Valin and Merratol must get their raging thoughts and emotions under control. Are they up to the challenge?

Blig Ideas In A Shrinking World

I'm looking forward to making something bigger out of this blog. There's so much potential! I've been slowly contacting a few other authors, and this is what we aim to do:


A Grand Discussion tackling the BIG IDEAS of science fiction!



When?
- Whenever I find the time to organise it! Definitely not before September, hopefully before Christmas.


Who?
- Whoever would like to contribute their comments, but to begin with I'll be getting together with a few like-minded science fiction authors, scientists and engineers, and who knows, perhaps poets and people from other walks of life.


Where?
- Each core contributor who has a blog or web page will host one of the Big Ideas, with handy links to all the others.


Why?

Too often, the 'sci-fi' that's served up publicly is shallow, badly thought through, or more commonly still, shovelled out mainly for profit, pumped full of special-effects hormones, bloated with worn cliches. One reaches 'The End' often with a sense of deja-vu, or possibly with a sense of 'So what?'


And I say, enough!


Yes, noble gentlepeople of intelligence and wit, for too long your minds have been coddled and your eyes made sore with spurious laser blaster fire and convenient sprints into 'hyperspace'. Too many charred corpses have been strewn gratuitously across the page for no thematic reason; too many gelatinous aliens have parachuted into the plot to save an author's hide.


Now it is our destiny to turn the tide and to raise the bar, focus the lens and hoist the mainsail. Ahem.


As I was saying, the online debate will aim to delve into such questions as...


HUMANITY - What does it mean to be human? Or post-human? Where do you draw the line?

MANAGING SPACE - As we expand into space this century and eye asteroids for mining, what ethical and legal basis can we cobble together to guide mining companies?

HOPE - How can we as SF writers encourage scientists and technologists towards a hopeful future instead of the easy dystopian vision that's so common?

ALIENS - What do you think - are they out there? How can you be so sure? If we should meet with some, what would guide our interaction?

SCIENCE - How does SF interact with Science Fact? How best do I research my technology before writing? Does SF encourage real science or cheapen it?

The goals may be a little nebulous right now, but I see it as a way for we writers to develop our craft, to think through the science of our fiction, while building much sturdier bridges to the factual world we live in - to use SF as a lens to focus on the issues that concern everybody. The question of 'Hope' interests me greatly: Is science fiction any use to anyone apart from its writers, readers and viewers? Could it help to inspire scientists towards a better tomorrow?


Please note that this is all still a loose cloud of ideas-in-development. And this means that I welcome suggestions and contributions.


Apologies to Randy Stonehill for the loan and tweaking of his song title.

Too Much Science Fiction?

On the way home from two great weeks in Europe I bought a Peter F Hamilton novel in Heathrow to read on the plane. It tidily vacuumed up the rest of our loose British change, relieving my pocket of a considerable burden. But the book itself was far, far heavier! Wait, let me measure it: over four centimetres thick; 745 pages; I estimate well over 200,000 words. It's taken me nearly a week of dedicated reading to get within a stone's throw of the ending. It has about five separate plot strands, and very few explanations about what's going on.


How can someone write something like this? Has Peter Hamilton actually cloned himself, like some of the characters in his novel, to team-write this colossus?


I only found out that it's Part II of a series after I settled down with it on the Boeing 777 at 32,000 feet over Iceland.

Three Kinds Of Fire

It was a great weekend. It was busy. It was sunny! But finally, in between the soccer game we took the boys and their friends to, and the trip out to the lake,  this collection of three short stories got up there on Smashwords as an ebook.
It contains the first two short stories that I wrote since coming back to Canada - A Kind of Fire, and The Captive Guest. The third one started off as 'Oh, better write a quick short one to add to the other two' - and it turned out the longest! It's a 'what-if' story. The background draws on my past as a batchelor English teacher in the Middle East... What if someone I knew had been kidnapped with little chance of release? What if I'd been challenged to live what I said I believed? It's a kind of allegory too; symbolic of greater things, of the Great Meta-Story. Here's the link:

Three Kinds Of Fire

It's easy enough to sample the first 20% ofthe collection and cheap enough to buy the whole thing. If you want to review it, drop me a comment or email and I'll send you the free coupon code. In fact... Here's the coupon code. For all those who've read this far, go and help yourself to a free copy of the book.

Coupon Code: SK24X (not case sensitive. please don't share the code.)

Enjoy!

Before writing a review you need to register with Smashwords and download the ebook, but it's easy and hassle-free. Don't let that put you off!