New Genre Wednesdays: Bildungsresume

A genre focusing on the growth of a protagonist from youth to maturity, with an emphasis on employability skills. Through successive encounters, the protagonist gradually builds up a not-verifiably-false CV. The Bildungsresume often begins with its youthful protagonist embarking on a long and hazardous journal.

Hustley Tuesdays: Sibilant Fricatives

Did you know that Adam Roberts's book Sibilant Fricatives, which collects his essays and reviews of science fiction and fantasy books and movies, is completely different from his blog Sibilant Fricatives, where he posts essays and reviews of science fiction and fantasy books and movies? I didn't!

The ebook is a snip at £3.42. It includes, for instance, the David Blaine-ish endurance magic of reviewing the entire of Robert Jordon's Wheel of Time cycle, without ever being made to, or wanting to; it includes a review of The Hobbit which delves into the nitty-gritty of the rewriting Tolkien did himself, long before Peter Jackson started messing with canon; it includes an emulsion-wistful review which Greg Egan was inspired to anatomise as a Hatchet Job; and it includes an introduction by Paul Kincaid: "[...] I like to think I was invited to introduce this collection of his reviews because of those disagreements, not in spite of them."

The title relates to Roberts's tacit suggestion that fandom should refer to the object of our love with a sort of pervasive hissing, as if we didn't already:

'SF', when spoken aloud [...] is never, I think, pronounced as it is spelled, in part because there is something tongue-twistish about the cramming together of a sibilant and a fricative after this fashion. [...] But the difficulty of juxtaposing sibilant and fricative appeals to me as a small symbol of the larger, creative difficulty of the genre as a whole. SF ought to be difficult. The melding of science (technology, philosophy) and fiction (aesthetics and narrative) best not be facile, and SF in which this blend is too painlessly presented is generally bad SF.

Compare one of Stephen Sondheim's harrowing "love arse" masterclasses (YouTube):

Hustley Tuesdays: Accessing the Future

Another shout-out for The Future Fire's Accessing the Future Indiegogo. From the futuristic furnaces whence came Outlaw Bodies and We See A Different Frontier anthologies.

Over at Paper Knife, a conversation between the editors and Maureen Kincaid Speller about how not to do disability SF.

Hustley Tuesdays: Growstuff

Support a free and open worldwide food-growing database.

SFF names #4: Beth Bradley

The name Beth Bradley appears to be a bid for innocuousness -- a bit of a humblebradley, maybe -- and it has all the hallmarks of a particular school of YA heroine-naming. You are going for a kind of Austenian inscrutability and vague pleasantness. Think of Austen's Emma Woodhouse, Charlotte Lucas, Catherine Morland, or Elizabeth Bennett, how neutral, collected and deadpan they sound to modern ears. Perhaps to contemporary ears, alas that none now prick.

First, you should probably choose a plausibly common surname, plausibly white and British or American, plausibly middle class or lower-middle-class. Perhaps, as C.S. Lewis did with the name Pevensie, choose a toponymic surname. Bradley is in fact one of those. Otherwise, get her an occupational surname, but archaic enough that the toil it might imply has mostly crumbled away, picturesquely, and been ruffled over, quaintly, by moss: Miller, Weaver, Fletcher, Potter. (Or just choose Moss, or Morris: as in Myfanwy Morris). Too much work in Farmer, so it doesn't quite work.

Second, choose a plausibly common first name as well. Of course it does not literally have to be common: it just has to be plausibly common, which approximates to "common in recentish English literature." Clearly, you can get away with a less plausibly common first name if your surname manages to look very plausibly common, and vice-versa.

Beth Bradley. Not Elizabeth Bradley. Three to four syllables, over the full name, is your sweet spot. Anapestic prosody nice but not essential. (Is "Beth Bradly" the elusive antibacchius, BTW?)

Useful associations: any associations of poise, of petiteness, of balance, of warmth, of leafiness (the place-name Bradley meant "broad wood"), of mousiness, of chastity, of castles (Lewis's "Pevensie" is castle-ish by virtue of its appearance in Kipling's Puck of Pook's Hill; also compare Bradley Fighting Vehicle), of domestic interiors, of charity, of economic preciousness, and of prettiness. But don't overdo any of those associations: you want to be on the Sally Lockhart, Kitty Jones, Holly Short, Nora Grey, Nancy Drew side of Wendy Darling and Bella Swan.

Of course, if a somewhat stern first name can abbreviate into something fun, that's a plus: hence too many YA Cats. Hence for that matter Myffy Morris.

Hence Alexandra to Alex, Al, Lex. If Jane Austen had only known: Em Woodhouse, Cat Morland -- there, another Cat already -- Lottie Lucas, Beth Bennett. Yes, Lottie and Beth, not Charlie and Liz: because above all, you must alliterate.

Alliteration recalls perhaps a world of comics. Liz Bradley would not correctly evoke the feats of heroes like Wonder Woman or Ms. Marvel, the sniveling mediocrity of their everywoman alter egos like Clark Kent, Peter Parker, Susan Storm or Kamala Khan, the dastardly schemes of their antagonists like Lex Luthor, the love of their love interests like Lois Lane and Pepper Potts, or even the forgettable interventions of forgettable bit parts like -- well I truly believe they are out there too.



Jupiter Jones and Peter Pan will tell you the alliterative thing is not just down to Stan Lee.

Is that it? Is that all there is to the name Beth Bradley?

To be continued!

Tribal Loyalty

"This is because our predictions are about the future only in the most superficial way. They are really advertisements, conversation pieces, declarations of tribal loyalty – or, as with Irving Fisher, statements of profound conviction about the logical structure of the world." Tim Harford at the FT on superforecasting.

From "Invasion of the Space Invaders" (1982)

By Martis Amis.

Lunar Lander is a game for owlish adolescents and gentle old hippies. It is qualitatively different from any other game. Most video creations stress a certain sort of game-activity. Missile Command is a game of interception, Lunar Rescue of dodging, PacMan of munch-accumulation (which perhaps explains why it is the only video game with any kind of following among women). Most games, of course, are games of blasting, wasting, creaming, smashing. Lunar Lander, on the other hand, is simply a game of landing.

No ghouls or hellcats lurk on the rocky moon where Lander lands; no rockets, photons or zipships buzz its slow descent. This is a game without aliens, without adversaries. The only enemy is the player’s own hamfistedness.

Like Asteroids, the Lunar screen is simply a matter of outline, white on black. The effect is well-defined, pristine, classy: it makes many of the more colourful games look like an infant’s paintbox or a cutprice carpet. The Lander’s module comes bleeping in over the spiky terrain. Various landing sites are indicated – graded according to difficulty (though I confess that I’ve never really seen the difference: once you get down to Landing, they’re all pretty much the same). Rotating right or left, and steadying the pod with deft surges on the reverse-thrust console, the Lander picks his spot and gingerly / descends, counteracting the simulated gravitational pull, friction and momentum.

As you home in on the flat landing-pad, the game pulls its best stunt: you switch to close-up. The landing then becomes a question of ticklish fine-tuning, as you adjust and correct and over-correct and re-adjust for touchdown. There are several grades of landing (good, hard, crash), as indeed there are four grades of ‘mission’ (Training, Cadet, Prime and Command – selectable at the beginning of the game), and points are awarded accordingly. The controls are beautifully responsive, though on any mission more advanced than Training you are going to have frequent recourse to the Abort button, which gives you escape thrust and resets the display for a fresh attempt. That little pod goes twirling out of control very easily, and no amount of thrust will tame it back into line. The top of the screen is adorned with altimeters and speedos and fuel readings, most of which can be safely ignored. Don’t bother with the readouts: just put more money in the slot.

Elsewhere: Mark O'Connell, "The Arcades Project."

Hypothesis Thursdays: Don't Imagine That

What is sometimes called speculative fiction or imaginative literature can just as easily operate through the suppression of some speculative or imaginative element which is ordinarily active in everyday life.

New Genre Wednesdays: New New Space Opera

Damien G. Walter on new new space opera.

Hustley Tuesdays: Accessing the Future

Consider supporting Accessing the Future, an anthology of disability-themed speculative fiction, on Indiegogo. They've hit the target, but at $7000 they go pro market. Some juicy story / novella crit perks still available too.

Elsewhere: The Future Fire.