2018: A New Hope

Here we are.  The obligatory year in review blog.

2018 will go down in history as an awful year, a year where the American, UK and Australian governments moved even further to the right, made even more unconscionable decisions, and were responsible for even more suffering and deaths.  

Everyone who survived the year will take something different away from it.  For me - and I suspect a lot of us - the most enduring aspect of 2018 was the way that we responded.  The clearest example of this is the March For Our Lives movement, the massive nationwide protests demanding gun reform in America, inspired by yet another mass school shooting.  Unfortunately Trump's government didn't listen, and made no effort to make guns harder to get, so by the time the schools were out for winter, 113 people (mostly students between 6 and seventeen years old) had been killed or injured in 93 incidents of gun violence in American schools.  The survivors of those shootings, the hundreds of thousands of kids who took to the street honestly give me hope for America's future - hope that I hadn't had for the last twenty years.  

On a local level, without the threat of being murdered in their classrooms bringing them together, it was great to see the Australian school children also protest against the Morrison's government's inaction on climate change.

The overall feeling is that people are getting more politically active, and that our schoolchildren are more politically aware than they have been over the last twenty years.  That gives me hope.  

And personally it's been a year of unexpectedly positive results as well.  I mean, I'm still writing this blog.  This is number 21 for the year.  I like that I have begun reviewing Australian Speculative Fiction books on my blog, and am supporting the Australian Spec Fic community in that way, so you can expect more of that next year. 

I received my first acceptance of a piece into an anthology this year - 'Flash Fiction Addiction' by Zombie Pirate Publishing - which shall be published next year.  And through my involvement in the Australian Speculative Fiction group I've helped put together a collection of speculative fiction short stories, 'Beginnings' which I reviewed here, and which features my first ever published story, 'The Teacup' which I am still excited about.

At the start of the year, I wasn't sure if I'd keep at this whole writing and blogging thing.  And it's fair to say I surpassed my expectations.  My first ever short story has been accepted (after first being rejected for another anthology), and the third short story I ever wrote has already been published.  I'm excited to see what 2019 brings!

Thanks to everyone who has read, commented and shared my blog posts.  I hope I've kept you somewhat entertained, and I hope all make it through the holiday period!  See you next year.      

    

    

ASF Book Review #3 - 'Beginnings'

My last Australian Speculative Fiction book review of the year will be something a little different, for two reasons. Instead of a novel, the book is an anthology of short stories.  And it's an anthology that not only features one of my own short stories, but 'Beginnings: Australian Speculative Fiction Anthology Vol. 1' is something that I helped put together as well.

In the middle of 2018 there was a post in a Facebook writing group asking if other Australian authors who wrote speculative fiction would want to create their own group for supporting each other, for sharing writing advice. And so the Australian Speculative Fiction group was formed.  From there, it was only a short while before we had the idea to create our own anthology.  Six months later, we released 'Beginnings' - which makes it sound easy. It was not easy. But we did it. And here it is - isn't that cover amazing, by the way?

Firstly, what I love about this collection of short stories is the diversity.  While there may be a few sci-fi or fantasy stories, each is unique and takes you on a very different journey.  One of the benefits of this is that it exposes the reader to different genres than they would normally read - personally I've never been interested in the paranormal/supernatural genres (witches, werewolves and vampires), two of my favourite stories in 'Beginnings' are about witches - 'The Morrigan' by Maddie Jensen and 'Dealt in Sin' by Sasha Hanton.

Between stories set amongst the stars are tales set in our own backyard.  Stephen Herczeg's 'Bus Trip' is about a student taking the bus home from Canberra to Adelaide for the Christmas holidays. Belinda Brady's 'Break the Spell' gives me the familiar imagery of Melbourne's Royal Arcade. 'When the Lights Went Out' (Lachlan Walter) is an intriguing sci-fi piece set in the Victorian countryside, and Rebecca Dale's 'Bugles Bred & Bugles Born' centres around the unbelievable events at one of Sydney's Westfield shopping centres.  'Bugles Bred & Bugles Born' is one of the most unique stories in the anthology, and honestly I don't know how to define or describe it, but the ending still sends shivers up my spine it's that good.

The theme of 'Beginnings' is explored in a variety of ways, from starting life over in a new city ('The Teacup' - Austin P. Sheehan) from starting over alone on a brand new world ('Portals' - A. A. Warne) and from the transition from life to the afterlife ('Next Journey' by Chris Foley and 'The Beginning of the End' by Carolyn Young).

Amongst a collection so diverse, it should be hard to pick a favourite. But 'The Inheritance Experiment' by Kel E. Fox is an absolute standout. It's the story of an Austrian girl, stolen from her family home and subjected to horrible experiments, before being flung into the carnage of World War One. It's a compelling story, and - like every good short story should - it leaves the reader wanting more.

In conclusion, this is a thoroughly enjoyable collection of diverse short stories. There's something in there for everyone, and many of the stories are so good they're worth re-reading.

Here's a link to the Aussie Speculative Fiction website, for information about the group, where you can read more reviews of books by Australian Speculative Fiction authors, and see exclusive flash fiction pieces and author interviews.

Here's a link where you can buy the 'Beginnings' Anthology where it's currently being sold exclusively through Amazon.

An Investigation of Dragons

Back in August I wrote 'A Critique of Dragons' where - as part of my research into Dragons for my NaNoWriMo project 'Dragons of Bern' - I discussed the way dragons were presented in various works of literature; 'THE GREAT ZOO OF CHINA' by Matthew Reilly , 'DRAGON HEART' by Cecelia Holland, 'DRAGON KEEPER' by Robin Hobb and the 'EARTHSEA' cycle by Le Guin.

Continuing the exploration of the portrayal of dragons, I've since read 'TALON' by Julie Kagawa, 'TOOTH AND CLAW' by Jo Walton, 'SERAPHINA' by Rachel Hartman and McCaffrey's 'DRAGONFLIGHT' - some very wonderful and diverse books.  Of course, I am not reviewing the books themselves, just the dragons themselves.

Let's start with 'TALON' (by Julie Kagawa).  Shapeshifting dragons.  Dragons in human form, in our world, pretending to be human, living their whole lives out as human beings.  Being hunted down by an elite, top-secret military organisation - the Order of St. George.  Ember and Dante Hill are two hatchlings who - in human form - are sixteen-year-old siblings, being introduced into the human population for the first time. The existence of their dragon community is the greatest secret on the planet, and they must restrain their natural impulses, and never transform into their dragon selves under any circumstances.

There are some very clever things in this book, and I like the way that the protagonist Ember has two selves, her 'human' self and her 'dragon' self, which both have conflicting ideas about certain other humans and certain other dragons.  How were the dragons portrayed though?  They were a more instinctive, much larger and scarier version of the character's human selves.  The whole concept of shapeshifting from human form into dragon form is too much of a stretch for me, though.  There's just such a massive size discrepancy, where does all that mass come from/go when they transform?

Next is 'SERAPHINA' which is Rachel Hartman's debut novel.  It's an outstanding debut, and I really enjoyed it.  But we're here for the dragons.  This novel is set on a different world, in the Kingdom of Goredd, which it about to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the truce between draonkind and their Kingdom. Seraphina, the protagonist, is the music mistress at the royal court, herself under the tutelage of Orma, who is a dragon in human form living amongst the human population.  Shapeshifting dragons again?  Yes indeed.  Disaster strikes the Kingdom when Prince Rufus is murdered prior to the arrival of the Ardmagar, the leader of the Dragons.

Despite the shapeshifting element of the dragons - again a stretch too far - the dragons in Hartman's novel are very interesting.  They are generally emotionless, supremely logical beings with their own political structures. Throughout the story it's shown that throughout their conflicts and wars with humanity, they've learned from us, and there's been a significant cultural change where instead of hoarding gold they now hoard other values like intelligence.  I especially like this because it brings them to life even more - ideas values, and ways of thinking do change over time, and it speaks of the depth and complexity of their species.

'TOOTH AND CLAW' by Jo Walton really took me by surprise.  I didn't know what to expect when I picked it up, but I fell in love with it really quickly.  It's a regency romance (think Pride and Prejudice) but all the characters are dragons.  Throughout the country, there live common servant dragons and dragons of noble rank, such as Exalted, August, Majestic, Illustrious, Dignified and Respected. This story focuses on the family of Dignified Bon Agornin, who begins the story on his deathbed, and what becomes of Respected Avan, Blessed Penn and the sisters Respected Selendra and Haner.  While they have titles, they have very little in terms of wealth and size. 

These dragons are portrayed so well; they sleep on beds of gold coins, the bigger and stronger can develop the ability to breathe fire, the Blessed (the priests) bind their wings and do not fly, the servants have their wings bound and are not permitted to fly.  The society is so well divided into the haves and have-nots, and as you may have suspected, a lot of the story revolves around finding acceptable partners of noble rank.  They're intelligent, they're all unique individuals with their own values - greed, love, equality, honour, for example.

And finally, 'DRAGONFLIGHT: THE FIRST CHRONICLE OF PERN' by Anne McCaffrey which some may say is an even more iconic Dragon series than Le Guin's 'Earthsea.'  Well, it's got a lot more dragons in it.  Pern is a planet, colonised by humans, and highly empathetic humans with an innate telepathic ability have the ability to bond with and fly the Dragons.  Over hundreds of years, the reason for the existence of these Dragonriders has been forgotten, and only one of their Weyrs remain inhabited. But soon they're going to be needed more than ever.

The dragons in this tale are certainly the more traditional type of dragon.  They are divided into classes by their colours, gold dragons are queens, the large brown dragons are the ones best suited for combat, and there are also smaller green dragons and so on.  It is only the queens, the golden dragons, that can lay eggs.  And a dragon will only bond with one human in it's lifetime.  It's a complicated system that works.  The dragons can communicate with each other telepathically, and with their bonded rider.  They have their own intelligence and wisdom - and this is the thing that irked me about the book, that the humans made all the decisions, all the plans without consulting their dragons.  Those dragons may have a wealth of helpful ideas and abilities that aren't being used because the humans are too pig-headed to ask.

So what is there to learn from these stories?  None of the dragons really came across as terrifying deadly monsters - the scariest were in 'Talon,' and given the protagonist is a dragon herself, it was kind of hard to be afraid of them.  A common theme amongst these four stories were the communities the dragons lived in, the way their societies were structured.  The dragons in 'Talon' were part of a secretive organisation, with clear ranks and roles assigned.  In 'Tooth and Claw' dragons had a complex system of nobility, birthright and marriage, as well as legal and political structures.  In 'Seraphina' the actual political system wasn't thoroughly explored, but they certainly had a complex society with a ruler, ambassadors to the human Kingdoms, as well as a rigid system of punishment for dragons who broke the law.  The Dragons of 'Pern' had a really interesting almost symbiotic relationship with their human riders, and the riders of the dragon queen and her mate were given the positions of the leaders of the Weyrs.  It was really interesting to explore these different political and social structures during the reading of these books.  I've learned that the old saying "no man is an island" applies equally to dragons.  They too have families, peers, leaders and social and political structures.   

Over the next few months I shall read Novik's 'HIS MAJESTY's DRAGON,' Goodman's 'EON,' Pratchett's 'GUARDS! GUARDS!' and 'THE DRAGON DIARY' by Steer. Of course, feel free to suggest your favourite dragon novels as well!