A Temporary Matter

I started my Sunday by reading an article about Earth Hour, which took place yesterday at 8:00 p.m. around much of the world. In honor of Earth Hour, national landmarks across the globe dimmed their lights. Citizens were encouraged to turn off any non-essential lights, computers, and appliances. People in many countries turned Earth Hour into a celebration. In Greece folks strolled through the streets with candles (that must have been pretty). Australians enjoyed candlelit dinners and beach bonfire parties.

The next thing I picked up to read was "A Temporary Matter," a short story from Jhumpa Lahiri's collection, Interpreter of Maladies. The premise of the story revolved around a scheduled blackout. In order to repair local power lines, a young couple would be without power starting from 8:00 p.m. for exactly one hour. The similarity of the couple's situation to Earth Hour struck me (although unlike Earth Hour, this blackout would be repeated throughout the week until the lines were repaired).

For the characters in "A Temporary Matter," these scheduled hours of darkness were the time when they came to terms with a tragic event that had damaged their relationship. Being alone in the dark together, lighting candles, telling stories, reconnected them. Now, the morning after Earth Hour, we read that the globally scheduled hour of darkness not only represented environmental responsibility and hope for the future, but that it brought people together on both a global and local level.

Why is it so much easier for human beings to connect in the dark, their meeting lit only by flickering candles? Something about the darkness makes us shed just enough of our individual defenses to connect with others. Perhaps our reaction is simply a throwback to our primitive past, huddled in the darkness with only a fire and our companions for warmth. And certainly part of the answer is that when we are cut off from the distractions of our modern lives, and have nothing to pay attention to but the people around us, we suddenly realize that they're there.

Find the lost ring

The ARG, or alternate reality game, is a new interactive way of telling stories that became popular with the I Love Bees ARG promoting the release of Halo2. Now the producer of I Love Bees has set another ARG in motion, this one called The Lost Ring.

A look around The Lost Ring website reminds me of a series of mystery puzzle game books I enjoyed years ago. Those books were filled with photographs of newspaper clippings, theater tickets, bloody handkerchiefs, and other random clues which, with the help of disjoint textual description, the reader had to organize and use to solve the mystery. The Lost Ring site is the HTML version of those old puzzle books- which means that you can zoom in on the photos and scraps of paper, and nearly all the clues are linked to other clues, or to web pages that contain further information. Many of these links take you to "real world" websites, so that an ARG character tells some of his or her story on his blog, Flikr page, or has uploaded You Tube videos related to the game.

But The Lost Ring is more than an evolved You-Solve-It mystery book. The game is well-endowed with ARG hallmarks- a spec fictional story element, timeliness that makes the story feel live and relevant, tied to the time in which it is played, and interactivity that connects players of the game.

A sense of the spec fictional is conveyed through a combination of the mystical-historical with the scientific, an aesthetic you can grasp by the images on the clues (owls, old statues, brain scans). The sense of timeliness was created by linking the story to the upcoming 2008 Summer Olympic Games in China. This sense of timeliness makes the story experience unique- something that only makes sense to participate in during the spring and summer of 2008.

The element of The Lost Ring that first caught my attention was its use of Esperanto. In the opening video trailer for the game, I noticed a mysterious tattoo that read "Trovu la ringon perditan" (Find the lost ring). Many of the clues are written in Esperanto. In addition, the six main characters in the story speak six different languages! This adds an interesting layer to the interactive element of the game. Since it is unlikely the average participant can speak Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, German, French, Portuguese, and English, cooperation between players of different national and linguistic backgrounds is essential to unlocking the mystery.

ARGs already have a history of interactivity- people meeting at phone booths to receive an important clue, participants blogging, creating wikis, and working together to solve the puzzles. The Lost Ring has taken that interactivity one step farther. By encouraging interaction between people of different cultures, The Lost Ring becomes more than a game, more than a story. It's becoming a global event.

Arthur C. Clarke

16 December 1917 - 19 March 2008

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
-Arthur C. Clarke

The Road Home

A friend loaned us The Road Home (Wo de fu qin mu qin) to watch over the weekend. Spec fiction movie lovers may recognize the film's leading lady, Ziyi Zhang, from her role in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Don't expect any fantastical fighting in The Road Home- this film isn't speculative, but it is extraordinarily well-made and beautiful. Contrast, in color and in motion, makes The Road Home a memorable and emotional experience.

Color: Scenes from the modern day portion of the story, in which an elderly woman mourns her recently deceased husband, were shot in black and white. In contrast, the flashback to the courtship of the woman and her husband, blossom into full-blown, gorgeous color. All the hope, youth, joy, and promise of the woman's life are portrayed by her bright red and pink coats, the striking green ribbons tied at the ends of her pigtails, the red banner she weaves, even the vibrant colors of the birch trees in the beautiful autumn countryside. Color remains an important part of the plot, as red becomes the color that first attracts boy to girl. When the love story ends, the viewer is brought back to the present, brought back to black and white.

Motion: Since I don't speak Mandarin, I watched the film subtitled in English- yet I could have almost watched the flashback portion of the film with the sound and subtitles turned off. Ziyi Zhang portrayed most of her character's longing, hope, despair, and joy by running through the village, running through the woods. Whether to catch a glimpse of her would-be lover, to let him catch a glimpse of her red jacket, to bring him food he might or might not eat, The Road Home told much of its story through the act of running motion. This makes the moments when the protagonist stands still heartbreaking and poignant.

Cinema is moving picture, and director Yimou Zhang combines motion and skillful manipulation of colorful image to turn the story of a village woman into a memorable cinematic experience.

Duma Key had me at hello

Several weeks ago when I posted about the Kindle's bestseller lists in science fiction, fantasy, and horror, I mentioned that King held three of the top five places in the list. Now he holds two of the top five (his number five usurped by Scott Smith). But King's latest novel, Duma Key, still holds strong at number one. Duma Key also ranks #2 in horror in Amazon's paper bound bookstore.

There's no doubt King's well-known name helps Duma Key climb bestseller lists. Yet I can't help but wonder whether the extraordinarily strong opening of the book isn't responsible for a lot of those sales. Whether readers downloaded the first sample chapter of the novel on their Kindle, downloaded the free PDF sample from Amazon's product description page, or flipped through the first chapters in a brick and mortar store- there's no doubt that something magical was going on in those first few chapters, and I'll bet readers sensed it. To quote a favorite saying of Melinda, eldest daughter of Duma Key's protagonist, this novel "had me at hello."

I think King's depiction of his damaged protagonist in the opening chapters is some of his best writing. The horror element of those initial pages isn't supernatural in the least- hospital beds, blinding pain, rage, confusion- are all very real. Details, such as the words printed on the seat belt that pressed near the protagonist's face during the accident that ended his "first life," are just as terrible, perhaps more terrible, than the supernatural horror story that follows.

Can such a strong beginning sustain so high a level of quality through nearly 600 hardcover pages? In the case of Duma Key, the answer is no.

As the protagonist began his journey of rebuilding his "second life," King began to use the familiar (and fun) patterns of supernatural fiction writing, and some of the raw energy of the opening was lost. One of the strengths of the body of the novel was repetition of themes embodied through specific details of everyday life. The novel's biggest weakness was a long stretch of "too good to be true" fortune and friendship forging, that bordered on too ideal and too sweet for me, even if King constantly held the threat of ominous mojo coming to ruin it all.

And, though the climax of the novel held my attention and made me hold my breath, I could almost see the bones of the story outline poking through the flesh of the narrative. King brought the story to a satisfying conclusion, but he didn't get the job done with anywhere near the skill and insight that he used to open it.

Although the stunning quality of the opening waned, Duma Key is still one of my supernatural fiction favorites. It was a fun, satisfying read. My criticism is that the superb opening made me expect something more of the middle and the end.

Oh- and I may never be able to face a rag doll again. Especially if its hair is RED.

The King of Kong and the Art of Conflict

I was less than thrilled when my husband announced that our movie night featured a documentary about video games. The documentary would cover two gamers fighting for the record high score in the original arcade classic, Donkey Kong.

The King of Kong turned out to be an engaging and memorable story, one that generated a lot of conversation and speculation after the film, and that days later is still on my mind. Given that I am not a classic video game fanatic, why did I get so excited about this documentary?

The King of Kong used conflict as the combustion engine of its story telling machine. But this conflict was made even more interesting by using three techniques:

1) The makers of the documentary clearly picked a "hero" and a "villain." As a viewer, I was rooting for the newcomer on the arcade gaming scene, Steve Wiebe, to overtake Billy Mitchell's long-standing high score record. Mitchell's machinations to preserve his record and shun Wiebe's acceptance to the arcade gaming community, made me feel that Steve Wiebe was a hard-working, genuinely nice guy, and that Billy Mitchell was a jerk.

2) Although they had clearly sided with Wiebe, the makers of the documentary left one niggling doubt about Wiebe's integrity. They also kept the conflict balanced by demonstrating that Mitchell was an extremely skilled gamer, and by including a sub-plot (coaching an elderly Q*Bert champ), in which Mitchell could show his human side.

3) Walter Day, the arbiter of the conflict (who was shown throughout most of the documentary in a black and white referee costume), faced trying to balance fairness to Wiebe and loyalty to Mitchell. Day's difficult emotional journey showed that successful resolution of the conflict was vital to more than just the contestants.

These techniques kept me engaged in the conflict and rooting for the hero. At the same time, I was intrigued by the possibility that Mitchell might have some honest (or at least not so blatantly self-serving) motivation for shunning Wiebe. I was also intrigued to watch Day's journey, as he made mistakes, agonized, then tried to live up to his pledge of integrity.

Invincible Banana fails to say it all

My husband was sorting through the flotsam of papers on my desk in search of scratch paper. He picked up one of the scraps, read it, then asked,

"What does invincible banana mean?"

I remembered writing Invincible Banana on a sheet of paper one night shortly before bed. It was one of those flashes of story ideas that hold a lot of promise when I first think of them. Usually I jot the idea down somewhere, think about it for awhile, and decide if I can develop it into something exciting. I know I had some pretty concrete ideas about a story I would title "Invincible Banana." Unfortunately, other than the title and the memory of my own excitement, I remember nothing useful about the story- like the plot, situation, characters.

I learned several things from this experience: 1) clean my desk more often, 2) don't leave crazy stuff around where my husband can read it and laugh at me 3) make more detailed notes even if I have a mouthful of toothpaste, and 4) "Invincible Banana" was probably not a good story title, because the title tells me (and the reader) nothing about the story.

I blogged earlier this week about a story called "St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves" by Karen Russell. The title encapsulates the magical realism element of the story (something normal, something fantastic), describes the setting (St. Lucy's Home), describes primary characters in the story (girls raised by wolves), and even hints at the story's main conflict (civilization vs. the wild life). Wow, now that is a title that would make sense unearthed from scraps of grocery store receipts and junk mail- and, by the way, it would also make a lot of sense to a reader about to embark on the story.

Listening to T.C. Boyle read Tobias Wolffe's "Bullet in the Brain" in a New Yorker Fiction podcast, I was struck by the story's title. "Bullet in the Brain" is a very short story, and approximately half the drama happens before the critical event of the bullet entering the protagonist's brain. So I asked myself: wasn't Wolffe cutting the tension of the drama by telling us what was going to happen before we even started the story? Well, having heard "Bullet in the Brain" read out loud, my response was that the "giveaway" title didn't do anything to destroy the drama. Why? Part of the answer is that the heart of the story occurs after the bullet has breached the skull of the protagonist's brain. But there is also an element of tragicomedy present in the first half of the story, that makes the tension of the moments before the bullet is fired worse, because we know (or strongly suspect) what's going to happen. Since readers know the protagonist is going to get shot in the head, we're biting our nails as the protagonist goads the gunman. If the reader believed the protagonist might somehow escape his fate, the tension would be lessened.

As much as I enjoy the koan-like sense of wonder evoked by the two word titles of J-Pop bands like Swinging Popsicle, Crispy Park, Berry Roll, Browny Circus, I have my doubts about this kind of ambiguous , two-word title for a short story. What makes these band names cool (at least for me) is that they open up my mind in the attempt to figure out what the heck they mean. But in a short story every word counts. In most cases, something as important as the first words should focus the reader's mind, or do something to help the reader grasp the context or content of the story. And in instances like "Bullet in the Brain," the title can manipulate building tension in the plot.

Of course, I'm sure there are great short stories out there with intriguingly vague titles. I'd like hear about some of your favorites.

St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves

Listening to a recent PRI Selected Shorts podcast I encountered a delightful example of magical realism. The short story's title, "St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves" practically defines magical realism: a fantastic premise treated as casually as any normal part of life.

The premise for the story is classic spec fiction stuff, and could easily produce a fantasy, science fiction, or even supernatural or horror tale. But instead of spinning the speculative premise into fictional world, Russell inserted the fantastic premise into the real world- then made it squirm to fit in. The conflict of the story becomes whether or not these weird, wild little girls will be tamed by the sisters of St. Lucy's, and eventually be able to adapt to normal life.

Strengths of the story include the use of concrete detail to make the girls raised by wolves and St. Lucy's Home seem equally real. And a liberal use of humor endears the protagonist and her sisters to the reader through her innocent, and often funny candor. But I think what really makes the story tick is that magical realism is so central to its conflict. The bizarre isn't simply present in the real world- the bizarre world and the normal world actually vie for the girls' fates. I'm interested to read some further magical realism, and to see whether this conflict between the real and the fantastic is a core convention of magical realism.

Kindle sci-fi and fantasy bestsellers

We had a request to follow up on what's happening with the Amazon Kindle's spec fiction bestseller lists. It is three months to the day I posted about the front runners at the Kindle's launch, so it seems like a good time take another look.

In science fiction, classics continue to dominate the top sellers, with Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five occupying the number one slot, and Orwell's 1984 right behind at second. In November these two classics rated in the top 300 of overall Kindle sales, and both have now moved up to around the top 200 in Kindle sales. Video game tie-ins have given way to the newest military SF by Nebula winner Elizabeth Moon, and yet another science fiction classic, Brave New World.

In fantasy, Gregory Maguire's Wicked continues to hold its own near the top of the bestseller list. Wicked has fallen from #1 to #2 in fantasy, and has fallen from the top 150 to the top 250 in Kindle's overall sales. Number three in fantasy is World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks, and number four is Gaiman's Stardust.

Here's an interesting piece of zeitgeist: the stunning success of the Dresden Files series on the spec fiction Kindle bestseller lists. Author Jim Butcher's Storm Front occupies the number 4 slot in science fiction and the number 5 slot in fantasy. Not only that, his White Night: A Novel of the Dresden Files is number one in fantasy. Not too shabby.

In horror, King continues to dominate, with three of the top five bestsellers. King's novels alternate with books by Kim Harrison.

The Taste of Tea

I've been having a lot of fun watching Japanese films. I'd begun to see a few themes emerge (life in Tokyo vs. rural life, connection with nature, connection with community, and, unexpected to me, a fascination with music and dance). Then I popped Cha no Aji (The Taste of Tea) into the DVD player and was dropped into a whole new experience of Japanese culture.

In a way The Taste of Tea was more what I was expecting out of a Japanese film: characters who are anime artists, bizarre events of the type I'd expect to see animated in a manga. When these fantastic elements are combined with an exploration of what it means to be human, the result is a film that can look at disappointment and loss with a gentle playfulness.

I had heard The Taste of Tea called a "surreal" version of Ingmar Bergman. Maybe its the last vestiges of my Midwestern upbringing, but I'd say Bergman has his own claim to surreal. I'd call the Taste of Tea a "happy" Bergman. It's an oversimplification, but where Bergman plays with his idea of what it means to be human on the dramatic stage of the creepy and macabre, The Taste of Tea approaches the same theme with childlike excess and humorous fantasy.

Who is Dagny Taggart?: a love story

It took me a long time to read Atlas Shrugged- no surprise, since Wikipedia counts it at 645,000 words. It also took awhile for me to shake out of the polarized morality of Ayn Rand's world and get a grip on what I'd read.

Atlas Shrugged is a romance novel. Set aside what you've heard about Rand's philosophical masterpiece and look at the protagonist's path. Our beautiful young heroine, Dagny Taggart, is torn between her ardent lovers. All three men want her desperately. But when Dagny first encounters the man of her dreams, she swoons, and he holds her in his arms and gently carries her to his bed.

The difference between Atlas Shrugged and the typical Harlequin romance, is that Dagney runs a railroad. Dagney's profession isn't just a way to get our heroine into a demure gray suit that she sheds to show her stunning sexuality in a black party dress (although that does happen). And her profession is not meant to later attest to what's "really important" to her (ie., her femininity and role as a lover and wife). In fact, Dagney's profession is so intrinsically bound to her personality, her character, her essence, that Dagney is her profession. What's more, the men who fall at her feet, one by one, are in love with her precisely because she embodies the spirit of competence and professionalism.

Turns out Dagney embodies one more important ideal, the ideal beyond Objectivism that lies at the heart of the book: Dagney represents the potential of the individual to love herself.

The magic of Atlas Shrugged is the fact that Rand was able to embody her ideal in her main character, and at the same time, make that protagonist so human, so real, so worthy of the reader's understanding and compassion. Dagney's journey is the journey of coming to embrace the ideal of self-love, and at the same time, she has always been the ideal. It's beautiful and skillful writing.

Unfortunately, as Rand builds to the climax of the novel, she devolves into droning, boring exposition, in which Galt gives a speech to extemporize Rand's philosophy (Wikipedia counts this dreadful speech at 56 pages long, and though Wikipedia mentioned Atlas Shrugged is one of the longest novels ever written, it fails to mention this is one of the longest chunks of exposition anyone has ever been forced to read). Rand's attempt to explain her philosophy in prose deadens the innate feeling of "rightness" she had cultivated in the reader by simply following Dagney's journey. This made the ending of the book resonate a bit less for me. But the self-discovery journey in which Dagney learns what she is truly worth, learns that she is Love, was intense and captivating.

Neverwhere

My copy of Neverwhere ended with an interview of the author in which he mentioned that I had just read the American version (as opposed to the UK or international version) of the book. One of the most enjoyable aspects of the book for me concerned descriptions London's geography, and in fact Gaiman embellished these for the benefit of those who aren't intimately familiar with London.

Neverwhere was originally written as a television script, and Gaiman saw the novelization as an opportunity to more fully realize his own vision of the tale. For me the book felt like one of the coolest plot outlines I've ever read, but, the novel failed to feel fully fleshed out. Epic events took place in the space of a few pages. Based on the book's intriguing premise, the compelling direction of the plot, satisfying world building details, and what Gaiman had told us about the characters, I often perceived the weight of a scene intellectually, but failed to feel the tightness in my chest, the wrench in my gut, that meant I had connected with the characters on an empathetic level.

In his interview, Gaiman mentioned that his protagonist was meant to be an Everyman, dull and plain, with a good heart and good intentions. Richard Mayhew fits the role Gaiman intended so well, that parts of his anatomy could be snapping off and I found I simply did not care. Door, the girl for whom Mayhew gave up "his life, his identity and everything else" is described by Gaiman as heroine, "for want of a better word." With the exception of a scene in which she walks through her murdered family's magical home, and in which she has a necklace made by a blacksmith, Door certainly didn't seem like a heroine to me, and rarely seemed worth all Richard's trouble.

The ideas, the world, and the main plot points of Neverwhere were the stuff of an enchanting adult fairytale. These elements deserved a longer treatment, with more engaging protagonists and pacing that took the time to make the reader squirm.

London Smog

When the yellow pea soup of London's famous fog came up in two different books I was reading this weekend (Neverwhere, Niel Gaiman and Thunderstruck, Erik Larson), I had to look into the phenomenon.

The most interesting article I found on the web was from the EPA. The EPA was less interested in yellow pea soup as grounds for creepy historical ambiance than as an early environmental crisis. London's noxious fog was produced by burning soft sea coal- a cheap alternative to burning wood (or later, the harder anthracite coal). The soft sea coal gave off about as much smoke as it did heat, and belched out the chimneys of homes and factories to blend with the hovering water vapor, and coat the city in thick, yellow smog that sometimes lurked for days.

The EPA article cites London's first environmental legislation at 1272, when King Edward I banned the use of sea coal literally on pain of death. But the EPA article points out that by then wood was scarce (forests had already been plundered to build the city and to heat its dense population's wood burning stoves), and because wood was scarce, it was expensive. Despite the fact that Edward actually had the first sea coal-burning offender put to death, folks kept on using sea coal. See, the king couldn't kill the whole swarm Londonders who didn't have the money to keep warm any other way. The pressure of their need and numbers overrode environmental legislation, and continued to do so until 1952, when a four day immersion in yellow pea soup killed about 4,000 people.

The deaths, the phenomenon of indigent children hired to light a pedestrian's way through the fog, and the pea soup nickname, have become a way for modern writers to evoke the ambiance of London's past. But imagine living through that smog. Imagine being Tolkien, imagine being Shakespeare (The EPA article points out that Shakespeare lived through these fogs, and its influence is evidenced by Macbeth's witches: "fair is foul, and foul is fair: Hover through the fog and filthy air"). Pea-soupers weren't some quirky phenomenon from the past, they were the smelly smoke of poverty, of deprivation and environmental catastrophe that you could taste on your tongue, wipe from your skin. It settled in your clothes and hair, penetrated lungs and brought out great coughing wads of mucous. It was the cost of building a great city, and the cost of surviving there and maintaining a decent standard of living.

Talk Talk

Don't let the title of T.C. Boyle's 2006 novel fool you. The book isn't about talk, it's about communication. Boyle uses a deaf protagonist to show how words can get in the way of human understanding.

In harmony with his theme, Boyle uses reference as his main means of communication with his reader. I could relate to each and every one of Boyle's references. From the J.A. Henckels knives I thought about buying around Christmas, to my favorite new white wine (Sauvignon Blanc), to a reference to Diana Krall, Boyle didn't refer to a single aspect of modern life that didn't resonate with me. The literary magic of this book involves placing the reader in the shoes of his hero (and anti-hero) by referring to locales, situations, objects, ideas, and states of mind familiar to the reader.

This contemporary fiction magic is made more poignant by its mortality. Cultural references change so quickly, will Boyle's novel mean anything to readers ten years from now? Twenty? Fifty? Not unless it children are forced to read it in school, and buy Cliffs Notes that explain the socioeconomic implications of the references at the time Boyle wrote. Even still, the barrier of time will remain between author and reader, leaving Boyle's audience with an intellectual understanding, but not the visceral understanding that made Talk Talk something special.

Instant asynchrony

I've really been thinking about letter writing lately. Maybe it was writing holiday cards, or maybe it was listening too many times to "From My Own True Love (Lost at Sea)," a song in which the Decemberists keen "Mr. Postman, do you have a letter for me?" The Decemberists' tune brought back memories of listening to "Please Mr. Postman-" the version by the Carpenters my parents used to play when I was just a tater tot. I remember really connecting with that song, because when you're three years old, mail addressed in your name is a really big deal. I used to long along with Karen for someone to seal a message in an envelope, mark it with my name, and send it through mysterious channels to reach my front door. Magic. Slow motion conversations.

Now that I'm old enough to send and receive letters, I mostly use email. Sure, the delivery system is different (email has no yucky envelopes to lick) but letter delivery technology has a history of changing with the times- think back to the Pony Express (later replaced by the First Transcontinental Telegraph), or the pneumatic tubes that delivered mail twice daily in Paris. What interests me about the modern letter isn't just the technology used to deliver it, but the persistence of the letter through the dozens of way we now have to communicate.

Telephone, fax, mobile phone, SMS, chat room, message board, instant message, sites that allow users to share photos and video, blogging, online games, voice chat, and video chat. We have the technology to talk to each other across great distances face-to-face, real time, and to call each other anytime, anywhere. So why is so much of modern communication conducted as letters, albeit mailed electronically?

Email offers us instant asynchronous communication, and gives us the power to control the pace of our slow-motion conversations. Recipients can take as long as they want to reply to an email- hours, days, even weeks or months. But they also have the possibility to reply within seconds- which gives email superpowers that the guys running the Pony Express never dreamed of. I have written email to my husband while he is sitting in the same room with me. Why would I do that? The power of asynchronous communication is all about time- the summary of my research on feline nutrition may not be best communicated to my husband while he's battling the final board of his favorite video game. You might decide to email a colleague a few feet from your desk. Let my husband- and your colleague- get to your email when they have time to process it.

Asynchronous forms of conversation also leave a record- whether we're blogging, posting to a message board, or sending an email, it's pretty easy to re-read what we've written and how others have responded. The likelihood of finding a record of a conversation is in direct proportion to the asynchronism of the form of communication. I can pull up an email from 2004 with a few keystrokes. I can scroll back and re-read something a friend has written in an instant message window. Although it's certainly possible (and a little creepy) to record a telephone conversation, the content of a conversation isn't very searchable unless I keep written records correlating each conversation to its specific content.

The speed of interpersonal (and business) communication has an effect on our artistic expression. The epistolary narrative of Dracula was born in an era when people kept in touch by writing letters that took a long time to reach the recipient. Bob Newhart developed his famous stand-up routine (and later running TV gag) of one-ended phone conversations when it became possible to telephone people across incredible distances. The mobile phone has become a staple of modern action movies, to show the hero receiving critical information in the nick of time.

How is the instant asynchrony of the ubiquitous email affecting artistic expression?

Brandon Sanderson to write A Memory of Light

Today TOR announced that Brandon Sanderson will be writing the last book in Robert Jordan's epic fantasy Wheel of Time series. In an interview posted on WoT fan site Dragonmount.com, Sanderson talks about his "Characters first, everything else second" philosophy, tells us his favorite character and his favorite scenes in the series, and discusses why he thinks he was chosen to conclude the Wheel of Time. Both the announcement and the interview discuss notes Jordan left- some written, some audio recordings- with detailed explanations of how the book (and series) will end.

A Memory of Light is scheduled to be published in Fall 2009.

Wicked #1 on Kindle's Fantasy Bestseller List

My last two posts (The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West and Kindling the revolution of reading) are meeting up on on Amazon's Kindle Bestseller list. Maguire's Wicked has been the number one seller in the fantasy section of the Kindle store for at least the past two days. Today it rates #136 on the Kindle's overall Bestseller list.

Three of the top five leaders in science fiction are sf video game tie-ins (Halo and Mass Effect). The remaining top five include Slaughterhouse Five (Vonnegut, #2) and 1984 (Orwell, #3). Horror is topped by King's Song of Susannah.

What's interesting to me is that Wicked scores in the Kindle Store's overall top 150. The two sf classics are in the top 300. The King book at the top of horror comes in at only #640 overall.

I'll be keeping my eye on how these trends develop.

The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

This autumn I can't walk in New York without bumping into some reference to the Wizard of Oz. On Halloween the whole staff of our local bakery dressed as Dorothy and company (the blue grease painted Munchkin was especially impressive). Bus stops in Manhattan are plastered with notices of the Sci Fi Channel's premiere of Tin Man this Sunday. Approachig Times Square, I was overwhelmed by the amount of advertising for the musical Wicked, based on Gregory Maguire's book of the same name (although last week's New York performances weren't held due to the stagehand strike).

There was no question why I suddenly had the urge to read Wicked, the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. The reminders of my childhood days in Oz were too in my face to be subliminal.

What I admire most about Maguire's book is its dramatic structure. If a creative writing teacher asked Maguire what his protagonist wanted, I know he could answer in a heartbeat: the Wicked Witch of the West wants forgiveness.

Forgiveness for what? Plaguing Dorothy? No, no. All that Dorothy business comes late in the book- perfectly timed to synchronize events from Baum's well-known tale to the thrilling end of the Witch's personal story. Wicked begins before the Witch's birth, and describes an Oz quite different, I think, from the one Baum envisioned. Yet Maguire selects a few haunting aspects of Baum's mythology, the tiktok mechanical creatures, the ruby slippers, talking animals- and uses them as conduits between his created universe and Baum's.

The question still stands: the Witch wants forgiveness for what? Well, that's kind of the point of the story, getting inside the Witch's oiled green skin and finding and losing sympathy with her as she finds and loses sympathy for herself.

Kindling the revolution of reading

The largest bookstore in the world has announced its own eBook reader, the Amazon Kindle. More than just a device, the Kindle is supported by a huge (and growing) catalog of eBook titles, and by the Whispernet wireless network. Amazon pays your Whispernet connection, allowing you to free wireless shopping and downloading of for-purchase content. Oh, and they threw in free wireless access to Wikipedia, too.

My first glance at the Kindle gave me a tickle in my stomach- I had the sense this was more than a cool gadget, it was a glimpse at the future of how writers get content to readers. Newsweek enthusiastically agreed with me about the Kindle's potential, and as I read Steven Levy's "The Future of Reading" I got more and more excited. Projecting from current trends in blogging and digital media, Levy envisions a future when the book is liberated from its cover. The possibilities are intriguing, and many of them point at changing the role of the author.

Imagine a book that could be instantly updated or corrected- or revised by the author based on reader feedback. Levy predicts serialized novelization (alla Dickens and King's Green Mile)- except that readers would be able to interact with the author in between installments. This situation would create a collaborative environment where the author is no longer master of the universe, but guide through a participatory adventure.

Levy also extrapolates the role of the Kindle's digital annotation system. If readers can upload and share their annotations overlaid on the text of a book, annotations become a forum for disagreeing with the author, whether for fun, or to pose serious political protest. And one of my thoughts based on this model, what about using annotations to create derivative works of art (kind of like playing The Wizard of Oz to Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon) or as a new form of fan fiction?

In one more possible affront to the omnipotence of the author, Levy points out that the Kindle is always connected, always online and ready to connect to other books (not to mention Wikipedia). So if the reader questions something the author wrote, or simply wants a different perspective from another writer, he is just a few seconds' download away from having another author's take at his fingertips.

Will the Kindle ignite a brave new world of authorship and publishing? I can't wait to find out.

Stranger in a Familiar Land

Whenever anyone asks me my favorite science fiction author, I reply: Heinlein.  This gets mixed reactions: from understanding approval to poorly hidden disgust.  Heinlein seems to evoke strong love or hate emotions in his readers.

But love or hate, most of my interlocutors can't mention Heinlein without talking about Stranger in a Strange Land- a book I have never read because it couldn't hold my interest past the first few chapters.

On a quest to understand whether or not books whose first chapters don't grab me are or are not worth reading (see my post Stardust in our eyes), I picked up Stranger in a Strange Land.  I muscled through the first several chapters, and read through to the end.

The result of the experiment was clear.  My feelings toward the book softened a little as I continued to read, got to know the characters and situations better, and to recognize certain Heinlein characteristics that I've come to know and love.  But I never felt a fraction of the warmth toward the book that I did toward Heinlein's Friday (read five times and counting), The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, To Sail Beyond the Sunset, The Number of the Beast or the adventurous sf Heinlein books geared toward children.  

The first few chapters of Stranger in a Strange Land didn't grab me, and neither did the rest of the book.