dashPunk

Right Me Up is one of my absolutely favorite songs from State Radio’s Us Against the Crown album .  Every time I need a pick me up, this is one of my top go to songs.

Watching them perform live with Manny on the stage is a guaranteed way to make bring a smile to my face, how about yours?

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Yesterday, I finished the first draft of a test story for a new setting I am developing.  Wow, that was a vague sentence, but it sounded like I really said something didn’t it.

I liked it.  I haven’t written an Urban Dark (Gothic) Fantasy since 1996.  I blame Emerian for my return to Horror writing.  I love the genre, abandoning it only after I felt trapped in the rules and requirements it puts on fiction.

After my near breakdown in November, and the many months of recovery, I realized that I am tired of playing by everyone else’s rules.  I have always been bound to one system or expectations.  The world I grew up in is gone, and there is little to nothing I can do to bring it back.  I have to just pick up from the mess that exists now and move forward.

If I can be allowed a cliché: “Be the change you want to see.”

A couple weeks ago, I started working on an idea.  It was strange and scared me a bit.  Unlike anything I have ever written, I didn’t have a model, or genre to define it.  I am not claiming that it is original.  I am sure somewhere someone has written something like it, but it is mine.  It is the type of story I want to read.

Form

My biggest hurdle has been getting beyond the structures of the novel and the short story.  I agree with H P Lovecraft that the best fiction is pulled off with the same craft as a well devised hoax.  So I started playing around with ways to tell a strory directly and from oblique angles.  I would love to share some of these stories, but they may be included in the final project, so I don’t want to release them early.

My biggest inspiration comes from comics.  I love the shared universe, and I would love to find some writers to help me out on this project.  The idea of the setting as hero mashed up with characters that readers will really care about excites me.  In the end I would like this story to spawn blogs, vlogs, and podcasts set in the world, expanding it holding to the canon.

I have never been accused of dreaming too small, LOL.

Test Everything!

If I had any advice for the writers out there it is this.  Test everything!  If you get an idea, no mater how outlandish, bizarre, or out of the mainstream.  Give it a try.  See how it comes out, then move forward based on the results.  I have found a new setting I love writing in.  Who knows what you will find.

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We are moving into a new era here at dashPunk, or to say that with a bit less drama: It is almost spring.  As we prepare for the April issue, I have a couple questions for you all:

Is your fandom a little dusty?

Do you have any area of fandom that you would like us to shine a little light on, or dust off for spring?

I have been reconnecting to my fannish roots, and falling in love with old loves all over again.  Have you looked as something with new eyes lately?  If so share your story with us.

The Best in SF

We are also preparing our first look at the best SF out there.  If you want to make sure your favorites make the list, send them in.

New Music

We are also building our first look at musicians and bands that everyone needs to know about this spring.  Send in your nominations.

Jump in!

Leave your comments here or email them to me.  I can’t wait to see what is heating up out there.

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A new story is boiling in my mind.  It scrapes at the inside of my skull like Athena trying desperately to get out.  The cast of characters came to me quickly, but they needed names.

…names…

Sometimes, I feel like names are the bane of all authors.  They have to fit the character and the setting, and work well with each other.  That might sound simple, but for me it spirals into a series of questions just short of the Spanish Inquisition.

Eric’s First Rule of Naming

No character in the story can have the same name as a member of my immediate family.

That is hard.  In this particular story, there is a character that feels like a Christopher and another who feels like a Donna, but my sister’s name is Chris and my mother-in-law’s name is Donna, so both of those names are out.

I made this rule when I was really young, when family thought characters with the same name were really ways to talk about them.  (sigh)

There is a practical reason for this too.  Writers can be sued if people think characters in their stories are based on them.  It makes naming a bit challenging for me, but it is a wise thing to do.

Eric’s Second Rule of Naming

Names must flow together well.

Flow is a hard thing to talk about.  The easiest way to think of name flow is that the names need to sound like they belong together.  Families and regions have certain naming conventions, and as a Speculative Fiction writer, determining those conventions are important.

Older fiction didn’t bother with this, so we ended up with names like Blork, Gort, and Xanthon.  Names that sounded outlandish, but were just weird.

H. P. Lovecraft thought a lot about the names of the creatures in his fiction.  Cthulhu for example is based on the greek work Cthon which means underground, and he intentionally wanted something that was hard to pronounce and that would be pronounced differently by everyone.  He thought it helped to lend the character an unknowable and alien quality.

Eric’s Third Rule of Naming

Love the names you choose.

Writing a novel or series is akin to marriage.  You are going to spend every moment of every day with these characters rummaging around in your head.  It can take months or even years to write and edit a story.  It is a commitment.  Make sure you are committed to the names you choose so you don’t end up with a Dwigt in your manuscript.

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Paul Jessup thinks he knows why Science Fiction is dying:

Heinlien. Asimov.  At the latest, Orson Scott Card (but mostly just for Ender’s Game). I don’t see anyone ever looking for something new…

This is why SF is spiraling downward in sales. It’s fans just aren’t buying it anymore. I’ve got mixed feelings about this. I love Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, etc. so I don’t mind that it’s popular and selling. But some part of me wonders- is SF meant to be kept in the past? Is that why Steampunk is so popular right now, because it’s an emulation of the past? I’m not sure. But this is a problem (Paul Jessup).

Is classicism the problem?  Well, it is part of it, but it is only one of many.

Lessons Lost

The biggest problem SF has is that the industry didn’t learn from the New Wave SF of the 60’s and 70’s.  These authors, most notably Harlan Ellison and Ray Bradbury, didn’t allow themselves to be constrained by the limits of industry enforced genre.  There stories were a little bit science, a little bit fantasy, a little bit horror.  The incorporated whatever they thought they needed into their stories to make them good.

Genre has become increasingly rigid.  Publishers forgot that Speculative Fiction is the literature of the imagination.  It once explored the question, “What if” without any limits save those of the author’s imagination.  As the genres stiffened, sales have continued to go down.

Lack of Imagination

This genre lock is not the only problem facing SF.  Have you seen any of the marketing for new fiction?  No?  You are not alone.

If a new classic is published and no one knows about it, will it make any sales?  Yes, among the author’s friends and family.  That is about it.

Publishers and authors need to find new ways to generate excitement about new titles, but that is not enough.  Fans need to find better venues to share and spread the word about their favorite new books.

Bless me, for I have sinned

I have to admit that I really haven’t read any new books in a long time.  With the exception of Night’s Knights, Brave Men Run, and Burning Skies.  These don’t count because I read them after meeting the authors.  I also don’t count the Harry Potter books or franchise fiction.  Personally, I find it too hard to find new books to read.

As a writer, I feel like I am confessing a mortal sin.  I want to read more, but I am not sure where to find new books.

I’ve thought about reviewing books myself, but I don’t feel like I have the time to wade through the weeds to find the books.

So, I ask you.  Where do you find out about new books?  How can we promote SF books better?

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Cold chills ran through my body when I saw this… and not the good kind either:

Exclusive: Huge news for sci-fi fans: Fox is developing a stateside version of the U.K. hit series “Torchwood.”

…

Unlike U.S. adaptations that have gone awry, “Torchwood” fans can take comfort that the original producing team is on board. In addition to Davies, exec producers include Davies’ producing partner Julie Gardner (former head of drama at BBC Wales for the show’s first season) and Jane Tranter (another BBC vet, now exec VP programming and production at BBC Worldwide Prods. in the U.S.).

Also, some of the current cast — most likely John Barrowman, who plays the immortal Capt. Jack Harkness — might star if Fox orders “Torchwood” to pilot (The Live Feed | THR).

I don’t know whether I should laugh, cry, or scream.  Maybe all three simultaneously.

Dear God, not Fox!

If any other network were involved, I might be excited about this, but Fox is where scifi goes to die…

The only shows that Fox allows on their network are reality shows, torture porn, and flat formulaic trash.  Any original show, ahem Dollhouse, gets canceled quickly.  Unless Glee is not a fluke, and the network is opening up to other original ideas, this is very dangerous.

Goodbye Jack Harkness

Despite rumors to the contrary, American media is not that friendly to GLBT characters.  If Torchwood goes to Fox, expect Jack to be retooled.

Help us, Russell T Davies, you’re our only hope!

I can only hope that Davies will fight for the series and the result will be as good as the American Queer as Folk.  O, please Fox, don’t mess this up!

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Is this really a reason to celebrate?

The Booklocker suit was in response to a decision by Amazon to make all print-on-demand publishers use its BookSurge (now CreateSpace) division if they want to sell their titles directly on the Amazon Web site or face the removal of their buy button. Under the agreement, Amazon agreed to not remove Booklocker books from its Web site or to remove the “Add to Shopping Cart” button. Amazon, which admitted to no wrongdoing, also agreed to pay $300,000 in attorney’s fees (Publishers Weekly).

I don’t think so.

Amazon gets to admit no wrongdoing, and pay what for them is a tiniest of tiny fractions of what they make an hour…

This maybe good news for Booklocker, but what about the other Print-on-demand providers?  I assume they are covered, and I hope to Uma Thurman that I am right.

The Publishing industry is changing, and we need new rules.

(via File 770)

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Hey everyone!  It is January 21st, and I am finally ready to ring in the new year…

Illness broke be for quite some time, and I have not been able to sit at my desk, or even use my computer for any extended period of time, but I am mostly better now, and we have a lot of work to do this year so I hope you are feeling up to it!

As always we are looking for suggestions on topics and direction for the new year.  I have some plans, and they will become clear soon, muhaha.

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Alias. Lost. Fringe. Mission Impossible 3. Cloverfield. Star Trek. All in all, writer/director/producer JJ Abrams had a pretty sweet decade. That’s why we at Entertainment Weekly named him one of the Entertainers of the Decade in our Best of the Decade issue (EW.com.)

He may be a nice guy, and he may be a savvy business man, but idea that he is one of the entertainers of the year is beyond laughable.

His credits include some of the dumbest, most boring, mass media schlock that I have ever seen.  Here is the list according to imdb:

• Alias (creator, executive producer, Writer)
• Armageddon (1998/I) (screenplay)
• Cloverfield (2008) (producer)
• Felicity” (84 episodes, executive producer)
• Forever Young (1992) (executive producer, written by) (as Jeffrey Abrams)
• Fringe” (executive producer, writer)
• Gone Fishin’ (1997) (written by) (as Jeffrey Abrams)
• Joy Ride (2001/I) (producer, written by)
• Lost” (executive producer, Writer)
• Mission: Impossible III (2006) (written by)
• Regarding Henry (1991) (co-producer), written by) (as Jeffrey Abrams)
• Six Degrees” (executive producer) (13 episodes, 2006-2007)
• Star Trek (2009) (producer)
• Taking Care of Business (1990) (written by) (as Jeffrey Abrams)
• The Catch (2005) (TV) (creator, writer, executive producer)
• The Pallbearer (1996) (producer) (as Jeffrey Abrams)
• The Suburbans (1999) (producer)
• What About Brian” (executive producer) (26 episodes, 2006-2007)

There is not one original or innovative idea on the list, and only Star Trek was worth watching, but with the usual JJ caveats: Try to ignore the lens flares, forget about it having a plot, and whatever you do, don’t expect it to make sense.

It would be a waste of my time to point out all of the problems with JJ’s works.  This is just Entertainment Weekly proving they care more about how much money a project makes rather than how good it is.

JJ is a master of smoke and mirrors, but has no idea how to craft a good story.  Let’s just sigh together and hope his career will be over soon.

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Depeche Mode always make stunning videos, and this is no exception.

I like the song, but the video effected me in a way I never expected.  I miss James Bond movies.  I hope the franchise will right itself after they fire Daniel Craig, but until then, I have this video that reminds me of what a new Bond intro should look like.

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