Guest Post: Where is the Wonder? by Roland Yeomans

Roland Yeomans is here today to introduce his latest book, The Not-so-Innocents Abroad —about a steampunk honeymoon like no other…

I like the title. For me it holds the promise of some wicked humour on top of all the wonder and excitement I expect from a renewed encounter with Captain Samuel McCord.

I haven’t read it yet, but… steampunk? Vampires? An alien Empress among us? Seems more than cool.

Here’s Roland to tell you more about it:
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WHERE IS THE WONDER? by Roland Yeomans

The wonder in the books we read seems to be lacking … at least it does to me.

Yes, it is Friday the 13^th: the perfect time for another stop on my infamous “Don’t You Hate Book Tours?” Book Tour.

I believe the reason we hate book tours is the same reason we are underwhelmed by many books hawked in them:

SAME OLD, SAME OLD

Same interchangeable plots with the same interchangeable characters

Was WWI won by one person?  Was WWII?  No, those wars were won by countless sacrifices of thousands of common soldiers fighting the good fight.

Aren’t you tired of THE FATED HEROINE who is the sole lynch pin upon which victory depends?

The world just doesn’t work that way.

The best books and fiction draw from the way the world really works.

 (Image belongs to Marvel, of course)

Great movie with a well-crafted script.

And then, there is the dreaded Mary Sue craze currently sweeping the books and movies.

Take the latest STAR WARS movie: A FAMILIAR HOPE. 

It was bad enough all the plots points of  IV were plopped onto the script of the new movie.

They made Luke into a Mary Sue: Rey.  She could fix anything.  She could out-fly veteran fighter pilots.  She could use the Jedi Mind trick first time out.  She out-fought Darth Whiney Boy the first time she held a lightsaber.

“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.”  

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

The best fantasies are the ones that tell of the insignificant person trying her damnedest to survive in a surreal world that doesn’t much care if she lives or dies.

Take the contemporary, urban mythology of Neil Gaiman's American Gods, in which characters from ancient religions are hiding out in modern America. Or even the weird fever-dreams of China Miéville that combine bizarre creatures with Victorian technology.

In these modern times, where most of us sit at computers or face a bland commute, fantasy books offer a chance to break out of mundane moments.

Give your readers a prose window into a world of wonders, and you will succeed in selling your books.

Oh, wait!

I’m supposed to be selling MY  book just released in Kindle format!

https://www.amazon.com/Not-So-Innocents-ebook/dp/B01EUFRKKI

I quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson because he appears in my book, detailing the honeymoon voyage of a cursed Texas Ranger newly wed to an Empress of an alien race.

The Xanadu, the world’s first Air-Steamship, is setting sail for a Steampunk adventure the likes of which you have never read:

It is 1867 in an America a layer of existence from this one.

General Sherman was denied his march through Georgia by forces beyond his ken. Abraham Lincoln was never assassinated though he wishes he had been killed instead of his beloved Mary.

The battered Indian tribes of America have a strange refuge courtesy of the cursed Texas Ranger, Captain Samuel McCord.

A global war of vampire kingdoms is going on beneath the noses of the living world — and it is interfering with the honeymoon of the alien empress, Meilori Shinseen.

She ruled the Aztecs when a political execution took place on Golgotha and channeled her frustration in repairing her starcraft by erecting the Sphinx. 

Joining the newlyweds are Mark Twain, 11 year old Nikola Tesla, his faithful black cat, Macak, Horace Greely, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ada Byron, daughter of Lord Byron, and the mysterious Greek physician, Lucanus.

Lurking in the shadows, hoping to kill them, is the insane Abraham Lincoln, the crippled General Sherman, the vampires, Abigail Adams and Benjamin Franklin, Empress Theodora, ruler of the Unholy Roman Empire, and the vengeful Captain Nemo, following in his Nautilus.

What are you waiting for?  Go to its Amazon page and try its LOOK INSIDE feature, and then buy it for your very own! 
Hey, what are you doing still looking at this page? 
  

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Well, if you're still looking at this page... Roland Yeomans has written 35 books. He lives in Louisiana and is a weaver of dreams. Visit him at his blog, Writing in the Crosshairs, or at his Amazon page. 

The Night of Elisa by Isis Sousa

Isis Sousa —Brazilian-born artist living in Norway— keeps saying that she’s not a writer and that “writing sucks.” Maybe. Maybe not. One thing I find certain —whether she uses words or images, she is a great storyteller. And in “The Night of Elisa” she tells a unique, absorbing story.

From the magnificent cover through the pencil sketches in the book to the beautiful flourishes on each page, Ms. Sousa’s ability to bring her characters to “life” in drawings as well as in words enhances the experience and fully draws the reader into the rich world of her story.

“The silence of the night was broken by a beautiful female voice singing a lullaby. It came from a distance and approached Leonhard slowly, surrounding him. He listened to the melody’s phantasmagoric cadence and the sounds penetrated his skin, his bones, until he could feel the music within him. He opened his eyes abruptly as he felt a heat spreading inside him; it was as though he had been covered by the most splendid earthly sunlight.”

So many of the elements of the Gothic novel are present here: Leonhard —the fallen hero, Elisa —the woman in distress, threatened by and fleeing from the evil Quentin, the general sense of unease and foreboding, the powerful love...

The writing has a hypnotic, dreamlike quality, achieved largely —I would say— by the use of the third person omniscient point of view, by the limited use of contractions, and by the almost screenplay feel of many of its paragraphs. The tone and the rhythm are perfect for this strange world where the dead and the living seem to coexist and to interact. And, Duskland, with its permanent gloom, is more than fascinating… Once having had a taste of it, I wonder, will one be able to stay away?...

“They want us to open a door but it takes a blood ritual to do such a thing, Elisa. Would you dare to try it?”

Dark, beautiful, haunting, “The Night of Elisa” is still with me days after reading the last page and will be for a long time…

Visit Isis Sousa's self-publishing website, Tragic Books, see her portfolio at Helheimen Design, visit her blog, Darkest Soirée and her Print Shop.
And find her on Goodreads too, where there's a giveaway happening right now for “The Night of Elisa.”

 

About a Certain Martian

"I'm pretty much fucked.

That's my considered opinion.

Fucked.

Six days into what should be the greatest two months of my life, and it's turned into a nightmare.

I don't even know who'll read this. I I guess someone will find it eventually. Maybe a hundred years from now.

For the record... I didn't die on Sol 6. Certainly the rest of the crew thought I did, and I can't blame them. Maybe there'll be a day of national mourning for me, and my Wikipedia page will say, "Mark Watney is the only human being to have died on Mars."

And it'll be right, probably. 'Cause I'll surely die here. Just not on Sol 6 when everybody thinks I did."

 

Mark Watney is Andy Weir. Or Andy Weir is Mark Watney. I would have said it even if I hadn’t read the interview in Entertainment Weekly. But what he says there confirms it. “My theory is that every protagonist is someone the author wants to be or who the author wants to screw. Just so we’re clear, Mark Watney is who I want to be. He has all the qualities I like about myself magnified without any of the qualities I dislike.”

Read the whole interview. It’s a very cool one.

The whole book is in fact a vehicle for Andy Weir to be Mark Watney and to have an adventure on Mars. And that’s all right.

The other characters seem to be there only to deliver dialogue and move forward the story about what’s happening to Watney/Weir on Mars. I suppose their behaviour is typical of NASA employees at that level and in such situations. I don’t know. I’ve certainly seen it in many movies dealing with space realistically. Many other reviewers have complained about the two-dimensionality of these characters. I say that there’s no use in knowing more about them; it would be just unnecessary details.

Because “The Martian” is a story with one character, or —okay— let’s say two at most: the protagonist —Mark Watney, and the antagonist —Mark Watney’s bad luck.

Mars is not really the antagonist. Mars is just the background. If there’s one thing I would’ve liked Andy Weir to do more, is to have Mars be more than just the background, share more descriptions of what must only be incredible, desolate vistas. 

Each page is heavily laced with scientific musings and calculations, so, if you’re not (very) scientifically inclined, you might find it boring to read.

Actually, this is not a science-fiction novel. This is a very realistic novel. People haven’t stepped on Mars yet but they will pretty soon.

There is one thing though that I don’t understand. In the book, NASA spent a lot of resources on these missions to Mars and, obviously, they knew that there are dust storms there, some so big that they could envelop the whole planet. So how come such a well-planed, expensive mission is aborted just a few days in because of a storm?

Obviously, Watney “needed” to be abandoned on Mars and with plenty of resources left behind by his teammates, but I cannot believe that NASA didn’t have a solution for such a scenario. Maybe an anchoring system for the MAV (Mars Ascent Vehicle) or something like that? After all, all these missions, of which Watney’s was the third,  were based on the MAV sitting there and producing fuel for the return ascent to orbit long before the crew even arrived to Mars.

However, the need to hastily abandon the planet comes from the danger of the MAV tipping over because of the high winds. Apparently, it was calculated for 150 kph winds and what they got there was 175 kph. And those winds were starting to tip the MAV over.

No. No. No. I’m sorry, but no.

According to Mars-One, “Mars has a very thin atmosphere, about 1% of Earth’s atmosphere. Because of this, hurricane forces on Mars feel like a gentle breeze on Earth. The problem of a storm is not that it will push you over or destroy material, the problem is that Mars is extremely “dusty”.” Read more about this at Space Exploration.

Mariner 9 has recorded wind gusts of 500 to 600 km/hr (or 300-375 miles/hr) and typical wind speeds in the Martian atmosphere exceed 200 km/hr (or 125 miles/hr). That doesn’t match with the 175 kph.

That being said, I simply cannot believe that the author, who seems to have researched and to have got the science brilliantly on everything else, could’ve made such a mistake. Maybe I’m missing something. Maybe there’s a catch. If you know it, please share it with me.

 

Leaving this aside, I loved the story and I loved Mark Watney. His ingenuity and his optimism are infinite and contagious. It was a pleasure reading his logs. His somewhat childish ways, his humour, and his use of profanity are not only endearing but also —I think— his way of overcoming one of the direst situations into which someone might find themselves.

He’s a great guy, made of the stuff the first astronauts and cosmonauts were made of.

"I need to ask myself, "What would an Apollo astronaut do?"

He'd drink three whisky sours, drive his Corvette to the launchpad, the fly to the moon in a command module smaller than my Rover. Man, those guys were cool."

Watney reminded me of “If the Sun Dies” (Se il Suole muore) a book about the early American Space program by the Italian journalist, author and political interviewer Oriana Fallaci. If you can find it, read it. If you can't find it, at least read the quote here from “If the Sun Dies" —it’s amazing!

And isn’t it a case of very good writing when you pretty much know the outcome and, yet, you’re still on the edge of your seat reading the story? I think that it is.

I gave “The Martian” five stars wholeheartedly.

Treat Yourself for Halloween – Step into Charles Gramlich’s Harmland

... that is, if you dare...

"Harmland" by Charles Allen Gramlich

From the menacing title, through the eerie cover, into the eclectic world of nine tales that take you from a grave in the swamplands to the undergrounds of the Miskatonic University, this is a truly scary trip that stayed with me long after I finished it.

After all, I had the finest guide... through and through, he kept me on the edge of my seat, with his mix of unrelenting action, dark humor, and very creepy hauntings, while still allowing a few moments when I could simply admire his beautiful writing.

As always, “About the Stories” gives fascinating insight into the creation of the stories, just as interesting to read as the stories themselves.

And, Charles, really? Are almost all the details except the “toad” itself and what it turns out to be absolutely true? :-) Then, yes, we should be very afraid...

Micro Weird: (Excellent) Tiny Tales of the Strange, by Charles Allen Gramlich

I posted this review on Amazon, but I thought that it wouldn’t hurt posting it here too with the hope it might reach a few more people. I really loved this book! I had acquired it earlier, when I only had Kindle for PC, but it was the first book I read now on my not-even-a-week-old Kindle Paperwhite. Too bad Kindle doesn’t show the colours. I love the cover art, by the very talented Lana Gramlich. In colour or in black and white, this photo gives me an eerie feeling that’s perfect for the stories.

Here goes:

In this aptly titled collection, Charles Gramlich has gathered fifteen very short stories. In them, there are ghosts, aliens, planets, spaceships, or just human beings whose bizarre behaviour or circumstances warrant them a place in this anthology of the weird.

Out of the fifteen stories, some are lyrical, some are humorous, some are tinged with sadness, most are disturbing, one was downright scary, and all of them have a delightful twist in the end. As a bonus, in the end we get a bit of history about the author’s early literary influences and a bit of history about each piece – this is a part I enjoyed just as much as reading the stories themselves

Flash fiction is not easy to write, but Mr. Gramlich is a master storyteller and I very highly recommend this collection.

Visit Charles at Razored Zen.

Love in the Time of Zombies

How is that possible? Even thinkable? One could experience horror, disgust or at best pity for these wretched creatures all while either running away from them like hell or hacking at them- the head, you have to destroy the head, isn’t it?- lest their bite would turn you into one of them.

Terror, yes, but love for a zombie?

Well, I guess it is possible if he’s Nicholas Hoult’s R. in “Warm Bodies.”

  

Because R. is a Corpse (that’s what they’re called in the movie) who hangs hard onto the flicker of humanity that’s somehow left in him. His interior monologue is humorous, mostly of the self-ironic kind. He is a keen observer of his new world and, while he does obey the primary impulse of hunger, he also tries to transcend it. (I suppose in this he also represents the teenager trying to surpass awkward bodily and emotional limits.) And how does he do it?

By trying very hard to stay connected with what it means to be human. Companionship, music, dreams and memories (even if they are not his and the way he acquires them is… well, yuck!).

And love.

Love. Love can thaw a frozen heart. Love can save you. (Love does conquer all, I guess.) And that simple gesture of holding someone’s hand suddenly shows its very complex significance.

 I loved, loved, loved the movie! (It’s been filmed in Montreal!) It is a wonderful mix of romance, comedy and suspense, and all the actors are doing a very fine job to convey them. Besides Nicholas Hoult (R.) there are Teresa Palmer (Julie), John Malkovich (General Griggio, Julie’s father), Rob Corddry (M., R.’s friend) and Analeigh Tipton (Julie’s friend, Nora). Jonathan Levine, as director and writer, has also done a great job.

Watch here the first four minutes of the film.

I went to see “Warm Bodies” on Saturday afternoon with my oldest daughter (not yet a teenager) –the youngest stayed home with my husband- and while I was not at all surprised that females made up for the vast majority of the audience I also found it amusing. I guess the few guys present were boyfriends or husbands dragged in there by their YA loving (better) halves. LOL

This makes me think of how most of the YA literature is directed at girls. Which reminds me of another zombie one can fall in love with…

Bram from Dearly, Departed: A Zombie Novel by Lia Habel.

I got this book from the library but halfway through it I decided I liked it so much that I wanted to buy it. (Long live Amazon!) Steampunk, romance and zombies in the same story might seem like a strange mix, but Lia Habel succeeds in a fascinating way. It is 2195 and the world as we know it has been destroyed. What remains of it has rearranged itself into a high-tech society with Victorian manners. But this world is conflicted and Nora, the high-society girl more interested by military history than debutante balls, finds herself right in the middle of it. That’s how she meets Bram, the young soldier, brave, handsome, noble… and dead. He has retained his humanity even better than R, with the help of medicine, yet theirs is a star-crossed romance for he is… dead and his decay inevitable…

You can read an excerpt here.

Finally, it’s funny that after all these thoughts on romance, I can’t help also thinking of Minheer Vanderhausen. What about him, you say? If you don’t know who he is or if you’ve forgotten, I invite you to (re)discover him in Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s short story, Strange Event in the Life of Schalken the Painter. You can read it here or here. Let me know what you think…

P.S. I just realized that I haven't mentioned at all the book upon which the movie is based, "Warm Bodies" by Isaac Marion. I cannot comment on it since I haven't read it yet...but I will... soon... :-)

Haiku Reflections - by Geraldine Helen Hartman

Geraldine Hartman presents in this little book (78 pages), published in 2012 by CreateSpace, an assortment of her thoughts on nature through the seasons.

Some of the haikus in this collection have appeared previously on Geraldine’s blog, My Poetic Path, where she has paired them with her beautiful photography. In fact, I was wondering, before starting to read them in the book, how they would fare without the enhancement of images.

It turns out they are doing very well. Even better, I would say, since the readers can create their own images.

Because Geraldine does not simply write about the four seasons, she somehow, miraculously, but in fact very skillfully, captures them in her words.

Spring sings of renewed life in crunchy bulbs, summer lounges lavishly by the lake, autumn throws carpets of crisp colours underneath our feet, winter is a quiet beast, safer to be observed from within the warmth of familiar things, yet hinting at the promise of another spring.

In her verse, Geraldine weaves an enchanted array of colours, smells, sounds, textures, temperatures, and feelings. The imagery is simple, yet always surprising in the best of ways. A robin is a feathered talisman, felines are furry kisses… Even the occasional sadness or nostalgia, unavoidable, are soothed by the awareness of the permanence of nature, of our place in it.

This is a collection of delicate beauty, to which one can return time and again, a pleasure to the soul, one that refreshes, inspires, and ultimately gives hope.

I liked it so much that I wrote for it my first review on Amazon! Very highly recommended.

Are the (Occasional) Highs Worth the (Many More) Lows? or Giving Up is Tempting

Writing stories has been a most important part of my life ever since, at twelve I believe, I read "Journey to the Centre of the Earth" by Jules Verne. Imagining fantastic adventures was my way of living them. I wanted to be a speleologist, a palaeontologist, a marine biologist, and archaeologist, an astronaut. I wrote, wrote, and wrote about that.

Over the years, I have started many novels, which I never finished. However, that never actually seemed important. I have always written for my pleasure. For the thrill of living many lives at once. I never worried about publishing my work. That made me light and carefree. I was also very young and the future stretched endlessly in front of me.

Yet, sometime during the past few years, something has shifted. I got older, of course. The thought of seeking publication has acquired a more tangible shape. The future, also, suddenly appeared finite –as it truly is, unfortunately- hence adding urgency to all my actions. Instead of being hopeful, I have become impatient, anxious. Except for the moments of complete trance, the writing has become (a bit) painful with apprehension. Just a little bit.

I buy a lot of books. However, I rarely go to bookstores anymore. I love books, I adore books, but seeing them all together like that makes me sad. It discourages me big-time. That’s because I can’t help thinking: What are the chances of all these beautiful, colourful, wonderful, shiny, published books to be bought and read by (many) people? I would say, rather slim. Except for the best-sellers, of course, which sell best because, well… they are best-sellers.

Then, there’s Amazon, with so many more books, all kind of books, including a lot of self-published books. While I’m not eloquent enough to express my admiration for these people who wrote their novels and published them, one way or another, I also cringe when I see Amazon best-selling ranks into hundreds of thousands or millions.

Don’t get me wrong. I still find an exhilarating motivation in seeing other people’s accomplishments, especially those of my blogging friends. Maximum kudos to all of them! I do not feel one drop of envy, please believe me, only admiration.

In this sea of books, I feel so lost. I’m not even capable of finishing my novel. I’m too stupid or too lazy, or both, to even finish one novel. I’m too overwhelmed by OCD – what else could it be this obsessive polishing of each sentence, this endless pondering of the logic of each plot element – to go from one paragraph to the next. I couldn’t agree more with whoever said first that perfectionism breeds paralysis. I’m really fighting hard to snap out of it.

I’m not giving up. No way. No matter the outcome, I will still be fooling myself and pushing myself because the “highs” are definitely worth more than the “lows.” And I will never be able to be just a reader.

Oh, Jules Verne, what have you done to me?

De Bello Lemures

I’m not into zombies. Occasionally, I will read such a story but I would not actively look for it. I will much more likely choose vampires, or werewolves, or even angels… I don’t know why. Maybe it’s the lack of glamour in the zombies’ condition, the unspeakable tragedy of it, the fact that I cannot see them as true characters any more than a force of nature bringing disaster would be.


However, I did not hesitate one moment when buying “De Bello Lemures – or the Roman War against the Zombies of Armorica” written by Lucius Artorius Castus and translated and edited (wink!) by Thomas Brookside. I had made up my mind to buy it even before I read the fragment available online. I was sold on by the title, by the fantastic cover (when in Rome, I have put my hand inside that mouth – la Bocca della Verità, the Mouth of Truth – and it didn’t bite my hand!) and by the idea.

From the cover:

A recovered Latin text tells the story of a struggle between Roman legionaries and the undead in 185 AD.

Lucius Artorius Castus leads an expedition to Gaul to defeat a rebellion against the rule of the Emperor Commodus – and gets more than he bargained for when his enemies rise from the dead to fight again. The power of the zombie horde is amplified by the Babel of Ancient Rome’s religions and superstitions, and the terror the undead bring in their wake foreshadows the incipient medieval darkness already creeping into the world at the end of Rome’s Antonine age. Richly annotated, this mashup of survival horror and alternate history takes the reader on a bracing journey into one of ancient Rome’s dark corners.

Maybe I’m not thrilled by zombies but I certainly am by ancient history and especially by the history of the Roman Empire. Therefore, a combination of the two seemed especially intriguing to me.

I was not disappointed.

Thomas Brookside’s short novel/novella reads exactly as he has intended – a commander’s first-hand account of a Roman military campaign gone awry. The abundance of editor’s annotations does not hinder, it completes, giving the whole a taste of authenticity that makes the story just as real as any recorded by, let’s say, Dio Cassius. In fact, for me, the writing style and all the details, from military techniques to country living in the Roman Gaul, made the suspension of disbelief so high that I not once thought of the zombies (the lemures) as creatures of fantasy or of the story as anything else but a recovered anchttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifient manuscript.

In short, I loved it and I highly recommend it.

“De Bello Lemures” is self-published on Amazon’s CreateSpace and Kindle.

Thomas Brookside blogs at Annotated Horror. He has two other books out that are quite tempting to me…

Here's the excerpt from “De Bello Lemures” from Google Docs: