Category: Books
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Steampunk and the End of the Future
Two weeks ago I attended the Arisia convention in Boston and had a wonderful time. One thing which was impossible to miss was the prevalence of steampunk costumes among some of the attendees, especially the younger ones. Maybe this was just because the guests of honor were Phil and Kaja Foglio, creators of the steampunk…
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Ozblogging: The Road to Oz, Part 5
We're going to summarize a lot here, because there's a long boring section between the time Our Heroes get into Oz and their arrival at the Emerald City. Most of it is taken up with introductions. Dorothy introduces her companions to Tiktok and Billina, who have come to welcome them. Then she introduces everyone to…
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Ozblogging: The Road to Oz, Part 4
After escaping the Scoodlers, Dorothy and Company come to the end of the road, literally. It reaches the edge of the Deadly Desert, an expanse of gray sand which completely surrounds the Land of Oz. In the course of the books the Deadly Desert becomes more and more Deadly. The first time we see it,…
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Ozblogging: The Road to Oz, Part 3
Our Heroes continue along the road, which they now know to be the Road to Oz. (The reader knew that from the book title.) The landscape is pleasant — if you haven't noticed, this journey is considerably less perilous than Dorothy's past exploits. The travelers have spent every night in bed, and aside from involuntary…
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Ozblogging: The Road to Oz, Part 2
Dorothy and Company arrive at a very odd village. It's inhabited entirely by anthropomorphic foxes. The fox-people are initially suspicious of the newcomers, but the power of the Love Magnet quickly turns that to friendship. Our heroes are conveyed to the throne room of King Renard IV, the ruler of the foxes, known to his…
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Ozblogging: The Road to Oz, Part 1
The Road to Oz is the fifth of L. Frank Baum's immortal Oz series, published in 1909. Like its predecessor Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, it follows Dorothy on another difficult journey to Oz with a group of entertaining companions. Sure, by this point it's a formula, but it's a winning formula and Road…
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How I Did It #7: “See My King All Dressed In Red”
This was the first story I wrote for an anthology, as opposed to a magazine, and it's also the only story of mine (so far) which has come true. "See My King . . . " was written for the anthology Crossroads: Tales of the Southern Literary Fantastic, edited by F. Brett Cox and Andy…
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Fantasies of Freedom
I've been thinking about stories lately (actually, I always think about stories), and something has occurred to me. In many stories — especially in genres like science fiction, fantasy, and thrillers — one of the attractions is that the protagonists are more free than the reader. Sure, they may be faced by evil overlords or…
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Lazy Thinking
This past weekend I was a guest at the storm-wracked PiCon convention in Enfield, Connecticut. I had a good time, and I hope others were entertained by my presence. I'll be going back next year if they'll have me. So now I'm going to be exceedingly ungracious. At the various panels I attended, I noticed…
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Genre and Plot
Diane and I went to see Super 8 this past Friday, as one of our mostly-weekly date nights. She was really excited about it — I was less so, but only because I've been cruelly disappointed by movies too many times in the past decade. (Capsule review: The Goonies Meet Cloverfield. Four out of five…
The Cambias Digression 