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gwillow-deactivated20190925

Latin@ Rising An Anthology of Latin@ Science Fiction and Fantasy (2017)

“Latin@ Rising is the first anthology of science fiction and fantasy written by Latinos/as living in the United States. The book gives an overview to the field of Latino/a speculative literature, showing the great variety of stories being told by Latino/a writers. Fifty years ago the Latin American “Boom” introduced magical realism to the world; Latin@ Rising is the literature that has risen from the explosion that gave us García Márquez, Jorge Amado, Carlos Fuentes and others.

The 21st century writers and artists of Latin@ Rising help us to imagine a Latino/a past, present, and future which have not been whitewashed by mainstream perspectives. Contrary to the popular perception, Latino/a Literature is not just magical realism and social realist protest literature–it also contains much speculative fiction. By showing the actual breadth of genres being used by Latino/a authors, Latin@ Rising will help extend the boundaries of the Latino/a literature canon.”

Edited by Matthew David Goodwin, Frederick Luis Aldama (Introduction)

Order it here

Matthew David Goodwin is an Assistant Professor in English at the University of Puerto Rico in Cayey. His work is centered on the topic of migration in Latino/a literature. In particular, he looks at the ways that science fiction, fantasy, and digital culture have been used to express the experience of migration. He completed his PhD in Comparative Literature at the University of Massachusetts–Amherst in 2013. He has published a number of essays on Latino/a speculative fiction for journals.

Frederick Luis Aldama is University Distinguished Scholar as well as Arts & Humanities Distinguished Professor of English, Spanish and Portuguese, at Ohio State University where he is also founder and director of the White House Bright Spot Awarded LASER (Latino & Latin American Space for Enrichment & Research) that creates a pipeline for Latinos from 9th grade through graduate and professional school education. He specializes in Latino and Latin American literature, comic books, and film—and pop culture generally.

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Life is Short

Great essay.

wind-of-color

onedarkrainyday-deactivated2016

Blue Door

gwillow-deactivated20190925

A Story In Three Parts

The first time I attempted to read The Satanic Verses, I was eleven. I found the hardcover on one of my parents’ bookshelves and took it down, thinking I was in for some kind of sword and sorcery epic. I was, at the time, deep into the Dragonlance series, as well as Mercedes Lackey’s Valdemar books. In this case, however, I got no further than the first page before I realized there were going to be no wizards or talking horses. But the first chapter—in which Gibreel Farishta and Saladin Chamcha are falling out of a plane over the English Channel—shook me in a way no other book I’d ever read had. Since childhood, I’d had an occasional recurring dream about falling. Every few months, it would happen: there was never any sound, just a gut-twisting loss of balance that would go on and on until it felt like the skin was going to pull off my bones. It wasn’t painful, exactly, but it was terrifying. I had never fallen from a great height, so how my body knew what it felt like remained a mystery. I put the Verses away, afraid it would give me nightmares.

cloakedinmystery

What do you call Barsavi wearing khaki trousers?

erikgern

Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of course. The world would create new religions overnight. We would be ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead, the stars come out every night and we watch television.

Paul Hawkens. Commencement address, University of Portland, 2009. (source)

mymodernmet

For 10 days, extreme weather pummeled Mount Javornik, part of a mountain range in eastern Slovenia as well as a popular ski locale. Photographer Marko Korosec captured the breathtaking, sculptural ice that formed.

fubiz

19th Century Library Filled by 350 000 Books

2014 Wrap-Up

Well... that was 2014. Overall, I had a good year for writing related pursuits and in general. It was a year of firsts for many writing related projects. Here are some of the highlights: 1. I finished a novel. It is the first draft and it is utterly terrible, but I finished! Right now it has been trunked, but I'm working on a substantially different second draft. Finishing the novel was important because I got past the mental barrier of finishing something novel length and I learned a lot about what does and doesn't work for my process. 2. I sold and had a story published in an anthology! This was my first pro-sale, and the story "Of the Dying Light" was the first story I finished after nearly two years of not having written anything. 3. I started reading slush for Podcastle. I've listened to Podcastle for a few years now and really enjoy the range of stories they've published. It's been an enlightening experience to read slush, in terms of seeing the quality of stories being submitted as well as working out why certain stories don't work for a particular market. 4. I had a 114 day unbroken writing streak. I averaged 377 words per day, and wrote a total of 43000 words in that period. I'm hoping to top that this year. 5. I attended my first convention (4th Street Fantasy) and was invited to participate on a panel ("Advice from New Writers"). I enjoyed meeting so many others who geeked out about writing and I'm looking forward to going back again this year. Reading: You can see most of my reading list for 2014 on Goodreads. I read an eclectic collection of short stories, non-fiction, graphic novels, and novels. I'd recommend mostly everything on that list. So it was a good year overall. To put it in perspective, I've been writing with the intention of getting published since 2006, but 2014 was the first year I really started to see the results of working at the craft. As I remarked on Twitter some time back, I'm glad I didn't give up after the first unsuccessful attempts at writing. It's a long road, and always will be, but it's totally worth it. Here's to a great 2015.

beyondvictoriana

We are always writing the other, we are always writing the self. We bump into this basic, impossible riddle every time we tell stories. When we create characters from backgrounds different than our own, we’re really telling the deeper story of our own perception. We muddle through these heated discussions at panels, in comments sections, on social media, in classrooms — the intersections of power and identity, privilege and resistance. How do we respectfully write from the perspectives of others? Below are 12 guidelines to get you started.

One of the best articles I’ve read on the subject. I want to hand this out at every art & diversity panel I speak on. Seriously.

beyondvictoriana

One of the best articles I’ve read on the subject. I want to hand this out at every art & diversity panel I speak on. Seriously.

ethiopienne

apjiwa

But devoted as I was to the universes hiding between the covers of my favorite books, I couldn’t help but start to wonder why I never read about people who looked like me. I didn’t see us at journalism competitions, on TV discussing New York Times bestsellers, or assigned on any syllabi. Did Black writers not exist? Or worse yet, were Black people just not worth reading and writing about?

medievalpoc

Best of 2014: Medievalpoc Fiction Week Masterpost

All Fiction Week Posts in one Mega Reading List!!

Thistil Mistil Kistil: Medieval Webcomic

Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed

Novels by Amelie Howard

Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters by John Steptoe

Silver Phoenix by Cindy Pon (includes criticism)

Diversity Showcase: Indie YA Science Fiction, Fantasy and Steampunk

Never Alone (Kisima Innitchuna) [-gifs at link]

Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okarafor

Un Lun Dun by China Miéville

Review by skemono: Marvel: Mighty Avengers, by Al Ewing and Greg Land

"As Demographics Shift, Kids’ Books Stay Stubbornly White" by Elizabeth Blair

Novels by Miriam Forster

"A Diversity Reading List" by Ellen Oh

Gaming and RPGs: V20 Dark Ages by David Hill

Novels by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The Octavia Butler Bibliography

"Ellen Oh Talks History of Hanboks" by Ellen Oh

Reading List: African Literature

The N. K. Jemisin Bibliography

ElfQuest by Wendy and Richard Pini (includes criticism)

Sword and Silence by Joyce Chng

Amok: An Anthology of Asia-Pacific Speculative Fiction

So Long Been Dreaming: Postcolonial Science Fiction and Fantasy

The Ursula K. LeGuin Bibliography

Birth of a Dark Nation by Rashid Darden

The Shadow Hero by Gene Luen Yang and Sonny Liew

"My Multicolored Heroes" by Sarwat Chadda

Ms Marvel by G. Willow Wilson, Adrian Alphona & Jake Wyatt

Baba Ali and the Clockwork Djinn by Danielle Ackley-McPhall and Day Al-Mohammed

Novels by Zoe Marriott

Short Fiction: Lunar Year’s End by Jaymee Goh (Crossed Genres)

Short Fiction: Blessed are the Hungry by Victor Fernando R. Ocampo (Apex)

The Blood of Eden series by Judy Kagawa

Ash by Malinda Lo

Diversity in YA: 10 Sci Fi/Fantasy Novels About Latino Characters

Thorn by Intisar Khanani

Courtship in the Country of Machine-Gods by Benjanun Sriduangkaew

Silver Phoenix by Cindy Pon

Unforgiven: A Highlander Fic (based on a 19th century painted portrait’s resemblance to Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson) by C. E. Murphy

Zahrah the Windseeker by Nnedi Okarafor

EastisEverywhere: topical commentary on discussions of multicultural Singaporean Literature

#WeNeedDiverseBooks

The Vast and Brutal Sea by Zoraida Cordova

L’Île au trésor by Jean-Philippe Stassen and Sylvain Venayre

Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie (Nebula Award Winner for Best Novel)

Review by r-stern: Assassin’s Creed

The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson

"Diversity, Literature, and the Audacity of Writing"-shwetanarayan

EastIsEverywhere: Selection of Singaporean Literature

Review by Medievalpoc: Dicebox by Jenn Manley Lee

Review by Medievalpoc: Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History ed. Rose Fox and Daniel José Older

Mytho by Zimra

Before There Was Mozart: The Story of Joseph Boulogne, Chevalier Saint-Georges by Lesa Cline-Ransome

DiversityInYA: 9 Books With South Asian Main Characters

Sorrow’s Knot by Erin Bow

"Possibilities" by Medievalpoc

Mary Robinette Kowal on the Glamourist Series, historical Accuracy, and Medievalpoc

Discussion: Fairy Tales, Retellings, Race, and Creativity

House of Hades by Rick Riordan

"Black Nerds, Escapism, and Why We Need More Diverse Books" by Hannah Giorgis

DiversityInYA: Diverse Selections Including Romeo and Juliet Retellings

Review by Medievalpoc: Saga (Image Comics) by Brian K. Vaughn and Fiona Staples

10 African American YA Authors to Know

No Queens in Afrika: Women Rulers in Sword & Soul and Other African-Inspired Fantasy

The Girl Who Spun Gold by Virginia Hamilton, art by Leo and Diane Dillon

Refilwe: An African Retelling of Rapunzel by Zukiswa Wanner

Bitch Magazine Series: Girls of Color in Dystopian YA Fantasy Literature

Princesses Behaving Badly: Real Stories From History-Without the Fairytale Endings by Linda Rodriguez McRobbie

Neil Gaiman on Diverse Casting and American Gods

Reading List: Books with Gay Women of Color Protagonists

Fantasy Survey Results from writingcafe

10 Asian Pacific American YA Authors to Know

The Dark-Thirty: Southern Tales of the Supernatural by Patricia McKissack & J. Brian Pinkney

FOR LOVE & LIBERTY: Untold Love Stories of the American Revolution

The Little Piano Girl: The Story of Mary Lou Williams, Jazz Legend

Erekos by A.M. Tuola

Dark Metropolis, Otherbound, Drift, Rebellion and more from DiversityInYA

Crow in the Hollow by Brian W. Parker

The Dragon King Chronicles by Ellen Oh

"Don’t Categorize Diverse Books as ‘Special Interest’" by Ellen Oh

"Notable Novels for Teens About the Arab World" by Elsa Marston

Sin Eaters: Retribution by Kai Leakes

The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation by M. T. Anderson

"The Most Important Advice I Can Give To Writers" by blue-author

Half World by Hiromi Goto

Author Corinne Duyvis on why her YA fantasy, Otherbound, is not an issue book

Mare’s War by Tanita S. Davis

Novels by Nnedi Okarafor

Faerie Blood by Angela Korra’ti

Annals of the Western Shore by Ursula K. LeGuin

The Dreamblood series by N.K. Jemisin

"12 Fundamentals of Writing "The Other" (And The Self)" by Daniel José Older

Junot Díaz and the White Gaze, La Respuesta Magazine

"Whitewashing and the Earthsea Cycle" by Medievalpoc

The Circle of Magic books by Tamora Pierce

Review by Medievalpoc: The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin

"The Diversity Struggle for a POC Author" by Lydia Kang

Midnight Robber by Nalo Hopkinson

Discussion and Humor: Fantasy Sub-Genre Fiction “Explained”

"Race, Sexuality, and the Mainstream" by Malinda Lo

Review by Medievalpoc: Kate Elliott’s Crown of Stars (a blurb from this review is included in the front matter of The Very Best of Kate Elliott, forthcoming in Feb. 2015)

Wizards of the Coast’s Doug Beyer on Kiora, the Crashing Wave and Cultural Appropriation in Fantasy Media

Broken Age trailer from Doublefine Studios

Review by r-stern: Yoko Tsuno by Roger Leloup

"Children and the Myth of Colorblind Youth" by Medievalpoc

"Who Gets to Be a Superhero? Race and Identity in Comics" by Gene Demby

Review by Medievalpoc: The Inheritance Trilogy by N. K. Jemisin

Medievalpoc accidentally reviews Wolves of the Dawn by William Sarabande while attempting to answer a question

Kids Respond to Whitewashing on Book Covers

medievalpoc

The past is not past, is not an absolute difference; nor is the past conjoined to the present in continuity, in sameness. Past, present, and future are a temporal knot, thick with possibility even while impossible to fully untangle. Time is irregular, history is queer.

J J Cohen, “Early Modern”

A very insightful academic piece that revolves around periodization, and touches on a lot of the problems I have with it.

(via medievalpoc)

Book Review: My Real Children

I read My Real Children a couple of days ago, and I've been thinking about it since. Short summary, as I said on Twitter, it is a remarkable book and I think everyone should read it. It's certainly the strongest book I've read in 2014. As to why, here's a brief review (spoilers for the book ahead...) It's 2014 and Patricia Cowan is in a retirement home; her dementia is making it difficult for her to remember certain key events from her own life. She remembers two distinct pasts. In her life as Pat, she was married to Mark and had four children. In that life she worked as an English literature teacher and was involved in the feminist movement as well as activism for nuclear disarmament. In her other life as Tricia, she met and fell in love with Beatrice (Bee), and they had three children together. In this life, she has a successful career as a travel guide writer and splits her time between England and Italy. Some days she remembers one or the other, but she can't conclusively know which reality is real and which is not. The point at which her memories forked was contingent on whether she accepted Mark's marriage proposal. This framing device at the beginning of the story sets up the starting point for Patricia's recollection of her two lives. Each chapter alternates between one life or the other, with the events of Patricia's life being foregrounded against the historical events of the day. Not only is Patricia's life different because of the choice she made with Mark, but the world itself is different in both of Patricia's past lives in subtle ways from our own --a what if? scenario played out against alternative outcomes of major historical events of the 20th century. Alternate history is the sole speculative element in what could otherwise be read as a mainstream book. Where the events do show up, they are not forcefully relevant to the plot of the story, which would have been the case if the alternate history took precedence to the development of the characters. The most striking example of this is that in Tricia's world, the 20th century saw a limited nuclear exchange, something that only ever remained a possibility in our own past. Living under the spectre of nuclear fallout forces the characters to confront their mortality and live meaningfully through uncertain times. Genre conventions for certain types of fantasy and science fiction give the protagonist a great deal of agency and power to change the world in unexpected ways. The protagonists of My Real Children are not really placed to have a major impact on the course of world events. Pat and her family are trying to get by in a world that carries on around them, but they can't help but be acted upon by it in turn. It's interesting to contrast that to Pat's thought towards the end of the book, where she recalls the butterfly effect, and whether her decision to marry/not to marry Mark had a corresponding impact on world events. A more painful and unanswerable question arises when Patricia wonders whether committing to one memory of her past will collapse the waveform, if the act of remembering is all that holds reality together. In the hands of a lesser writer, the alternating timelines could have thrown a reader right out of the story, but Walton's intentionally transparent prose and linear story keeps the reader grounded in both worlds. I had no trouble at all managing Pat and Tricia (the names Patricia is known by in either past), and think this is due to how Walton mirrored their lives. Pat is unhappy in her personal life, but the political climate in her version of history remains fairly quotidian.Tricia's personal life is comparatively happy, despite a more unsafe, unstable world. Yet, it doesn't last. Pat finds meaning and relative joy in raising her children and involvement in activism, whereas Tricia finds it in her relationship with Bee, in art, and in Florence. Both women experience personal tragedy and both bring up questions about determinism and free will, religion and atheism. Their lives contrast without ever being contradictory to who Pat is, and how she constructs her identity. The book invites reflection to this question: are we defined by choices we make in our lives, or is there a self that remains independent of these choices? That in the end, all roads lead to the same destination? The distinction posed by the question as I stated it is overly simple and there are no clean answers, but My Real Children took me on a journey of heartbreak and sorrow, of joy and quiet contemplation, and it made me wonder. The narrator sums it up beautifully with this thought:

"Now or never, Trish or Pat, peace or war, loneliness or love? She wouldn't have been the person her life had made her if she could have made any other answer."

*** A final note: there were two poems referenced in the book I'd never heard of, both of which I enjoyed after reading in full, and I'd encourage you to read them:

1. Sonnet Against Entropy by: John M. Ford 2. To His Coy Mistress by: Andrew Marvell

Word Log - June 26th, 2014

So its been six months since I stopped writing progress reports. I haven't stopped writing overall, but real life got in the way in the form of work and a host of other things, some good and some bad, that I won't post on the internet. But, the short answer is: I'm still writing. I started the year with approximately 31,000 on the novel project, which has moved up to 41,000 words and is steadily marching along at an average pace of 350 words a day. That manuscript, The House of Stories, is already looking at a 2nd draft revision later this year. How's it been so far? Well...novel writing is a foreign concept to me; its like designing houses (no, sandcastles) for your whole life, and then trying to craft an entire neighborhood, a city, a world, with the same tools. No two are ever the same, and I expect that a huge amount of what I'm writing now will be reconfigured and rebuilt in draft, but I digress. I've had a lot of fun breaking my process over the course of writing; for example, I had to throw away a lot of the outline for the middle of the book and trust that the characters knew what they were doing. And for the most part, they provided cues and prompts, little Chekov's guns to be placed on mantlepieces and fired at inappropriate intervals throughout the story. It will need work, but I'm pleased that by abandoning the outline, I came up with something cooler than I would've thought of when I started writing. Other than that, my secondary project is "The Afterlife of Objects," a short story. I'm obsessed with the strange voice and narrative of this story. It's providing an excellent counterpoint to the voice I'm using to tell the novel, but its so weird that I'll probably need a dozen or so drafts before I convince myself that beta readers would like it. I'll post more on the blog as I bring these projects to completion, as well as what projects I'll be working on next. *** In other news of my life, I attended 4th Street Fantasy convention, which was one of the best writing/community events I've been to. It was also my first convention, and from what I understand, it's unique in terms of both its size and programming. Single panel tracks and relatively small size meant that I was able to meet new writers, catch up with old friends, and attend all of the panels. I even participated on a panel, Advice from New Writers, which was exhilarating and a little nerve wracking as well. But I was lucky to participate alongside engaged co-panelists and the whole experience was fun. There was a moment on Sunday morning, around 3 or 4 am, when quite a few of us were deeply engaged in discussion about writing, I looked around and saw other writers: passionate about craft and geeking out with each other about story, and I knew I was with the Tribe, and I was happy that I made it out. There are too few opportunities in real life for such deep diving, and sometimes you have to refill the creative well in order to keep your energy and enthusiasm available for when the writing gets hard. I'll definitely be coming back next year for more conversation and more stories. *** This month I read two books that everyone should check out: 1. Three Parts Dead by: Max Gladstone. Before reading this book, I never realized it fulfilled a very specific type of fantasy story I was looking for. That is, it is a secondary world urban necromantic steampunk fantasy which uses techniques and tropes from other genres/visual storytelling to structure and tell its story. I'm not going to give the story away, because half the fun is in discovering the utterly cool world that Max has built, but everyone should go read it. 2. Range of Ghosts by: Elizabeth Bear. This is a historical fantasy (part of the Eternal Sky trilogy) set in a Mongol/near eastern flavored secondary world. Part of the reason I entirely stopped reading secondary world/core fantasy for a few years was because I couldn't see any new stories being told about the vast range of human cultures that acknowledged these peoples and their cultures had their stories to tell. Books like this one, as well as Max's books above have drawn me back, and I'm foraging further for writers who are actively making an effort to tell these stories. (Thinking about Saladin Ahmed's Throne of the Crescent Moon next). To get back to Range of Ghosts, Bear has thought through how someone in this culture and this world would perceive the world, and consequently, has built the story around characters from different cultures in this world. The story follows Temur, heir to the Khaganate, who escapes from a battle, at which most of his family is killed by Temur's uncle in a bloody succession bid. Meanwhile, the head of an obscure religious cult is setting events into motion that will lead to civil war, of which the battle for the Khaganate is just the start. We also follow Once-Princess Samarkar who sacrifices her ability to procreate in order to become a wizard of the citadel. She joins with Temur in order to stop the events set into motion by the cult. Along the way they meet Hrahima, a seven foot tall sentient tiger (!) who has an agenda of her own, and a monk who has taken a vow of silence. I appreciated that Bear didn't make this story about the "chosen one." Each one of the characters has their own personal story arc that isn't bent to the narrative of one central character. More importantly, she successfully develops multiple cultures, each with its own unique worldview and outlook. This book doesn't take any shortcuts to meaningful development, and the contrast between the characters deepens the richness of the story and the world itself. I haven't finished the trilogy yet, but I highly recommend it if, like me, you were looking for something different that most fantasy didn't have to offer.

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