Ripley Patton

Reaching Out My Ghosthand

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:42:54 GMT

Well, I did it. Moments ago, I clicked off the first few chapters and a rough outline of my YA urban fantasy/magical realism novel Ghosthand to The Agent. I am terrified. I am elated. I am terrified.

And what shall I do to comfort myself? Write, of course.

And what shall I write about? How about Ghosthand itself, as a little teaser, and to help myself process that, much like my eleven-year-old daughter, Ghosthand is now off at wilderness camp and I can't save it or help it, or hold its hand any longer. It will have to stand on its own three chapters.

So here is a blurb about Ghosthand. I'd love to hear what you think.

Seventeen-year-old, gritty Goth Olivia Black was born with a rare birth defect known as minus flesh. Instead of a skin, bone, and blood right hand, Olivia's hand is made of ethereal matter, or spirit energy. Everyone in Olivia's small home town is used to her hand, especially because she keeps it concealed under a leather glove, but in the wider world, minus flesh has become an issue of great conflict. Some people think that it is the next evolutionary leap, that humans are destined to throw off their flesh entirely and become beings of pure energy. Other people think that minus flesh is a defect, an abomination, or a sign of the Beast, and that anyone with it should be eradicated. Olivia just thinks of it as her ghosthand.

Then one night, Olivia's ghosthand begins to do strange things, like pulling household items out of other people's chests. Between putting a boy in the hospital, getting arrested, and fighting with her mom, Olivia finds herself on the outs of her small town community. When a dark, young man shows up in place of her high school guidance counselor, asking questions about her hand, Olivia doesn't trust him further than she can throw him, but he just might have the answers she seeks. So, she takes a risk, and together they break into the Police Chief''s house to steal back the items Olivia's hand has been gathering from people. When the Chief catches them in the act and shoots the dark, young man in the chest, it doesn't even faze him and they make their escape, but Olivia has more questions than ever before. Who is this strange, dark man, impervious to bullets, who goes by the title of I'minus? Why is he gathering a rag-tag band of people with minus flesh? And why is Olivia the only female in the bunch?

She'll have to go with him and his band deep into the south amidst the fanatics against minus flesh to find out,

Want to go with her?

This is not your Mama's Twilght

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 10:26:23 GMT

Okay friends,
I need emergency Critters for a grungy YA urban fantasy/magical realism first chapter. This is not your mama's Twilight.

I need it hard, and I need it fast. First few volunteers get a stab at it, but only if you can get comments back to me in a day or so.

PM me your e-mail.

The Agent: Further Happy Developments of the Surreal Kind

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 01:43:27 GMT

Well, a day of research revealed that clients of The Agent who stalked me have nothing but rave reviews of her. I found a rad interview with her and I have to say that our philosophies of writing and reading really mesh. She is a young, strong, woman of color which thrills me because I write anything but "anglo white male" fiction. Several exchanges of e-mail revealed that we love the same writers for the same reasons.

The agency itself is interesting. It isn't just a literary agency, it is what I would describe as a media-talent agency. They have clients who are sports figures, celebs, musicians, in the film industry, in television, and writers as well. I think this is a cutting edge approach. Let's face it, books aren't just books anymore. Books are stories that become films, songs, television shows, video games, podcasts, and the list keeps expanding. They agency is relatively new on the scene but have staff who worked in the industry elsewhere before moving to this newer venture. And they are known for selling their client's work, sometimes to the tune of six-figure deals.

I could find no one represented by them complaining. What I did find was a bit of a forum cufuffle by writers who had been rejected by them in a way that was probably not "best practice". I asked The Agent about this and she was really straightforward in telling me what went down. Suffice it to say, there was a "thing happening" that got blown out of proportion, and someone eventually got called on the carpet for it, but some damage had already been done. The agency isn't doing "the thing" anymore. End of story.

So, The Agent and I have been e-mailing back and forth. I sent her a CV, sort of a "here is why I am such a great and versatile writer worthy of your representation". That felt weird, but it was all true. I also included a list of my current projects, of which there are quite a few. She came back with which ones she really likes and which ones she thinks would be a hard sell in the current market, which was advice worth its weight in gold.

AND THEN... she asked for outlines, rough work-ups, and first chapts for my best WIP in every genre I write. AND she said she LOVES my titles.

So, now I have a serious fire up my butt to get my outlines and first chapts polished and ready in a jiffy. I may be scarce for a bit here, but I'll try to keep everyone posted.

Cloud nine doesn't even begin to describe my location.

Oh, and mylefteye had the same thing happen to him- the agent who repped Robert Jordan sought him out after reading some of his work. So it does happen.

I am just still really having trouble wrapping my head around the fact that it is happening to me.

Help! I'm Being Stalked by a Literary Agent

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:32:32 GMT

There are things a writer only dreams of. One of them is being "sought out" by a literary agent. Conventional wisdom will tell you agents don't have the time, or the necessity, to look around for writers to represent. They have slush piles higher than Mount Everest. They have talent beating at the door. And for the most part, that is true.

However, occasionally, an agent stumbles upon a story or an author that gives them a "certain" tingle. They fall in love with the writing first, and if it fits what they solicit, and what publishers are looking for, it is within the realm of reality that they might send the author a query.

Don't think it happens. Well, I didn't either, until I opened up my e-mail this morning and found this message:

Sometimes the inner bookworm in an Agent gets a bit of a happy tingle in the belly when they read a piece. This is the rarest of sensations ; one that makes all of the hustle and bustle of agenting worth it. Thanks for giving me that small happiness this morning with The Comfort of Cabbages.

I apologize for the Facebook stalk, but your livejournal addy was bouncing back and I had to get in touch! Based in NYC , my company has over 100 celebrity and Pulitzer-Prize writers. Fiction is my passion and I would absolutely love to hear about what you are working on and what your goals are as a writer.

Of course, I went mad. I called my husband, and e-mailed my friends. I drooled and dreamed. I went and made sure it wasn't a hoax. Yes, she really is an agent with a real agency. Feel free to be excited for me.

However, once the glam and drool have lost their shine, not all literary agents are created equal. I have a lot of calm research to do before I make any committments or sign over my current projects to anyone.

If you ever find yourself being wooed by a literary agent or agency, here are some great sites to help you stay calm, educated, and thinknig with your head instead of your desperate, writerly heart.

SFWA's article on Hunting for a Literary Agent:
http://www.sfwa.org/2005/01/hunting-for-a-literary-agent-which-to-keep-and-which-to-shoot/#4

SFWA's things to Beware:
http://www.sfwa.org/for-authors/writer-beware/agents/

Great post on how to evaluate an agency's website:
http://accrispin.blogspot.com/2006/04/victoria-strauss-evaluating-agents.html

Preditors and Editors
http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/pealo.htm

I'll be sure to keep you all posted on further developments.

A Pat on My Blogging Head

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 21:00:28 GMT

I like to blog. It keeps my writerly juices flowing on a regular basis. It helps me stay in touch with friends, family and fans. It gives me a soapbox when something riles me up, and provides me a place to publically celebrate when a story finds a home, goes to print, or gets nominated for an award.

I like to blog. And I think I've gotten better at it than when I first started. Practice makes perfect, right? But I'm fairly biased about my own talents:) I think I"m good, but what do other people think of what I write? Sometimes it can be hard to tell. Escpecially as the holiday season hits and people don't have time to read blogs, let alone comment on them.

So, as an experiment, I posted two of my recent Halloween blogs onto the Red Room author site. They have themed "contests" there. Basically, you write a blog on their theme (in this case Halloween) and the editors choose a few of them to be "featured blogs" for the site's main page. If you're chosen, you win the publicity and usually a cool free book.

And lo and behold, I got an e-mail today saying that my blog, Writing Your Demons, was chosen as one of the three top Halloween blogs. It is featured at Red Room here: http://www.redroom.com/blog/well-red/weekly-blog-topic-halloween. I've won a book called Morbid Curiosity by Loren Rhoads, which sounds yummy.

Thanks for the pat on my blogging head, Red Room. It is much appreciated.

Writing Your Demons

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 00:29:17 GMT

It is Halloween here in New Zealand. Tonight children of all ages will be dressing up in guises of hope and fear. Teenagers will be buying eggs and toilet paper, and telling their parents they'll be at each other's houses until late (which technically isn't lying if by "at their houses" they mean in the back yard vandalizing them).

But it has been a long time since I've dressed up or egged someone, at least on the outside. My monsters have had time to mature, to become more complex and ingrown. When I dress up as the serial killer, the witch, or the apparition, I do it internally, in the inner, dark robes of my imagination. I am a writer, and so I do not dress up as my demons; I write them.

You might think that this is strange, or that somehow I am unique, but I think there are many writers who feel as I do. Bad things happen, scary things, monstrous things. They happen to us, and around us, or maybe we only hear about them or read about them in the news, but they stick, somewhere deep in our psyches. They lurk under our beds, they hide in our closets, or make scratching noises in the basement of our minds until we can't help but go down there.

Stephen King spends a lot of time visiting the basement of his mind. That seems obvious. But I don't think writing demons is unique to the horror writer. Monsters come in all shapes and sizes. King's demons come dressed as the things that scare him, but those aren't necessarily the same demons I wrestle. Nor do we engage them with the same plots, literary devices or words. The things in the basement can be as easily clothed in fantasy as horror. One can shroud them in science turning them to aliens, other worlds, or spaceships. As far as that goes, the wrangling of demons isn't even limited to fiction. Behold the monsters cower and bow when they are written up as sonnets or limericks or articles for women's magazines.

I write my demons, but please don't confuse that with any desire to destroy them. Demons, I believe, always serve a purpose of self-realization. They lead us somewhere we might never have gone without them. They take us into the dark, the marginalized, inner places that most people never visit. They make us who we are, the storytellers; the warriors who dare to face the dark and come back to the world of light and words with a better ending, a satisfying denouement, a hero's tale, rather than a victim's.

That is the power of writing for me, that I can battle my monsters with swords, or flames of magic, or I can dress them all in tutus and have them dance the Nutcracker. My words empower me. My stories redefine what I fear, what you fear, what we all fear.

And so this Halloween I challenge you- what demon has been scratching at your basement door, and when are you going to write it?

Becoming the Monster: Why I think Halloween is Important

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:00:22 GMT

You can tell kids there are no such things as monsters. But you'd be lying. Let's be honest for a change, for the sake of Halloween and all that's hallow. There are monsters out there, and most of them are dressed up like humans. Jaycee Lee Dugard, the California girl who was kidnapped at age eleven and kept as a sex slave for 18 years in the back yard of a sex offender - she knows there are monsters. The boy who watches his father beat his mother bloody in a drunken rage- he knows there are monsters. The children molested regularly in their own beds by trusted family members- they know there are monsters, maybe not under the bed, but monsters grim and terrifying all the same.

Even children kept safe and secure know there are things to fear, monsters in the ranks, and with this truth comes a sense of horrible vulnerability. If you are a child, smaller, and weaker, and denied the power that adult monsters wield, how can you keep yourself safe? You may do everything right, follow all the precautions, and still the monsters may get you. Children often feel powerless about the monsters in their lives, the big, strong, powerful things that control or hurt them. What defense do they have?

And then in walks Halloween. Evil, pagan, satanic Halloween and it is the perfect gift of empowerment to children (and adults who still need to face their monsters). For three hundred and sixty-four days out of the year, monsters wear human flesh and walk among us indiscernible. On one night a year, humans don monster flesh and take the night back, and most of them are children. Petite blond girls and shy bookish boys put on the veil of ghosts and ghouls, witches and serial killers. They carry swords and cleavers. They bathe themselves in fake blood and smile the wicked grin of the fanged. They take on claws. They look out of the too-large eyes of monsterhood and demand from adults that they be given treats. It is a threat, this Trick-or-Treat. It isn't meant to be polite or "thank you for the candy." It is a child's chance to become the monster for a change. It is Max sailing away to Where the Wild Things Are. It is childhood embracing the dark, becoming King of the Beasts, and coming home unscathed to dine in decadence.

And so, if you're thinking of insisting that your child dress as a cowboy or a ballerina this year. Well, don't. If that is what they want to be, by all means, empower them. But if they want to be something gruesome or frightening, remember this; children know there are monsters out there. They have seen them on the news, in the paper, and possibly in their own neighborhoods or homes. But there is something about becoming the monster, about donning monster flesh, and monster bone, and the monster crown and yelling "Let the Wild Rumpus begin!"

There is something about Halloween that actually dispels fear, if we let it.

The Goodness of Google Alerts for Authors

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 00:45:30 GMT

Life is full of good things and bad things. Oh, and don't even get me started on the greyish, neutral things that muddle up in between all the goodies and badies.

The other day a bad thing happened. It went down like this. First, I got a Google Alert in my e-mail which revealed that someone had uploaded one of my stories to a documents website without my permission and was planning to make some money off of it. The sad thing is the story in question is the SJV short-list nominated sci-fi tale "The Derby" which is already availabe for free at the Wily Website for Dowloadable Speculative Fiction. The good news is I quickly e-mailed the website concerning copyright infringement and they took the story down immediately.

I highly recommend to my fellow writers that you set up daily Google Alerts for your name, pen name, and story/book titles. Not only does it keep you aware of who is talking about your work and linking to it (so you can go comment and thank them) but you can also catch the badies every once in a while, which feels pretty good.

So, maybe that's a good thing.

Ripley

Momma Said There'd Be Days Like This

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 01:45:50 GMT

So, I've been beating myself over the head today because hubby's $5,000 motorcycle got stolen while he was away at a work thingy and I didn't even notice until he arrived home yesterday and said, "Where's my motorcycle?" Apparantly, It was stolen in the middle of the night from right outside our bedroom window and the cats didn't even bark.

But the day had to get better, right?

Well, nope. Not when I just received a letter informing me that my "long awaited" colonoscopy (for which I have been on the public health care waiting list for 9 months) is scheduled for November 26th. That's right people. I get to drink laxitive and have a camera shoved up my ass on freaking THANKSGIVING.

Momma said there'd be days like this.

Traveling by Petroglyph nominated for the Micro Awards

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 00:32:08 GMT

I've just received an e-mail that Traveling by Petroglyph, which recenlty appeared in Flash Me Magazine (July 2009), and originally appeared in Flash Fiction Online (October 2008) has been nominated by the editors of Flash Me for this year's Micro Awards.

Thanks guys for nominating it. And all you friends keep your fingers crossed.

The Comfort of Cabbages

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 00:54:42 GMT

At long last my fiction story, The Comfort of Cabbages, has gone live at New Zealand's Prima Storia. I wrote this story years ago based on the experiences of a close friend. It was first accepted for publication in an anthology about breasts titled Knockers which, after two years of negotiations with the publisher, had still not seen print. I finally pulled it and sent it back out into the world. Prima Storia, due to serious editorial and staff changes (and simple things like moving to Berlin), did not respond to my submission, but a query revealed that they wanted to publish it. Yeah!

So The Comfort of Cabbages is finally offered to the greater world. Just a note that this story is not speculative fiction, but a thoughtful read non-the-less.

Here's a blurb to whet your appetite:

I had hoped to sleep off my grief for a month, for a year, for a lifetime, but my breasts woke me up on day two. I sat up in bed, feeling the weight of them pull me forward. My once small boobs, now three times their normal size, throbbed, taut and foreign. I cupped one in each hand, hefting them; wanting to hand them back to their rightful owner. The drum-tight skin tingled with anticipation.

Oh, and don't miss fellow SpecFicNZ Core member Grant Stone's offering at Prima Storia as well.

Good reading.

Loss, Movement, and Renewal

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 02:37:50 GMT

We have moved. We have moved from our home of three years in a quiet, remote valley on Banks Peninsula New Zealand, to the heart of Christchurch City. We have exchanged the sound of the burbling river for the concussion of tires in pot-hole puddles. the bleating of sheep for police car sirens, the twittering of birds for- the twittering of birds. There are birds in the city, you know.

For the most part the move went well. We lost one cat (out of four). He went on a wander the day before the move and never came back despite our frequent visits to the property to secure him. I feel much loss and guilt about that. Why didn't I keep him in the house the day before? What was I thinking? How will he feel when he comes back to his home and jumps up to the window to be let in only to find the house filled with strange furniture, strange people, and a Bull Mastiff the size of a small cow?

He (is) was a great cat. One of three kittens that I helped deliver, and he was a caulbearer, born with his amniotic sack completely intact and I had to poke it with my finger to release him so the mother could lick him clean. Caulbearers are known to be able to see "beyond the veil" into the spirit world and they are also impervious to drowning, but sadly not to accidental abandonment.

We left notes in all the neighbor's mailboxes to keep an eye out for him, but I have little hope. The reality that all change involves loss is a little comfort, but not much. Loss sucks no matter how you couch it.

But one must move on from loss. You can't reside there for too long. In a way, our first home in New Zealand was a land of loss. It was a beautiful place, quiet and isolated from which to mourn our homeland in hiding. Leaving America has not been easy. We have no family here, no sense of inherent belonging. We share the language (mostly) but not the culture. There were disappointments we had not anticiapated- our children bullied out of the local, rural school. My husband's job less than ideal. Anti-American sentiment and prejudice. Finding some things we had left behind completely unrecoverable here. We were naive. We made mistakes. We had no idea how much moving countries and continents would affect our inner landscape, our psyches, our essential selves. I would say internally each one of us experienced a tectonic upheaval- the very ground beneath our feet had moved and changed. There were numerous times in those three years that we would have high-tailed it back home if property ownership hadn't tethered us to our new land. Looking back, we are thankful for that.

I have heard before, from other immigrants, that if you make the three year mark, you have "made it". From that vantage point of time and perspective you can finally objectively evaluate if you have found a place you can belong.

Our move to the city comes a month after our three year anniversary of transplanting ourselves in New Zealand. We have left the remote valley of loss and hiding. We have even thrown off the secure tether of a mortgage.

And we love our new place smack in the heart of the city with its wood floors and french doors and neighborhood full of cats. Our children are happily attending alternative city schools. My husband is within walking distance of work and has plans to build a boat in our front garden. My writing is going well, and I have discovered a family of writers here- a community both welcoming and open.

I can finally say, without hesitation, that I belong in New Zealand.

Yes, there has been loss, and movement, but out of such dark, rich compost the seeds of renewal sprout eternal.

My Interview at The Book Bundle

Sun, 27 Sep 2009 05:42:38 GMT

I was thrilled to be interviewed about short story and flash writing over at The Book Bundle , which is mainly a book reveiw website. I would love if everyone would go check it out and leave comments on the site or come back and tell me what you think on my LJ.

We begin the move from our serene valley back to the buzzing and active city tomorrow, so if I'm scarce for a bit, that's why.

May the new internet connect quickly and without incident.

Cheers,
Ripley

We Are here! We Are here! We Are here!

Sun, 20 Sep 2009 22:31:55 GMT

I have a fondness for Dr. Seuss and in a past post for New Zealand Spec Fic Blogging Week I mention why I think he was a closet Kiwi.

One of my favorite moments in one of the good Doctor's books is from Horton Hears a Who. No one believes there is life on a dust speck. It is too small, too insignificant, too far removed from the large reality of elephants, jungles and nay-saying kangaroo mothers. And in the tale, Horton spends the entire story trying to convince everyone that there is life on his dust speck, but he can't. In the end, the dust speck has to make itself known. It has to prove its own viability. It has to make its own voice heard.

The only way to do that is for every Who on that speck to make noise, to raise their voice, to clang a pot or bang a drum. It takes the cumulative quality of their voices shouting to break through the thick shroud of their atmosphere. And what do they shout? What is their mantra of self-empowered existence?

We Are Here! We Are Here! We Are Here!

And so, the Speculative Fiction Community of New Zealand has shouted for a week. We may live on the speck of two small islands, but We Are Here! We may live in a remote location in the southern Hemisphere, but We Are Here! We may not be as big as Elephants like the US and Australia, but We Are Here! We may have to subvert the nay-saying kangaroo publishers of New Zealand and seek publication outside of our own country, but We Are Here.

We have shouted by blogging. We have blogged about our childhoods, our discovery of Spec Fic, our landscapes, our homelands, our history, our culture, our travels, our frustrations, our triumphs, our publications, and our WIP. We have blogged about isolation, and a new comaraderie. We have blogged about our passion for Spec Fic and our determination to do what we love, from a place we love, and still make our mark on the world at large.

This year I am proud to say that 24 different authors, with 52 different posts in one week, have declared We Are Here! We were joined by friends from both Australia and the United States. Some of us raised our voices for the first time in this cause. Some of us discovered each other's voices for the first time. We were encouraged and empowered. By shouting We Are Here, we have made that truth even more of a reality.

Thank you to all of you who have participated in the first annual New Zealand Spec Fic Blogging Week and a special thanks to Anna Caro for being our own personal Horton. If you have not sampled some or all of the wonderful posts, make sure to follow the link above.

We'll be louder next year. I guarantee it.

Weird New Zealand: The Land of Speculation

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 05:14:58 GMT

It isn't hard to find inspiration for Speculative Fiction in New Zealand, because frankly, New Zealand is pretty weird. I mean weird in the nicest way, of course. I am fascinated by weird things, and perhaps it is just weird to me because I'm a foreigner. Still, if that's the reason, it would be weird to the majority of the world, and so I thought I'd share some of its weirdness. Who knows? Something I mention might be spark and feed a story. Below, I've divided up my weirdness observations into various categories. There's a lot of weird, but at least it can be somewhat organized. Enjoy!

WEIRD FLORA:

One of the first things I thought when I saw the New Zealand bush was that Doctor Seuss wasn't that creative, he'd just obviously visited New Zealand. I mean the cabbage tree is straight out of one of his books. They have tree ferns here. Yes, ferns as big as trees, and little ferns with rivets. They have lots of ferns. But one of the most fascinating things is that in normal countries an immature tree looks like a smaller version of its mature species. Same leaves, and bark, and limb formation, just smaller. Not in New Zealand. In New Zealand many of the tree species look totally different when they are young than they will look when mature. Imagine if baby humans looked like aardvarks, but then grew up to be pale, furless, bipods. Yeah, that's weird.

WEIRD FAUNA:

New Zealand is kind of like Darwin's Galapagos Adventure, where you can see the effects of evolution on a pretty intimate scale. First, there have never been any significant natural predators in New Zealand (except for man). The only native land mammal is a bat, and it eats insects. So, with no predators, birds really didn't have any reason to fly away and many lost the ability all together. The Kiwi, the Weka, the Takahe, Kakapo, the Pukeko and the Moa are just a few. The Moa is now extinct but was like a cross between a dinosaur and an ostrich. It also happened to look like a large, tasty drumstick to the Maori who hunted it to extinction. The Takahe was presumed extinct in 1930 but was found to be holed up in the mountains in 1948, waiting patiently for man's demise. Again, almost every one of these birds could be a shoe-in for Doctor Seuss's star-bellied sneetches. They also have an alpine parrot here, the Kea, which can rip off your car bumper and has been known to eat people's tents and boots. The only defense against them is playing AC/DC on your car stereo, which they happen to love. Weka's are just as curious and are known to take off into the bush with people's car keys or a bag of groceries. Many of these birds are not only flightless, they are fearless.

One interesting thing I have learned is that in a closed environment, like an island, prey tend to grow larger than normal over time (like the Moa), and predators get smaller. So, if we're around long enough, maybe we'll actually get to see New Zealanders turn into hobbits.

WEIRD CHARACTERS:

Now all places have their unique characters but New Zealand has some pretty awesome ones. Take the Wizard of New Zealand. This is a man, no a wizard, who speaks in Cathedral Square on a ladder in a robe and sandals with a pointy hat on. He has a long grey beard and is well seasoned in years, like all good wizards. He has been officially acknowledged by the government to be the nation's wizard and has also been categorized as a Living Work of Art by the local arts council. I listen to him quite often and he speaks on everything from history to religion to magic and being a post-feminist man. Oh, and he charges nothing. He isn't a street performer. He's a wizard.

Now, I really wish we could get an approved, national witch as well.

WEIRD LANDSCAPE:

Pancake rocks, volcanoes, mountains, avalanches, glaciers, hot springs, lava fields, limestone cliffs, turbulent oceans, placid lakes, swamps, plains, craggy hills, shady valleys, golden bays, peninsulas, islands, rain forests, misty fjord land, waterfalls, windswept sand spits, and more. New Zealand has it all. Some would argue that larger continents like the US have all these things as well, but not in such close proximity to one another. All these features exist on the South Island where I live, and I could drive to almost all of them in under 2 hours.

Often, writers are given grief for making their landscapes change too quickly and unrealistically from one feature to another, but New Zealand proves, I think, that this is certainly within the realm of possibility.

WEIRD WEATHER:

The clouds. The Maori name for New Zealand means Land of the Long White Cloud. If you have never seen New Zealand clouds climb over the hills like a monster made of quilt batting, you haven't seen clouds. The clouds here are a living entity, a personality of the sky and landscape. I have seen clouds descend into my valley like a behemoth. I have seen clouds fill a bay like cotton served up in a giant's bowl. New Zealand clouds have substance and presence. They aren't just in the sky, they come down to earth to visit. This clouded aspect of New Zealand inspired my recent short story, The Future of the Sky, which I am planning to enter in the Au Contraire short story contest once it has run through Critters.

The wind is a monster as well here- a character of air. Being an ocean island located midway between the equator and the South Pole, we have our maritime warm Nor'westers and our cold Southerlies. The wind sounds like a train or a beast coming down our valley, which acts as somewhat of a wind tunnel. The New Zealand Wind featured as a minor character in my story Sheep Women and Dog Boys. Wind brings change. It makes the cats bounce off the walls. It energizes some people, and makes other cranky and depressed. When you go outside it batters you. When you go inside, it seems to batter the house even harder. And the direction of the wind can change on a dime. One minute it is warm, the next it whips the other way and brings a chill all the way from the Antarctic. It can slam all the doors of your house at once, and take your laundry down the lane to the neighbor's farm. It definitely has a weird will all its own.

Well, I find this weird post growing long. I don't think I've touched on all the wonderful weirdness of New Zealand, but I hope I've given you a taste, a glimpse, and maybe an idea for your next speculative fiction story.

Experiments in Collaboration

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 01:54:37 GMT

I am somewhat of a lone wolf, as most writers tend to be. I like to be by myself, think by myself, plan by myself, and I certainly don't want anyone else mucking about with my writing. But despite my soloist leanings, I've begun to notice and become curious about a phenomenon in Speculative Fiction writing. Recently, I keep bumping up against all these writers who are experimenting in collaboration.

In my Wily Writers group many of the members are working on a shared world project. So far, I've been watching from the sidelines both impressed and slightly alarmed at what a beautiful monster it is becoming. I know Wily's is not unique. I have encountered other shared world websites and stories in the past few months.

As a part of New Zealand Spec Fic Blogging week I recently stumbled upon a project called The Event. Apparently, five Wellington Spec Fic authors got together to write a story. Five authors, writing from the viewpoints of five different characters, weave a story of mystery and speculation concerning "a catastrophic event" happening in Wellington, New Zealand. There was no previous planning and no rules other than the setting. Part five, the final piece of the story, is coming soon. I've only read part one, but the rest is certainly on my reading list.

As someone who has not collaborated and feels a little leary about the whole thing, I have some questions for those of you who have dared to collaborate (or even if you haven't but still have some thoughts).

First, is this really a new phenomonon, or something only new to my radar? Have writers always collaborated, but the age of the internet has made is easier to accomplish and more accessible to an audience?

Second, what is the motivation to collaborate? Does is answer some need in writers to defy the lone wolf persona and interact with their peers? What is the appeal? What effect does it have on your growth as a writer?

Third, what advice would you give to someone considering a collaboration project? What are the challenges and the rewards? What should writers "watch out" for?

Fourth, what different kinds of collaboritive projects are out there? I'm aware of the shared world idea, collaboration between authors on a single book, and shared story ideas like The Event. Are there other ways of collaborating?

Fifth, if you are, or have been involved in a collaborative project, would you please link to it in the comments of this post, with a short description, so I and others can check it out.

A Stranger in a Strange Land: Why I Write from New Zealand

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 00:12:09 GMT

On a regular basis I am asked what brought me to New Zealand. I get asked this by the American friends and family I left behind. I get asked this by almost every new person I meet here in New Zealand. Usually, I answer rather flippantly. I say my husband dragged me here, or I say they finally opened the US borders and we ran while we could. I answer this way because the real answer, the true answer, is long and complex and multi-faceted and people's eyes would roll back in their heads if I gave it.

However, I think I can give a bit of it here and now, during New Zealand Spec Fic Blogging Week.

Traveling has always been like a bit of magic to me, and it has always been closely connected to writing. As a child, my family toured and camped the US and Canada many times over, and I wrote stories to while away the long hours in the car. Many of my published stories have been inspired by my travels. "The Derby" and "Traveling by Petroglyph" came after a five week tour of Alaska, mostly on the Inland Passage ferry system. Traveling takes you out of your familiar landscape, it jars your reality. It introduces you to characters you would never meet or know otherwise. Traveling is external motion. Storytelling is internal motion. They are two manifestations of the same thing. In all good stories, the protagonist travels. She might travel on foot, or on horse, or by spaceship, but she also travels through internal change. The two kinds of travel are entwined, one with the other.

And on really big quests in the really good stories, the protagonist doesn't just go visit somewhere close by and vaguely familiar. No, the best stories are when she is taken completely out of her element, to a foreign land, or a different planet where nothing is like what she is used to. There she learns that her homeland's customs are not the only customs, her language not the only way to express, her people not the most civilized, her landscape not the only beauty, her god not the only holy entity. In that new, strange place, she cannot run back to the comforts of home. She must stay and face her fears, her truths unraveled to new, more informed and complicated truths. She must be changed.

That is what brought me to New Zealand- a hero's quest. I wanted to live in a different world than the one I had grown used to. I wanted that new place to inform my writing and my life. I wanted to be surprised by the landscape around the next corner, by a new history, and culture and politic.

I can say with all honesty, that I have not been disappointed. After three years, New Zealand is still unfolding her treasures before me. She is a land of mystery and great creative power. Since moving here my writing career has taken off in leaps and bounds.

I am a stranger in a strange land, and I am loving it.

Thank you, Aotearoa

Stay tuned for tomorrow's post, in which I reveal the Weird Side of New Zealand. And believe me, it can get pretty weird.

Free New Zealand Spec Fic Story

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 05:09:58 GMT

In honor of New Zealand Spec Fic Week, Wily Writers is featuring Grant Stone's story "The Salt Line" this week for free audio and text download. Grant Stone is a good friend, great writer, and the Kiwi bloke that stole the Sir Julius Vogel Award 2009 for best short story right out of my grubby little hands.

"The Salt Line" was written by a New Zealander in New Zealand, is set in New Zealand, was recorded in New Zealand, and the audio is read by another Kiwi bloke, Tim Jones, in a fabulous New Zealand accent. You can't get more New Zealand Spec Fic than that.

Please, go listen or read the story here to celebrate our week with us!

Cheers,
Ripley Patton

A Sampler of New Zealand Spec Fic Authors

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 01:58:54 GMT

You know those sampler plates that restaurants have full of appetizers like onion rings, hot wings, chicken fingers or crispy, deep-fried jalapeño poppers. Well, I thought to offer you today, a sampler of New Zealand Spec Fic authors. I'm only going to give you a nibble, a bite, a little taste to share with your friends and whet your appetite. After that, it will be up to you to go out to your local library or book store and get the full meal deal.

Crunchy, Mouth-Watering and Good with Mayo:

Russell Kirkpatrick: Do you enjoy intricate, lovingly-detailed maps and high fantasy trilogies akin to Lewis or Tolkien? Then you should try more than a sample of author Russell Kirkpatrick who started life as a cartographer, once mapped fear itself, and has the physique of a very handsome hobbit. His book Across the Face of the World was the 2008 bestselling debut novel in the US according to Bookscan sales data. You can find more about Russell and his works at his website.

Helen Lowe: Poet, YA writer, and fantasy author Helen Lowe recently burst onto the scene with her debut YA fantasy novel Thornspell, which received the Sir Julius Vogel Award 2009 for Best Novel in its category. Her first book of a four part series, The Wall of Night, is scheduled for release in September 2010 with Eos (HarperCollins USA). You can find out more about Helen and her writing at her website.

Lyn McConchie: Want to meet the patron goddess of New Zealand Spec Fic writers? Let me present Lyn McConchie. Lyn is somewhat of a legend around these parts. She was a good friend and collaborator of Andre Norton's and has been publishing just about everything she writes in almost every genre and length since she started submitting work in 1991. You can find a great interview with her here . Lyn also write non-fiction about life on her small New Zealand farm under the name Elizabeth Underwood. Her website can be found here.

Hugh Cook: Hugh Cook died in November of 2008, but he is not forgotten. His first novel Plague Summer was published in 1980 when he was 24. Along with his massive fantasy novel series, The Chronicles of an Age of Darkness, Hugh has an incredible list of short story publications. Many full samples of his short works can be found at his website here.

Philippa Ballatine: In 2006 Philippa Ballatine became the first New Zealand author to podcast a novel. That book, Chasing the Bard, follows William Shakespeare into the world of the fey, and has been followed by Digital Magic, both now available in print from Dragon Moon Press. Philippa has also just signed a two book deal with Ace books. More of her work can be accessed on Podiobooks.com and her Erotica a la Carte podcast is not to be missed. Links to come as right now the library internet system seems to think Philippa is just a little too spicy!

Historical New Zealand Speculative Fiction

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 23:09:16 GMT

Want to know who was writing New Zealand Speculative Fiction long before it was even called Fantasy, Science Fiction and Horror?

Check out Anna Caro's fascinating post and link to The New Zealand Electonic Text Centre. You won't be disappointed.

New Zealand Spec Fic Blogging Week Has Arrived

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 22:33:27 GMT

So, it is here at last- The first annual New Zealand Spec Fic Blogging Week sponsored by the futuristic writers association SpecFicNZ.

What the hell is all this hubbub, you ask?

Well, let me explain.

You see, I live and write speculative fiction in New Zealand. It is a well known fact that New Zealand is a fabulous place to make fantasy movies. New Zealand has fantastic scenery, the American dollar goes a long way here, the country is sparsely populated (unless you count the sheep) which means people won't harass your camera crews or maul your actors, and one of the two primary languages is English. Add to all that the fact that Wellington is home to one of the best visual and digital effects companies in the world, Weta Workshop and Viola! You have a movie making heaven and the location for The Piano, The Last Samurai, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, King Kong, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Bridge to Terabithia, The Xena Warrior Princess television series, and The Legend of the Seeker television series.

New Zealand is made for fantasy, and New Zealand has many fantastic creators of written specuative fiction. They just don't get quite as much press as their cinematic counterparts. So, when I moved here one of the first things I did was scrounge up a bunch of writers and editors of speculative fiction to found an organization with the intention of promoting and fostering New Zealand's Speculative Fiction writing community. SpecFicNZ was conceived, though technically it hasn't been born yet. The Core group of founders has named it, come up with an organizational charter, and is now working on a website to help officially launch the org in early 2010.

But honestly, we just couldn't wait that long to get the ball rolling. Those of us in the SpecFicNZ Core are passionate about New Zealand Speculative Fiction. We know there is great Sped Fic stuff happening in our country right now. We also know that the rest of the world is pretty much oblivious to it. And so, the idea for New Zealand Spec Fic Blogging week came up and we said, "Yeah, let's do that!"

But what's that got to do with you? Well, we'd like to ask you to join us. Many of us in the Core have committed to writing about New Zealand Speculative Fiction every day for a week. We'd like to challenge you, Kiwi or not, to join us in writing at least one blog post about New Zealand Speculative Fiction this week (Sept 14-20). If you don't know anything about New Zealand or its Speculative Fiction authors, go have a look on the internet. You're bound to find something or someone that sparks your interest. Link to an author's page or blog, review a book, interview an author, feature or submit to a New Zealand Spec Fic e-zine or market. Get creative, and when you do a post, link it to this website: pterodaustrodreams.org/drupal-6.8/node/100 so we can find what you've done. Be sure to check out what other people are blogging.

Speculative Fiction is alive and well in New Zealand.

Oh, and for those of you who are still confused, it is the 14th in New Zealand when it is only the 13th in most parts of the world. We are literally living in your future. We know things. Pay attention. There may be a quiz later.

Women Do It Too: The Case of Russell Crowe

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 22:30:39 GMT

In my last post on the Flabulous Lizzi Miller picture in Glamour Magazine, someone brought up Russell Crowe in the comments and it reminded me of a small article I had recently read about him.

Apparantly, he was out biking with his personal trainer and they stopped to have a snack. Russell proceeded to eat three tacos and drink a large soda. A female reporter saw him do this and wrote a scathing article mocking his "fitness routine" and commenting on his belly flab. She was basically saying he was obviously unfit based on what he ate and how he looked. Again, this is a case of evaluating someone's health on very limited data.

When Russell read the article, he issued a good-natured, public challenge to the female reporter that they should bike 25k together and see who was fitter. She agreed, and they had their bike ride with Russell leaving her in the dust the whole way.

My point is, we women do it too. The body image hammer can swing both ways. But I would still contend that is swings the female direction a hell of a lot more often than the male direction.

Absolutely Flabulous: Some commentary on Lizzi Miller's picture in Glamour magazine

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 01:28:47 GMT

I was recently turned on to an article at The Daily Beast about a picture that appeared on page 194 of the September 2009 issue of Glamour magazine. The picture accompanied an article titled "What Everyone But You Sees About Your Body” with sample advice: such as “When you focus on the body parts you love, your ‘flaws’ fade away.” The picture is of Lizzi Miller, an average-sized model. She is smiling gloriously, in the nude (except for some very scanty underwear), and she has an obvious, un-airbrushed, roll of belly flab in the picture.

Since the release of the issue with Lizzi's picture, Glamour magazine has been inundated with e-mail and correspondence from readers thanking the magazine and responding positively to the publication of a picture that represents a female body type hardly ever shown naked in media. It seems almost every blog aimed at women has commented on the Flabulous picture, and although I may be behind the times, I feel compelled to comment on it, especially after reading the comments left at The Daily Beast.

1) First, I am amazed and pleased that Glamour magazine published an article about female body acceptance, in a media world aimed at making women and men dissatisfied with their bodies. Frankly, magazines are generally designed to make you feel dissatisfied with some aspect of your life. Magazines are funded by advertisers who sell products. Dissatisfaction sells products. Contentment doesn't. Yes, it was an article on page 194, not the lead article by any margin, but it was in the magazine. That has me impressed. Go Glamour.

2) The readership of Glamour magazine, I believe, is primarily female. Females of all shapes and sizes are used to seeing only a certain type of female body represented in the media. That type, generally tall, thin, muscled and air-brushed, is put forth as the ideal but it is far from the average female body type. Many of the women depicted in the media make a career out of their appearance and spend unusual amounts of time, energy and money maintaining it. Not only do they have personal trainers, dietitians, make-up/hair artists and corporately funded wardrobes, but many of these "ideal" women have dangerous surgeries or medical treatments to maintain their appearance. This "effort of appearance" is not something the average woman, whose career is not her appearance, can realistically afford, either in time or money. Obviously, many women were moved by the picture of Lizzi. It validated their experience and appearance as women in average bodies. It is a picture without shame. In it, Lizzi is obviously smiling, happy, confident, and glowingly beautiful. It is a very empowering picture for women.

3) Many men have commented on The Daily Beast about the fact that the picture is not attractive or beautiful to them. My response to them would be that the picture and article are not about men, or for men. The picture of Lizzi is not intended to "attract" men or make them feel horny. I honestly don't care if men find the picture attractive or not. Beauty is a matter of personal, subjective judgment and it is silly to argue over it. I don't believe that beauty is primarily defined by sexual appeal. I find the picture of Lizzi quite beautiful, but I do not mean by this that I am sexually attracted to it. I find it beautiful because it resonates with me, reminds me of myself, empowers women to be themselves, and expresses the pleasure and confidence women can have in their bodies despite what the media world puts forth as an unrealistic ideal.

4) Many men have commented that putting forth and lauding pictures like Lizzi's promotes ill-health, laziness and obesity. First, depite the proven connection between obesity and some health issues, thinness does not equal health, nor does fat equal ill-health. This is a gross oversimplification of numerous variables involved in gauging how healthy someone is. Lizzi's body stats do NOT put her in the category of obese. She looks glowingly healthy in the photo. Having belly flab does not make her unhealthy or unfit. Her doctor is qualified to comment on her health, bu not someone wanting to degrade her body based on a photo. Many people in our world are thin because of extensive drug use, disease, eating disorders, and malnutritcian. Being thin does not make them healthy. Anyone who has studied history and art knows that a certain amount of fat has been considered healthier and more beautiful in eras of humanity's past because it indicated an adequate amount of caloric intake. Fat also provided caloric storage over the long winter months when food was not as available and it provided important body insulation against cold weather. Fat actually helped people stay alive. There have been studies done that show that thin women have a harder time conceiving because their body is not convinced they have enough stores to sustain themselves and a child in the womb. The idea that thin is healthy, and fat is not, is just not true.

Secondly, any person who thinks that showing more "realistic" body images of women will lead to eating disorders has a very limited understanding of female psychology. Eating disorders are mislabeled, in my opinion, as they are rarely about eating. They are usually about love, acceptance, and the belief that body image is the path to acceptance. Girls and women starve and binge trying to obtain an "ideal" naturally (through eating) that they see as "attractive" based on media and magazines. The problem is that ideal is not average, not attainable by most, and requires a level of "effort of appearance" that your average teenage girl or working woman will never have access to. As for the picture of Lizzi leading women toward obesity- the obsession with and growth of the health industry almost exactly paralells the rise in obesity statistics in America. It would seem the more that we obsess and comercialize something, the worse we make it. The more we promote an impossible ideal, the more we strive and fail to miss the mark of that idea. I think true body health comes from body acceptance, realistic expectations and goals, and inner satisfaction.

5) My final comment is actually a question. If this had been a picture of a man with belly fat in a men's magazine, would we be having this discussion at all? I don't think so. Men are not held to the standard of beauty and appearance that women are. Images of men in media and magazines are often more varied, including men who are balding, bearded, fat, old, or have other physical attributes not generally considered "attractive" by many women's standards. But I have never heard this mentioned as an issue. I have never heard people rally that this promotes obesity, or that those men should be taken "off the air" because they aren't sexy enough. It seems men are allowed an "attractiveness" value beyond the physical that women are not.

In conclusion, I am thrilled that Glamour ran the picture of Lizzi Miller in their Septmeber issue and I hope that the response they got from their readership means there will be many more "realistic" and accepting female body images to come. And more toward the front, or maybe even on the front cover.

My Fiction's Bechdel Quotient

Thu, 03 Sep 2009 00:19:41 GMT

The Bechdel quotient, as I'm calculating it, was inspired by this cartoon and is normally applied to films. The Quotient takes a value between 0 and 1, thus: 0.25 for one of: two female significant characters, conversation between same, female conversation on topic other than male significant character; 0.5 for two of these; 1 for all three attributes. Zero, obviously, if none of these attributes are present. punktortoise did a post on his LJ in which he used the quotient on his own short fiction, and it inspired me to do the same. Here are my results.

MY SHORT STORIES:

PUBLISHED :

0 - A Speck in the Universe

0.5 – The House that Dirk Built

1 - Sister of the Benevolent Gods
0 – The Derby

0 - Traveling by Petroglyph (One strong female character that doesn't talk about a man- still it gets a zero)

1 – Sheep Woman and Dog Boys

0.5 - For Want of a Woodpecker

1 - Corrigan's Exchange

0 – Rites of Passage

1 – The Moth Collector's Daughter

0 – Over the Rim (forthcoming)

0 – The Comfort of Cabbages (forthcoming) (Again, one strong female character that doesn't talk about a man).

UNPUBLISHED (as of yet):

0 – My Mother's Body (Again, one strong female character that does not talk about a man)

1 – The Future of the Sky

1 – The Disney Solution

1 – When We Were Cursed

0.5 – Seeing Clearly

1 – Heart of the Salamander

1 – Lumbergina

0 – The Parable of the Three Iron Knockers

0 – The Bus to Nostalgia

0 – A Wedge of Time

Total: 10.5 out of 22 stories. Giving me an overall Bechdel quotient of 0.48. I had really hoped it would be higher.

What I learned:

I have included stories of all lengths, including flash, and some as yet unpublished stories that I believe are publishable but just haven't found homes yet. In some of my flash, one strong female character is featured, and I found it a bit frustrating that these earned no Bechdel points. It did cause me to make an observation about my own work, however. I realized that I tend to write lone, strong, female characters in a world otherwise filled with male characters. I think this has much to do with the fact that I lost my mother at a young age and was raised in a house full of men. Writing lone female characters very much reflects my personal experience and process as a female. Still, that kind of ratio isn't particularly empowering to women as a gender community. It gives somewhat of an isolationist perspective, as if strong women are clearly an anomaly, destined to be lone wolves because their own kind won't run with them.

Note to self: Give your female characters some backup for Goddess' sake!

That is probably why I loved "The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd so much. All those strong women and nary a man between them.

Anyway, what is your fiction's Bechdel quotient?

The Word Count Gospel

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 21:41:53 GMT

In the beginning were the words and the words were counted, and the word count was from God and the word count became God. All words were counted by the word count meter, and without it no words were made that weren't counted. In the word count was life and it was the light of men who counted words. And the counted words shone in the darkness of uncounted words, and those who did not count words comprehended it not.

The word count meter came from God. It came to bear witness to the numerical value of words, that all men, through it, might believe their words are nothing lest they be counted. Words are not light, but were sent through our hearts onto the page in order to be made a-countable.

Word counting is the true light, which lighteth every word that cometh into the world. Each new word written increases the count of the meter by one and light does abound. Each word removed decreases the meter by one and darkness prevails. And words that are changed, being only replaced by better words, but with the same numerical value, shall not be counted. Though they improve the story, they shall be null and void.

And across the face of the earth, the desire became for words to increase in frequency and number. To this end, man created such websites as "Write or Die" so that writers could be punished for their lack of counted words. And writing became a living hell, in which word count became the end all and the be all of what was once a creative process, an art, a craft, a love of words, not the counting of them. Writing became archaic math, notches on bone, tally marks in the dust. And there were many words, as many as the hairs on a writer's head, as many as the sand in the sea, and every last one of them was counted.

And man saw what he had counted, and he said, "It is 340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 345, 346, 347.......