POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAYS: An Alien Invasion May Already Be UNDERWAY!!!!

Several summers ago, I spent sporadic weeks chopping down the invasive tree/bush known as the common buckthorn…For my money, it is not only annoying, it is an horrendous MONSTER! (https://scontent.ffcm1-2.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/106777038_10156827573131324_1338251936212348319_n.jpg?_nc_cat=101&_nc_sid=8024bb&_nc_ohc=9q9yeayXZNAAX8wacF5&_nc_ht=scontent.ffcm1-2.fna&oh=0578f6e378467324c0b4b97446be1500&oe=5F25001B

Oddly, this got me to thinking about a set of novels I read during my young adulthood. I was a pretty freshly minted science teacher. I could teach lots of the sciences, but my interest had always been in biology.

David Gerrold, of STAR TREK fame (“The Trouble with Tribbles” in particular), wrote a unique alien invasion novel (actually a series), that detailed how the Chtorr had begun their invasion by wiping out a substantial portion of Humanity through a viral attack.

The survivors began to find weird plants, animals, and “stuff” all over. The “worms” are only the most voracious members of the “invasion suite” – but they are terrifying: “…they range in size from as small as a dog to as large as a bus…They have two double-jointed ‘arms’…with incredibly sharp claws. Their bodies are covered with symbiotic ‘fur’, each strand of which is a distinct lifeform and acts as a sensory input.”

This is a sort of invasive species on steroids.

After spending weeks attacking an invasion of a European plant called “common buckthorn”, whose scientific name is Rhamnus cathartica. It was brought here as an “ornamental shrub” from “from the central British Isles south to Morocco, and east to Kyrgyzstan.”

It blends in and is seemingly innocuous, though its scientific name hints at one of its uses in herbal medicine: “The seeds and leaves are mildly poisonous for humans and most other animals… [causing] stomach cramps and laxative effects…[suggesting a] common name purging buckthorn…”

It’s a nasty thing that grows leaves before most of the rest of the northern species of trees and grows fast. Local animals don’t graze it; though birds eat the seeds. As well, the plant contains a chemical called an “emodin”. It made me think of Imodium when I first saw it and while this over-the-counter anti-diarrheal medication STOPS diarrhea, emodin causes it. Animals that try and eat the little hard, black berries drop them all over the place – effectively seeding the bush and helping it spread.

This is just one example of a particularly obnoxious plant that is insidiously taking over vast swaths of North America. The species is naturalized and invasive in parts of North America. Rhamnus cathartica has a competitive advantage over native trees and shrubs in North America because it leafs out before native species. Of the annual carbon gain in R. cathartica, 27–35% comes from photosynthesis occurring before the leaves of other plants emerge. Soil in woodlands dominated by R. cathartica was higher in nitrogen, pH and water content than soil in woodlands relatively free of R. cathartica,[15][18] probably because R. cathartica has high levels of nitrogen in its leaves and these leaves decompose rapidly.

"Rhamnus cathartica is also associated with invasive European earthworms (Lumbricus spp.) in the northern Midwest of North America. Removing R. cathartica led to a decrease of around 50% in the biomass of invasive earthworms.

"Soils enriched by extra nitrogen from decayed buckthorn leaves and…Invasive earthworms (which in MN means ALL earthworms…)…need rich litter, break [buckthorn leaves] down rapidly, destroying beneficial fungi and exposing bare soils in the process. These soils provide ideal conditions for buckthorn germination and seedling growth but many native trees and shrubs need the beneficial fungi and will not reproduce without it…it is particularly prevalent in the Great Lakes states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan.”

Why can’t we fight it with 21st Century science? “Numerous potential biocontrol insects for common and glossy buckthorn were screened for host-specificity and impacts. Early on, glossy buckthorn biocontrol was eliminated from consideration due to lack of promising agents. Research continued on common buckthorn. After 11 years of searching for a biocontrol insect that is both host-specific and damaging to common buckthorn, we concluded that we do not have any promising agents at this time so we ended the project.”

So, while I’ve always laughed at the labels that say “Non-GMO” (because Humans have been genetically modifying organisms since the first Mayan crossbred the first corn plant to get bigger seeds – by hand and by century: (https://i.redd.it/mbe42vdt49841.jpg), I’m surprised that we haven’t tried to modify some kind of bug to take care of it. It does have an economic impact here; it certainly has an impact on the timber industry in other states – but none of the states affected by buckthorn are LUMBER-producing states, so…we don’t do it.

It's kind of creepy to realize that some sort of alien Chtorr could set up an alien ecosystem and we might not even notice it. What if biological invasion is a LONG-TERM proposition? What if some sort of AI ship or landcraft landed and proceeded to introduce various species across their normal boundaries, weakening the entire ecosystem. Then instead of the dramatic “red” invasion of the War Against the Chtorr, you’d have something virtually unstoppable.

How would we even know?

How about the first starship to reach an Earth-like world finds that the lifeforms are incredibly…familiar; and that the survey shows that a number of the species they find on the planet are what we would call “invasives” or even “introduced” – and as far as that goes, pheasants are “introduced” in Minnesota rather than invasive, because “some people” released them for hunting purposes…

So, I have a scenario where one of the new colonists is from around here – or find out where the most invasive species reside – is on the bio-survey team. They can’t find anything of Human-level intelligence. Then another, farther-reaching mission finds and makes a First Contact, and their “home world” has species very familiar on Earth…in fact, their biology is suspiciously Earth-like…

To finish up, I checked up on methodologies under investigation to destroy our accidental destroyer: Fungus Among Us: MTU Student Using Native Fungi to Weaken Invasive Trees. Seems this youngster has discovered a FUNGUS that seems to enjoy feasting on buckthorn! Cultivating SuperPurp as Stone does makes it easier to process into a sprayable liquid. Stone uses an immersion blender to whir the solution to the proper viscosity, then pours the broth into a garden-variety sprayer used for application in outdoor test areas.

“It’s literally mushroom soup,” he says.

Stone, an undergraduate majoring in ecology and evolutionary biology is living proof that you don’t have to wait until you graduate to tackle the complex problems facing the world.

"SuperPurp is Stone’s not-so-secret weapon to beat back the widespread Midwest invasion of two species of invasive buckthorn trees: Rhamnus cathartica and Frangula alnus. The trees are gaining a foothold across the upper Midwest and altering the character of forests. Stone inoculates them with the fungus, weakening the aggressive invaders to give native species a chance to rebound.
Abe Stone, an undergraduate majoring in ecology and evolutionary biology at Michigan Technological University, a public research university founded in 1885 in Houghton, Michigan, is living proof that you don’t have to wait until you graduate to tackle the complex problems facing the world."

Foundation: https://www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/index.html#:~:text=Minnesota's%20natural%20resources%20are%20threatened,land%20or%20in%20the%20water., https://files.dnr.state.mn.us/natural_resources/invasives/terrestrialplants/is-bmp.pdf
Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_Against_the_Chtorr#A_Matter_for_Men_(1983), https://www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/terrestrialplants/woody/buckthorn/index.html, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhamnus_cathartica, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emodin, https://www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/terrestrialplants/woody/buckthorn/index.html
NEWS!: https://www.mtu.edu/unscripted/2024/03/fungus-among-us-mtu-student-using-native-fungi-to-weaken-invasive-trees.html
Image: https://www.honey-plants.com/img/picforcontent/rhamnus-cathartica_3_large.jpg

Science Fiction MYSTERY: I NEVER REALLY KNEW THERE WAS SUCH A THING, Until I Saw "I, Robot"...

The murder mystery is a classic plot structure, and has been written into SF settings many times, from classics such as Alfred Bester’s “Fondly Fahrenheit” and Pat Cadigan’s “Tea From An Empty Cup”, to Tade Thompson’s FAR FROM THE LIGHT OF HEAVEN. What are some of our favorite books in this genre? What books put a uniquely SFF twist on the locked room mystery or the unbreakable alibi, and use their setting to write mysteries that couldn’t be written outside the genre? I was the last person to expect that I would love to read mysteries.

As a kid, Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, and books like that bored me.

I loved Asimov and the other panoply of writers from the end of the 60s through the 1970s. But if you’d asked me if Asimov wrote mysteries, I’d have said, “No. He’s a science fiction writer!”

About six or seven years ago, I stumbled across Craig Johnson, who wrote the novels about sheriff Walt Longmire. I can’t tell you even how that happened, but I fell in love with Longmire – and I’m currently rationing the last few of his novels that I haven’t read!

What caught me? How come I never noticed that Asimov’s novels were mysteries – and I read Caves of Steel, The Naked Sun, and even have a copy of The Robots of Dawn from the Science Fiction Book Club. But I didn’t READ them as mysteries. I read them as “robot novels”.

I’m going to look at this today!

First, what caught me with Longmire? Why’d I even BOTHER TO READ THE FIRST BOOK? I am no fan of Westerns (REALLY NOT!), and I never really thought of myself as a “mystery reader”. However, an old friend of mine LOVED the books and because I respect him, I tried the first one – COLD DISH. I was hooked because first off, Longmire’s not a supremely confident, “just put a gun in my hand and I’ll bring justice to the Old West ‘cause I’m the baddest-assed Lawman in the West!” kind of guy.

He's Human – I mean, he’s Human in the best possible way. Somehow, Craig Johnson managed to write Longmire as a quirky, smart – I mean, the man quotes Shakespeare! – and not entirely sure of himself. He also trusts the dangdest people. Sometimes, when he does, my first impression is that the person isn’t WORTHY of trust.

But, Larson gets that, too. Sometimes Longmire makes mistakes in who he trusts and then there are dire results. Also, Longmire DOESN’T ESCAPE HIS MISTAKES OR COME OUT UNHARMED! Even in movies, characters often make mistakes and other people suffer. Most of the time, it’s Longmire who suffers – though, just like in real life, others pay the price for his mistakes. They also pay the price for his well-night-to-unstoppable sense of justice – his daughter Cady ends up paying one of those times.

In essence though, what is it that attracts me to that kind of story? First off is the mystery – don’t get me wrong, I LOATHE mysteries in real life! I need to know what’s happening and to whom. I don’t mean just like, MURDER mysteries, though I’ve tried my hand at one or two – my first sale to CRICKET Magazine was “Mystery on Space Station Courage” (November 1997). No murder, just some strange sounds that turned out to be from someone who was trapped and might die if Candace can’t figure out and convince others that there WAS a mystery!

Another story where I use elements of mystery and science fiction is “Dinosaur Veterinarian” (ANALOG Science Fiction and Fact, November/December 2022). There you have a series of deaths seemingly caused by birds – which hinges on the fact that birds are relatives of the dinosaurs (doubters among you? Just go to the grocery store, and in the ethnic foods section, find a bag of frozen chicken feet! Don’t tell me that those feet DON’T have scales on them!) Anyway, my veterinarian character Javier Quinn Xiong Zaman DVM [aka Doctor Scrabble© (Because in the game, J, Qu, X, and Z are the highest scoring tiles)] has to find out what’s hunting and killing soldiers from both North and South Korea, as well as an entire international group of birdwatchers…

Of course he solves the mysteries.

Recently, I discovered that Isaac Asimov loved writing SF mysteries as well. Despite reading his work for most of my adult life, I didn’t notice that he wrote mysteries until the movie, “I, Robot” hit the silver screen with one of my favorite actors Will Smith, playing detective Spooner. What MOST people don’t know, is that the actual story that the movie is based on was in ASIMOV’S Science Fiction. “Robot Dreams”, while it isn’t ANYTHING LIKE THE MOVIE, had the seed in it. The movie-makers just added a Human cop with a grudge against robots to make the MOVIE…seems more Human, cause, really, would YOU go see a movie about, say, a Wyoming sheriff…who was a ROBOT? I mean, really?

Anyway, I’ve discovered I enjoy mysteries – also like WATCHING them, too, in particular the Hercule Poirot mysteries of Agatha Christie.

But I think I like not only the logical order of mysteries, I like that the logic comes wrapped in fallible Humans…or even fallible robots. STAR TREK: The Next Generation’s Commander Data’s holodeck adventures as Sherlock Holmes are intriguing and I enjoy those as well.

While reading a bit for this article, I stumbled across this: https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/its-simply-too-dangerous-to-arm-robots in which it explains how “San Francisco was embroiled in controversy earlier in December of 2022, over a proposal to allow police to deploy robots armed with deadly weapons. After initially greenlighting the technology, the Board of Supervisors reversed course due to widespread public outcry. For the time being, killer robots are banned in San Francisco, but the controversy there has put the issue in the national spotlight. People are increasingly aware that this technology exists and that some police departments want to deploy it.”

In a nutshell, people hated the idea and voted it down. Interesting, eh? Robots that can kill are NOT all right, but Humans who can kill are a-OK and we should be happy to sell them guns…maybe this world ISN’T ready for a robot detective yet. Then again, mostly when we think of a “robot detective”, we’re thinking of an ANDROID detective, a law enforcement officer who is built as an “humaniform” robot. But what about MACHINE detectives that don’t look anything like Humans, but are sapient and trained as police officers…what about them?

I'll be exploring this subject through stories more in the future! I'll let you know if I succeed...

Another Article I wrote on SF Mysteries:

https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2014/07/possibly-irritating-essays-four-tips-to.html

My New “To Read” List: https://theportalist.com/sci-fi-mystery-books

An INTERESTING Read: https://creation.com/i-robot
Image: https://comicvine.gamespot.com/a/uploads/original/8/85165/1966575-sonny.jpg

IDEAS ON TUESDAY 655

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them? Regarding Fantasy, this insight was startling: “I see the fantasy genre as an ever-shifting metaphor for life in this world, an innocuous medium that allows the author to examine difficult, even controversial, subjects with impunity. Honor, religion, politics, nobility, integrity, greed—we’ve an endless list of ideals to be dissected and explored. And maybe learned from.” – Melissa McPhail.

Fantasy Trope: The Quest
Current Event: http://contemplativequest.com/, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice's_Adventures_in_Wonderland

Světlana Angelika pursed her lips, looking out over the hectares of forest. In the MSP Vertical Village, it was mostly deciduous trees – oak, maple, patches of white-barked birch, poplar – with a sprinkling of pine trees. The concourse she and Uthman Aali were on was packed with people. Not a hundred thousand, for sure, but too many to think. “We need to go somewhere,” she said abruptly, speaking in the too loud manner of all the inhabitants of Vertical Villages everywhere.

Uthman gave her a look that said, “You’re crazy.”

She slugged him in the shoulder. It was a little kid move – but then, they’d been friends since they were three years old. “No, I’m serious. We need to go somewhere real.”

Without changing his stare, Uthman said, “We can go up to the six hundredth floor...”

“No! I don’t mean here. This is all so...boring. We need to go,” she pause, “through a looking glass.”

“A what?”

“A looking glass! Haven’t you ever read Alice in Wonderland?”

“I might have seen a threevee of it once. Wasn’t it a cartoon?”

“Yes – and no, you haven’t seen this. Lewis Carroll wrote a novel, it’s true. But he was a mathematician. His logic is all over the book. Math. Everything.”

Uthman snorted, “It sounds like science fiction.”

“It’s fantasy – she steps through a mirror.”

“If it’s math and logic, it’s science fiction.”

“There are talking rabbits,” said Světlana. “And a talking, disappearing cat. As well as a talking, smoking caterpillar, talking mice, and soldiers made of playing cards.”

“OK. You win. It’s a fantasy. But what does it have to do with us? What kind of mirror can we jump through? I’m sure there are some here – but...”

“The windows. We can jump through one of those.”

“A window?”

“Come on, let’s go to the outer walls. We’ll leap through one of those!” She turned and ran, Uthman running after her.

Names: ♀ Czech, Roman; ♂ Arabic, Hindu
Image: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/98/71/e5/9871e52bbc09c525af21b8f6471eab15.jpg

Slice of PIE: I WISH I Could Be A Hopepunk Writer, but I Don’t Qualify…

This entry was inspired by a session I read about during the World Science Fiction Convention in Dublin, Ireland in August 2019. The link is provided below where this appeared on page 25…

WARNING: THIS ARTICLE HAS POLITICAL AND DEEPER-THAN-USUAL CHRISTIAN OVERTONES. DON'T READ IT IF YOU ARE OFFENDED BY SUCH.

Introduction to hopepunk: Alexandra Rowland coined the term ‘hopepunk’ in a Tumblr post in 2017, saying that: ‘…the opposite of Grimdark is Hopepunk’. Our panel will discuss what the term means and how hopepunk intersects with other speculative subgenres such as grimdark, noblebright, and solarpunk, as well as offering reading recommendations.

Sam Hawke: Lawyer, writer.
Jo Walton: Hugo and Nebula award winning novelist, blogger at Tor.com, poet.
Alexandra Rowland: Game monitor at an escape room company, seamstress, and writer.
Lettie Prell: Science fiction writer.

I had never heard of this, but it’s probably what I’d write if I could get it published.

Of course, it EMPHATICALLY does not include me: in the article resourced below: “Hopepunk says that genuinely and sincerely caring about something, anything, requires bravery and strength. Hopepunk isn’t ever about submission or acceptance: It’s about standing up and fighting for what you believe in. It’s about standing up for other people. It’s about DEMANDING a better, kinder world, and truly believing that we can get there if we care about each other as hard as we possibly can, with every drop of power in our little hearts.”

This definition seems to exclude Christianity as an ultimate hope because (it seems), God isn't a necessary component for goodness.

Rowland, the article points out, “…was responding to the idea of 'grimdark' — a literary descriptor for genre texts and media which evoke a pervasively gritty, bleak, pessimistic, or nihilistic view of the world…in which cruelty is a given and social systems are destined to betray or disappoint." 

It’s also, apparently political as the article subtitle made clear, “In the era of Trump and apocalyptic change, Hopepunk is a storytelling template for #resistance — and hanging onto your humanity at all costs.” And of course, the prime advocate of this #resistance had no political connection or motivation and was merely a humble representative for a political party that had the good of all people everywhere in mind: Andrew Slack noted that JK Rowling and JRR Tolkien ‘readied us for a message of hope, change, and global citizenry [that was advocated by] Barack Obama,’ he wrote, noting that Obama’s presidency was also ‘met by a giant swell of popularity around fantasies that dwelled in the darkness: vampires, dystopias, and Heath Ledger’s nihilist Joker.’ In essence, grimdark.”

Of course, the movement apparently feels Jesus was “a good man” as Rowland was quoted in an article that followed up on her Twitter invention of the new literary category: “…she crucially offered examples of both mythical and real-world political figures: ‘Jesus and Gandhi and Martin Luther King and Robin Hood and John Lennon’ — heroes who chose to perform radical resistance in unjust political climates, and to imagine better worlds.” (She might want to read CS Lewis’ response to her inclusion on her list: https://caldronpool.com/c-s-lewis-destroys-unbelievers-who-think-jesus-was-a-good-man/)

Wow! Jesus (who was, apparently, mythical) resisted…Rome? The Jewish establishment? living in an “unjust political climate”, and accordingly, imagined a better world. Through sacrificing His life?

According to the author of this piece, hopepunk is “…a perfect aesthetic accompaniment to the…philosophy that aggressively choosing kindness, optimism, and softness over hardness, cynicism, and violence can be a powerful political choice….[it] says that ‘kindness and softness doesn’t equal weakness,’ Rowland wrote in her expanded definition, ‘and that in this world of brutal cynicism and nihilism, being kind is a political act,’ [combining] the aesthetics of choosing gentleness with the messy politics of revolution…”

The end of the article elucidates the books, stories, authors, and trumpets the advent of a spectacular new concept apparently invented by Millenials: “Rowland’s original hopepunk definition has now been widely shared and discussed throughout the sci-fi and fantasy community, in online forums and in panel discussions at a number of conventions, and writers have frequently started to describe their own works as hopepunk…panel[s] on hopepunk and optimistic sci-fi/fantasy…N.K. Jemisin, whose works carry themes of resistance in a time of apocalypse and bear sharp signifiers of hopepunk…As the first black woman to nab the top prize in 2016, and then the first writer to win it three years in a row thanks to her 2017 and 2018 repeat wins, Jemisin’s 2018 win became a moment of convergence in which literary hopepunk evolved into real-world activism — a show of defiance in an ongoing battle against radical right-wing extremism within the sci-fi/fantasy community. [Which, oddly, appears to have been unnoticed since the inception of SFWA in 1966.] In recognizing her work, with its themes of finding humanity and love amid apocalyptic change, Hugo voters sent a message that they would not allow blights like racism to undermine the sci-fi community’s humanism and idealism [which they HAD been for nearly a century...which see, one example: the identities of James Tiptree, Jr. and CJ Cherryh and the consistent snubbing of any number of women SF/F writers]…Ever since, Hopepunk has seemed to be suddenly everywhere, becoming a true force in the literary landscape in the last couple months of 2018: At IO9, Eleanor Tremeer argued that we need utopian fiction now more than ever; the piece didn’t explicitly identify hopepunk, but many of its readers did…The Verge announced its upcoming Better Worlds science fiction series, intended to promote sci-fi…Tor wrote about “high epic fantasy hopepunk…As the idea of hopepunk has caught on, many people have expressed gratefulness to Rowland for coining the term. When I first introduced and explained the term to Slack, for example, he wrote me an ebullient 15-paragraph email, exclaiming, “This is some seriously important and sacred [crap]!”…Part of the reason that hopepunk feels so important in the current moment is that two years into Donald Trump’s presidency, it’s arguably difficult for many people to stay motivated and alert to the many political crises happening at once. Hopepunk, then, is a way of drawing energy and strength from fictional inspirations in order to keep fighting the good fight in the real world…This is not an easy task,” Slack wrote. “It shakes us to our core. But hopepunk reminds us to thank…goodness that we have such a beautiful core.” (Apparently hopepunk includes the vigorous use of vulgarity to emphasize how devoted you are to its ideals…)

This shining movement, a testament to all things Humanly Wonderful, has totally ignored at least one author who wrote peaceful, tranquil science fiction decades ago and whom few people read now because he DIDN’T write about empires, kingdoms, and Obama. He wrote hope in an era spanning the Great Depression, WWII, Korea, post-Vietnam, through the Iranian hostage crisis (overseen by then president and a proponent of not only hopepunk, but of old-fashioned HOPE, Jimmy Carter) and almost to the Fall of Communism:

Clifford D. Simak, I daresay, was one of the original hopepunk writers…oops…sorry, I guess he can’t be. He believed in God, which (while it isn't essential to being a hopepunk writer), might make it a bit easier to write a story that is inherently positive and hopeful.

Program Book: https://dublin2019.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/ProgrammeScheduleWeb.pdf, https://dublin2019.com/whats-on/programming/programme-schedule/
Resource: https://www.vox.com/2018/12/27/18137571/what-is-hopepunk-noblebright-grimdark, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford_D._SimakImage: https://fq8ku9wqwk7gai1z3frl16nd-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/HOPEPUNK-100-996x515.jpg

IDEA ON TUESDAY 654

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them. Octavia Butler said, “SF doesn’t really mean anything at all, except that if you use science, you should use it correctly, and if you use your imagination to extend it beyond what we already know, you should do that intelligently.”

SF Trope: Evil de-evolution
Current Event: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devolution_(biology) (Fascinating article in which an evolutionists tap-dances around the idea that the dissemination of correct information is NOT the responsibility of scientists but of...um...Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, but ultimately Nobody and CERTAINLY not them…(http://www.corsinet.com/braincandy/hlife.html))

Ugnė Mertens flipped her pigtail back again as she stared at the image on her laptop. Muttering, she stepped sideways to the microscope and moved the slide using the X-Y translational control knobs fine adjustment. The image of the chromosome she was studying moved fractionally.

Naranbaatar Todorov picked at his thin, first beard and said, “Staring at it isn’t going to make the genes magically appear, Ug.”

“That’s what you think,” she straightened up, she smiled and added, “Baaaaa,” drawing out the stereotypical sheep sound. “Watch.” She touched a pressure toggle on an odd, goose-necked device standing beside the microscope. The computer’s screen fuzzed suddenly, then the single chromosome lit up as if it was a candy cane.

Baa started, looked at the lamp and exclaimed, “What is that thing?

“Something I invented and you didn’t,” Ug said, sitting on the lab stool, leaning forward.

Baa swallowed hard, pursed his lips then said, “Listen, I know you don’t much like me...”

Ug reached out and typed an entry into the text box then said, “If I had a choice between dissecting three-day-old roadkill and having lunch with you...” she paused, made a face, then said, “I’m not sure which one I’d pick.”

Baa glanced at the clock on the wall. He still had four hours left of his shift. He couldn’t skip it or Dr. Harber would find out and dock him points. But he wasn’t sure he could keep his feet still and not kick Ugnė in the butt. He took a deep breath and said, “Must be an infrared to ultraviolet, rotating frequency projector.”

She shot him a look then went back to making notes on her computer. Occasionally she tapped her smartphone as well, which lay next to the laptop. “Lucky guess.”

“So that means, ‘yes’. Then you must have bathed the chromosomes in a solution that would...” Naranbaatar hooked another stool with his foot to drag it closer. Shrieking as it vibrated along the floor tiles, he winced and said, “Sorry.”

Ugnė sniffed but didn’t reply. Finally she said, “I used a mix that the older the gene, the less fluorescing compound it would pick up.

Baa frowned then asked, “What are the chromosomes from?”

“A narn.”

“You’re kidding!” he exclaimed. Reports had been circulating for years about animals whose genes had suddenly started evolving – a quantum evolution event – from static forms to much, much more intelligent forms.

“These are chromosomes from raccoons killed in southern Minnesota.”

“We have narns here?” Baa exclaimed, backing away from the microscope.

Ug turned to look at him. “The genes aren’t contagious, idiot! This isn’t a disease – it’s animal chromosomes. Dyed and fixed at that! What are you afraid of?”

“Nothing. Nothing!” He spun around and took long strides out of the lab. He didn’t care if he lost hours – all he could see in his mind’s eye was the raccoon he’d nearly run over when he was biking on rural trails near his family’s home in an outer ring suburb of what was slowly becoming the three, four-kilometer-tall towers of the Minneapolis-St. Paul Vertical Village.

He would never forget the look on its face as it held out a mangled aw to him and said, “Help...”

Names: ♀ Lithuanian, Belgian; ♂ Mongolian, Bulgarian
Sidebar: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punctuated_equilibriuM
Image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e1/Falcon_9_Demo-2_Launching_6_%283%29.jpg/220px-Falcon_9_Demo-2_Launching_6_%283%29.jpg

WRITING ADVICE: Short Stories – Advice and Observation #29 Adam-Troy Castro “& Me”

In this feature, I’ll be looking at “advice” for writing short stories – not from me, but from other short story writers. In speculative fiction, “short” has very carefully delineated categories: “The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America specifies word lengths for each category of its Nebula award categories by word count; Novel 40,000 words or over; Novella 17,500 to 39,999 words; Novelette 7,500 to 17,499 words; Short story under 7,500 words.”

I’m going to use advice from people who, in addition to writing novels, have also spent plenty of time “interning” with short stories. While most of them are speculative fiction writers, I’ll also be looking at plain, old, effective short story writers. The advice will be in the form of one or several quotes off of which I’ll jump and connect it with my own writing experience. While I don’t write full-time, nor do I make enough money with my writing to live off of it...neither do most of the professional writers...someone pays for and publishes ten percent of what I write. When I started this blog, that was NOT true, so I may have reached a point where my own advice is reasonably good. We shall see as I work to increase my writing output and sales! As always, your comments are welcome!

Without further ado, short story observations by Adam-Troy Castro – with a few from myself…

I read my first story by Adam-Troy Castro in the June 2001 issue of ANALOG, a curious tale with the unlikely title of “Saturday Night Yams With Minnie and Earl”; most recently, I read “Minnie and Earl Get a Kitten” in the September/October 2024 issue of ANALOG. Castro’s science fiction short stories are really good at carrying me away and giving me something to think about, and so I thought I’d use a couple of interviews of him to shed light on WHY I might like his short science fiction, and HOW I could learn something of writing short SF from him.

“Usually I write between a thousand and two thousand words per day…It was autobiography with a science fictional twist, and it was therapy, and it came out in a kind of explosion. It needed to exist.”

The interviewer asked, “Do you have any advice for other writers?”

“Don’t be comfortable. If what you write strikes you as routine, it will feel routine. Dig deep.” LIGHTSPEED; August 2022

To tell you the truth, until recently, I haven’t had the time to write that much. By the same token, in the past twenty-eight years, I’ve managed to write (and often been paid for!) seventy-seven short stories, essays, and reviews; one book of children’s sermons (it’s actually been in print since 1998), and a YA/MG science fiction novel. So, writing to get published CAN be done while working a full-time job.

As for what’s been uncomfortable for me…I’ve only started to learn that recently, asking myself, “How do I know what I’m saying?” I also found out it’s possible for me to write stories I wasn’t sure what I was trying to “say” until I was done with it, had put it away, and took it out to read it again. (https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2024/08/possibly-irritating-essay-how-do-i-know.html)

That has happened recently with a story I wrote in 2011 (on a REAL typewriter!). I wondered how (a quote from the movie “Apollo 13”) “I remember the NASA Public Relations guy [saying]: “All the networks dumped us. One said we make going to the moon look about as exciting as a trip to Pittsburgh.” This kind of attitude might have grown up again. While there’s lots of talk about spaceflight in some place, most real people don’t care. My story “High Carnival” looks at a way we might be able to turn that around…

Apex Magazine: What motivates writing a story like this? What sparked the initial concept?

Castro: You know, certain stories come with brilliant little back stories, fascinating little anecdotes, intense little explications of creation, to the point where the behind-the-scenes tale is as, or more interesting than the fiction…This is not one of those stories. I vaguely recall writing it, but can no longer summon the genesis, at all. Sorry.

My own stories? I can’t always remember the exact inspiration, either. Some, though? It’s clear. Lately, I’ve been trying to figure out what my THEME is. It’s sort of vague, but I look at it as an exploration of what I want people to know; persuade them, for example, that education has changed as time has passed. For example, for years after I started teaching, it was nearly impossible to get a teacher to tutor a student when they were ill or had an injury they were recovering from. When I was a counselor, we had a young person who was undergoing treatment for a life-threatening disease. She was smart, got high grades, and was a wonderful kid…but we never found a teacher to tutor her.

If she had been diagnosed and confined TODAY, there would have been NO PROBLEM CONTINUING HER EDUCATION. We had to problem-solve during the COVID pandemic. Schools went 100% online AND…it was very, very messy. We made mistakes; made the pandemic WORSE for some families, and we lost a large number of students in the struggle to figure out what we were doing.

BUT…there were science fiction stories that talked about some precursor to distance education. We just didn’t figure it out completely; and how many teachers do YOU know who would have listened to some crackpot scifi writer telling us how to educate kids???

Anyway, Education is a focus of my stories; thriving with an alternative way of learning; my faith. All of those have found their way into my stories. All of them will CONTINUE to.

Apex: You write a variety of styles, characters, and perspectives. Is there any specific point-of-view that you find you most naturally lean toward in rough drafts, or does experimenting with POV drive how you approach the initial composition of a story?

Castro: Although the story dictates the voice, I sometimes find myself unduly steered toward first-person, present-tense, though that often goes away after I lie down for a while. As a reader, I like anything that emotionally affects me…As a writer: one reason I like mystery, if not as a genre, then as a format for science fiction stories, is that it gives the protagonists an excuse to walk around asking questions, and figuring out the world on their own, which is a very organic way of explaining it to the reader at the same time.

I was NOT a mystery reader as a kid, or even as a young adult. But as an adult, I’ve gradually fallen in love with certain CHARACTERS in mysteries. Me and my wife loved the TV show BONES…her because the mysteries were fascinating; me because I LOVED the science in the stories. Bones – Temperance Brennan – was forensic scientist, and it was the science that drove the stories. I’ve started to play around with mystery somewhat. As well, the mystery of location is what I fell for in the LONGMIRE series of books – NOT THE TV SHOW! I love the novels because they’re so much deeper than TV can ever get.

However, in learning to love the mystery, I’ve discovered that ALL fiction is mystery. Even romance is mystery – characters meet, and in every one, especially the romantic comedy/mystery, you know they’ll fall in love in the end. As they’re people, they’ll also have relationships.

That’s what’s started to creep into my own stories. NOT always romance; but sometimes reconciliation, another theme I discovered that’s meaningful to me. That was recent and I’ll be using that as a theme more in the future.

“Where’s there reconciliation in scifi????” you shout at me. You’ll find my discussion of the the subject here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2024/11/possibly-irritating-essays-time-travel.html and here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2024/01/possibly-irritating-essays-spider-man.html

I’m working on it…now lastly:

Apex: What was the most important (to you) piece of writing advice you’ve encountered?

Castro: Worst piece of writing advice, ever: “You will never sell a word; Best: the well-known editors who took me to breakfast to say, “Adam, that first story you sold us? Were you a little unnerved that it was coming out of you? You were? Okay…have you felt more comfortable of late? You have? Well, that’s what you’re doing wrong.”

Castro: Despite international publications, award nominations, compliments from people I grew up reading, and so on, I still think of myself as an amateur who has yet to prove himself. With twenty-seven books published or contracted, I find the finish line is still moving, and that the worst possible thing for me, ever, will be catching up with it.”

And there you go. More with more authors and what I’m learning, in future posts!

References: https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/nonfiction/author-spotlight-adam-troy-castro-30/#:~:text=Don't%20be%20comfortable.,Dig%20deep.
Reference: https://apex-magazine.com/interviews-2/an-interview-with-adam-troy-castro/
Image: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhK6miXJMTMNyB3kzq-r6I2LVCTZJj0CDS0dPV2Qapl6e9rZPuHx2u5QKcKT1QGeDg1_tPMv-lpnuSr_eiBjwPXmex9mcgtuH2-SUtZEpGWV0_HdtJQelVt5K69NulJBUqNju5GNjHgQibXsIo4NeWpTOj4ai85jCRjMHOtwtkqshzxFvZPUSjXZNq6=s320

IDEA ON TUESDAY 653

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them. Regarding horror, I found this insight in line with WIRED FOR STORY: “ We seek out…stories which give us a place to put our fears…Stories that frighten us or unsettle us - not just horror stories, but ones that make us uncomfortable or that strike a chord somewhere deep inside - give us the means to explore the things that scare us…” – Lou Morgan (The Guardian)

H Trope: The dead coming back to life...
Current Event: Any “miraculous” “resurrection” of someone who was “dead”…

Ephraim Mendoza shook his head and said, “That can’t be.”

Mercedes Chokkoon pursed her lips, closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. When she opened her eyes, she said, “She’s dead. I was with her when she died.”

Frowning, Ephraim looked at her, eyes wide and said, “You said she’d be fine.”

Mercedes shrugged. She couldn’t take any more of this. “She was my sister. She was just your girlfriend. You think this is easy for me?”

He stared at her for a long time before he said, “No. That’s why I don’t understand how cold you’re acting. You sister is dead. The love of my...” his voice caught and he looked away. Not before she saw the tears slid down his face.

Mercedes glare at him, willing herself to blame him. “I can’t.”

“Can’t what?”

“Blame you.”

“What do you mean ‘blame you’? How could I have had anything to do with...”

Mercedes shook her head hard, “Nothing you did. Nothing you didn’t do. She wanted to live for you.”

“So? She wanted to live for you, too!”

“Not enough.”

“You’re blaming her for dying?” he said, incredulous. “She didn’t do anything to deserve this! She had no control...”

Mercedes slapped him. Then found her hands clenched in fists. One moment she was trembling, the next she was hitting him. She hit his face. Hit his nose. His eyes. Then she kneed him in the groin. He shoved her away, slamming her into the wall. She bounced off, spun, and fell face-first into the meal tray, screaming obscenities at him. He was down on the floor with her, hands around her throat, pressing; pressing; pressing the life out of her...

On the bed beside them, Chante sat up and said, “Stop it. Now.” There was no emotion in her voice. There wasn’t even a breath. The sound came without her moving her lips.

Mercedes scrambled back, free suddenly from Ephraim’s hands. He tried to stand as well, but tumbled over her. They found themselves with their backs against the hospital room door, side-by-side, clasping hands.

The heart monitor, still connected to her, was silent. The respirator, still taped to her jaw, was silent. The EEG waves turned the screen green with wild activity as she spoke, “Stop it. I love you both and if you don’t stop fighting…”

Names: ♀ French, Thai; ♂ Israeli, Mexican; ♀ French Image: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51niGRrH6DL.jpg

Image: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51niGRrH6DL.jpg