One of the advantages to owning a Kindle which I hadn’t anticipated is the fact that Amazon’s Kindle Store seems to go on sale with delicious regularity, and genre books tend to be well represented. Currently, Amazon is holding a sale it’s calling “A Big Deal“, and this ends on July 27. As with the previous “Sunshine Deals” sale, I trawled through the 900+ books on sale and picked out titles that seem to fall within the speculative fiction genre, or which would be of interest to the spec fic fan. (Quite a few of the Smart Pop YA series’ are on sale.) Pyr Books is once again participating, and there are a lot of the Classics+Supernatural mash-up books on sale as well. I’ll start with the books I’ve heard good things about, but first let me mention a book that isn’t part of the Big Deal but is on sale nevertheless–Yukikaze, from Haikasoru.

Now, on with the spending show!

Zoo City by Lauren Beukes

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

Strange Affair of Spring-Heeled Jack, The (Burton & Swinburne) by Mark Hodder

Hard Spell: An Occult Crimes Unit Investigation (Angry Robot) by Justin Gustainis

Hunter’s Run by Gardner Dozois, George R. R. Martin and Daniel Abraham

Blood of Ambrose by James Enge

Archimedes to Hawking : Laws of Science and the Great Minds Behind Them by Clifford Pickover

The Anime Art of Hayao Miyazaki by Dani Cavallaro

Fast Forward 1: Future Fiction from the Cutting Edge by Lou Anders, Kage Baker, Stephen Baxter and Elizabeth Bear

The Evolution of Fantasy Role-Playing Games by Michael J. Tresca

Dawnthief (Chronicles of the Raven 1) by James Barclay

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

Warriors #1: Into the Wild by Erin Hunter

Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson and Donna Diamond

The Girl Who Was on Fire: Your Favorite Authors on Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games Trilogy by Leah Wilson, Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Mary Borsellino and Sarah Rees Brennan

Succubus Blues by Richelle Mead

Demigods and Monsters: Your Favorite Authors on Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson and the Olympians Series by Rick Riordan and Leah Wilson

Nyx in the House of Night by Jordan Dane, Kristin Cast, Karen Mahoney and P. C. Cast

Lament: The Faerie Queen’s Deception by Maggie Stiefvater

Lockdown: Escape from Furnace 1 by Alexander Gordon Smith

Wicca for Beginners: Fundamentals of Philosophy & Practice (For Beginners (Llewellyn’s)) by Thea Sabin

Red-Headed Stepchild (Sabina Kane) by Jaye Wells

Longitude by Dava Sobel

Kushiel’s Scion (Kushiel’s Legacy) by Jacqueline Carey

Dragon Slippers by Jessica Day George

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dreadfully Ever After (Quirk Classics) by Steve Hockensmith

Bewitching by Jill Barnett

Starlighter (Dragons of Starlight) by Bryan Davis

The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls (Quirk Classics) by Steve Hockensmith and Patrick Arrasmith

The Unincorporated Man by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin

Immortal: Love Stories With Bite by Rachel Vincent, Rachel Caine, Kristin Cast and Claudia Gray

Ashes of the Earth: A Mystery of Post-Apocalyptic America by Eliot Pattison

Dead Men Kill (Stories from the Golden Age) by L. Ron Hubbard

Chosen Ones (Aedyn Chronicles, The) by Alister E. McGrath and Wojciech Voytek Nowakowski

Shadow Bound by Erin Kellison

Eternity’s Edge (Echoes from the Edge) by Bryan Davis

Finnikin of the Rock by Melina Marchetta

The Electric Church by Jeff Somers

Ascension (Guardians of Ascension) by Caris Roane

The Strangely Beautiful Tale of Miss Percy Parker by Leanna Renee Hieber

Encyclopedia of Angels by Richard Webster

On the Run (Elijah Project, The) by Bill Myers and James Riordan

Faerie Wars (Faerie Wars Chronicles) by Herbie Brennan

The Meowmorphosis (Quirk Classics) by Franz Kafka and Cook Coleridge

Herbert’s Wormhole by Peter Nelson and Rohitash Rao

Star Wars Vs. Star Trek by Matt Forbeck

The Dictionary of Demons: Names of the Damned by Michelle Belanger

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Jane Austen and Ben H. Winters

Elfsorrow (Legends of the Raven 1) by James Barclay

Sneaky Uses for Everyday Things: How to Turn a Penny into a Radio, Make a Flood Alarm with an Aspirin, Change Milk into Plastic, Extract Water and Electricity … a TV with Your Ring, and Other Amazing Feats by Cy Tymony

Hearts at Stake by Alyxandra Harvey

The Sword of Darrow by Hal Malchow and Alex Malchow

That’s Not Your Mommy Anymore: A Zombie Tale by Matt Mogk and Aja Wells

The Shrinking Man by Richard Matheson

Android Karenina by Leo Tolstoy, Ben H. Winters, Eugene Smith and Constance Garnett

Keeping It Real (Quantum Gravity, Book 1) by Justina Robson

Booksurfers: Treasure Island by David Gatward

TimeRiders by Alex Scarrow

Exploring Space 1999: An Episode Guide and Complete History of the Mid-1970s Science Fiction Television Series by John Kenneth Muir

Shadow Walkers by Brent Hartinger

Another Faust by Daniel Nayeri and Dina Nayeri

Sword Fighting in the Star Wars Universe: Historical Origins, Style and Philosophy by Nick Jamilla

The Battle Sylph (Sylph Series) by L. J. McDonald

In the Peanut Gallery with Mystery Science Theater 3000: Essays on Film, Fandom, Technology and the Culture of Riffing by Robert G. Weiner and Shelley E. Barba

Booksurfers: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by David Gatward

Dragon, Dragon: and Other Tales by John Gardner

Timeless Reality: Symetry, Simplicity, and Multiple Universes (Great Books in Philosophy) by Victor J. Stenger

Backteria and Other Improbable Tales by Richard Matheson

Captain America and the Struggle of the Superhero: Critical Essays by Robert G. Weine

Official Underground 2012 Doomsday Survival Handbook, The by W.H. Mumfrey

The Book of Pirates by Jamaica Rose and Captain Michael MacLeod

The Beasts that Hide from Man: Seeking the World’s Last Undiscovered Animals by Karl P. N. Shuker

Founders of Comic Fandom: Profiles of 90 Publishers, Dealers, Collectors, Writers, Artists and Other Luminaries of the 1950s and 1960s by Bill Schelly

Buffy Meets the Academy: Essays on the Episodes and Scripts as Texts by Kevin K. Durand

Scream Street: Fang of the Vampire by Tommy Donbavand and Cartoon Saloon Ltd.

The Twilight Mystique: Critical Essays on the Novels and Films (Critical Explorations in Science Fiction and Fantasy) by Amy M. Clarke, Marijane Osborn, Donald E. Palumbo and C. W. Sullivan III

Fan Fiction and Fan Communities in the Age of the Internet by Karen Hellekson and Kristina Busse

Existential Joss Whedon: Evil And Human Freedom in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly And Serenity by J. Michael Richardson and J. Douglas Rabb

I Talked with a Zombie: Interviews With 23 Veterans of Horror and Sci-Fi Films and Television by Tom Weaver

Undead TV: Essays on <I>Buffy the Vampire Slayer</I> by Elana Levine, Lisa Ann Parks, Mary Celeste Kearney and Susan Murray

How To Slay a Dragon by Bill Allen

Brigitta of the White Forest by Danika Dinsmore

Angel Burn by L. A. Weatherly

Blue by Lou Aronica

Rogue (Cat Star Chronicles) by Cheryl Brooks

Tempest Rising (Jane True) by Nicole Peeler

Eternal Flame (Night Watch) by Cynthia Eden

By Magic Alone by Tracy Madison

Fuzz by Ed McBain

Fairy Tales Reimagined: Essays on New Retellings by Susan Redington Bobby and Kate Bernheimer

Modem Times 2.0 (Outspoken Authors) by Michael Moorcock

Mammoths of the Great Plains (Outspoken Authors) by Eleanor Arnason

So it’s summer in the US, and Amazon is promoting the Kindle by slashing the prices of over 600 books to 0.99, 1.99, or 2.99 for the first two weeks of June. It’s called the “Sunshine Deals” promo and while the bigger US publishers don’t seem to be part of the promotion, don’t make the mistake of thinking there aren’t a few gems to be found.

There are a pair of Pyr Books titles on the list and they’ve seldom steered me wrong before, and I’ve been eyeing that Story Engineering book for a while. I looked through the list and figured that, while I was at it, I might as well put together a list of titles that might interest a Rocket Kapre reader. So without further ado:

• 90 Days to Your Novel by Sarah Domet
• Artemis Fowl (Artemis Fowl, Book One) by Eoin Colfer
• Ballad: A Gathering of Faerie by Maggie Stiefvater
• The Dervish House by Ian McDonald
• The Fairy Tale Detectives : The Sisters Grimm, Book One (Bk. 1) by Peter Ferguson and Michael Buckley
• The Greyfriar (Vampire Empire, Book 1) by Susan Griffith and Clay Griffith
• Hawk of May by Gillian Bradshaw
• House of Dark Shadows (Dreamhouse Kings Series, Book 1) by Robert Liparulo
• Inside Joss’ Dollhouse: From Alpha to Rossum by Jane Espenson
• Into The Dark Lands by Michelle Sagara West
• Invasion by Jon S. Lewis
• Kingdom Keepers: Disney After Dark by Ridley Pearson and David Frankland
• The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold, Geoffrey Klempner and Robert J. Sawyer
• The Master of Rampling Gate by Anne Rice
• The Naming: The First Book of Pellinor by Alison Croggon
• Need by Carrie Jones
• Norse Mythology: A Guide to Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs by John Lindow
• The Psychology of Dexter by Bella DePaulo
• Philippa Fisher’s Fairy Godsister by Liz Kessler
• Predators I Have Known by Alan Dean Foster
• The Psychology of Dexter by Bella DePaulo
• Secrets of the Dragon Riders: Your Favorite Authors on Christopher Paolini’s Inheritance Cycle: Completely Unauthorized by James A. Owen
• Stink: The Incredible Shrinking Kid by Megan McDonald and Peter H. Reynolds
• Story Engineering by Larry Brooks
• The Tail of Emily Windsnap by Liz Kessler and Sarah Gibb
• Those Who Hunt the Night: A James Asher Novel by Barbara Hambly
• Toby Alone by Timothee de Fombelle
• Tortilla Sun by Jennifer Cervantes
• Wizard’s First Rule (The Sword of Truth) by Terry Goodkind
• Wordcatcher: An Odyssey into the World of Weird and Wonderful Words by Phil Cousineau

Few people are more keenly aware of the rift between “literary/realist” and “popular” than genre authors and komiks creators. For those who would like an overview of that debate within the Philippine context, from an academic perspective that is sympathetic to the possibilities inherent in non-realist forms, I recommend From “Darna to Zsazsa Zaturnnah: Desire and Fantasy” by Soledad S. Reyes. My review of this collection is up on Filipiniana.net, and I hope it leads more readers to Reyes’ essays–particularly the abovementioned genre authors and komiks creators.

[Image from Goodreads.]

This post continues my 2010 roundup of reviews that may be of interest to Rocket Kapre readers. A few days ago I posted my list of 2010 komiks reviews, whether or not the komiks were speculative in nature. Today I’m doing the same for reviews that came out this year for books by Filipinos in the fantasy, science fiction, and horror genres (regardless of the publication date of the book – it’s the date of the review that matters). The list is much shorter than that for komiks, but then, there are fewer works of prose speculative fiction than there are komiks. I do hope that this changes in the future, both in terms of content and commentary, but I’m heartened that we have a very active book blogging scene here, and Chachic over at Filipino Book Bloggers notes when someone has reviewed a local book. With due respect to Bob Ong, I believe that both reviews and critiques (two different things, really) play a part in both improving the quality of fiction and increasing public awareness of a book, something which is very helpful to writers who aren’t residents of the bestseller lists. All of the book bloggers and reviewers I’ve met do what they do out of love, and I agree with Marianne Villanueva when she says that every review is a service. I hope that those who provide these services, whether they be bloggers or academics, receive more respect in the future.

Now, on to the list. As always, if I missed anything, please let me know in the comments section.

• Afraid: The Best Philippine Ghost Stories
• Ang mga Kaibigan ni Mama Susan (1) (2) (3) (4) (5)
• Bullysaurus Rex
• Craving
• Demons of the New Year (POC part 1, 2)
• Kapitan Sino (1) (2) (3) (4)
• Naermyth (1) (2)
• News of the Shaman (1) (2)
• Philippine Speculative Fiction 5
• Spooky Mo
• Takod
• Tall Story (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6 – multiple)
• Tales of Enchantment and Fantasy
• The Best of True Philippine Ghost Stories
• The Lost Language
• Tragic Theater (1) (2)
• Waking the Dead (1) (2) (3)

[Long post warning dear readers. Also, please note than any emphasized text in the excerpts will come from me, not the originals.]

Definitions of Magical Realism:

As befits the modern age of convenience, we start with the Wikipedia definition: magical realism, is “an artistic genre in which magical elements or illogical scenarios appear in an otherwise realistic or even “normal” settings… As used today the term is broadly descriptive rather than critically rigorous: Matthew Strecher has defined magic realism as “what happens when a highly detailed, realistic setting is invaded by something ‘too strange to believe’.” Second on Google is Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s page on the Modern World / Macondo:  “Literature of this type is usually characterized by elements of the fantastic woven into the story with a deadpan sense of presentation. The term is not without a lot of controversy, however, and has come under attack for numerous reasons. Some claim that it is a postcolonial hangover, a category used by “whites” to marginalize the fiction of the “other.“”

In a 1993 essay published in the Science Fiction Studies Journal entitled “Carlos Fuentes and the Future” Ilan Stavans uses Fuentes to show one way of distinguishing between SF and magical realism (or mythic writing):

Even though the art of Stanislaw Lem and Isaac Asimov does not interest him, the Fuentes oeuvre is useful in distinguishing between SF and mythic writing (also called “magical realism” when speaking of Gabriel García Márquez, Isabel Allende, or Salman Rushdie). The one, as defined by Darko Suvin, is marked by the interaction of estrangement and cognition and has as its main formal device an imaginative framework alternative to the author’s empirical environment;4 the other is an exploration of elements taken as expressing, and therefore as implicitly symbolizing, certain deep-lying aspects of human and transhuman existence. Sometimes the two intertwine, but it is obvious nonetheless that we are dealing here with different modes of literature: one concerned with some sort of scientific knowledge, the other involved with absolute truths. It is therefore not casual that the Americas below the Rio Grande prefer the latter while the industrialized nations prefer the former.

Of course, as with most classifications that try to define something aesthetic or literary, entire books can and have been written on the subject and its associated works.You can also find an article by Allena Tapia exploring the topic in the context of trying to decide whether or not magical realism is a mode for you, as a writer. Still, one aspect of the many definitions that I find interesting, and troubling, is the importance given to the geographic/cultural origin of the writer, so let us deal with that next…

Magical Realism and the Exotic

In an article on Tor.com (the comments on the post make for a good read as well), Jon Evans relates the following anecdote:

Some years ago I was at a con in Cambridge where Steven Brust, during his otherwise very fine GoH speech, made an offhand crack about “magic realism—which we all know is just fantasy written by a Latin American author!” The crowd laughed and applauded, but I did not.

The joke and Evans’ reaction touches on the dissatisfaction that some feel with regard to the emphasis placed on the  national/cultural identity of the author or the setting–and yet such an aspect seems to be commonly found in the definitions of the genre. Later on, in the context of placing magical realism/surreal fantasy at one extreme of a spectrum of fantasy works, with systematic fantasy at the other end, Evans (in what seems to me to be a strange turn given the reaction to the joke) also makes use of the geographic/cultural origins of the works to contrast the two types of fiction (long excerpt warning):

Consider their pedigrees. Systematic fantasy tends to come from Western writers, who live in nations where “peace, order, and good government” (to use that wonderful Canadian phrase) more or less rule. Oh, there are wars and depressions and tragedies, but by and large, the phones work, the roads are smooth, and you’re not likely to be massacred without warning.

Surreal fantasy comes from more troubled lands. Midnight’s Children is set in post-partition India; The Famished Road in Nigeria; One Hundred Years of Solitude in Colombia. Their magic is random, surreal and arbitrary because their worlds are random, surreal and arbitrary.

…

When you live amid papered-over blood-soaked horror, like Nigeria’s Biafran civil war and corrupt dictatorships, India’s partition and Emergency, and Colombia’s La Violencia, then the surreal becomes normal and the insane becomes rational. That’s the well that magic realism draws from. What the surreal fantasists have to say about desperation and tragedy and violence is more powerful because, alas, the desperation and tragedy and violence they’re writing about isn’t fantastic at all.

While not setting out to give any direct definition of it, the most intriguing piece I’ve seen wrestle with the topic is the aforementioned Jorge Volpi speech:

This is not the place to discern the academic, petty things that separate ”magical realism” from the ”real wonderful”: it is enough to underline that the artistic category suddenly became a sociopolitical tag for the whole region. The canonic definition establishes that, unlike traditional fantastic literature, where magic or miracles are not lacking, an essential characteristic of the Latin American current is indifference before the extraordinary. A maiden flies on air, and we lift our shoulders; a corpse asks for his father, and we yawn; time runs backwards, and we make a fastidious grimace; children are born with a pig’s tail, and oh, we prefer a soap opera. Since this lack of reason governs us—a lack which in any other place would be considered unnatural and would unleash curiosity, astonishment, or morbid fascination—these events are a mere distraction. When the critics of Cambridge, Harvard, or Paris fill their mouths with the phrase “magical realism”, we imagine a current of socialist realism.

Volpi tackles the idea of geographic/cultural origin from the standpoint of someone who comes from a land supposedly not governed by reason, and he does not like what this implies. Speaking for his fellow Latin Americans, he states:

In what role does this thesis leave us? Once again we appear as good savages, dominated by superstition and mystery, accustomed to coexisting with the supernatural, or, in the other extreme, as a primitive people who remain apathetic in the face of the very unusual. The social interpretation of the literature thus acquires an unsettling political shade: Latin American people are not distinguished by our fantasy, but by our resignation. A resignation of a murky Catholic origin that explains the conformism which turns us into docile subjects, cannon fodder, the successive victims of Colonialism, Imperialism, Communism, and Capitalism.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but when I read that portion of the speech, I felt he could just as well have been talking about the treatment given to Filipinos as well. So let us bring the discussion home shall we?

Magical Realism and Philippine Speculative Fiction:

In Barbara Jane Reyes’ piece, she relates magical realism to folk beliefs and mythopoetic poetry:

I’ve been thinking that magical realism is that thing you call ethnic literature when you don’t know what to do with their “folk” beliefs still existing and manifesting themselves in the modern day. You don’t know why those old beliefs still exist, and why the mythical and spiritual are so incorporated or fused into their everyday modern lives.

It defies conventional logic in modern, secular societies, to still believe, but more so, it defies conventional logic in modern, secular societies for those old beliefs and mythical deities to manifest themselves in our modern daily lives. Advanced as we think we are, we decide that such conventionally unexplainable phenomena are the province of the superstitious, backward, third world, unenlightened. We hear their testimonies of encounters with the fantastic with an air of doubt, and we judge them. In high literature, these stories become exoticized, objectified, hence, magical realism. In poetry, perhaps it’s also objectified and othered as the mythopoetic.

She then speaks about  Speculative Fiction in the light of these folk beliefs and the popularity (or, at least vocal online presence?) of the genre here, as spurred by a Dean Alfar interview and the consideration of a certain new webzine *wink*:

Just the other morning I was skimming an interview with Manila based speculative fiction writer Dean Francis Alfar, as well as looking at this new Philippine speculative fiction online journal Usok. I started to wonder why speculative fiction seems to be big in the Philippines, and it dawned on me, especially looking at the image at the Usok website (I love this image, tikbalang in a jeepney, aswang hanging on the back!) that speculative fiction, what I read as a more culturally neutral term than magical realism, is what Philippine writers are calling their own work in which those old “folk” beliefs do indeed find themselves manifested in the present day, in our urban centers, even among the thoroughly educated, urbanized, and modernized. Others would call it magical realism?

Spurred by Reyes’ post, Joey Nacino recently posted his own ruminations on the matter:

For those of us living in the Philippines, magic realism– and to a certain extent, speculative fiction– is a normal fact of life. As an example, just look at our yearly rituals during Lent: the crucifixion would rank us up in the Western world as ‘superstitious’ and ‘third world’ but we take it for granted that people would allow themselves to be nailed to the cross in exchange for or in gratitude of certain divine favors (i.e. small miracles).

And that’s how we translate or write them into our fiction, that the strange and the weird is as normal as morning rush hour traffic or mall-wide sales up to 50%! Unfortunately, like two sides of the same coin, then we’ll always run the risk of being read by the Western world* as being exotic or alien– and not because of the value of our stories.

Joey ends his post on a rather plaintive note, about how Speculative Fiction from the Philippines will also have to wrestle with the lure of the exotic:

I’ll have to get back to you on that Joey, once I’m sure I’m being *read*

Off the cuff (in relation to the thoughts expressed in this entire post and not just Joey’s article), I’m not a big fan of classifications meant to be academic or literary, but I do find marketing classifications, a way of telling a reader that this might be the type of story you ‘d like if you loved so-and-so. I love writing about local folklore, and while I’d never consciously paint my homeland as exotic (because precisely since it’s home, to me, it isn’t), I don’t see anything wrong with people picking up a story because it contains elements of a culture/world that he or she is not familiar with–part of promoting Philippine Speculative Fiction is because is waving your arms and shouting “Hey! You! Look at the awesome stuff we’ve got going on over here that you might never have seen before!” and that shout is aimed to people who are strangers to the Philippines and strangers to Speculative Fiction. I also don’t quite see the Filipino experience as being a closer relationship with the fantastic; while magic and miracles are part of our environment, I don’t think it’s any less so in the “developed” world–look at UFO cults or Western faith-healer phenomenons. Nor do I see how any portrayal of Filipinos as being “apathetic to the fantastic” could be accurate, based on the fervor and gossip generated whenever a supposed miracle occurs (we had one in Xavier back when I was in Grade School, and  neither the student body nor the administration treated it with a shrug of the shoulders).

To end, and since I’m on a bit of a Le Guin essay kick at the moment, let’s close with her “take” on magical realism, from an interview with Vice Magazine:

How did you come up with the idea for “The Farthest Shore”? Why focus on secondary world fantasy?

As I’ve talked about in the book’s introduction, Dean and I were talking about our love of secondary world fantasies and how as Filipino writers we couldn’t write about them because of the lack of Filipino elements in such stories. So we decided to hell with expectations and come up with an anthology of secondary world stories written by Filipinos.

I came up with the title “The Farthest Shore” in honor of Ursula K. Le Guin’s third Earthsea book and thought it apt given her definition of what ‘the farthest shore’ meant. Likewise, I thought the title evoked the feeling of islands, which is really what this is all about: secondary world stories from the Philippine islands, as far as it can be from the US or international readership.

How did you go about defining “secondary world fantasy”?

The basis of our definition of secondary world fantasy stems from the epic doorstoppers like George R. R. Martin’s and Robert Jordan’s works, as well as J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth. However, we also thought that this kind of definition is somewhat limiting given the other kinds of secondary world ideas, i.e. the portal-to-a-fantasy-world like Stephen Donaldson’s Thomas Covenant books or the new weird stuff like China Mieville’s Crobuzon tales.

So we thought of making the definition a little vague in order to give our writers free rein to interpret what secondary world fantasy could mean. Hence, in this anthology you will find stories about pseudo-Filipino myth-laden realms (like Rod Santos’ “Queen Liwana”), a girl’s imaginary world of justice fulfilled (like Eliza Victoria’s “The Just World”), a New Weird-ish story of generational turtle ships (like Dom Cimafranca’s Rite of Passage), etc. Of course, those descriptions are my reading of the stories and may not apply to others. *wink*

You’re obviously well versed in some of the classic secondary world stories. Do you have a few more obscure secondary world favorites to recommend? Those that deserve more attention and acclaim?

Well, people can always try the late Paul Zimmer’s Dark Border novels (“The Lost Prince”, “King Chondo’s Ride” and the stand-alone “A Gathering of Heroes”) and P.C. Hodgell’s Kencyrath books (“God Stalk” and “Dark of the Moon” which was later collected in “The God Stalker Chronicles”; “Seeker’s Mask” and “To Ride a Rathorn”, which was collected in “Seeker’s Bane”). Zimmer’s books chronicles a cold war fantasy world wherein evil is just a border away. However, though the heroes of the Dark Border are quite compelling, they’re also tragic. Istvan the Archer is a famous swordsman who foreswore the bow after a massacre that made his name. Hodgell’s books are similar in that evil also lies over another border but her adventure stories of Jaime are leavened by a sly sense of humor. Both have their strengths and weaknesses but overall, they made quite an impression on me—especially since I managed to acquire copies of these more-than-likely-out-of-print books at secondhand bookstores. Unfortunately, there aren’t any Dark Borders books anymore since Zimmer—the brother of fantasy granddame Marion Zimmer Bradley—died in 1997. Fortunately, Baen Books have been publishing omnibus copies of Hodgell’s books and it looks like a fifth one is in the offing.

In the course of putting together this anthology, what was your biggest challenge? Your biggest surprise?

For myself, the biggest challenge was having enough stories that fit the bill to fill the anthology. Despite the popularity of fantasy/SF books in the Philippines, it seems like Filipino writers aren’t as keen to write about non-Filipino stories. Or maybe that’s just my perception. The biggest surprise? Filipino writers can write good secondary world stories.

Ah, now there’s a statement that might be misconstrued. How was that a surprise? what were your initial expectations when you and Dean began the project?

Well, the submissions did open my eyes to what could be considered as secondary world fantasy. Prior to this, my perception of a secondary world story was limited to the Western type ( i.e. J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth or George R.R. Martin’s Westeros to China Mieville’s New Crobuzon) though I never realized it. Good thing I found myself seeing past this as I read stories that were non-Western– sometimes non-Filipino– but still apply a very Asian context to the idea of secondary worlds.  An example would be Crystal Koo’s “Wildwater” story about a poor yet ambitious fisherman who goes off to find fame and fortune in the big bad empire. Ironically, Charles once pointed out one time that the submission guidelines describing the secondary world theme as “too vague”.  Good thing that worked out to our advantage.

Could you tell us a bit about your story “Brothers-in-Arms”?

My story “Brothers-in-Arms” is actually one of my few attempts to finish writing a secondary world story. Likewise, it’s also one of a series of attempts to break a number of genre tropes. In this case, I came up with the idea of a man trying to break a spell cast upon him since birth. This spell, whether you consider it a curse or destiny, it’s all the same thing: is there such a thing as free will or do we just think we’re making our own decisions?

Predestination huh? And what’s your personal stance on that?

We all make our choices and these set our paths before us. Of course, whether we walk the paths is also up to us.

How long did it take you to write the story?

A long, long time. Maybe five to eight years? It took me a while to align my urge to write with my sense of Filipino nationalism. But that’s another story altogether.

Were there any particular sources of inspiration for your story?

None in particular. But I do think that Alcatraz bathroom scene in the Jerry Bruckheimer movie “The Rock” helped, wherein the Navy SEALS were trapped by the besieged Marine Recon soldiers. The movie’s flaws notwithstanding, the idea that you had soldiers on the same side forced to fight each other was pretty powerful for me.

What aspect of the writing/ editing did you enjoy the most?

The conceptualization and the editing. I love coming up with story ideas. Writing the actual text is painful for me, given that I’m such a lazy bastard. But once I’m done, it’s all easy-peasy—unless the text doesn’t want to cooperate.

What aspect of the writing/editing did you find most difficult?

See above. In this case, “Brothers-in-Arms” was a bit of a hard delivery as I complicated the story too much. Thankfully, my appointed editor managed to point out the problems that were making it clunky.

If you could write in a secondary world created by another (literary, television etc.), which world would that be? What kind of story would you write?

You mean fan-fiction? (Insert smiley face here.) I never really given it much thought since I prefer to write my own creations. However, I once fell in love with Hayao Miyazaki’s post-apocalyptic environmentally-conscious fantasy opus “Nausicaa” and imagined myself writing my character into it.

You’ve announced that Farthest Shore is to be the first in a line of books from your new digital press. What can you tell us about Estranghero Press?

The local writing market that’s open to the writing public and at the same time is regular is pretty scarce at the moment. Aside from Dean’s own annual Philippine Speculative Fiction anthologies, there’s also Kenneth Yu’s Digest of Philippine Genre Stories, the Story Philippines magazine, the literary-oriented fiction section of the Philippine Free Press magazine as well as the Philippines Graphic magazine. Unfortunately, running a magazine/book publishing needs a lot of money which I don’t have so I decided to create an online press that would give writers another paying market. Likewise, given the international flavor of the Internet, it would also give people abroad a chance to read Filipino stories. What’s not to like about that idea?

Where else can we find your work?

I’ve been published in Dean’s Philippine Speculative Fiction (all four volumes!), the Digest of Philippine Genre Stories, Manual Magazine, the FHM Ladies Confessional issue, and Vin Simbulan’s A Time of Dragons anthology. I also run a blog at www.estranghero.blogspot.com as well as an idea writing blog at www.thisisfifteenminutes.wordpress.com.  And then, of course, there’s secondary world anthology at www.farthestshore.kom.ph and all the imprints that will come out from www.estrangheropress.kom.ph (Note: the Estranghero Press website isn’t active at the moment).

Anything else we haven’t touched upon that you’d like to talk about?

Yes: do you think that words should have an expiration limit?

Well some words certainly seem to have a shelf life. I’m usually more concerned with weeding out words that wouldn’t have been in existence yet in my story’s time period. You?

I don’t know. I have yet to finish that story yet!

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We’d like to thank Joey for agreeing to do this interview (and allowing us to interview the other authors as well). You can find him online at his blog, The Grin Without the Cat.

Could you tell us a bit about your story?

Absolutely. My story is about a young boy who wanders the countryside unsupervised with his best-friend, a chubby yellow rodent who shoots electricity. No wait, that’s Pokemon. Okay, now I remember. My story is about an old woman who bargained with dark powers in her youth and who must now face the consequences. It is based loosely on my own experiences pretending to be an old woman.

How did you hear about the Farthest Shore anthology?

Some of the voices in my head are psychic. Or perhaps I read it on Charles Tan’s Livejournal.

Prior to that, had you ever written a secondary world story before?

Yes, the majority of my stuff is speculative fiction set in secondary worlds. This world is far too boring.

How long did it take you to write the story?

That’s a tough question. The first incarnation of this story was written in 2006 for one of the weekly Flash Challenges at the Liberty Hall Writers’ Forum. For these challenges, writers are given a “trigger” and 90 minutes to write a story. The trigger can be a word, a picture, lyrics, or whatever. So, it took it me 90 minutes to write the first draft, then three years to complete the final revision.

What aspect of the writing did you enjoy the most?

The final draft. By that time, it just required some fine-tuning, and I could enjoy the story without having to make any major choices.

How do you know when a story is “ready”, that it’s time to stop making those minuscule corrections?

When I run face-first into the submission deadline (I can be a terrible procrastinator). I don’t know that one can ever stop tinkering with a story. If I do a few read-throughs and nothing leaps out at me, that’s one sign that it’s about ready. Of course, an author is often the worst judge of his/her own work. Getting feedback from other writers can be invaluable.

What aspect did you find most difficult?

The actual writing part.

Were there any particular sources of inspiration for your story?

In retrospect, this may have been inspired by a Simpsons’ Halloween episode. It’s the one where Homer sells his soul to the devil (played by Flanders) for a donut. However, the deal is made null and void because of an old love letter he’d written– his soul is saved because it was already pledged to Marge.

Are you working on any new stories or projects now?

I just sent out something for an anthology on female pirates. Currently I’m working on at least four short stories in varying stages for various venues. This includes a retelling of the Apple of Discord myth, as well as an entry for next quarter’s Writers of the Future contest.

And of course there are the novels, which haunt my conscience. I have two in the works, one humorous and one laughable. Sorry, just self-deprecating. Actually the two novels do reflect a dichotomy I find in my writing: one is light-hearted fantasy about unfinished works, and the other a darker tale interweaving Filipino folktales. It seems I either want to make people laugh or scream.

I’ve found that comedy and horror are some of the more difficult elements to inject into a story. Do you feel the same?

Absolutely. My approach with comedy is to have the characters act seriously–no matter how absurd their actions and dialogue are. My approach to horror is to write simply and let the situation speak for itself. Of course, I’ve read some terrifying stories with really elegant descriptions. Of the two–comedy and horror–I’d say I have an easier time with the former. But that’s subjective. I know my first draft is never as funny as the final version.

If you could write in a secondary world created by another (literary, television etc.), which world would that be? What kind of story would you write?

I love George RR Martin’s series, A Song of Ice and Fire. While I haven’t written a short story in that world, I did create an adventure for an RPG session. The tricky part was creating a plot complex enough to be interesting and true to the flavor of the series, while not screwing up with the continuity or canon already established. It revolved around a reputedly miracle-child, and a misleading prophecy that seemed to be about an assassination attempt on the King, but was actually about the High Septon (the religious head of the Seven Kingdoms).

Where else can we find your work?
I’m glad you asked. My humorous stuff is under “Rod M. Santos” and can be found online at The Town Drunk and Flash Fiction Online. My more serious stuff goes under “Rodello Santos” and has appeared in Every Day Fiction, and the now defunct Dragons, Knights and Angels. Lastly, my stories appear in the print anthologies Philippine Speculative Fiction Vol. III, Cinema Spec, Cheer Up Universe (forthcoming), and Paper Blossoms, Sharpened Steel (forthcoming). By some miracle, my PSF3 story received an honorable mention in the 2008 Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror anthology. Oh, I also have a tale in this cool anthology called the Farthest Chore, or Fascist Score, or something like that.

Joey and Dean will murder you for that. I know there are writers who use different names when writing different types of stories, but you’re the first I’ve interviewed–can you tell us a bit about why you chose to use different names?
Oh dear, I sure hope they don’t murder me. Now I’m going to be checking over my shoulder all the time. Regarding the use of different names, I didn’t want fans of my humor stories to accidentally pick up something about monsters who drive hearses, and vice versa. I might revisit this strategy and end up lumping everything under “Rodello Santos.” I guess I’ll decide eventually…then change my mind again.

Anything else we haven’t touched upon that you’d like to talk about?
Squirrels are awesome. Also, the music of Savage Garden is neither savage nor botanical. Discuss.

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We’d like to thank Rod once again for agreeing to this interview. Next week we speak to one of the head honchos, editor/contributor Joey Nacino, about the Farthest Shore and his story “Brothers-in-Arms“.

Could you tell us a bit about your story, “Spelling Normal”?
I don’t know how to answer the question without preempting the story (and consequently ruining the whole Big Buddha Bang Theory and propagating the Cliff Notes Virus).

I think I had a bad case of that virus in High School (mixed with Acute Bluffititis).
Hahaha, I had the latter when I was studying Shakespeare and almost contracted the former when I was studying— yeah, Shakespeare. It was all cured by a doctor in Shakespeare named Ick.

So, how did you hear about the Farthest Shore anthology?
I have Elves and they have special ears. The Web Elf told me about it. I said, “How far is that from my Native Shores?” Then Agent Elf sneaked the story out of my factory and here now is Secondary World History.

Man I wish I had a story factory. (Mine’s more of an outlet store.)
Hahaha, not a bad outlet store since it landed you a Palanca. Hey, let’s do a comparative analysis on the production from a factory and an outlet store, hahahaha. But the damn factory is a sweatshop with an agoraphobic Torquemada as its supervisor: woe.

Prior to that, had you ever written a secondary world story before?
By the gravitas of the definition and tropes of the term “Secondary World”? Nope. But I always consider any work of fiction as secondary world isotopes, hehehe.

Ah, that pesky definitional issue. How would you define a secondary world story then? (The image of an isotope is an intriguing one.) I confess I’m not very adept at making distinctions myself, not in the field of art at least.
Lexical and semantics gymnastics: What is pesky? What is an issue? What is an isotope? What is a distinction? What is art? What is a box? What is a line? What is a point?
What is a definition: you write it and the editors and critics do the labeling. On with the smashing discourse yo!

How long did it take you to write the story?
Eight years. Seriously.

Wow. That’s a long time.
Hahaha, welcome to that reaction club. The last time I was asked that (in a lecture about creative nonfiction and short fiction), it involved a creative nonfiction piece I wrote and writing that one took ten years. Not an entirely encouraging fact, haha, but it does take years for a text that really matters to reach its completed form. Anyway, I felt holy mother of awful butt-naked after writing that and answering questions about writing that. Art as a relief, Hirn says. And there goes our token definition of that in this discussion, hahaha.

What aspect of that long process did you enjoy the most?
The eight years of serious drinking that came with it.

Aha, so that’s the source of your power!
Hahaha, endurance and discipline too! My Jose Philip Farmer says: To say that the possible is possible is mere tautology. To make the possible possible, that takes courage, intellectual strength, and imagination…And so once there was this man from Bombay…

What aspect did you find most difficult?
The hangover from the eight years of deadly serious drinking that came with it.

Walked right into that one didn’t I?
See? Told you you’re funny! Hey, with great power comes great hangovers! (Mao Zee Dudong did say that it’s a long and painful process.)

Were there any particular sources of inspiration for your story?
Ah, once there was this ala hospital metal chart notebook from Eight Years Ago. The front cover has mySAP.com printed on it. On Julius 5 Eight Years Ago, the chart wrote “Freak”. The chart ends the day with “I am not a crusader for the freaks. I do not expect people to know and understand. I do not expect people to stumble over their sentiments just because one person is sensitive to certain topics. Or certain anecdotes. I expect people who are educated to at least have some semblance of the one of the seven outcomes of education: Empathy. I am a freak. I know that. We are all freaks. People don’t know that.” And pasted on it is a post-it-apology masticating on Julius 5. A Dinosaur taught me that sensibility, by the way, and the notebook’s graciously aging in Iron Oxide Heaven. Moving along…

Very few of us are taught empathy though, and even less learn it. That must be some notebook!
If you went to school, then the statement is false on the “taught” part. As for the “learning” part: true. It’s a skill, man, like everything else. And unique, just like everything else, hehehe. As for that notebook, yeah…it has a couple of nuclear bombs in it, too. All undecided in what form it would come out. Damn frakkers.

Are you working on any new stories or projects now?
Yeah, I’m reconstructing every this and that and here and there that I lost when my laptop was stolen a month or so ago by these poor inconsiderate bastards. One of the stories I was working on was all about this character named CharleS.A.TAN in a space punk junk setting in the midst of Meiosis. He likes to eat Sinigang Na Swan and walks around in this S&M outfit (think Milla Jovovich in Fifth Element). He gets pregnant and calls his kid Omar. And CharleS.A.TAN says “Yikes”… Yeah, the poor inconsiderate bastards took that away. Sigh.

Agh, I think I heard about that. What ignominious fate would you wish upon the thieving bastards?
On good days, I would like them to spell, say, and use “ignominious” in a sentence.
On bad days, I rant about the thieving government so that they do something about the country’s poverty hence these poor thieving bastards can stop thieving.
On PMS, I would like to find them and make them bite the curb and I drop- kick their heads.
But what for? What was done is done and what’s left to do is more doing, and one has to laugh about the absurdity of it all.
(By the way, I would like to thank my Ma, my sister Egg, and my family for the speedy replacement of that laptop. The laptop and the factory are still romancing each other.)

How are you going about reconstructing the stories? Purely from memory?
Yep… and more drinking… and more of those ambivalent nuclear notebooks. (Memory is an alcoholic analog, you know.) But my brain seems to automatically shut down when I really try to think about reconstructing everything. And then I want to scream. Then it all loops to the answers to the previous question.

If you could write in a secondary world created by another (literary, television etc.), which world would that be? What kind of story would you write? (‘cors if you’ve actually written secondary world fanfic, feel free to plug it here ^_^)

You know, I just remembered that I used to mess around with Charlaine Harris’ Eric The Vampire and Sookie The Freak when that series first came out. I’m now thankful that I didn’t pursue it since look at HBO’s True Blood, hahahaha.
On an oh-so-serious note: Why will you re-write when you can write, hmmm?
But yeah, sure, I want to write about how Hello Kitty invites kids to kill themselves. I would also like to write a story on Space Operetta Reality from the eyes of Simon Green’s Valentine Wolf. That would be some trip. (If Mr. Green ever gets to read this: The series’ ending made me cry. Also, it made my sister Gnomie scream and thereon depressed. We’re traumatized… Excellent!)

Ah a Deathstalker fan! I really should finish that series some day.
Does “traumatized” mean “fan”? Yeah, finish what you start, eh? And once you’re done, I bet you a book you would: 1) Scream; 2) Say WTF?!; (3) Cry, man, cry because they really all lived happily ever after.

Where else can we find your work?
Besides the possibility of my work taking your call? In the factory. But ask Jeeves and he’ll tell you that only Mr. Google knows.

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We’d like to thank Mia once again for agreeing to this interview. Check back next week when we talk to Rodello Santos, author of “Queen Liwana’s Gambit”.

Today’s Writer’s Wednesday is brought to you by… The Farthest Shore. We’ll focus on fantasy today (the secondary world sort at least), although there’s always an overlap with other branches of SF. We’ve got links to a pair of resources you might find useful for world building as well as a list of fantasy-relevant writing tips, old and new.

Baiting the Muse (Links):

• Let’s start with this great list of world-building questions posted by Patricia Wrede over at the SFWA site, which are meant to help authors create believable worlds for their stories.
• For worlds patterned after the pre-hispanic Philippines, Filhistory.com is a fairly new site that covers Filipino history and weaponry (not just of the pre-hispanic kind). We’ll also be doing a series of posts on pre-hispanic Philippine weapons in our upcoming Talasalitaan segment.

Consulting the Muse (Tips):

• While you’re going through the SFWA list of questions in order to beef up your fantasy world, it would be wise to heed Mary Robinette Kowal’s advice and learn to be specific with culture.
• Fantasy Factor has an archive of articles on such topics as characterization and forms of government, as well as a fantasy name generator.
• The About Writing blog also has an extensive list of links to fantasy writing resources.
• At the Book View Cafe, Vonda McIntyre’s Pitfalls of Writing SF and Fantasy consistently doles out practical, easy-to-grasp advice for writers.
• When trying to appeal to the seasoned fantasy reader, it pays to pay attention to their frustrations with the genre they love, and Limyaael’s Fantasy Rants (here and here) are a good place to start.

Testing the Muse (Prompts):

Think of a trope or a cliche (note: not the same thing) in the fantasy genre which you are tired of, and write a scene (or hey, an entire story) which breaks away from that.

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While we’re always keen to post helpful links for writers here at Rocket Kapre, we thought we’d devote the Wednesday of each week to a more concentrated form of writing goodness.

WW is an experiment and work-in-progress so please let us know what works for you and what doesn’t in the comments ^_^.

Tell us a bit about your story “The Just World of Helena Jimenez”:

Without spoiling anything, “The Just World of Helena Jimenez” is about a girl whose family has been a victim of a heinous crime. One day she just finds herself in a world where there is no crime.

How did you hear about the Farthest Shore anthology?

Wow, I can’t even remember. I must have picked up the “call to submissions” link from Charles Tan’s blog, or from Dean Alfar.

Prior to that, had you ever written a secondary world story before?

No. Or if I ever were able to write such a story before, the writing was done unconsciously. If anyone ever reads a story of mine and points this out to me, I’ll probably just dismiss the notion and say, “Oh, those things didn’t really happen, it’s a psychological thing, the character’s just insane”. Etcetera etc. When I write non-realistic fiction it is still very much rooted in our reality, so much so that the fantastic elements can be easily explained by psychology. Ha! I don’t know if that’s a bad thing. I can never do Lord of the Rings, where everything is created from scratch, even the language; I’m inclined to use the two-world trope. I suppose Harry Potter falls in this category. This world, that other world.

I can never erase this world from my stories, but that’s me speaking now. This may change in the future.

As far as reading goes though, does your present self share those same inclinations? Or, all else being equal, do you enjoy reading Lord of the Rings type epic fantasy as much as a tale set in our world?

Confession time: I haven’t read Lord of the Rings. (Please don’t shoot me.) But to be sure, I enjoy reading non-realist fiction as much as the realist ones. I read like crazy. I read whatever the bookstores and the book bargain sales and the online journals can offer (well, as long as I can still afford them). I don’t care if the story is set in this universe, or elsewhere. If the language is lovely, the plot engaging, the characters interesting, then I’ll pack my bags and board that plane to Wherever.

How long did it take you to write the story?

Hm, not too long, but longer than usual. However, it took years before the story finally assumed the form I wanted it to have. I started writing this story in 2007, my last year in college. I finished the story sometime after graduation I think. The first draft was more than 30 pages long. It pained me to cut it, so I just set it aside, then wrote other, shorter stories and sold them. When I heard about Farthest Shore, I revisited the story, rolled up my sleeves, and revised.

What aspect of the writing did you enjoy the most?

Creating a new world is always fun. Describing the culture, the surroundings – I enjoyed this immensely.

What aspect did you find most difficult?

Editing! Oh, editing this monster pained me, because it was so long and I had to cut so many conversations between the characters short. Also, the first draft was very graphic, very violent. I toned it down a bit; though the violence is necessary, I really don’t want to hit the readers too hard.

Ouch. Always painful to kill one’s precious babies. How did you choose what made the cut and what didn’t?

I remember a couple of scenes where the characters suddenly became melodramatic. Like telenovela-melodramatic. When I read the manuscript again after setting it aside for a little while, the dialogue made me cringe. So out with those scenes.

The other parts I didn’t really cut, I just shortened them. I mean if a scene can be shortened and it still works, then it doesn’t have to be that long, right? As a writer, you’re just wasting space. Or being clingy to your language, like, “Oh, but this line’s so beautiful/witty/whatever”. Enough with that – just edit!

Were there any particular sources of inspiration for your story?

Somewhere online I read a story of a hate crime in Wichita, Kansas. It was absolutely awful that the news item stayed with me.

When I became a senior I took up P.I. 100 (Rizal, in UP), and in one class our professor was talking about El Filibusterismo and anarchy. Now, I can’t remember what he actually said, but he said something about a (in)famous anarchist, often depicted holding a cannonball. Maybe I heard him wrong, but during that class I just had this image of a girl in black, with a cannonball, standing in a field of sand.

I found the image intriguing.

The hate crime in Wichita had a survivor. How is he/she now?

And there’s my story.

Are you working on any new stories or projects now?

Well, I’m working on a longish piece. Not sure if I can turn it into a novel. It’ll be fun to turn it into a novel and find a publisher for it, right? But baby steps.

If you could write in a secondary world created by another (literary, television etc.), which world would that be? What kind of story would you write? (‘cors if you’ve actually written secondary world fanfic, feel free to plug it!)

Ooh. I don’t write fanfic, but I enjoy reading it. I am so fascinated with slash fiction, and the fans who write them. Very interesting. (wink, wink)

Can we consider Haruhi Suzumiya as a secondary world story? I just finished the first season, and the world the characters live in seem so exciting.

I’ve written gay fic before, so yes, I’ll probably write something slasherrific for that haha. And quiet. That’ll be a challenge because Suzumiya episodes are normally riotous.

Neil Gaiman’s Sandman universe is insane and lovely, so for the Dreaming I’ll write something dark.

Haruhi slash huh? (Gets side-tracked by Kyon-ko) Aaanyway,where else can we find your work?

Oh! You know your slash! I love it!

Anyway.

In print, I have some goodies in the Philippines Graphic, Philippines Free Press, Story Philippines, Very Short Stories for Harried Readers, and Philippine Speculative Fiction IV.

Online I have a story in Expanded Horizons and another to appear in Cantaraville next year.

My poetry is forthcoming in The Houston Literary Review and elimae.

I’m going to receive a Palanca award this year for my poetry, so maybe the awards website will upload those poems in the future.

Naks, award-winning poet. Congrats! Anything else we haven’t touched upon that you’d like to talk about?

Ha, so says the guy whose story didn’t win this year!

Please read our stories in Farthest Shore, please support Rocket Kapre, please support Philippine literature, and if you want to waste more time, you’re always welcome to read my blog.

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We’d like to thank Eliza once again for agreeing to this interview. We’ll be moving regular interviews to Tuesdays from here on out, so check back next Tuesday when we speak to Mia Tijam, author of Spelling Normal.