From the Backlist: Making Wishes

 

Image by VitorCruz2019 on Pixabay

 

Welcome to our October posts from the Backlist! 

Today's spotlight was written October 7, 2010 by the fabulous author Jocelynn Drake. This gives us a chance to say Happy Birthday to all the Libra's and wonderful dreamers out there who still blow out the candles . . . and make a wish!

Hope you enjoy!

You can read more about Jocelynn Drake on her website. 

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Making Wishes

by Jocelynn Drake 

Oct 7, 2010 

Today is my birthday. Yep, I unwittingly chose the seventh of every month to write my blog post for Supernatural Underground simply because it seemed rare for me to be traveling at that time. For some reason, all conferences and out-of-town appointments tended to fall in the middle or the end of the month. It honestly didn't occur to me that I had chosen the date of my birth to be one of my blog entries.

So, today I'm going to talk about birthday wishes. These are something that I take very seriously. Every year for as long as I can remember, my mother has baked me a chocolate cake with chocolate icing. My family gathers around and sings "Happy Birthday" as badly as possible. And trust me, they are getting really good at being really bad. And then I make a wish before blowing out the growing numbers of candles.

I look back and I remember that there were some years that I simply wished to be happy, but then those were some dark years. However, most the time, it was the same wish over and over again -- I wished to be published. Writing has been my heart and soul for so much of my life that I wished on candles, shooting stars, and pennies in a fountain that my words would one day be read by others. That's not to say that I didn't also work my butt off to also make it happen, but I like to think that all that hard wishing also helped to add a special magical aspect to it all.

Now that I've accomplished that mean feat, I have to come up with a new wish. I think I've got one, but

I obviously can't share it or it may never happen. However, I will share with you an impossible wish that I have. I wish I could sit down and have a long dinner with my main characters Mira and Danaus. (Perferrably when they are both in a good mood and not fighting with each other.) Both creatures are not only something other than human, but also centuries old. 

I would love to hear from their mouths their thoughts on the world, humanity, and the struggles they've been through, including the people they have loved and lost. I want to hear about their dreams and fears. And for reason, something in me yearns to actually hear their laughter and see them in person as they gaze across the table at each other as they share a private joke. In them are deep layers of love and loss and desperation and hope. I only wish I could see it in person, because I think it would truly be a beautiful thing. 

Read the full post here . . . 

 

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Speculative Fiction (Fantasy/Thriller/Sci-Fi/Urban Fantasy) for adults and teens.

 

 

We're a group of best-selling authors providing news, reviews and interviews from the darker, more speculative side of fiction.

Fiction that makes the heart beat faster...

Pressing Pause on Posting – Just For Now!

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… which also means a hiatus on heroines. Again, just for now!

WALL #4 edit time!

All because I am deep in the throes of editing the final book in The Wall of Night series, and the wheels of high-level creativity and attention to fine detail are both grinding away at the macro and macro levels. O-o!

The Wall of Night series -- USA

Leaving no bandwidth for doing justice to blog posts as well. :-/

The Wall of Night series -- UK

But fear not, I already have great ideas for more heroines posts. So once the edit’s a wrap, I shall be back.

Not quite like this ;-)

Meanwhile, I believe SU HQ have some ideas to fill the gaps so there’ll be plenty to read here. J
And watch for me in the new year.

~*~

About Helen Lowe

Helen Lowe is the award-winning author of Thornspell and The Wall Of Night fantasy series, as well as a poet, blogger, and lover of story. She is currently editing the the final book in The Wall of Night series. 

Helen posts regularly on her “…on Anything, Really” blog, monthly on the Supernatural Underground, and tweets @helenl0we.

From the Backlist: Fantasy Festivals

Art by the amazing Stephanie Pui-Mun Law

Happy Equinox everyone. 

Whether your season is turning from summer to autumn, or from winter to spring, it's a time of Sola Aequo where the divine beings 'make equal' the power of the sun for day and night. It's traditionally a time of celebration and gratitude, and a time to reflect.

With that in mind, today's post from the Backlist is Kim Falconer's Fantasy Festivals.

Enjoy!

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Fantasy Festivals 

by Kim Falconer on the Supernatural Underground

There are a number of ways an author draws the reader into their story. They can use pace, suspense, fear, excitement, but behind the page-turning tools is a little something called atmosphere, the nuance that creates immersion.

For example: Harry Potter's first festival feast not only helps create an atmosphere at Hogwarts, it shows a contrast to his austere upbringing.

In this way, the readers and audience are captivated by the story, not just because it excites them, but because it feels 'real'.

Ways to create an atmosphere stem from language, word choice, dialogue, character and world-building - the sights, sounds, smells, textures, tastes and history of the story-world. Included in the art of world-building is the power of celebration. . . 

... and there's nothing like a royal wedding to make the heart sing.

Tolkien certainly new how to put on a festival! LOTR Return of the King

These fantasy festivals might match ones the reader is already familiar with ...full post here.

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Do you have a favourite fictional celebration? We'd all love to hear it.

Happy Equinox, everyone!

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About Kim Falconer

The Amassia Series

Kim Falconer, also writing as AK Wilder, has released Crown of Bones, a YA Epic Fantasy with Curse of Shadows as book 2 in the series. 

 Quantum Enchantment

Kim can be found on AKWilder.com, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and KimFalconer.com. 

Throw the bones on the AKWilder.com site. See you there!

Read Blood and Water, a PNR alt history that will leave you questioning every natural disaster ever endured.

“There is no doubt fiction makes a better job of the truth.” 

Fiction Predictions: Rumi's Mystical Atoms

 

Rumi didn't sit at a desk to write! He danced! Art from Pinterest

Welcome to the next edition of the Fiction Predictions series. Today we go back 800 years to 13th-century Persia and visit the poet and philosopher known to us as Rumi. We will look at his "Poem of the Atoms" (or Zarrah in Persian) that reads uncannily like a description of subatomic particle spin, orbital mechanics, and quantum entanglement. [1] 

Rumi's Creative Process

In our imaginations, we might see Rumi bent over an ancient scrolltop desk, studying Greek philosophers and their notions of 'atomism'. Or maybe we envision him holed up in a candle-lit garret, learning Sufi mysticism teachings. But Rumi didn't tap his creative genius in such an academic way. Instead, danced.

In a state of ecstasy, Rumi whirled about, Dervish-style, channelling his creative works seemingly out of 'thin air'. If it weren't for his disciple, his 'recorder' as he would be called in my stories of Ash, all his beautiful and enlightening words would never have reached our ears.

Fortunately for us, chasing closely behind him was his scribe. He eagerly recorded every word Rumi uttered, scratching away with his reed pen, filling sheet after sheet of handmade rag paper before it was too late. Before the words were gone.

This was the raw, chaotic creative process of Jalal al-Din Rumi and his constant companion, Husam al-Din Chalabi.

In this way, Rumi gave us depth and understanding that science would verify 800 years later. 

Rumi and Quantum Physics

Long before the birth of quantum mechanics, Rumi described a universe made of tiny, ecstatic, perpetually spinning building blocks (zarrah in Persian, meaning the smallest indivisible speck) that was then translated into the ancient Greek word for Atom (in the 5th-century BCE, the Greeks theorised that the universe was made of indivisible units ("atoms") moving through a void (universe). 

But Rumi experienced these atoms in ways that might be hard for us to believe. We have to ask, did this ancient Sufi master somehow tap into the subatomic secrets of the cosmos long before our instruments could identify them?

Rumi's Atomic Universe of Love

From his famous Poem of Atoms, we find:

"O day, arise! Shine your light, the atoms are dancing.
Thanks to Him the universe is dancing,
Overcome with ecstasy, free from body and mind.
I'll whisper in your ear where their dance is leading them.
All the atoms in the air and in the desert are dancing,
Puzzled and bemused to the ray of light, they seem insane.
Every single atom, happy or miserable,
Becomes enamoured of the Sun, of which nothing can be said." [1, 2, 3]

Rumi's Atoms vs. Modern Physics

Rumi's Mystic Verse (13th Century)	The Parallel in Modern Physics (20th–21st Century)
"O day, arise! Shine your light, the atoms are dancing... Overcome with ecstasy..."	Quantum Wave-Particle Fluctuations: Subatomic particles are never still; the quantum vacuum is a constant "dance" of fluctuating energy.
"Every single atom... Becomes enamoured of the Sun..."	Fractal Orbital Mechanics: The fundamental design of matter involves objects orbiting a central nucleus, a central star, or a galactic core.
"Behind every atom of this world hides an infinite universe."	Subatomic Complexity: A single proton contains a practically infinite landscape of quarks and gluons bound by immense nuclear forces.

 Was Rumi a Seer of the Future?

Sufi Dance by Maryam Mughal
FineArtsAmerica

How do we evaluate a 13th-century poet who spoke of the universe as if reading from a quantum physics textbook? Did he look through time and grasp the truth of subatomic matter?

Again how?

There were no particle accelerators back then, or mathematical equations to prove the nature of quantum reality. But he was educated in Islamic philosophy, which had preserved the ancient Greek concept of the zarrah—the smallest, indivisible unit of matter. 

Where Rumi Begged to Differ

Western science later treated the atom as cold, dead, mechanical building blocks of the universe, Rumi’s Sufi mysticism saw the entire cosmos as a living manifestation of divine love (Ishq). And, to Rumi, love required a dance and an orbital centre to spin around. Through living this dance, he tapped into a universal truth: that the same laws governing the human soul must govern the physical world as well. 

Modern quantum physics eventually built the tools to prove that the universe is as dynamic, vibrating, and deeply interconnected as Rumi said it was eight hundred years ago. Perhaps he wasn’t a seer of this scientific data but more a manifestation of cosmic harmony, proving that sometimes, the heart will map the universe long before the mind can verify it.

What do you think?

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About Kim Falconer

The Amassia Series

Kim Falconer, also writing as AK Wilder, has released Crown of Bones, a YA Epic Fantasy with Curse of Shadows as book 2 in the series. 

 Quantum Enchantment

Kim can be found on AKWilder.com, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and KimFalconer.com. 

Throw the bones on the AKWilder.com site. See you there!

Read Blood and Water, a PNR alt history that will leave you questioning every natural disaster ever endured.

“There is no doubt fiction makes a better job of the truth.” 

From the Backlist: "CS Lewis Taught Me all I Know" by Janet Mullany

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Who out there also remembers the magic of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and Narnia generally? We do, too, which is why we're revisiting Janet Mullany's walk down memory lane... Enjoy!

CS Lewis taught me all I know

by Janet Mullany

I love talking about kids' books and what we read when we were kids. What's fascinating too is how what you read comes back to you and how it creeps into your own work as a sort of cross-pollination ... I had a scene where a character was exploring a mysterious house and I immediately remembered a scene in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, where Lucy Pevensey has to explore such a house to find a magic spell. I haven't read this in years but I immediately remembered how Lucy caught a sight of her reflection in a mirror that was framed with a beard and thought a stranger was peering out at her... creepy!

I enjoyed CS Lewis's books a lot when I was a kid and occasionally re-read them as an adult...But, like so many other books I once loved, I now find myself reading CS Lewis with a critical eye. Even as a kid I wondered how, in a land where it is forever winter, there was any food at all, let alone tea, buttered toast, and sardines (yum! It's an English thing--that's Mr. Tumnus's high tea in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and here's a gratuitous pic of James MacEvoy whom I find alarmingly attractive even when he's a pale, freckly goatboy). I also found the "boys taking charge" thing a bit much, now and then.

 

 

I admire the way CS Lewis tied some of his loose ends up when he wrote The Magician's Nephew: he explains the origin of the wardrobe and why there's a lamp post in the middle of the Narnian woods, and where that danged White Witch came from anyway. (Okay, this is a safe place. Raise your hand if you, too, have a massive girl crush on Tilda.) That's something I love to see happen in my own writing, when something pops into my brain and onto the page and although I may not know it at the time, there's a reason and a story behind it. 

...

 

To read the full post, click here

 

To check in on Janet Mullaney, she has an Amazon page here & is on Good Reads here. 

 

 

 

A Year of Heroines in Fantasy: Beatritz de Barbentain, Mneri of the Khentor, & Korriya of Night

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This month's trio of heroines have a considerable amount in common. All three are supporting rather than major characters, but still have  a part to play in the main story, and all three are priestesses. 

Beatritz is High Priestess of the goddess Rian in Guy Gavriel Kay's A Song for Arbonne. She is also the daughter of Arbonne's ruling countess but was so determined to pursue her spiritual calling that she blinded herself voluntarily (a now archaic practice in Arbonne, but traditionally thought to enhance prescience) to ensure she would not be coerced into a dynastic marriage. 

That's commitment, right?! But the prescience she gains thereby, however fleeting and partial, turns out to be crucial in saving Arbonne from Gorhaut, its traditional enemy. 

In A Song for Arbonne the stakes are Arbonne's independence and the freedom to worship Rian, whereas in both Joy Chant's Red Moon and Black Mountain and my own The Wall of Night series, the characters face an existential evil that threatens all life.

In Red Moon and Black Mountain, the young woman called Mneri is one the Khentor, the nomadic warrior tribes of the plains. She is called to the role of priestess by her people, which gives her greater standing in a world where women are subservient to men and the worship of the mother goddess is respected, but must be practiced in underground sanctuaries. Yet although an honor, in the world of the Khentor where the tribe is all, refusal is not a real option for Mneri. 

Mneri's part in her story is less crucial than Beatritz's, but when the final destructive force unleashed by the antagonist must be overcome -- although it is primeval, rather than evil in itself -- she unmasks the potential solution. 

Korriya's part in The Heir of Night is also less critical than Beatritz's role. She is the most circumscribed of the three in terms of her personal circumstances as well. In the world of the warrior Derai, priests are discriminated against and segregated from mainstream society, so Korriya was not only forced into the temple life, but effectively imprisoned within it. Over time, she has become a senior priestess, but when the story opens, events force her to challenge Derai segregation in order to alert the wider community to the paranormal forces that threaten all.

As noted at the outset, Beatritz, Mneri, and Korriya are all supporting characters in a wider epic-heroic story. What their part illustrates is that defeating the "big bad" is not only about the "captains and kings" but also about everyone playing their part -- even when their societies don't recognize or respect their role or contribution. Or in Beatritz's case, know about the key element at all, which must remain forever secret... 

Nonetheless, all three step up when circumstances demand it, and serve their societies and worlds as faithfully as any champion wielding lightning bolts or swords -- which is why they've more than earned their place in my pantheon of Fantasy heroines.

Prior Posts: A Year of Heroines in Fantasy

February: Aerin, Elfrid, & Malian of Night
March: Yeine Darr & Rowan Birchmoon
May: Brienne of Tarth, Adjunct Tavore, & Asantir, Commander of Night
June: Shallan, Jehane Mor, & Aidris of the Chameln

July: Amat Kyaan, Rachael Boucher, & Nhairin
August: Karou, Rose Marshall, & Yorindesarinen

~*~

About Helen Lowe

Helen Lowe is the award-winning author of Thornspell and The Wall Of Night fantasy series, as well as a poet, blogger, and lover of story. She is currently editing the the final book in The Wall of Night series. 

Helen posts regularly on her “…on Anything, Really” blog, monthly on the Supernatural Underground, and tweets @helenl0we.

From the Backlist: Never Make an Author Mad

 

Art by Omven on DeviantArt

Welcome to our posts from the backlist! Today's spotlight was written August 2011 by the spooky-wonderful author Karina Cooper. Check out her hilarious, somewhat disturbing take on why it's best not to poke the bear, if the bear be an author!

Hope you enjoy!

You can find Karina Cooper on Goodreads!  

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Friday, August 26, 2011

Reasons Why You Never Want to Make an Author Mad *

by Karina Cooper

Come on, you've seen us. We're all very lovely people, us authors. We smile at the cameras, sign books, hug fans, and so on. Surely, making an author mad must be akin to swatting at a dust bunny, right? I mean, what are we going to do? Cry into our keyboards?

I mean, can't you just see the gorgeous Vicki Petersson cackling with glee as she comes up with creative ways to use a coin slot machine and a pair of dice to off somebody . . .

. . . let's not discount Merrie Destefano, who knows all the good places in New Orleans to hide a body, or Joss Ware, who knows seventeen ways to dismember a man beyond recognition. Juliana Stone knows what kind of wounds look like animal attacks—"I have no idea, officer, it looks like a jaguar attack to me."—and Pamela Palmer who is an engineer, and you know how devilishly clever engineers are. I wouldn't mess with her with a twenty-foot pole and a getaway driver on speed dial.

Ahhh, authors. So innocent, and yet...

Mwahaha. . .

Well. Sort of.

See, yesterday I found myself in the middle of a task that I do actually need for this current run of books I'm plotting. And as I scrolled through pages and pages of data, I thought to myself, Karina, it's a damn good thing your profession is what it is.

Because how else am I to explain why my internet history is full of information on modern day torture techniques?

That's right. Let's talk about reason number one: We know how make you scream. We've researched it down to the last details—certainly not for ourselves, oh, no, but what out characters know, we know. And if we're carrying around a character who is an inquisitor, or a character who was tortured, or worse, we know.

Would we use it? Oh, of course not, officer! We'd never use this information for evil. We're entertainers, not in the business of making the things we know actually happen. Right?

Heh. Heh heh. Right.

Reason number two to avoid making us angry? We know how to hide the body. We've thoroughly researched it. Currents, erosion, garbage truck route details, you name it, we know it. We're a little obsessive when it comes to details, you might have noticed. After all, how else can we guarantee that the extra we offed in chapter 4 doesn't come to light until chapter 15?

The devil is, in fact, in the details.... 

 

* Note: This post is entirely tongue-in-cheek and not actually a commentary on the likelihood of authors to commit heinous crimes against real, living people. This is a joke. A post devoted to the rather hilarious fact that we tend to research the most horrible things in our bid to get it right.

Murder is bad, mmkay?

Read the entire POST.

 

Enjoy!

 

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Speculative Fiction (Fantasy/Thriller/Sci-Fi/Urban Fantasy) for adults and teens.

 

 

We're a group of best-selling authors providing news, reviews and interviews from the darker, more speculative side of fiction.

Fiction that makes the heart beat faster...