One Year of Bluesky
Posted on April 27, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 5 Comments
A year ago today my pal Lou Anders asked me if I wanted an invite to a new microblogging site called Bluesky, which was making a little bit of a news splash because Jack Dorsey was on its board, and because it was initially a sort-off offshoot of what was then still known as Twitter, but designed to eventually be a federated protocol, like Mastodon was.
I did want an invite. One, I always like to reserve my name on any new social media instance, and two, I was auditioning other microblogging sites, like Spoutible and Post, to see if they were worth my time, and worth moving over from Twitter, which was well into its transformation into a fascist shithole. It was worth auditioning Bluesky for this as well. When I logged in, the site had just under 10,000 users. I posted my traditional “here I am, here’s a cat picture” inaugural post, and settled in to see if I could like the place.
Reader, I could. A year later, and not counting my own personal site, Bluesky is what I consider my primary social media hangout, the place I go to see and be seen online, to chat with friends and readers, to be accessible in a causal way, and, simply, to have fun. It’s not the only place I’m online — I’m on Threads rather a bit as well, not to mention Mastodon, I keep professional and private accounts on Facebook, and I even pop into Instagram from time to time. But if you ask me the question “what’s the social media you check first and last every day,” Bluesky is the answer.
What I like about Bluesky is wrapped up in both its technical differences from other social media, and the way I use it personally, both of which dovetail into each other. Bluesky is (largely) algorithm free – what you’re presented with when you sign in is the list of people you follow, and their posts in chronological order. As a default, the service doesn’t push posts on you; you can subscribe to lists that people create, for varying interests, but if you only follow a couple of people, then by default those couple of people will be all you see (this is why, I imagine, there was this period when one of the largest complaints about Bluesky was that all people saw on the service was me and Neil Gaiman — people followed us because they knew of us, and we both are, shall we say, enthusiastic posters). Bluesky is what you make of it, essentially.
Which I think is great! As it happens I don’t want my social media site to suggest reading material for me, because inevitably the algorithms want you to “engage,” and since people “engage” with the things that piss them off, inevitably the feeds make people twitchy and angry. All social media algorithms lead to doomscrolling; it’s damn near axiomatic. That Bluesky doesn’t lead with this is perfect. I quickly found friends and interesting people on Bluesky, and my feed was filled with some fabulous stuff.
Now, the flip side of this is you can’t just sit back and let Bluesky happen to you. You have to engage with it — actual engagement! Not the kind where an algorithm pokes you with a stick! — or you’re going to be bored. It’s not an endless TikTok firehose where all you have to do is put yourself in its path. It’s a spigot, and you control how much or how little you get. Everyone says they want that, but it turns out a lot of people kinda like the firehose instead.
The other aspect of Bluesky being algorithm-free (and still being relatively small; its user base currently sits at 5.5 million) is that it’s not great for being famous or being an influencer, or being a troll. I think the Bluesky technical and cultural schema confuses the famous and/or influencer and/or shitty people who come onto the service to be famous, or to influence, or to be shitty for clicks. You can’t game an algorithm to go viral, and the sort of marketing that works on other social media works less well on Bluesky, and even if it did work that way, there aren’t hundreds of millions of people to broadcast at. You can try to do all these things on Bluesky, obviously. But Instagram and TikTok and Threads and the former Twitter are all still there, and much easier to game and influence and troll. People who come to Bluesky to do those things don’t seem to stay very long.
Which is a feature, not a bug, for me, and comports with how I want to do social media. I am not on Bluesky to be “famous,” or purely to market myself and my work. I’m on Bluesky to fart about and chat with people, and do socializing that works for me as an introvert and who is, most of the time, better in text. Do I tell people about upcoming books and events, and talk about the writing life, and occasionally brag about the cool shit that happens to me because I’m just “famous” enough to have cool shit happen to me? Hell yes I do! Along with the pictures of cats, weird thoughts that pop into my head, and talking with people I enjoy chatting with. It’s all “yes, and,” and Bluesky is great for that.
I want to talk about one other technical aspect of Bluesky which I think is a real differentiator, and also helped me evolve my thinking about how I want to be online generally, which is its really fantastic “block” feature. When you block someone on Bluesky, it doesn’t just keep them from seeing you, or you them. It also (as I understand it) nukes every interaction you’ve had on the site with them out of existence, not just for the two of you but for everyone else. I understand that some people dislike this and feel like it’s overpowered and breaks conversational continuity. I tend to think of it differently. I think it both disincentivizes the power of being shitty for clicks and influence in general, and disincentivizes being shitty to people, or (intentionally or otherwise), directing others to dogpile. On social media, that is absolutely a jewel beyond price. You can still be an asshole on Bluesky if you want to! And some people are! But you risk all your “work” in that area being wiped out by someone else in a single click. That’s not fun for most trolls.
It’s also changed my behavior. I don’t go out of my way to troll, but on the former Twitter, when trolls rolled up on me, I would give them a little head pat, say something sarcastic, and then block them, because it was fun and I was petty enough to do it, and because there would be that residue of me stomping a troll. On Bluesky, there’s no residue, so there’s no point in doing that… which made me think about why I was doing it at all. Stomping a troll is fun, but it’s also still acknowledging the troll exists (or existed), and it’s still farming a response from one’s followers. It’s not being a troll, but it’s not great, either. And bluntly, it mostly didn’t feel great on my end — there was that enervation of having let a troll get to you in the first place, if only to sarcastically dismiss him (and yes, almost always, it’s a him).
Bluesky early on fostered the idea of “Don’t Engage, Just Block,” which is to say that the first time some dick rolls up to give you a hard time, you just zap him there and then, no muss, no fuss, just that dickhead gone forever, not longer your problem and no longer the problem of anyone else in that comment thread. Bluesky’s powerful block tool encourages getting that done sooner than later, so you don’t disrupt the conversational experience for anyone else, and then it’s done and you literally never have to think about that person again.
I found this philosophy of blocking early and often and without taking on anything they did more than “Oh, look, troll,” to be liberating. No more wasting brain cycles! Just block with the dispassionate mercy of angels and get on with your life! I had been leaning that way the older I got anyway — I wasn’t any less desiring of poking jerks, I’m just more tired — but this was a real clean break opportunity for me, and I took it. I also adopted it for Threads and Mastodon and everywhere else I am online. I do so much less taunting of the tauntable now than I did back in the day. Mostly now I just block.
(Am I proud that it took Bluesky’s block feature to help me decide change my own behavior, at the oh-so-tender age of 54? No, I am not! But let’s take our improvements where we may, shall we.)
Bluesky, it should be noted, is not perfect: Humans are still humans, on both sides of the site, and Bluesky has in the year I’ve been on it weathered its own controversies and cliques and weirdness, including a sort of insularity, especially from people who were on the service early, which I suspect ran off some folks who might have otherwise stayed on the site. Some people took the concept of “Bluesky Elder” far more seriously than they should have. I’ll also note that I personally use Bluesky for some things more than others, and farm out other things to other services. Generally when I want to gripe about politics, I go to Threads, and if I’m going deep on some nerd issue, I tend to head to Mastodon. So it’s possible that Bluesky is not a complete social media solution for me.
Then again, I don’t know that I’m looking for a complete social media solution at this point. I don’t need Bluesky (or Threads, or Mastodon, or wherever) to replace what Twitter used to be for me; there’s some wisdom in realizing that this was an “all eggs, one basket” approach to social media. I don’t think Bluesky is going to be bought by an egomaniacal fascist billionaire anytime soon (it should be noted that Jack Dorsey, while on Bluesky’s board, is not running the place and in fact doesn’t even currently have an account on the site), but if it is, it’ll be better to also be active on other sites as well. Bluesky is my current favorite social media site; it doesn’t have to be my only current social media site.
Ultimately, here’s the thing that makes Bluesky my current favorite social media site: I’m actually happy to be on it. I enjoy it in a way that I hadn’t enjoyed being on social media (particularly the former Twitter) for years. The fun of hanging out with friends, of meeting new people who might one day become friends, of being goofy with strangers and riffing on the silly memes being created and shared — I missed that, and I didn’t realize how much I missed it until Bluesky reminded me it was possible to do that. It’s been a year of social media being a positive part of my life again, and no matter what happens from here on out, that’s something that I, frankly, was not expecting.
So to the people who make Bluesky what it is, both the staff and the folks who post it on it: Thank you. It’s been a pretty good year. I hope we keep it going.
— JS
New Books and ARCs, 4/26/24
Posted on April 26, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 14 Comments
As we hurtle toward the end of another April, there’s still time to tuck in one more stack of new books and ARCs that have come to the Scalzi Compound. What here strikes you as a good read to take with you into the weekend? Share in the comments!
— JS
The Big Idea: Samantha Mills
Posted on April 25, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 3 Comments
Author Samantha Mills has a lot on her mind with The Wings Upon Her Back, and much of what is on her mind goes back… way back. Find out how the experiences of those who come before come to color the lives of those who live in the now, and what it means for this novel.
SAMANTHA MILLS:
One of the shittiest things about intergenerational trauma is that you’ve often passed it on before you even realize you have it.
I was in my thirties with two small children when I began to reflect more heavily on my own upbringing (like you do), and it finally clicked, in a way it never had before, that my parents were raised by people who had fled Europe after World War II. An entire generation of stoic survivors who didn’t want to talk about any of that; who didn’t believe in therapy and instead insisted that kids need toughening up, as though a bit of trauma now would inoculate them against life’s worse atrocities later. (Spoiler: everyone’s got anxiety instead!)
There aren’t many circumstances that have society-wide repercussions for entire generations at once. War is one of them. Covid-19 has been another.
In The Wings Upon Her Back, there is also a single widespread trauma that shapes society for generations, and that is godly abandonment. There are five gods sleeping above the city of Radezhda. When they first arrived, they bestowed great technologies on their followers and inspired unbridled devotion. But one day, without explanation, they turned their backs.
The trauma of that abandonment haunts the book and everyone in it. I used it to build out the history of the city (I had a load of fun in the epigraphs, if fun is the right word), the character backstories, the primary conflict and its messy resolution… once I understood the ramifications of what I was describing, it seeped in everywhere. It had to.
My main character, Zemolai, spends much of the novel in a crisis of faith. And fantasy is a great medium for this, because you also get to ask interesting questions like: what does a crisis of faith look like, when you have physical proof that the gods are real? The people of Radezhda have built towers to the heavens to go knocking at their gods’ feet. Their existence isn’t in question. Their motivations, on the other hand…
This is the situation Zemolai finds herself in. Cast aside by the charismatic leader she gave up everything to serve, facing the terrible things she did for her, and questioning everything. Her story is the story of the city itself, an entire people caught in a cycle of devotion and disillusionment, an entire people asking why did they leave us? and finding that the answers are never as satisfactory as one hopes.
It’s a compassionate book, I hope. The villain is villainous as hell, but there’s a terrible pain point underlying everything she’s done. Zemolai struggles with her faith, but comes to a more nuanced place than she started. As in real life, the way through for her involves looking to the past and untangling the threads of shared history. For all of us, it means coming to terms with what brought us here, and then doing our best to make things better for the next generation.
The Wings Upon Her Back: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Bookshop|Mysterious Galaxy
Attending Salar’s April Wine Dinner
Posted on April 24, 2024 Posted by Athena Scalzi 11 Comments
I tend to write about restaurants I like, so it’s funny to me that I have never written about my actual favorite restaurant. It’s a Peruvian restaurant in the historic Oregon district of Dayton called Salar. It’s upscale, sleek, and has truly excellent food and drinks, as well as superb service. I never get tired of dining there.
One of the things I love about Salar is their events. More specifically, I’m a big fan of their monthly wine dinners. Five courses, each one paired with a wine, and each wine gets described by the wine expert so you know all the deets of the liquid in your glass.
This month, their wine dinner was on my mom’s birthday. I asked her if she would like to go, and she said yes, so she and I had a lovely girl’s night wine dinner that also was her birthday dinner! This was the third one of their wine dinners we’d been to, so we knew the ropes by now but were still excited to attend.
For the first course, we were served a scallop crudo with orange and smoked shoyu, basil oil, pickled daikon, and carrots.
I absolutely love scallops, and scallop crudo is no exception. The rich, buttery-ness of the scallops was an excellent contrast to the crunchiness of the daikon and carrots, as well as the bright acidity from the citrus of the orange. I did try a flower, but it was slightly bitter, so I left the other three off to the side. It was a great start to our meal.
This first course was paired with Comtesse Marion, Viognier, from France. I learned that Viognier is a type of grape, and that these grapes grew on an estate that’s been around since the 12th century. The current family that owns it has had it since the 19th century. The location in France is close to the Mediterranean with black volcanic rock, and the wine doesn’t touch any oak, just stainless steel. This one was from 2022 and was described as having a “peachy stone fruit quality.” To me, it was a dry white that was perfectly fine. I’m still working on learning to appreciate drier wines, so in my eyes this dry white was decent but I just don’t quite have the palate for these types of things yet. Doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy learning about it, though!
I was surprised at the second course because it was fried chicken, which is not something I would normally consider having as a dish at a fancy wine dinner. This fried chicken had a guava rocoto pepper glaze, toasted hazelnuts, jicama and tri color carrot slaw, with an agave and basil vinaigrette.
I’m normally not really a chicken fan, but this chicken was so good. It was cooked well; the chicken was moist and the skin was crispy. The sweetness from the guava glaze was delicious, especially alongside the intense fresh flavor of the cilantro on top. The slaw was a wonderfully crunchy accompaniment, and the hazelnuts were a pleasant addition.
As for the wine, it was Prisma Rosé of Pinot Noir, from Chile. The expert told us it was grown in the Andes between 600 and 1000 meters, with heavy fog from the Pacific and lots of afternoon sunshine that helps it retain its acidity. Another stainless steel fermentation process, from 2022. This was actually my favorite wine of the evening. I tend to like rosé, if for nothing else than its aesthetically pleasing color.
For our third course, we had five spice roasted pork belly atop a shiitake mushroom congee.
I know there’s a lot of people out there who don’t like mushrooms, but I am not one of those people. In fact, I really like mushrooms, especially shiitake. The congee was amazing, so flavorful and chock-full of mushrooms, I could’ve eaten a huge bowl of this stuff. I’d never had congee before, but its very similar to a risotto. The pork belly was quite decadent, and had a melt-in-your-mouth texture. This dish was definitely heavier than the previous two, but very delicious.
Our third wine was Zorzal, Gran Terrior, Pinot Noir, from Argentina. Apparently, it’s from the highest elevation in Argentina on a huge bed of limestone, and it was aged in French oak. It’s from 2020, and being a Pinot Noir it was of course a dry red, so I didn’t care much for it. My mom loves dry reds though, and was a big fan.
Our final savory course was a pineapple and aji amarillo marinated roasted beef brisket with stewed garbanzo beans, greens, and toasted nuts.
The beef brisket was good, but I didn’t care for the stewed greens. I wasn’t sure if it was spinach or some other green, but I think cooked greens are considerably worse than just raw greens. They’re always too bitter when they’re cooked. Other than that, the dish was quite tasty, but I didn’t finish everything on the plate this course. Probably my least favorite course overall, but still good.
Onto the wine, we had Vina Alberdi, Reserva Riojo, from Northwest Spain. This dry red is from 2019, 100% estate and 100% organic, as well as aged for a year in fresh oak before aging even further in older oak. Truly a carefully crafted wine. Can’t say I liked it. Again I don’t like dry reds, but I’m sure if I did this would’ve been a good one!
Of course, you can’t end a five course meal without a dessert, so here is our Chirimoya mousse crème patisserie:
I don’t know how I managed to take a photo that wasn’t in focus, but please disregard that and trust that it was very yummy! I had never heard of Chirimoya before, but apparently they’re also known as custard apples, and it’s a tropical fruit native to South America. The mousse was creamy and sweet without being too much, and was the perfect size to end the meal.
For the wine, we had a bubbly wine this time. Victorine De Chastenay Crémant de Bourgogne Brut. Certainly a mouthful, but I do enjoy a sparkling wine, and apparently this company (brand?) makes no still wine at all, only sparkling, which I found interesting.
As you can see, my mom and I enjoyed a fantastic dinner, and it was even nice enough weather to sit out on the patio so I had nice lighting for my photos. I had an excellent time with my mom, and I hope to attend even more of their wine dinners in the future.
Like I mentioned earlier, I love eating here, not just for their events but just regularly dining, too. I can’t recommend Salar enough. If you’re in the area, it’s a must try.
Which course looks the best to you? Are you a scallop fan? Have you tried chirimoya before? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!
-AMS
One For the Gen-Xers Out There
Posted on April 24, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 3 Comments
Devotees of the film Say Anything… and of Lili Taylor’s character Corey will appreciate this song, which riffs off of one of the sixty-some-odd songs that Corey wrote about Joe (two of the songs, actually), and does a pretty good job of it. This song is from 2014, but the band Prom Queen continues to be an ongoing concern, so if you dig the song, check out their other stuff.
— JS
The Big Idea: Chris Panatier
Posted on April 23, 2024 Posted by Athena Scalzi
We all have voices in our heads. But what do you do when one becomes so loud they begin to take over? Author Chris Panatier is here with his newest horror novel, The Redemption of Morgan Bright, to show what can happen when two “people” occupy the same body.
CHRIS PANATIER:
The first Big Idea for my horror novel The Redemption of Morgan Bright wasn’t even my idea. In fact, it’s one of the oldest tropes across virtually all genres, that is, the falsification of one’s identity as a means to gaining entrance to some place. In the case of asylums, perhaps the most famous account is that of young journalist Nellie Bly, who did so in 1887 at the age of twenty-three.
In order to investigate patient treatment and conditions, she assumed the name “Natalie Brown” and had herself committed to the infamous Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island in New York. The administration was convinced she was mentally ill, calling her “positively deranged” and attempting to have her committed permanently. Her editor had to intervene to have her discharged. Bly wrote a book about her experience called Ten Days in a Madhouse and published it that same year.
The Redemption of Morgan Bright is a contemporary gothic tale. A woman (Morgan) assumes the false identity of a troubled housewife named Charlotte Turner and has herself committed to an “enlightened” mental institution called Hollyhock House. She’s doing all of this to find out why her sister died in the same place a year earlier.
I’d originally set out to write the entire novel from Morgan’s perspective, whether as herself in relevant flashbacks or in the leadup to her commitment, or while behaving as Charlotte. But in early drafting, that setup quickly disintegrated—and not because of any outlining or planning on my part. I couldn’t have planned what happened, which was that as I wrote Morgan playing Charlotte, Charlotte became real.
It was from writing the dueling points of view of both Charlotte and Morgan that this new dynamic emerged, what I’ll call Chris’s Accidental Big Idea. Charlotte’s identity bled into Morgan’s and eventually took over. As a Proud Pantser™ (those who write “from the seat of their pants” rather than outlining), this was the type of interesting angle you hope to stumble upon.
And so it was that Charlotte quickened from a character created by Morgan, into a fully realized individual. She has a distinct personality, desires, flaws, the full range of human emotion, and most importantly, goals. Charlotte has goals. The problem, of course, is that what she wants and what Morgan wants aren’t aligned. In fact, they’re entirely incompatible. That can be problematic when they both live in the same head—and it was that tension that really propelled this story forward.
I’ll leave it to the reader to decide if the dynamic between Charlotte and Morgan is better characterized as psychological (a possible manifestation of Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), historically referred to as “multiple personality disorder”) or as paranormal (possession), or even a hybridization of the two.
Unlike a demon, Charlotte is not an invasive entity that comes from an external place—indeed, she was created by Morgan—nor is Charlotte an identity created as a response to trauma, as is often the case with DID. In this story, she’s a new thing. Regardless of the characterization, one of the story’s central conflicts is a case of battling identities stemming from the sober, rational, and sane creation of a mask that takes on a life of its own and eventually subjugates the wearer. Two standout books that explore the opposite ends of this spectrum are Sara Gran’s Come Closer (demon possession) and Catriona Ward’s sure classic The Last House on Needless Street (DID).
They say ‘write what scares you’ and the crossroads of lost identity and lack of control make my blood run cold. I’m just happy that my lawless pantsing led me to this fantastic source of conflict.
The Redemption of Morgan Bright: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Books-a-Millon|Bookshop|Powell’s
Author Socials: Website
Back Home and a Bit Discombobulated
Posted on April 22, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 7 Comments
This is what I get for taking redeye flights and then daysleeping to catch up on all the sleep I didn’t get on my flight. Today a total wash-out for braining. The song above captures my general state at the moment. I’ll be better tomorrow. Maybe! We’ll see!
Regardless, good to be home. It’s where my people are.
— JS
Checking In From LA
Posted on April 20, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 21 Comments
Here’s my view from the stage at the LA Times Festival of Books earlier today, on which I, Ben Winters and Tim Blake Nelson (with moderator Jesse Andrews) were meant to talk about “when work gets weird,” but actually ended up discussing many other topics as well, which at one point resulted in me, a very lightly progressive member of the petit bourgeois, unleashing a stem-winding polemic about the endgame of late-stage capitalism, because, I guess, why not. It’s 2024, maybe someone has to. That said, it was a generally lovely panel, and it was nice to meet all the other panelists. Then we all went to sign books, and it’s always a pleasure to do that.
Aside from the Festival of Books, I also had a few meetings to talk about current and potentially upcoming projects. One should never counts chickens before they hatch, particularly in LA, but I can say I thought the meetings went well. Seeds were planted, shall we say. We will find out if any bloom.
How has your weekend been?
— JS
Happy Birthday, Krissy
Posted on April 18, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 39 Comments
She’s fabulous and I just think she’s neat. And it’s also her birthday! If you are so inclined, wish her a happy one.
— JS
The Big Idea: A.D. Sui
Posted on April 18, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 3 Comments
Author A.D. Sui knows about the day-to-day experience of navigating the world with a disability, and in The Dragonfly Gambit, she brings some of that experience in to the life of her characters. In this Big Idea, she explains why this was important to her, and what it brings to her characters to give them life (and spite).
A.D. SUI:
Disclaimer: in this post I’ll be focusing on depictions of physical disability as that’s something I have personal experience with. Your (or others’) experience with disability, whether it’s physical, sensory, or otherwise may vary, but I hope this post can still be a jumping point for discussion around disability portrayal in speculative spaces.
#
Imagining yourself as the protagonist of a sweeping epic is a universal experience. I’ve done it. You’ve done it. We’ve all closed our eyes at some point whether when were eight or twenty-eight and imagined what it would be like to save the day. Past heroes in Science Fiction & Fantasy spaces tended to come in a standard male able-bodied muscular configuration which left most of us out of this ubiquitous experience. What’s worse, these depictions could convince us that disabled folks were simply not meant to be the heroes of a story.
Modern SFF offers a broader variety of protagonists for us readers to imprint upon, especially disabled protagonists and heroes. However, when writing our own disabled characters who save the day, we may, unintentionally, shield them from their own disability. We can do this through 1) special powers or magic that the disabled protagonist wields which allow them to forgo the typical physicality expected of protagonists and heroes (e.g., magic can be used in combat from a distance) 2) placing them in a disability-normative world (e.g., disability is socially positioned as normal variation rather than a deficit) or 3) by situating them in environments where their disability plays a less limiting role (e.g., a non-ambulatory character in zero G).
Across the board, these protagonists are still capable, optimistic, and attractive (as many real-world disabled people are). While there is nothing wrong with using these narrative techniques. Often disabled authors want to create a world where they don’t need to deal with ableism and other discrimination. But these narrative approaches may also provide a “way out”; a means for authors to star a disabled protagonist without having to write about the messy nature of disability and the messiness of disabled bodies.
In The Dragonfly Gambit, I aim to create circumstances that yield well to discussions of class, gender, ethnicity, and how those intersect with disability. For example, and without too many spoilers, I illustrate how two characters with vastly different social status are treated following their injuries. I can also discuss how the visibility of a disability impacts the perception of a character’s attractiveness and their social capital, and how these concepts intersect with traditional feminine ideals.
For Nez, my protagonist, I make a world that is harsh and that provides few opportunities to exert her agency. I leave nowhere for her to hide, give her limited tools to make her mark on the world and leave her to her own devices. As a disabled kid growing up in post-Soviet Ukraine, that was my own starting point. I know it well.
By leaning into the negative perceptions and hurdles in Nez’s way (and her personal dissatisfaction with her disabled body) I am able to discuss how agency can still be exercised even if it means leveraging the negative perceptions of others. In a sense Nez is neither an active nor a passive protagonist, but rather a constrained one, having to navigate a world that does not and will not accommodate her. It also allowed me to develop Nez into a character with whom I felt at home. She’s tired, and angry, and refuses to forgive.
In the real world, where we often stereotype disabled folks as kind, inspirational, and nearly-superhuman (consult any Paralympic advertisement), it felt refreshing to draw up a character with some relatable pettiness and grit. Some of my favourite depictions of disability in popular media are the Elric brothers from Full Metal Alchemist, Camina Drummer’s brief injury/disability arc in The Expanse Amazon series, and Toph from Avatar: The Last Airbender. All of these examples don’t shy away from the anger, confusion, and dissatisfaction that often comes with disability without portraying their characters as “weak”. With the case of the Elric brothers and Toph, special “powers” (and I use “powers” broadly to encompass alchemy and Earthbending, respectively) do not fix the disability and do not spare the characters from the physicality that’s required of them.
Disability experiences are just as unique as the people having them. Hence, I do not expect that the framing of disability in “The Dragonfly Gambit” will resonate with every reader. But by leaning into disability, instead of softening the experience, we, as authors, have an opportunity to hold space for the complex and often unpleasant emotions that disability can unearth. By doing so, we have the chance to write disability experiences that will resonate with real-world disabled readers. By creating protagonists who are angry and unsatisfied, we can also validate these feelings in our readership.
Finally, a disabled protagonist who isn’t supported by magic or their environment and who succeeds despite of it (or in spite, as spite is a favourite motivator of mine) may become a stronger symbol of hope to the real-world disabled readers than a character with special powers. It stokes the idea that we are strong enough to do the hard things with just ourselves and our bodies, no matter how messy or frustrating these bodies can be. Change will be won over through effort and not an incantation. Unfair worlds will be made fair and not simply become so out of thin air.
There is no magic in the real world, but luckily, us disabled folks don’t need it.
——
The Dragonfly Gambit: Amazon|Bakka Phoenix
A Quick Trip To Portland (Oregon, Not Maine)
Posted on April 17, 2024 Posted by Athena Scalzi 41 Comments
In a recent post of mine, I said that I felt like I wasn’t doing much of the things I enjoy lately. One of these things is travel, and another is spending time with friends. When the opportunity arises to combine the two, who could say no? So at the end of March, I popped over to the West coast to spend a few days with an old college pal who is currently living in Portland, Oregon. She played tour guide and showed me around to some amazing spots in Portland. We hung out, had good food, good drinks, and had a great time overall. I thought I’d share some highlights with y’all!
I had been to Portland once before, when I was sixteen for the 2015 Westercon. From what I remembered, I quite liked Portland, and coming back almost ten years later seemed like a lot of fun.
My flight arrived into PDX at 8:30pm, and I ended up making it to my friends place at about 9:30, so they suggested a place that was open late for food. Specifically, a place that is only open late, that being between 7pm to midnight, and they only serve coffee, tea, and desserts.
I thought that sounded just like my cup of tea (ha!), and we walked a few blocks to Rimsky-Korsakoffee House. I was so excited to try it, but when we stepped inside I realized I had literally been here before. Some very cool people from Westercon had taken me here, and it was only when I saw that familiar, whimsical, cozy string lighting that I recognized it. Regardless, I was more than happy to be back, and had a difficult time choosing what dessert to get.
I ended up getting the Ginger Cake with Warm Caramel Sauce, and an orange cappuccino. The ginger cake was for sure an amazing choice if I do say so myself, as it was warm, moist, and spiced to perfection. The orange cappuccino was a wonderful pairing. Honestly if I lived in Portland I would make it a point to try every dessert listed.
The next morning, it was a short jaunt over to Flour Bloom, a coffee shop that has plants, pastries, and, you guessed it, coffee!
There was art for sale from local artists, tons of plants you could buy, and a photobooth. My friend and I both got “The Flower Child”, which is a honey-lavender-rose latte with cardamom and dried rose petals.
(Though we got the same drink, my friend got hers with oat milk, so it’s a slightly different color than mine.)
After our coffee, my friend took me all around the Industrial District and we explored so many different and super unique antique/vintage/thrift stores.
One of them had this vintage style kitchen that was totally to die for.
As well as this super cool wall of old stereos!
After gettin’ my thrift on (I bought so many trinkets), we headed to McMenamin’s Kennedy School. It’s basically an old elementary school that got repurposed into a hotel and restaurant type of thing.
Again, I realized I’d been here before, but my friend and I got to do something I didn’t do last time, which was spend an hour in their soaking pool. I love me a good warm body of water to relax in, especially when accompanied by a crisp, cold cider. I got the blackberry cider and my friend got the blood orange ginger cider. I didn’t take any pictures of the pool or anything because it was prohibited (which is totally understandable). It was a great time despite it being a little crowded.
For dinner we went to a modern Japanese place not far from my friend’s apartment called Wa Kitchen Kuu, where we tried a sake flight, some seriously good chicken, and I also got a roll.
Everything was so delish, I was tempted to go back for dinner or lunch another day, but my friend said we should try to avoid repeats and I agreed.
After dinner we went to Studio One to see a movie, and it was unlike any theater I’ve seen before. Each auditorium has a different name and is set up with all sorts of comfy furniture, like couches and plush chairs. There’s also tables for your drinks and food. Which, by the way, you can order your drinks and food right from your seat! Like real, hot food, not just movie theater popcorn. And also drinks with alcohol in them! It was so luxe.
We had already had dinner so I just got a drink and a crème brûlée, which was extremely yummy. We had intended on seeing Godzilla: Minus One, but accidentally saw Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire. It was very bad. But honestly laughing at it the whole time with my friend was so fun it was worth seeing that garbage.
And that completed my first full day in Portland! The next day, my friend and I got breakfast at a place called Harlow which is classified on Google as a health food restaurant and I can totally see why. I got the pesto garden scramble which was eggs, seasonal vegetables, yams, potatoes, cauliflower, broccoli, and kale, with walnut basil pesto. Plus a side of quinoa.
This was so tasty and filling, and I felt so healthy eating it! The bee pollen on top of my turmeric golden latte with coconut milk might’ve been too healthy for my taste, but these veggies, eggs, and pesto really hit it out of the park.
Later on we grabbed a quick bubble tea from Mochinut. I got the Thai tea which is one of my favorite kinds of boba to get.
That night we were going to a club called 45 East for a rave, and I had nothing to wear to said rave, so we went shopping at this very interesting shop that had Halloween costumes, huge platform shoes, lingerie, wild accessories, all sorts of funky stuff! I threw together an outfit of a black dress, neon green fishnets, and these absolutely amazing Demonia boots.
I’d always wanted to go to a rave and I was not disappointed. The music was boppin’, the people were friendly, the lights were colorful, and it was so much fun. My feet definitely hurt from dancing, though.
After that we popped over to a nearby restaurant for a quick bite and a drink, and I got a seriously delicious drink called “Dirty Pretty Dirty Chai” which was chai infused vodka, Mr. Black cold brew, miso-vanilla, and oatmilk. I also got these strange, fried deviled eggs.
They were certainly something.
The next day I got to go to the infamous Portland Saturday Market. It’s basically a giant art vendor market and there’s also things that aren’t art, like clothing, home decor, and food (not that home decor and clothing can’t be works of art).
There was so much to see, so many more vendors than I thought there would be! If I hadn’t had to fly home with my suitcase, I would’ve bought way more stuff. But I ended up buying a few items like a shirt, some stickers, and I got some food, too. My favorite thing I ate was this rice pudding.
Following the market, my friend took me to Lan Su Chinese Garden, which was a beautiful place full of Chinese history, culture, and gorgeous foliage. Not only did we walk through the tranquil gardens, but we stopped at the lovely tea house and had tea and pastries. I honestly didn’t take many pictures because I was trying to really soak everything in and just enjoy the flowers, tea, and nice weather. It was an excellent time.
After walking around downtown for a bit and exploring some more, we stopped at Dan & Louis Oyster Bar, and I was so excited to get some West coast oysters while being in the actual West coast!
These oysters were really good, I honestly wanted to get more but I ended up being pretty full from the clam chowder, calamari, and shrimp cocktail we had.
That night we went to my friend’s friend’s party, a Queer Prom, and I met so many amazing people and had such a fun time, and the party lasted late into the night.
And then the next day I flew home!
My time in Portland was time very well spent, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. I loved hanging with my friend and meeting her friends, had so much good food, saw so much unique, cool stuff, and was just glad to be out doing something I like to do. It was great.
Have you ever been to Portland, or maybe even live in Portland? Do you have recommendations for me for the next time I go? Do you like thrifting and West coast oysters? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!
-AMS
The Big Idea: Christine Ma-Kellams
Posted on April 16, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi
History doesn’t always repeat, but echoes of what has happened before turn up in new variations in the present. Christine Ma-Kellams uses one of those echoes for dramatic effect in The Band, in a way that involves… kitchen appliances.
CHRISTINE MA-KELLAMS:
The most terrifying part about evil is not so much its magnitude but its proximity—how ordinary it is, how close to home.
Exactly one decade and a day ago, I woke up from nap-time with my then-toddler in our one-bedroom Cambridge apartment with my man hovering over me.
“Did you hear what happened?” he whispered.
I didn’t at the time, but soon found out about the pressure cooker bomb that went off at the Boston Marathon—an event we almost went to that fateful morning but decided against at the last minute—when two brothers who lived down the street from us in Inman Square did the unthinkable. We spent the rest of the afternoon sheltering in place after the governor shut down the entire city to look for the perpetrators.
Seven years later, when I (along with the rest of the country) underwent another shelter in place—a much longer one this time, because of a totally different kind of disaster—a strange deja vu set in. I invariably thought of how the Tsarnaev brothers used a household kitchen appliance to wreak deadly havoc on innocent Bostonians on an otherwise ordinary April day.
The last lockdown was also when I started writing The Band, so it probably comes as no surprise that a pressure cooker bomb makes a cameo in the climax of my own novel as well. I didn’t want to just recycle history though; I wanted to rewrite the future in a never-before-seen configuration. Stuck at home, I looked around my kitchen. At that point, a 7-in-one electronic device changed my life twice over: first, when it made me into a domestic goddess who no longer had the plan ahead for dinners, and second, when it became a turning point in my novel.
Because in the seven years between the two lockdowns, something else notable happened: the Instant Pot became a national sensation. Somewhere around 2016, it became the “It’ thing to have in every kitchen in America. I, being prone to suggestibility, could not resist. Technically, the Instant Pot is a pressure cooker. But crucial to the unexpected turn of events that unfold in The Band, it’s not your usual pressurized device. All the ingenious bells and whistles that made the Instant Pot inventor—a software engineer named Robert Wang—rich and famous also accounts for the critical twist that comes about in my own novel when one villainess’ plot doesn’t go as expected. Evil—like everything else—doesn’t always go according to plan, and that makes it all the more more interesting.
Household appliance-turned bombs aside, there is another layer of evil that ends up being the sub-flooring for The Band. It’s the kind of wrong we commit not out of hate, but indifference, which strikes me as the true opposite of goodness and love. When terrible things happen because well-intentioned people trying to do the “right” thing are not paying sufficient attention to what is really going on—that just might be the real mystery of the universe, one we have yet to solve.
The Band: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Bookshop|Powell’s
I Was Absolutely NOT Procrastinating Today, Nevertheless, Here is a Cover of “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl)”
Posted on April 13, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 19 Comments
This is the fault of my friend Greg van Eekhout, who today on Facebook opined that “If you’re over 45 and play guitar you have a moral duty to learn at least one yacht rock song.” To which I commented that I called dibs on “Brandy” by Looking Glass. And since I called dibs on it, I felt beholden to, you know, actually whomp it up. It is the weekend, so I felt like I could take a couple of hours to play with it. And here we are.
Two things: I did not do the background vocals on the song, because I am lazy, and I used MIDI guitar, because I’m having some difficulty getting my audio interface to play nice with my guitar right now. The problem here is almost certainly me rather than the audio interface. Nevertheless, if you were going to comment that my guitar playing seems to be coming along, all I can say is, thanks, I cheated.
Also, if you want to compare and contrast with the original, here it is:
Enjoy the rest of your weekend!
— JS
Hey, I’m Not Going to Try to Scam You on Facebook (Or, You Know, Elsewhere)
Posted on April 13, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 8 Comments
Briefly: Some dimwit scamster is pretending to be me on Facebook and then is sliding into people’s messages there, trying to get them to use “my” marketing expert, what looks to be an equally scamalicious Facebook account. So for the avoidance of doubt:
This is the only public Facebook account I have (note the URL); you’ll notice the “verified” blue check on it (likewise, I note it’s mine here). Any other public facing account purporting to be me is fake, and if tries to get you do anything, you should probably report it as a scam.
(Note: I have a private Facebook account for friends and family, and also a Scalzi Enterprises account. Neither of them are going to slide into your private messages to try to sell you anything, either.)
Here is that fake account purporting to be me; if you have a Facebook account and would like to report it for impersonation, please feel free (don’t be a jerk about it, just report it). Here is the account of the “marketer” it wants to suggest I am using. I do not use her, nor, obviously, do I suggest you use the services of that account, either. It’s almost certainly a scam. FYI, the picture of the woman there is stock art.
Also, in a general sense, any account purporting to be a well-known person who tries to get you to give money directly to them, or someone else associated with them, is probably really bad news, and you should not have anything to do with them.
Also also: I am not going to try to upsell you on any marketing mavens. All my marketing and publicity is handled by my publishers. I don’t work with outside marketing people at this time, and even if I did I would not slide into your messages about it.
At this moment in time, the only thing I’m trying to sell you is books. I’m not going to slide into your personal messages about those, either. You can get them from any bookstore. Support your local one!
— JS
Your Occasional Reminder the 80s Were Even Weirder Than You Remember
Posted on April 12, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 36 Comments
That is, if you were there for them at all.
That’s it, that’s what I have for today. Some days are like that.
— JS
Here Comes the Rain Again
Posted on April 11, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 7 Comments
Turns out it was no joke that the only clear day in a week was the one that had the eclipse: it rained so much today that my yard river is back, which means good odds that I will find more fish in the grass when I walk the dog tomorrow. It’s such an odd thing. I imagine the fish aren’t thrilled with it either.
— JS
A Quick Note to Struggling Authors About What You Should Not Do
Posted on April 10, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 31 Comments
Hi there. I know publishing is a difficult industry and it’s a real challenge to get eyeballs on your work and to find an audience, especially here in 2024. These days I do generally try not to be proscriptive about advice I give about how to get attention to work; nevertheless I do think there are some things that no one should do, ever, because it will come back to bite you hard on the ass, and follow you for the rest of your career.
One of those things: Fabricating quotes from other authors about your work, and then putting those quotes on social media promoting your work. It’s a bad idea! Don’t do it!
Why? To begin, it’s dishonest, and depending how you do it and for what purpose, possibly actually legally fraud. Which is not a good look! To continue, the authors who you are manufacturing quotes from are real live humans who may be annoyed or irritated by being used in such a manner. Their endorsements and identities are valuable to them and others (which is why you’ve pilfered them), and fabricating their approval is a risk for them if left unaddressed.
Also, if you’re going to manufacture an endorsement from an author prominent enough for your purposes, it means that other people will know or know of that author, and may even contact them and say, more or less, “hey, did you actually promote this book?” And when they attest that, indeed, they did not, this means that your dishonesty will become known to the very people you hoped would read your work. Which, you know. Defeats the purpose.
So, please, resist the temptation to fabricate quotes from other authors (or, really, anyone) for your books. You will be found out! It will become part of your reputation! The results will not be great for you! Ever!
Thank you for your attention.
— JS
PS: Yes, this piece of advice is based on real life events, involving me. I would greatly prefer it if you didn’t go out and try to find this person; if I wanted to shame them by name I would have done so. I hold out hope that they have the ability to learn, and that this is a momentary case of ambition outstripping good sense, and that they will remove those posts of their own accord, and soon, and choose not to do this again. Also, remember: Never be an asshole on my behalf. I don’t need that kind of help, and it reflects poorly on you if you volunteer yourself for that sort of service. Thank you.
An Artistic Rendering of the Eclipse
Posted on April 10, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 4 Comments
At the eclipse party the other day, one of our younger participants decided to document the event in chalk on our house sidewalk. I took the picture, darkened the concrete via Photoshop, and was treated to this end result, which is, indeed, a fair likeness. Better than I could do in chalk, in any event.
— JS
The Big Idea: Shannon Page
Posted on April 9, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi
For the Nightcraft series of books, of which The Empress and the Moon is a part, Shannon Page delved into a branch of arcana that eventually became the heart of her writing. Read on to find out what it is and how it shaped the work.
SHANNON PAGE:
I am not a tarot practitioner, trained or otherwise. I’ve done very little reading up on the cards and their traditional interpretations; I have only even ever had my own cards read once. But, as may be obvious by now to even the most casual of readers of my Nightcraft Quartet, I am strongly attracted to the cards and their symbology.
As The Empress and The Moon, the fourth and final volume of the quartet, is releasing, I’ve been thinking more about this apparent contradiction: “I know nothing about this, but I think it’s great.” My main character, a witch named Callie, shares with us her skepticism about the tarot. Her best friend, Logan, is a professional tarot practitioner, and Callie’s mother also works with the cards; both witches are always trying to get Callie to learn them, to accept their value. In traditional witchkind, however, particularly the science-based community Callie is a member of, the tarot is looked down upon. “They’re for humans” is a common, and scornful, attitude.
Of course, characters grow and change, and by the end of the series, many of my witches, warlocks, humans, cats, and others have expanded their understanding of the world and how so many things are not what they may seem. Dividing lines turn out to be more fuzzy than sharp; truths that “everyone knows” get challenged and upended…and Callie finds herself reaching for the cards at some pivotal moments.
In writing these moments, I reached for the cards myself.
I own a number of tarot decks, though the one I use most frequently is also the one I’ve had the longest. It is a traditional Rider-Waite-Smith deck in its classic yellow box, and it used to belong to my ex-husband, who found it in the hallway of an apartment building he lived in before we met. Intrigued, he put it on his bookshelf but never opened the box. When we married, I sort of adopted the cards, and took them with me when we parted.
I have no idea whose they were originally, or why they were left in a hallway in Oakland, California in the late 1980s. But they are mine now.
I used them in several different ways as I wrote the Nightcraft Quartet. When deciding the books’ titles, I chose cards with images and meanings that particularly spoke to me as they related to Callie and her journey from a powerful, yet fairly sheltered, younger witch to the wiser and more self-possessed woman she is at the end of the series.
When I got stuck in a scene and didn’t know the best way forward, I would often pull out the deck and deal a few cards onto my desk, studying the images and letting them tell me a story that resonated.
And, when I needed an actual tarot reading in the epilogue of Empress, I shuffled and dealt an invented spread, “reading” the cards just as they came out, changing nothing from what this random act gave me. Amazingly—or maybe not so amazingly—it worked. The cards told me just the story that needed to be there.
A big reason for the tarot’s enduring appeal is the near universality of the images and their themes. In not just the Rider-Waite-Smith deck, but also the many, many other versions I’ve seen (a number of which I own), we find issues and concerns shared by so very many of us: love, family, attachment; grief, fear, danger; power, and the lack thereof; community, wisdom, triumphs, mistakes; poverty and wealth. We humans (and witches too, I think) are endlessly interested in these themes, in all their variations and permutations. It’s at the heart of why we write and read stories.
The Nightcraft Quartet could have been written without the use of the tarot, but it would have been a far shallower story—more head than heart, more elaborate construction than tale from the soul. Like Callie, I’ve grown to appreciate the truth of the cards as I’ve opened myself to their intuitive magic. They’ve been a divining rod to the story deep inside…inside me, inside all of us. Come along; I’ll deal you in.
The Empress and the Moon: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Bookshop|Powell’s
Eclipse Report
Posted on April 9, 2024 Posted by John Scalzi 69 Comments
Look, I’m not going to lie: I was not one hundred percent convinced we were going to be able to see the eclipse. April in Ohio has, shall we say, variable weather, and the week before the eclipse was almost all gray and rainy. The weather predictions were “mostly cloudy” to “raining in the AM,” none of which was at all promising. It would be annoying enough if it was just me, but we were having about 50 people over. And while none of them would (reasonably) be annoyed if the eclipse didn’t show, it would still be a disappointment.
So, aside from the eclipse being an absolute fantastic celestial experience, it was also a massive relief that for one day, April in Ohio did us a solid, and the sky was clear with (at most) high, hazy clouds. The eclipse went off without a hitch, my guests were thrilled and amazed, and it was exactly the sort of once-in-a-lifetime sort of experience it was meant to be. As an astronomy person from way back, it was absolutely a bucket list experience, but even folks in town who I know were not hugely invested in it were taken with it. And I didn’t even have to leave my property for it. Which meant, of course, that it was perfect. The fact that I got to see it with friends and family made it even more wonderful.
I hope wherever you were, that you got to see some or all of it; even as a partial eclipse it was a fantastic experience. Tell me your experience in the comments.
— JS
Whatever Everyone Else is Saying