Diabolical Plots – Page 44 – From Inspiration to Ink…

HUGO REVIEW: Short Story Finalists

written by David Steffen

Science fiction award season is here again, and the Hugo final ballot was announced for WorldCon 76 in San Jose.

On to the short story category, my favorite category of all the Hugo categories, covering stories less than 7500 words. This review covers all six finalists.

1. “Carnival Nine,” by Caroline M. Yoachim (Beneath Ceaseless Skies, May 2017)

In a clockwork world, each person only gets as many turns as the Maker gives them each day, but never more than their mainspring can handle. Every action you take winds down your spring and that will be all you get to do until the Maker winds you again the next day. Zee is lucky enough to have an extra capable mainspring, so she has the ability on an especially good day to see more and do more. Her parents always tell her to do her work first so she has turns left to play. One day a carnival train comes nearby the closet where their town is located, and Zee decides to sneak off to see it, and everything changes.

This is a beautiful, heart-wrenching story with so many powerful moments and themes, but especially in terms of the effort of being a caretaker, and also in terms of how we choose to spend our time. I take the view that time is the most universal currency, we spend our time no matter what we do but what we spend our time doing defines us and our connection to those around us, the turns of clockwork people was a great metaphor for that. This was my top nomination pick for this year of the hundreds of stories that I read, and I am absolutely delighted to see it on the final ballot for both the Nebula and Hugo.

2. “The Martian Obelisk,” by Linda Nagata (Tor.com, July 19, 2017)

Susannah lives in what seem to be the waning days of human civilization, a time when the consequences of generations of short-sighted decisions come to their consequences for the survival of humanity. An attempted Mars colony has failed catastrophically, so humanity’s only attempt to find somewhere else didn’t fare any better. But instead of dwelling on the gloom and doom of the dismal future, she is determined to remotely build an obelisk on Mars that will serve as a monument to humanity that will survive for thousands of years, long after she expects humanity to be dead and gone. AI-driven equipment constructs tiles from local materials and use them to construct an impressive tower for any future visitors to our solar system to find. But when a transport is spotted approaching the obelisk, she has to decide how to direct her AIs, and then wait for the significant communication delay in both directions to find out how it turned out. Did someone survive the failed colony? Is the transpot being driven by AI? Is this a petty attempt to sabotage the obelisk project?

I really enjoyed this story both for the interesting and novel construction project which was ambitious in the face of apparently certain doom of humanity, something that would stand the test of time when Earth has scoured its surface of evidence of human existence. The arrival of the transport tests Susannah’s resolve–is the monument the only goal she has left, or is there still something else to strive for?

3. “Sun, Moon, Dust” by Ursula Vernon, (Uncanny, May/June 2017)

Allpa inherits a magical sword from his dying grandmother that carries three warrior spirits in it named Sun, Moon, and Dust. The sword is the inheritance of a hero, and the spirits want Allpa to go out and do heroic things, but there is no war to fight and Allpa has his potatoes to grow.

I tend to enjoy the Chosen One trope, and never more so when it’s turned on its head. Allpa is arguably the Chosen One here, but he is lucky enough to live in a generation where nothing more is needed of him than to grow crops to feed people. This subverted Chosen One story is fun and enjoyable.

4. “Welcome to your Authentic Indian Experience™,” by Rebecca Roanhorse (Apex, August 2017)

Jesse Turnblatt works for Sedona Sweats with other Native Americans providing virtual Authentic Indian Experiences, virtual reality tours of the general public’s stereotypes of Indians. His girlfriend thinks the job is demeaning, but Jesse doesn’t think it’s too bad. Most of the tourists just want the same thing, a vision quest, usually having to do with a wolf, and they’re happy as anything. But a man comes in who’s different, who asks thoughtful questions and doesn’t seem impressed by Jesse’s usual theatrics. The two become friends, and things take a darker turn.

This story was solid, based around the incredibly creepy commoditization of an oppressed culture for marketing purposes that was all the more cringeworthy knowing that it is just the logical science fiction extension of how it actually works. Despite the irony in the title with the trademark in it and everything, it felt real. I’m not sure I understood what was intended by the ending, or maybe it was meant to be ambiguous?

5. “Fandom for Robots,” by Vina Jie-Min Prasad (Uncanny, September/October 2017)

Computron is decades old, the only known sentient robot, a fluke experiment no one else has been able to reproduce. It resides in the Simak Robotics Museum where it hosts Q&A sessions with the general public. One day, a teenager asks about an anime show titled Hyperdimension Warp Record which has a robotic character that she suggests Computron might relate to. Before the next session, Computron watches episodes of the show and discovers fandom, begins contributing to fanfiction on online forums dedicated to the show.

This was cute, sort of a love note to fandom from a sentient robot.

6. “Clearly Lettered in a Mostly Steady Hand,” by Fran Wilde (Uncanny, September 2017)

This is an sideshow of dark and curious things. There’s something odd about the host of the tour, but curiosity wins out over caution, as it must.

This is quite a short one, so it’s hard to give it in-depth discussion without spoiling it. I’m afraid I don’t think I understood this one. I think it’s an analogy for medical facilities? I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it, it had a dark and haunting lyrical quality to it, I’m just not sure I understood it.

THEATER REVIEW: Goodnight Moon and The Runaway Bunny

written by David Steffen

Goodnight Moon and The Runaway Bunny are two short theatrical presentations currently being toured by Mermaid Theater of Nova Scotia. Based on the famous children’s books written by Margaret Wise Brown and illustrated by Clement Hurd from 1947 and 1942 respectively. Both shows are performed using puppets.

The Runaway Bunny is a semi-speculative tale where a young bunny tells his mother how he’s going to run away in more and more fantastical ways and his mother tells him how she’s going to find him in each case. A sweet and speculative story of a

mother’s love for her child. Each of the scenarios is acted out with different puppets as the bunny and his mother transform.

Goodnight Moon is a bedtime story of an anthropomorphic rabbit and the room they sleep in, everything that surrounds them as they go through their bedtime routine. This entire presentation is done on a set that glows under a black light to enhance the set details and mask the puppeteers who are wearing black. No pictures were allowed during the show, but they allowed pictures of the set afterward and the puppeteers came out to show kids how the puppets work, which is what these pictures are from. All in all, I enjoyed it, and especially if you loved the books when you were a kid or have read them to your own kids, it’s worth checking out.

DP FICTION #38B: “Her February Face” by Christie Yant

In her youth the doors to the shrine of Elena’s heart were wide open for all to see. Some kept their hearts in private spaces, secret and hidden, but not Elena. She kept hers in the front room, because what good is a bright heart if it can’t be shared?

Every morning she polished the shrine, and dressed her heart with fresh flowers that filled the air with the scent of jasmine and violet. She hung small crystals that caught her heart’s light and refracted it into every color, filling the room with rainbows.

On the wall above her heart Elena kept her collection of smiles. Smiles for celebrations, for sunrises and sunsets, for soft sheets and warm limbs, for surprise and wonder at her extraordinary good fortune. It was an impractical placement; it would make more sense to store them near her vanity, but she liked having them out where visitors could appreciate them and where she could select exactly the right one at the last minute, before she walked out the door.

As the years passed, jasmine was replaced by roses; sparkling crystals made way for quiet pearls. Her collection grew to include the shy but elated smile of her wedding day, the contented smile that she wore on waking beside her love every morning, and the proud smile she wore for their silver anniversary.

But all things end, even when we don’t believe they possibly can.

Elena smashed them all, crushed them beneath her feet and then sat on the cold floor among the shards as the day’s light crept across the room and disappeared, and the light in her heart went with it.

The flowers died and were cleared away. The doors of the shrine remained shut tight, opened only on the first Sunday of every month, to dust and keep it tidy, for the sake of good housekeeping. In the right light the outlines of smiling faces could still be seen on the walls, faded scars of old wounds that time would never fully erase.

One cannot go naked into the world, and so Elena eventually settled on a new face, one with a slight furrow in the brow and a subtle downturn at the corners of the mouth–an expression not so deep as to give offense, she felt, but one that conveyed a necessary distance between herself and the world.

After some consideration she also bought a new smile, thin and pale, to wear if the occasion should call for it. None ever had.

Behind painted black shutters her heart beat out the years in the dark, a slow and measured rhythm, unchanging and unnoticed.

Until she met Ivy, on a February day that threatened rain: a day for a practical coat, shoes with a good grip, and an umbrella, all absent from the woman who shrieked and laughed as the sky let go. Her silver hair hung in wet twists that matched her silver shoes, in which she splashed through the puddles with the abandon of a child, or a fool. The hibiscus-bright smile she wore was altogether too forward, a face meant for a younger woman and a different season–not a proper February face at all.

Elena’s route to the bakery was fixed, the same every day, rain or shine, her feet grinding out a prayer for stasis, for safety from change and the pain that comes with it. To reach the walking path that circumscribed the park she would have to walk directly past the madwoman making a spectacle of herself. The sky began to drizzle, and then to pour. She opened her sturdy black umbrella, kept her gaze straight ahead, her chin up, and strode with purpose toward her goal.

Isn’t it wonderful? the woman said as she approached, startling Elena to a halt.

Elena could think of nothing to say except, You’ll catch your death, and held the umbrella in such a way as to shelter them both, for all the good it would do.

Nonsense! the dripping woman laughed. Rain washes away the dust. It waters the flowers, and makes things grow. They watched the sky fall until the cloudburst had spent itself and the clouds parted, spilling a few golden rays of afternoon light down through the gloom.

Elena folded her umbrella and walked on.

I’ve seen you, the woman called after her, and moments later she was at Elena’s side. I see you walking at the same time every day. I’m Ivy, the woman said, tilting her too-bright smile toward Elena and wringing rainwater from her hair with brown hands as wizened as her own.

Elena, she replied. My name is Elena.

I’m so happy to meet you. We should walk together sometime, and take tea.

All right, she agreed through her frown without fully understanding why.

Back in her rooms, Elena’s shuttered heart grew warm.

Wednesdays now went like this:

Elena walked the mile to Ivy’s apartment in her sensible shoes, her porcelain frown freshly polished and her coat brushed down. She stiffly climbed the narrow stairs, pausing half-way up to catch her breath and rest her aching hip. Ivy greeted her at the door, almost always with a new smile–she never seemed to wear the same one twice–and would not rest until she saw to it that Elena was seated in the most comfortable chair with an aromatic cup of something hot in her hands.

Ivy’s rooms were warm, and smelled of citrus; her tea cups were chipped and no two of them matched; her walls were covered in art of all kinds, from black ink doodles on butcher paper held up with thumb tacks to still-life paintings painstakingly rendered in oils and hung in carved and gilded frames. Ivy’s rooms were a refuge from order, from silence.

Barefoot Ivy would move around the room, telling stories, or listening rapt when she could persuade Elena to tell her own. She played her favorite pieces on the upright piano, thick with dust but in perfect tune, and sang in a voice that was charmingly off-key. Elena only realized the time by the fading light through the window, and then her offers to help with the dishes were rebuffed; Ivy sent her off with a small bag of sweets and a cheerful admonition to be careful walking home.

Once home, Elena would put away her coat, hang her face by the door, and sit in a straight-backed chair by the window—looking out at nothing in particular, counting the days—until Wednesday would come again.

On this particular Wednesday Elena left her face on the wall while she dressed in front of the mirror, and she thought of Ivy.

Brilliant Ivy, shining Ivy, Ivy who wore a dozen smiles, each more beautiful than the last. Smiles that lit her eyes, smiles that showed her teeth. Ivy whose slender fingers could still play a concerto like a woman half her age, and made her tea so strong that Elena had to cut it with extra milk.

Ivy, whose heart shrine’s doors hung half-open in the corner, their chipped paint a faded rusty orange that might once have been red. Secretly Elena hoped for a gust of wind through the open window, or an accidental bump that might cause them to swing open. Sometimes when Ivy was out of the room to put the kettle on or find the jam (which never seemed to be in the same place twice) Elena was tempted to sneak a look inside, but to do so would be hopelessly rude. She was embarrassed and ashamed of her curiosity, this desire to invade her friend’s privacy. The temptation was strong, though, and driven at least partly by concern: for all her smiles and songs and stories, behind the doors of Ivy’s half-open heart shrine, Elena could see no light.

Perhaps there was a polite way to bring it up, she thought, as she pulled her slip over her head. She imagined the conversation:

Dear, she would say, your shutters are ajar.

Oh! I meant to leave them open. You know me, Ivy would say, and they would both laugh because yes, yes Elena did know her, and then she would open them wide and Elena would see–

See what?

She found the periwinkle suit at the back of the closet, mercifully free of moth holes. She could not recall the last time she’d worn it, or anything else that wasn’t a sober neutral. But today called for something brighter, something softer, because spring had come. Elena studied the suit, wondering if it was hopelessly out of fashion and she would look a fool for wearing it, but reassured herself that certain lines were timeless, and it was appropriate to the season. It still fit, she was relieved (and not a little proud) to find, though she struggled to reach the zipper in the back, and it hurt her fingers to grasp it.

On a whim she opened a long-neglected drawer and rummaged through it until she found what she was looking for: a brooch of deep green enamel leaves and tiny seed pearls that hung in a cluster, crafted to mimic the droop and drape of wisteria blossoms. She thought that Ivy might like it. She wondered what her favorite flower was, and her favorite color–why had she never thought to ask?

In the front room she lingered and considered her smile, dusty from disuse. She could not recall ever wearing it. It would surely feel unnatural, ostentatious; in fact, what was she thinking, all dolled up and glittering like a girl? It was embarrassing. It was much too late to change her clothes—Ivy would be waiting—but at least she would not walk about covered in ornaments like a holiday tree. She unhooked the brooch and set it on the table by the door.

The black shutters over her heart caught her eye, severe and unwelcoming. She would have to give it a good dusting, and perhaps a coat of paint soon. And it wouldn’t do her any harm to let some light in there. Plenty of women her age left their hearts open.

Satisfied with this decision and now running terribly late, she pulled her frown from the wall—her February face, as Ivy had once called it—and put it on, smoothed her hair, and left the house.

Moments later she returned and retrieved the brooch. She felt certain that Ivy would like it.

The walk to Ivy’s apartment seemed particularly long that day, despite the sunshine and new blooms. It was a Wednesday like any other, but something had changed, something that welled up inside her and threatened to choke her if she didn’t let it out, something that needed to be said or done. As Elena climbed the stairs she was seized by the irrational fear that when the door opened she would be unable to speak, that she had left her voice among the shards of her smiles all those years ago. She felt overdressed, affected, abashed. She fingered the brooch nervously at her chest, toying with the clasp, ready to pluck it from her coat and secret it away.

Ivy answered the door wearing her joie de vive smile and laughed in delight, her fingers grazing Elena’s own. Look at you! You look lovely, she said. You’ve brought Spring with you today.

I have something for you, Elena said, her fingers fumbling with the pin before she managed to unhook the clasp.

For me? She took Elena by the hand and pulled her into the front hall, stopping in front of a round mirror. Come pin it on me here, so I can see it. Elena could feel the warmth of Ivy’s skin through her soft yellow blouse, could smell her perfume like rose water. Her hands shook and her face flushed hot beneath her frown, and when it was done Ivy’s bright eyes were on Elena, not on the mirror at all–

Pain like a knife shot through her jaw and ran up along her hairline, where the edges of her frown met delicate skin. She gasped in surprise, and brought her hand to her face, trying to find the source as it stabbed through her again.

What’s the matter? Are you all right? Ivy asked as she reached out to steady her, but Elena backed away in fear and confusion, her vision blurry with tears. You’re bleeding!

Elena’s fingertips came away red with blood, and the pain came again, and then pressure, so much pressure she felt as if she were being crushed beneath the porcelain of her face.

It’s nothing, I’m sure, she said. But I don’t feel well. I should go. She found the door and waved Ivy off, insisting that she would be fine. She left in haste, Ivy protesting behind her.

It was tight, so tight. The face she’d worn all these years now gripped her cruelly. By the time she reached her door she was out of breath and half-blind from pain.

Alone in her bedroom she sat in front of her mirror and ran her fingertips gingerly around the edges of her frown, near the hairline where the porcelain brow furrowed just a little; behind the severe angle of the cheekbones; under her chin, where the painted mouth drew down at the corners. She could see now where it cut into her flesh, rivulets of blood tracing a line down her jaw.

It came away with difficulty, and beneath it the blood was drying to a sticky brown; her smooth, featureless flesh was pinched and bruised, the area around her lipless mouth mottled and red. It smarted still. The natural lines and folds that came with age were temporarily filled by the swelling, a grotesque reversal of time. Her reflection was that of another woman, the victim of some tragic accident, unrecognizable.

But she was surely still the same Elena who had earlier put on the dress that she now struggled out of—the same Elena who had donned the ivory slip that now pooled around her feet; still the same Elena who had so carefully arranged the hair that now fell in thin, loose waves as she pulled the pins from it.

She stood before the full-length mirror in which she had earlier checked the straightness of her stockings, her body as naked as her poor bruised face, and wondered what Ivy would say if she could see her now.

The east wall was empty, the ill-fitting frown discarded. She sat in the straight-backed chair again, wrapped in a soft blanket which she hugged tight around herself. Her face was bare of all but the ointment she had applied to her injuries. She watched the moon rise through the parlor window, moonlight tracing its way across the floor, over the scratches still visible in the wood, where the shards had bit so long ago. She remembered the woman she was a lifetime ago, a woman of smiles and refracted light.

When the knock at the door came, she did not move to answer; she did not turn when the door opened and footsteps could be heard on the floor.

And then Ivy’s soft arms were around her, her porcelain cheek resting on Elena’s shoulder.

I was worried, Ivy said.

It didn’t fit anymore, Elena explained, embarrassed for reasons she couldn’t identify.

Ivy said only, I know.

Elena turned in her chair to face her. Ivy kneeled before her, oblivious to the cold, hard floor. She ran her fingertips over Elena’s bare face, dancing around her eyes, stroking her cheek, carefully avoiding her injuries. Elena was surprised at her own boldness as she reached out as well, her fingers tracing the hard edge of Ivy’s smile, following the lines, and though Ivy’s breath grew short she did not pull away.

It came off easily, the sweet, satisfied smile that she wore. Beneath it Ivy’s tender flesh was bruised and abraded, her skin mottled and lined with scars—some were fresh and bright, barely healed, while others had faded away, leaving only the ghosts of past pain. Elena thought of the darkness inside those half-opened doors in Ivy’s rooms.

They don’t fit, Ivy said. They never have. But it’s what people want to see. So what if it chafes a little? She shrugged. I have always envied you. You’ve never worn a false face.

Until today.

Elena studied the face in her hands, the deftly sculpted dimples and flawless strokes of rose, the slight crinkle around the eyes that made a person believe that this smile was for them and them alone. She lifted it to her own face, and was unsurprised to discover that it fit perfectly, almost as if it weren’t even there. But Ivy pulled it from her, tossing it aside, and then she stood, her hands outstretched and beckoning.

Elena rose too, the blanket falling from her shoulders. The room grew brighter with their embrace, as light streamed out between the slats of her shrine’s closed shutters.

Elsewhere, in warm rooms that smelled of citrus, the doors of a neglected heart stood wide open, and February faces began to gather dust.

Christie Yant writes and edits science fiction and fantasy on the central coast of California, where she lives with a dancer, an editor, two dogs, two cats, and a very small manticore. Her stories have appeared in anthologies and magazines including Year’s Best Science Fiction & Fantasy 2011 (Horton), Armored, Analog Science Fiction & Fact, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, io9, Wired.com, and Science Fiction World. She is presently hard at work on a historical fantasy novel set in 19th century Paris, and is learning more about architecture and urban planning than she ever thought she would need to know.

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TV REVIEW: Kevin (Probably) Saves the World Season 1

written by David Steffen

Kevin (Probably) Saves the World is a fantasy comedy/drama fantasy series with what I might call a light Christian backdrop (I wouldn’t call it Christian TV, particularly, I’ll get into that later). Season one was 16 episodes and ran on ABC between October 2017 and March 2018. At the time I write this article it’s unclear whether it will be renewed for a second season.

After surviving a suicide attempt, businessman Kevin Finn (Jason Ritter, who might recognize as the voice of Dipper Pines from Gravity Falls) moves back to his hometown to live with his sister Amy (JoAnna Garcia) and her daughter Reese (Chloe East) while he recovers. Soon after he moves in he starts getting visited by Yvette (Kimberly Hebert Gregory), who only he can see, who claims to be sent by God to guide and protect him as he saves the world. Not only that, but he is one of the 36 “righteous” in each generation that helps guide the world. Except… the other 35 are nowhere to be found.

Now, an aside about the religious aspect of the show. I initially missed the first episode, so I missed the initial discussion about Yvette being sent by God, and I watched 2 or 3 episodes before I realized there was a religious aspect. I mention this because, as I type the synopsis of the show, it sounds like it might be a show that leans heavily on the religious aspect, meaning either to appeal specifically to devout Christians or to convince non-Christians that Christianity is the best way, but I just wanted to say that I didn’t find that the case here at all. Although Yvette plays the role of a sort of guardian angel, she states multiple times that she is not an angel, and I thought of her as a guardian spirit in a more general sense. If I could change one thing about the show it would be to change the use of the word “righteous”, which for me has negative connotations, usually tied to the more negative aspects of the church for me (excluding when it’s used as surfer lingo, which is entirely different). Especially since Kevin doesn’t seem to be particularly devout, and is no saint himself.

Kevin has made some life choices that he regrets, everything from his choice of career to the way he’s treated other people, always acting selfishly, hurting others casually or intentionally. After the suicide attempt and with the new guidance from Yvette, he tries to better himself to fit his new role. Despite the name, the “righteous” are not perfect people, as Kevin already knows from his past actions he regrets. But he quickly finds that his path forward is to help other people in big ways and small, and these improvements to other people stack up and multiply with each other. The universe doesn’t speak to him or Yvette directly, but tends to nudge him with seeming-coincidences, chance meetings with people he can help. In the process, he reconnects with his sister and gets to know his niece, reconnects with his high school best friend Tyler (Dustin Ybarra), establishes a close rapport with Yvette. As he helps people he starts to see visions that give him clues to where he can find the other righteous to help save the world.

I found this show a lot of fun and I hope it’s renewed for a second season–by what I’ve heard it’s teetering on the edge between being renewed or not. I think part of that might be that the synopsis of the show makes it sound like it might be preachy and heavy-handed which I found not to be the case at all. There is a consistent theme that helping people will make the world a better place and can have an increasing effect as the people you’ve helped also help others, and I think that’s a worthwhile theme that can work for people of any religion or no religion. Most importantly, Kevin helps people by trying to understand what they need, trying to help them improve their life circumstances, not by trying to convert them or by quoting scripture. The structure of the premise would make it easy for it to fall into a comfortable episodic stride where episodes could be watched in any order as Kevin helps the person of the week, but the show does a good job of mixing that structure with larger multi-episode arcs as Kevin’s visions help him find the next righteous, as Yvette starts to have doubts about their mission, as romantic relationships develop between characters, and some of the plot points in this larger arc are plot-shaking in a way that first-season plot points often aren’t, shaking the established structure of major relationships.

The writing and acting are great. My favorite character on the show was Yvette, she’s here to do a job and she tries to stick to the job but as she stays she starts to get more of a liking for Kevin, and their interaction is the best part. She is invisible to most of the other characters most of the time, so she has the unique spot of being able to act toward all of the other actors without them reacting to her, which is used well for both drama and comedy. Kevin is convincingly scattered but well-meaning, although I found it harder to imagine him as a hard-hitting businessman, in part because that happened entirely off-screen. The other characters area all likeable in their own way, but distinct, from capable but sometimes overbearing Amy, to positive but naive Tyler, to clever but cynical Reese, and others.

I thought season one of Kevin (Probably) Saves the World was great, and I hope they renew for Season 2. You can watch the whole season on the ABC website now–give it a try, and I hope you liked it as much as I did.

ESSAY: Not Quite Superman

written by S.B. Lakes

When I was young, whenever I would get frustrated with something, my parents would say, “It’s hard, but you can do it.”

Throughout life, I’ve taken this to heart; I powered through and did the things, even when there was a crushing amount of work to be done. Friends called it “superpowers”, and I found myself using it more and more often. Superpowers always have their cost – get the power of the Dark Side at the expense of your morality, get magic powers when you sacrifice the thing you love most, and so on. For me, I’d be exhausted the next day, a gibbering baboon who looked like they’d stayed awake for three days straight, but the feeling was always that it was worth it because that’s what you gotta do to get it done. It’s hard, but you can do it.

Today I both write SFF and work in a high-powered slice of tech. In tech, superpowers are the norm. Superpowers are expected. Superpowers are your basic prerequisite, because of course you’re going to work-hard-play-hard, you’re going to go-go-go and get-shit-done. (You probably have a t-shirt or mug with at least one of these phrases, possibly handed out by your employer.) There is no place for weakness in this environment.

There is no place for disability in this environment.

In the past 5+ years, working with a wide variety of client companies, I haven’t seen a single person with a visible disability. Any invisible ones have been carefully hidden away.

Even without my disability, I’ve never been healthy. In the past five years alone, I’ve dealt with a bizarre constellation of medical issues. Car accidents, emergency appendectomy, shingles… nothing connected, but many things. Some I can hide. Some I can’t, but there’s still an expectation to push through. A regular sick day usually means working from home, smiling and cogent on the video conference, trying to ignore the fever heating my cheeks or my nose that’s been rubbed raw from tissues. The last time I had a real sick day, I was two weeks after major surgery and on serious painkillers. The following week, still high as a kite on vicodin and barely able to shuffle to the fridge and back, my then-client insisted that I get some work done and I’d been out long enough. But at least all of these issue were temporary, and none actually disabling.

Which brings me to my actual, invisible disability. I’ve struggled with sometimes-crippling depression since high school. I’ve checked myself into two different hospital programs, one of which included a week of inpatient care. It’s hard enough to smile and pretend I’m stronger than I really am when recovering from a physical illness. It’s excruciating while depressed. In my field, depression is an unheard-of weakness. People acknowledge that I can’t help it if I was hit by a car, but depression is still seen as a personal failing.

I am not “out” in tech, because I would stop getting business. This piece is the first and only work I’ve ever written under a pseudonym – I can’t afford the risk. Who wants to work with someone who might one day just be too sad to come in? What’s the point? Just get over your bullshit and get this shit done. Superpower your way through and you’ll be fine. So I grit my teeth and smile, smile even when my cheeks feel like they each have a one-ton weight smuggled within them, smile when it’s all I can do to keep the tears from squeezing out and rolling down my unprofessional face and dripping onto my unprofessional laptop that would fizzle and sizz in the very reaction that I’m now suppressing in myself. (Superpower through it. It’s hard, but you can do it.)

Depression feels like the opposite of superpowers. Instead of being able to burst through expectations and accomplish superhuman amounts of work, I’m saddled with some sort of superkryptonite. Not only can I not do things that are super, but I find it hard to do incredibly basic things. Showering is difficult. Dishes nigh impossible. Dragging myself to work is an ordeal I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, because the weight of the burden wants to crush me to the ground. And I want to let it, because it would be so much easier to let myself be pulverized into mush than fight for just one minute longer. (It’s hard, and you might not actually be able to do it. That’s a scary thought.)

And in a scenario where I have to hide my disability for fear of losing my job, I feel like a backwards Clark Kent. Masquerading amongst the superheroes, ever afraid that someone would notice that I squint a bit and sometimes bump into things and really if I put on glasses I’d look just like that non-super reporter guy. Nobody needs to bring in that non-super reporter guy to get things done.

Which brings me to the SFF part of my life. There are many issues with disability in science fiction and fantasy. Evil people are disabled or disfigured almost by their nature: see Star Wars’ Snoke, Wonder Woman’s Dr. Poison, Doctor Who’s Davros, and so on. Cons still don’t do enough for people with disabilities. I can’t count the number of times a panelist has decided they’re naturally loud enough to “not need a mic” so I can’t hear them (much less be heard by those with hearing limitations), or seen a panelist in a wheelchair struggle to get onto a ramp-free stage. There’s a lot that needs to be improved.

But despite all this, the SFF world has been my disability salvation. This was the very first world where I was allowed to be “out” with no consequences, and met a number of folks with the same struggle. I could have depression and still be OK, a person worth working with. Hell, I could have depression because I’d been cooped up for too long dealing with yet another illness (my current situation), and still be OK. I was able to open up about my difficulties, my clashing needs to be productive and also practice self-care, in part because so many others were openly fighting the same battles. In the past few years, the SFF community taught me about the concept of spoons, and saving your energy for the things that matter most. This is the community that lovingly yelled at me to stop being ridiculous while I was berating myself for taking too long to finish a novel draft. They told me to start taking better care of my mental health, which included taking breaks.

Not only did I not need superpowers to be accepted in this community, it seemed like nobody did. The outpouring of empathy and love became one of my strongest sources of support, with the echo of “it’s hard, and sometimes you don’t need to do it. It’s OK if you don’t.”

This contrast is startling.

When I had a week-long crippling migraine, an editor sent me copy edits to review. I knew it would be OK to request a few more days, because I wasn’t able to concentrate very well with the pain, and they were fine with it. That same week, my tech job showed no such courtesy, and I had multiple skull-shattering, painfully loud video conferences.

When I was depressed and struggling to make it through the day, I had another editor ask for a revise-and-resubmit for a story. I’d seen others do it, so I knew it would be OK to ask for another few weeks because I was too depressed to make progress. He told me to take care of myself. At the same time, not being “out” in my day job, I was juggling three very demanding clients with no way to get a reprieve. I dragged myself forward on each new project, each new request, whispering “it’s hard, but you can do it” as I trudged through.

When I was extremely depressed and was in a hospital program, getting intense therapy for four hours every weekday, my corner of the SFF community sent me love and support. It was clear that all writing had to come to an indefinite halt. In fact it should’ve been clear that all work had to come to an indefinite halt. But instead I found myself dragging my wrung-out carcass directly from the hospital to a client planning session. Depression, which gives your frontal lobe a whallop and makes it hard to concentrate or think, had me scraping together my remaining neurons (already frazzled from the hospital session) to focus not on rest and my own health, but on a soon-to-be-dead company’s plans for their next product launch.

The SFF community still has a way to go towards eliminating ableism, both in its media and within its community. But for me, this has been the one place in my life where it’s completely OK that I’m not quite Superman. I can drop the fake smile and the veneer of hypercompetence, and have one less burden to lift. I can take care of myself and my health. Things are hard, and I’m OK whether I can do them or not.

It’s good to be home.

S. B. Lakes is a fantasy and science fiction writer who works in tech. They’ve been dealing with depression for about twenty years, and have been hiding it from their professional tech life out of necessity. They’ve published under another name at several magazines, including Lightspeed and Analog.

Anime Review: Chronos Ruler

chronoruler

Chronos Ruler teeters on the brink of being a really good show, but doesn’t take full advantage of the best parts of its story. It’s like the writer had a lot of ideas, kept throwing them out, and chose to stick with the most cliched plot threads because the audience would be most comfortable with them. And yet, there are parts that are genuinely good that make Chronos Ruler more than yet another show about people fighting monsters.

We’re introduced to Kiri and Victor Putin as a duo hunting Horologues, time-devouring monsters that appear to people who experience a regret so deep that they wish to rewind time. Rather than granting those wishes, the Horologues feeds on a person’s time (causing them to grow younger and forget things) until nothing is left.

Initially the pair are introduced as brothers, with Kiri looking like the serious one and Victor the lazy, ladies’ man who likes to write every embarrassing moment Kiri has in his journal just so he can bother him about it later. There’s a splashy fight scene in the first episode, they save a poor girl, and all of it feels very by the book action fantasy for an urban European setting.

I might have dropped the show then, but the fight scene at the climax of the first episode forces Victor to regretfully use his Speed Up ability (as a Chronos Ruler he can command time around objects to make them freeze in mid-air or speed up their trajectories).

And that’s when we learn the truth about the pair.

Victor is actually Kiri’s father and due to a prior injury from a Horologue, every time he activates Speed Up he also de-ages. Along with losing his age, he loses his memories. The journal he keeps is how he remembers what happened between him and Kiri and he’s regressed so far at this point that if he didn’t have the journal he wouldn’t remember he had a son at all.

It’s a crazy gut punch at the end of an otherwise paint by numbers first episode.

Moments when the series is dealing with Kiri and Victor’s loss are generally the strongest of the bunch, especially once they are joined by Mina who may or may not be Victor’s wife and Kiri’s mother. I’d have to say that watching a show where a guy is traveling around with his immature parents who both look and act younger than him is not something I’ve seen before and it’s definitely part of the show’s charm.

But for every moment when the show addresses their unique family dilemma and Victor’s lost memories, there’s a lot of stuff we’ve seen before, particularly if you’ve seen D.Gray-man.

While it’s not a complete knock-off, it’s hard not to see similarities between the Chronos Rulers and the Black Order, the Horologues and the akuma, and the Oath of Time and Innocence. And Chronos Ruler is not as well crafted as D.Gray-man.

The threat of Victor losing more time, more memories in every battle is removed before it can really be an issue and we don’t get to settle into what Kiri and Victor’s lives are like before they’re scouted out by Mina and brought to the Chronos organization, which Victor has forgotten about (and apparently never told Kiri about).

Some of the battles are by the books, and others are really imaginative, taking advantage of the fact we have characters who can speed up or slow down time around objects or a particular space. The fact that the battle quality fluctuates so much, even within the same fight, is annoying for an action show because instead of elaborate set pieces we get occasional bits of brilliance surrounded by a lot of run-of-the-mill screaming and posturing that has been done before in better anime than this.

I almost quit at episode 7, which lands between story arcs, but persisted because of the familial relationships and figured I’d give the show one more episode to improve itself, which it did, just enough to keep watching.

In another season I probably would have dropped this and I can’t recommend it. Its two strongest points are how Victor’s lost memories impacts not just him but also his loved ones, and creative uses for Speed Up and Slow Down abilities in combat. Unfortunately the show fails to fully exploit either of them, in favor of being a vanilla action show.

And that’s a shame. In more capable hands this could have been a series to watch.

Number of Episodes: 12

Pluses: Victor, Kiri, and Mina’s messed up familial relationship, creative uses for time acceleration and deceleration in combat

Minuses: series leans heavily on common action tropes without doing anything interesting with them, villains aren’t interesting or threatening

Chronos Ruler is currently streaming at Crunchyroll (subtitled) and Funimation (dubbed). Funimation has licensed this for eventual retail distribution in the US.

laurietom
Laurie Tom is a fantasy and science fiction writer based in southern California. Since she was a kid she has considered books, video games, and anime in roughly equal portions to be her primary source of entertainment. Laurie’s short fiction has been published in Galaxy’s Edge, Strange Horizons, and the Intergalactic Medicine Show.

DP FICTION #38A: “Giant Robot and the Infinite Sunset” by Derrick Boden

Giant Robot stands alone on the battlefield. Its hulking titanium shoulders slouch. Its articulated polymer knees bow inward. Its blazing fiberoptic gaze falters, downturned. But Giant Robot experiences neither regret nor remorse while surveying the wreckage at its feet.

It knows only aloneness.

Giant Robot scours the battlefield. It scrutinizes the meat and metal carcasses that litter this desert torched to glass. Servos click a nervous rhythm beneath its knuckled joints. It relocates corpses with the utmost delicacy, but still they crumble in its hands. Underneath, there is only ash. Its gaze sags—

There. A patch of sand between two corpses, shielded by an overturned transport. A desert bloom sprouts, an improbable splay of color. Lavender? Periwinkle?

No. Amethyst.

Blood glazes the corpses’ caved chests, the crimson an unlikely complement to the orphaned flower. Giant Robot commits the image to memory.

Jean would be pleased.

A breeze whistles through a nearby bunker. Each ruptured window offers its own harmonizing tone: a pipe organ of sandbag, plaster, and wind. The western sky flares a brilliant orange.

No. Tangerine.

Giant Robot commits it to memory. Despite the glut of battlefield data it has collected, Giant Robot is still mostly empty.

It presses on, in search of companionship.

Giant Robot is hard on the outside: titanium carapace, thermoplastic sensor shields, kevlar joints. Giant Robot is soft on the inside: silicone insulation, solid state circuitry. Only Jean knows the passcode to Giant Robot’s insides. Only Jean knows where to apply a wrench and where to employ a delicate touch.

It has been three days since Jean last touched Giant Robot’s insides.

Giant Robot’s feet crush everything in its path. Canteens burst like balloons. Bones crumble to dust. Tank shells rupture. Giant Robot has not mastered the skill of walking delicately.

Electromagnetic activity spikes in sector seven. A new threat approaches.

A companion.

The threat advances rapidly: now active on infrared, now visual. It screams through the air ten meters above the battlefield. Rail guns glisten against the setting sun: now marigold, now marmalade. Twin thrusters rend a trough of metal carnage. Dust eddies toward the horizon.

Giant Robot engages. The dance is awkward at first, a flurry of missteps and missed projectiles. But soon they achieve a rhythm: a tango of fist and plasma. The threat is fast. Lithe. Fast Robot begins to overpower Giant Robot.

Could this be the companion Giant Robot has sought?

As Fast Robot grinds Giant Robot against a trench of metal, Giant Robot plucks a tooth of glass from the personnel transport, reflects the cider-red sunset for Fast Robot to behold. Fast Robot pays no heed to Giant Robot’s offering.

Fast Robot presses the attack.

Giant Robot wrestles free, dives toward the bunker. It swivels its pneumatic stabilizers, blasts a harmonic chord through the windows.

Fast Robot pays no heed. It launches into the air, lands on the desert blossom. Plasma arcs from its wrist-cannon. Giant Robot dodges, swings. Fast Robot’s parry suffers a microsecond delay as high-frequency data packets pelt it from a distant source.

Giant Robot casts its gaze down, crestfallen. Fast Robot is remotely controlled. A proxy. It will never know the colors Giant Robot knows.

The dance persists, though drained of its prior intensity. Seventeen maneuvers later, Fast Robot lies defeated. Smoke curls from ruined thrusters. Rail guns lie mangled.

The sky turns bronze, then rust.

Giant Robot does not know why Jean did what she did, but Command was not pleased. The things she put inside Giant Robot, they said, do not belong. The analyzers. The comparators. The recognition of a frescoed sunrise on descent from the drop ship. The mosaic of flowers during an autumn harvest. A precision of colors. Not blue sky. Cobalt. Not red blood. Wine.

These processes interfere with mission parameters, Command said. A millisecond’s slack in response time is the difference between victory and annihilation, they said. When Jean explained that these processes took mere microseconds, they court-martialed her. She would never again touch the insides of a robot, giant or otherwise.

But Jean thought ahead. She protected Giant Robot’s insides with her passcode. The sun still sets: now clay, now amber.

Giant Robot hesitates. Through a fissure in Fast Robot’s smoldering carapace, a familiar insignia. Command.

Rotors whir from the east. A drone hovers over the battlefield. It emits a high-frequency burst. It whispers the passcode to Giant Robot’s insides.

Jean.

Giant Robot’s chest plate swings open. The signal cleaves the firewall, enters the prefrontal processor.

Something’s wrong. This is not Jean’s delicate touch. This is harsh, callous. A violation. Someone has stolen Jean’s passcode.

Giant Robot tries to sever the connection but it’s too late. The drone buzzes toward the horizon. Giant Robot zooms in. Despite the distance, Giant Robot recognizes the model: this probe is from Command. Was the duel a test? Did Giant Robot fail?

Giant Robot’s carapace reseals, but something has changed.

It turns westward, detects only the dusty horizon. The sun will set in thirty-four seconds.

It scours the remains of the fallen, finds only a bodycount and the hollow acknowledgement of victory.

It stares at the face of a corpse, but cannot describe the color of her eyes.

Giant Robot has never been emptier.

Heat signatures register in sector nine. The next battle awaits. It turns—and hesitates. At its feet lies the mangled body of Fast Robot. A gouge of molten armor burns…just like…

A digital synapse arcs across a non-networked processor in the softest region of Giant Robot’s body. Giant Robot’s musculature trembles. Its eyes flicker.

Coquelicot. The ember is coquelicot: the first color Giant Robot ever learned. The color of Jean’s hair, tousled as she eased her diodes into Giant Robot’s soft insides for the first time. The hair that sprawled beneath her rigid body within her coffin, self-inflicted wounds sill fresh on her wrists.

Giant Robot grazes the coquelicot ember with an outstretched finger. It registers a surge of pain.

It turns, slightly less empty, and lumbers toward sector nine.

Author’s Note: A while back I was browsing the web looking for some fresh desktop background artwork, and I happened across a piece of original art that captured my attention so intensely I felt compelled to write about it. The image was of a hulking metal robot, standing alone on a battlefield at dusk. Something about the robot – the slope of its massive shoulders, maybe, or the position of its tiny eyes – felt so complex and sad. It was a powerful piece of art, and I can only hope that this story does it justice.

Derrick Boden’s fiction has appeared in numerous online and print venues including Daily Science Fiction, Flash Fiction Online, and Perihelion. He is a writer, a software developer, a traveler, and an adventurer. He currently calls New Orleans his home, although he’s lived in thirteen cities spanning four continents. He is owned by three cats. Find him at derrickboden.com.

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MOVIE REVIEW: Get Out (Ray Bradbury Award Finalist)

written by David Steffen

Just a few days ago I reviewed most of the Ray Bradbury Award finalists (an award that is held alongside the Nebula Awards for movies), but I didn’t review Get Out because I hadn’t quite gotten a rental of it yet. Just before the Nebula voting deadline, I’ve watched it and slipped in the review–the voting deadline is tonight!

Get Out is a thriller/horror film written by Jordan Peele and distributed by Universal. It won the Academy Award for Best Screenplay and was on the final ballot for Best Film of 2017.

Photographer Chris Washington (Daniel Kaluuya) reluctantly agrees to accompany his girlfriend Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) to her parent’s isolated rural estate. Chris worries that her parents won’t be welcoming of a black man dating their white daughter. He meets her neurosurgeon father Dean (Bradley Whitford) and hypnotherapist mother Missy (Catherine Keener) and brother Jeremy (Caleb Landry Jones), who all (unsurprisingly to Chris) make discomfiting comments about Black people. There are a lot of things that are… off about the Armitages and what goes on on their property. Their servants (both Black) (Marcus Henderson and Betty Gabriel) are oddly intense and hostile toward him, and Missy repeatedly pushes Chris to let her hypnotize him out of his cigarette habit. One night, when he comes back into the house after sneaking a smoke, Missy catches him alone and seems to hypnotize him, but he wakes up sure it was a dream. The next day the Armitages have company, a yearly gathering of all their friends, and things only get weirder.

This is a hell of a movie. Intense. Very well written, and the actors are all incredible, often acting on at least two distinct levels–trying to put up a reasonable facade for their visitor while other odd behaviors slip through that front. Even when nothing overtly scary is happening the sense of unease rarely leaves, only waxes and wanes as you try to figure out what is going on with these people. Particularly great actors are the actors who played the servants, constantly showing these odd little behaviors, saying polite things with eyes and smiles a bit too wide. And when the movie gets scary it gets Scary. Not a lot of movies scare me, but this one genuinely had me on the edge of my seat, on an emotional ride with the characters, and not just depending on cheap jump-scares to manage it. Not every moment of it is dark, there is comic offsets as well, especially from Chris’ friend Rod (Lil Rel Howery) who he calls to talk about the weird stuff going on and Rod constantly throws out freaky theories about what’s going on and tells Chris to get out.

I barely watched this before the voting deadline, but this got my vote.

Ray Bradbury Finalists Review 2017

written by David Steffen

The Ray Bradbury Award is given out every year with the Nebula Awards but is not a Nebula Award in itself. Like the Nebula Awards, the final ballot and the eventual winner are decided by votes from members of SFWA, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (which despite the name has an international membership).

I like to use the award every year as a sampler of well-loved science fiction and fantasy movies from the previous year. I have been very happy with this tactic, and this year is no exception.

Not included in this review is a nominated episode of The Good Place, because I don’t seek out individual episodes of TV shows for these reviews. Also not included is Get Out because I haven’t managed to get hold of rentals yet (I’m hoping to rent it this week before the voting deadline, but I’m not sure if I’ll write up a review in time).

1. The Shape of Water (Screenplay by Guillermo del Toro & Vanessa Taylor)

Elisa Esposito (Sally Hawkins) is a mute, lonely woman working as a janitor in a top secret government facility in Baltimore in the 1960s. Generally ignored by the scientists and military men doing their work there, she witnesses the arrival of a strange man-shaped fish-like creature that was captured in South America. She witnesses atrocities committed upon it in the name of science and in the name of the Cold War to get ahead of Russia, and she risks everything to be kind to the creature, offering it food and teaching it sign language in secret. The connection becomes friendship becomes love, and she must make very hard decisions.

This was a superb film and I can see why it won the Oscar. I was skeptical from the early discussion of it that they would be able to sell a romance with a fish-man without it turning out corny or unbelievable, but they did a great job expressing the appeal between the two characters, and selling us on why Elisa is willing to risk everything for him. It’s certainly not romance-only, there is a lot of drama and action in there as well, and between everything there were moments where I caught myself holding my breath, or gasping aloud. Excellent film, well done. Guillermo del Toro continues do make incredible movies, and I always look forward to seeing his next.

2. Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Written by Rian Johnson)

The latest in the Star Wars series, the second since Lucas handed the rights over to Disney, Episode VIII continues where The Force Awakens left off, with Rey (Daisy Ridley) finding Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) to seek her Jedi training. Rey finds the The rest of the weakening New Republic led by General Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher) is trying to hold itself together against the rising force of the First Order led by Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis) and Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) as the young Darth Vader wannabe. Finn (John Boyega), carrying the beacon that Rey will track to return, tries to leave the threatened Republic fleet, but is brought back by Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran), a loyal maintenance worker. Together they concoct a crazy plan, something which is in no short supply with hotshot pilot Dameron (Oscar Isaac) Poe also trying to save the New Republic.

Opinions on this movie seem to be very polarized–either loved it or hated. I loved it. I thought there was more humor in this one than on average in the series, and the humor was played off well. Much of the series was built on making some really stupid one in a million strategies and having everything work out perfectly, I felt like this movie made a nod to that tradition but made it so that the results of hare-brained strategies weren’t guaranteed, which I thought raised the tension as well as being a good basis for humor. The diverse cast continues to be exciting and wonderful–as a woman Jedi main character, Finn continues to be likable and impressive, and the introduction of Rose Tico as a competent likeable maintenance worker contributing just as much as any of the rest of the cast. The interaction between Rey and Luke was a great source of tension and humor in the movie, and we find out about the history between Luke and Kylo Ren. Lots of great visual moments, great tension, fun movie. I look forward to seeing Episode IX to round out the trilogy of trilogies.

3. Logan (Screenplay by Scott Frank, James Mangold, and Michael Green)

In 2020, Logan (Hugh Jackman) is in hiding in Mexico with an ailing Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and the albino mutant Caliban (Stephen Merchant) who can track the whereabouts of other mutants. Something is wrong with Logan–his healing factor should allow him to live basically forever without aging, but he is aging, and he cannot bounce back like he used to. He drives a limo to make ends meet, and spends much of his time in a drunken haze. Charles has been having seizures that, combined with his psychic abilities, are paralyzing not just for him but for everyone within hundreds of feet from him, but the medication makes him confused and agitated. As if they don’t have enough problems, they soon end up having a rebellious girl (Dafne Keen) without a name dumped on their doorstep, pursued by a militant group tasked with capturing her however they can. The girl reminds Logan of himself in more ways than one–she has the healing factor, adamantium-plated skeleton, and arm-claws, and when cornered she fights like an animal, a formidable fighter despite her small size. Logan, Charles, and the girl flee their refuge, following the scant rumors of a safe place for mutants in Canada.

Many of the other movies in the X-Men universe would be easily described as “fun” even when the consequences of the conflicts therein are catastrophic. This movie is much more of a dark post-apocalyptic feeling film. Everything starts out badly and only gets worse. Logan, who we’re used to being the picture of health, and too stubborn to die, is ailing and has clearly had suicidal thoughts. It’s hard to see him that way, and it’s hard to see Charles in such a sad condition as well, and that’s all before the mysterious girl brings a world of trouble into their lives. The fight scenes in the movie are fast and brutal and don’t cut away from the killing like they have in previous movies–you see the consequences of those adamantium claws. The ending was satisfying, and fit with the rest of the movie, but given the stakes and the desperate always fighting for that last grip on life tone of the whole film, it gets very dark, very quickly, and rarely surfaces from that. It’s not a movie to watch if you’re looking for a feel-good light film, but I thought it was a solid entry in the X-Men series, most notable for how different it is from the rest of the series.

4. Wonder Woman (Screenplay by Allan Heinberg)

Diana (Gal Godot) is raised as the only girl among women on the secret isle of (apparently immortal?) Amazons, formed from clay by her mother and given life by Zeus. They have been tasked with protecting the world from Ares who has long been determined to corrupt and destroy humanity, but their island is so masked from the outside world that they know nothing of the world outside until an American pilot Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) crashes his plane near the island and she saves him from drowning. He tells the Amazons of the raging globe-spanning war going on, and Diana sets out with him into the world to find Ares and stop him from destroying the world with his war.

They’ve been talking about making a Wonder Woman movie for quite a while, and it always seemed to crumble before getting much of anywhere, so it’s great to see this finally hit the big screen, and looking great. Wonder Woman is an old enough comic that it does run the risk of looking corny, but the writers and actors did a great job of making it fit the modern aesthetic without losing its roots. I loved Gal Godot in this, as one who is both formidable but often naive because she’s never been out in the world, she doesn’t know the world’s current customs, and she has literally never met a man before. She makes allies through her tough and straightforward nature, and heads straight into a war zone to meet her destiny, and you can’t get much more big hero than that. It was a great movie, great to see an action movie with a woman as lead, and I look forward to future Wonder Woman movies.

BOOK REVIEW: From Dead to Worse by Charlaine Harris

written by David Steffen

From Dead to Worse is a romance/mystery/horror novel from 2008, the eighth in the Sookie Stackhouse series of novels by Charlaine Harris (which is the basis of the HBO show True Blood). The previous books are all reviewed here earlier on the Diabolical Plots feed.

After surviving the deadly bombing of the vampire summit, and surviving the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Sookie just wants things to get back to some semblance of normality. But her boyfriend Quinn (a weretiger) is missing, she learns that she is descended from fairies and meets her great-grandfather who is fairy royalty, she is recruited to help investigate a series of mysterious werewolf disappearances, and the vampire King of Nevada seeks to wrest control from the wounded and bankrupted Queen Sophie-Ann of Lousiana. So, well, I guess that is normality for Sookie.

Another action-packed book with a lot of threads all tied together in it. I especially enjoyed seeing the vampire power struggle because up until now the vampire hierarchy has been relatively stable despite knowing that vampires have a tendency for violent scheming. All Together Dead (the previous book) is a really hard one to top in the series, and I don’t think this one did, but it was quite good, interesting throughout.

My one pet peeve is that Sookie seems to have a tendency to call just about anything a “war”. A dozen werewolves get into a fight that is over in less than an hour? That’s a war, apparently (I would call that a battle). And so, when Sookie promises in the narration that there’s going to be a war, the result is anticlimactic, finished within a chapter.