Just for fun: "DragonBlog" now in Virtuous Medlar Circle

"DragonBlog", a short story by Simon Petrie, is now published as a reprint in my Virtuous Medlar Circle.

"DragonBlog" first appeared (splayed on rolled dead trees) in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, issue 33, 2008.

This is just one of many tales in Simon Petrie's jolly big and intelligently funny first collection of short fiction,

Rare Unsigned Copy:
tales of Rocketry, Ineptitude, and Giant Mutant Vegetables

published so recently by Peggy Bright Books that the ink (or rare blood on the pages) still wafts its ineffable fragrance.

Buy your Rare Unsigned Copy here, from Infinitas Books.

Halleluyah Gillard, who didn't thank God

"So many of us worked so hard and dreamed of this for so long. Julia Gillard is our Prime Minister.

A woman. Like our mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunts, nieces and daughters who still can't help feeling they are not good enough simply by the evidence of the constant sea of suits. Everywhere. On the boards, on the altar, on the bench, on the airwaves, on the telly, on the newsstands and on the ballot."
- Catherine Deveny, Labor rebirth: It's a girl, ABC Drum

Laundry washpowder!
From Liz II down, the gov-gen, prime minister, our federal member of parliament, state premier, state member of parliament—even our local bank manager: they're all women. Even the boss of the big bank that owns our bank is yet another woman, in a suit. Besides, as Kristina Keneally, Sarah Palin, Carly Fiorina and some would say Margaret Thatcher prove, a vagina warming a seat of power is nothing to celebrate, in itself.

A real reason to party
Refreshingly, Gillard didn't mention God once in her first speech as head of the Labor Party, just minutes away before becoming PM. The hijacking of Australian democracy by the Christian right has seemed inexorable since March 1996 when John Howard became Prime Minister. The connection was strengthened by Kevin Rudd's Christian-targeted campaign and his policies in his term of office as PM. This meant that, far from reflecting the bulk of Australians' attitudes, the (now former) PM as well as the present Leader of the Opposition (Tony Abbott, right-wing Catholic, like NSW's Premier Kristina Keneally) have skewed many policies (and overturned legislation) to satisfy a vocal and well-connected minority—from euthanasia to censorship—against strong public opinion. Already, the right-wing Christian lobby is trying to make sure they continue to enjoy over-representation and legislation tailored for them.

Her lack of Christian conviction, however, will be a harder one to rationalise with the Christian lobby which has already urged her to confirm "the values in society that proved attractive to many Christians throughout Australia under Mr Rudd".

She doesn't have to be photographed coming out of church every Sunday to have decent values and she spoke on Thursday about the values which have driven her to this point.
– Gillard and Abbott: Now the flirting ends, TVNZ

Hopefully, government with Gillard at the helm will respect democratic values.

"... she took an affirmation yesterday, not an oath, which leads us to think that Gillard, highly unusually for an Australian PM, is no God-botherer."
- Sydney Morning Herald Diary, June 25, 2010

A recent related Medlar Comfits post:
Australia's funniest science prize: The Eureka Ethics Prize and the Vatican

Leeches suck you, but you can suck a lychee

12 July INTERRUPTION: If you love good fruit, please read my lastest post,
Foodies arise, for luscious fruits you've never eaten.
We need your help to get the word out before the world's greatest collection is bulldozed.

Now, back to leeches and lychees ~

Just don't call us leeches

Ah, spelling! Ach, pronunciation. What a shock, then for the people who have recently been mobbing (relatively speaking) my posting "A resilience of leeches, and lovely luscious fruit"—all because they searched "fruit leeches".

That posting is about leeches—of the yellow-racing-striped back and bloodsucking chompers, and about a fruit gorged on by insects and birds but not humans. This posting, therefore, is about the deliciously sweet, "jellylike" (in a squeaky way) fruit above, pronounced lee-chee, lye-chee, or li=tzhi.

It is a cruel irony that 'leeches' is a misspelling
Correct names for this fruit:
Litchi chinensis, syn. Nephelium litchi
Common names, all correct somewhere: lychee, litchi, litchee, laichi, lichu, lizhi, and chinese cherry.

Lychees are often confused with rambutans and longans. See the difference on Jim Darley's informative site and (though I like these fruits best straight and not as ingredients) see his mouthwatering recipes, from his book Know and Enjoy Tropical Fruit.

Lychees are a treat eaten out of hand, and unzipping them from their skins is part of the fun. A lychee is as messy in its way as a fresh oyster, being surrounded in its perfect container by a thin layer of juice. The naked flesh has a clean, musical bite and a rather complex sweetness that combines Macintosh apple, pineapple, banana and resin. The seed is so smooth and shiny that it's luxurious on the tongue and a pleasure to behold and hold.

Lychees take to canning well, keeping their firm personality and distinctive taste. They also make excellent dried fruits.

There are many lychee cultivars being sold now, as this is a most attractive evergreen tree and can be grown in a small pot.

Highly Recommended: Lychee, in an excerpt from Fruits of Warm Climates, by Julia F. Morton, on the Purdue University horticulture site

A bone to pick at Customs - Is that a novel in your pocket?

The first person who correctly identifies these porn seekers will win a free copy of Spotted Lily, my fly-blown Australian novel about wowsers, writers, art and censorship—so shocking that the anonymous Publishers Weekly reviewer fabricated a completely different ending in their tell-it-all review, and so Australian that this novel is published only overseas. If you bring it in from overseas, you might have to declare it under our sparkling new regulations, as 'legal porn'. LOLita!

Bugger the World Cup. Australia is really competitive when it comes to censorship. We are now competing with the Chinese, and winning.

Study in red, untouched of course

Hair today, gorm today

Style before substance is not something anyone could accuse this little beauty of.

Simple, classic, and unlike style, attractive

A teaser, from Style Zero

The ladies swooned, to be brought to life only with a clod of chicken scat up a nostril. Men secreted themselves, unbuttoned sleeves as fat and slashed and colourful as candied-fruit-stuffed pheasants, and blew their noses into the embroidered cloth. Each man was suddenly as ashamed to be seen in what he stood in, as Adam was in the garden that suddenly wasn't Paradise.

—from my upcoming story "How Galligaskins Sloughed the Scourge" in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #46.

The effects of star-power on a publication

Mike Allen, poet and editor/founder of Mythic Delirium has some pungent words (yes, they are not illuminating) about the power of a name.

The mermaid and the sardine: Points of view and time

La Sirena & La Sardina
Now, if only they told their stories in the first person —
though would either, neither or both say, "I flap my tail . . ." ?

Hi Anna,
I've been working on on a story that is set in .... when it was .....
I wanted to explore the impact of ....on ......
Anyway I've got a favor to ask . . .

Hi . . .
I'm pleased that you're writing yet another story, and would be happy to look it over for you on one condition (and this is a subject that I almost brought up with you before). Please don't write it in the first person present. This is the default stance of most modern amateur writers, and it is a pain in the bum, to be honest. It is a faddish stance brought on by, I think, the overabundance of writing groups and classes, and the self-centredness of our times. The tense being the present is the primary wearier.

A natural stance for a story is to relate it in the simple past. It gives a distance to the reader and the narrator that is necessary for perspective, I think, and also allows a certain flexing in the tense. One can bring it forward to the present if needs be, for a reason. Or one can even go deeper into the past.

And as for the first person, this also is wearying. Unless the character has some character to explore, the protagonist being in the first person can lead to a preponderance of "I", and engender an unintended lack of sympathy for this person in the reader's mind. If there is a reason for the story to be told in the first person, to for instance, highlight the difference between this character's perceptions and that of the reader in what this person says and how this person reacts, then by all means, this point of view can be very effective and can add greatly to the story. If, however, the writer defaults to the first person, there are too damned many stories that are in the first person as this default.

So, is the story told as "I . . ." and is it told in the present tense? If not, great. Send it to me whenever you like. If it is either of these, and especially both, I beg of you to challenge yourself. Rewrite it in the simple past with an omniscient point of view. And if you couldn't be bothered and disagree with me, then I'm not the right person to read it now. I am OD'd.

So???

Looking forward to hearing from you,
Anna

Hi Anna,
Thanks for your email . . . The story is present tense . . . I've never been made aware of the logic you outlined but it does make sense. I will print out your brief and keep it near me when I re-write. I will also try and keep an eye out for the things you mention when I'm reading . . .


POSTSCRIPT: One intense and brilliantly effective story told in the present tense is Spar by Kij Johnson, in Clarkesworld Magazine. The point of view, however, is omniscient—and nothing in the writing of this story was done by default.

I can't think of any stories that work that are told in the first person present, but I'm sure that they exist. So please tell.

Jayaprakash Sathyamurthy writes again

It can be a long time between drinks for those of us with a thirst for Jayaprakash Sathyamurthy's stories (I highly recommend Aranya's Last Voyage), so here's his latest: Empty Dreams

Quaff away
On the 1st of August, I look forward to featuring another new story by JS, in The Virtuous Medlar Circle.

Persephone Books' special

From Nicola and Clara at Persephone Books, a small press that I've raved about before, repeatedly. I just love their books (and their bookmarks); and PB is a joy to order from:

"You may not realise but a huge proportion of books are returned by bookshops and then pulped because the cost of having them sent back to the publisher and cleaned up is far greater than printing new copies.

We could not go along with this because it so environmentally unfriendly, and asked for a thousand unsold Classics to be returned to Lamb's Conduit Street. This cost £500! Which makes the point that it is almost as cheap simply to throw away and reprint.

Sadly, most of the Classics are very slightly damaged: they either have a small mark or the remains of a bookshop sticker.

Since we cannot sell these either to our mail order customers or in the shop we have decided to give them away. So -- if you order one grey book at the normal price we will send you a free Classic. PLEASE DO NOT PAY FOR IT. Simply pay for your grey book as normal and write in the Additional Information box - free Miss Pettigrew Classic please, or something similar. (Nb. overseas books will be sent surface mail. And the offer only applies to one book.)"

There's been a lot of silly talk about the threat to publishers from electronic books. The horror is far worse in the system of "turnover" as maintained in today's hypermarts of commodified paper with printed words. Computers order with the taste and discretion of—computers—and stock must be sold within X# days or pulped like a day-old male chick.

It's great to see that Persephone Books is so revolted by this waste that they have paid to save the books for readers with human discretion (even if the PB special caters to base instincts—I've never been able to stop at just one book).

Drop in to Persephone's candy shop Books