THE GENIUS WARS By Catherine Jinks. Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 2009

It began with Evil Genius, in which orphan Cadel Piggott was being raised to become a criminal matermind. As part of this, he was sent to the sinister Axis Institute in Sydney, where he studied such subjects as Fraud and Disguise and improved his already considerable skills in computer hacking. By the end of the second novel, Genius Squad, he had rebelled against all this and was trying to live a nornal life, though villain Prosper English, who had been responsible for his upbringing, had done everything he could to prevent this.

Genius Wars opens nine months later. Cadel, now fifteen, has settled down with police detective Saul Greeniaus and his wife Fiona, who are hoping to adopt him. Despite his youth, he has begun university and is in contact with some of his friends from the Axis Institute and the Genius Squad, who also want normal lives. Life is pretty good, and he has used his computer hacking skills to make life easier for his best friend, mathematical genius Sonja, who suffers from cerebral palsy. All he wants is to make it possible for her to get around easily in her wheelchair.

But old enemies haven’t forgotten him - and the very things he has done to help his friend may work against him..

This has been a fascinating series. The original premise sounded humorous - and there are certainly some over-the-top ideas, such as Cadel’s friend Gazo, a human stink-bomb who produces a smell that can literally knock people out when he is stressed. And what about brother-sister computer hackers Dorothy and Compton , mostly known as Dot and Com?

But this is not a comedy. Cadel is angry, frustrated and terrified that even knowing him may kill anyone he cares about. The series has, predictably, been compared to Harry Potter, as anything with a young hero is these days. If anything, it’s reminiscent of Artemis Fowl, if you can imagine that young Irish genius as an orphan, being manipulated by nasty guardians rather than supported and protected by his loyal bodyguard and loving family - or, for that matter, Mark Walden’s H.I.V.E. novels.

In any case, teens who liked either of those series should enjoy this one. I’d describe it as borderline SF. It never ceases to amaze me how many different genres this writer has clocked up over the years - SF, fantasy, ghost stories, historical fiction, suspense. She is the writer equivalent of the kind of actor who refuses to be typecast.

There’s no point in reading this book if you haven’t read the others, so if you haven’t, go and get them. You won’t be disappointed.

A Day At The Opera - AIDA without Elephants

I've used this opera in my fiction, in a short story called "Nefer", in which a cat mummy follows a kid home from the museum, then proceeds to wreck the arena production of Aida in which her ballet class is taking part. The story appeared in a short anthology for kids, one of the Spinouts series edited by Meredith Costain and Paul Collins.

Also, I am very familiar with the music, because in my early teens I bought a boxed set with Leontyne Price in the title role, and saw the very old film in which Sophia Loren was darkened and someone else sang for her.

Till today,though, I had never seen it on stage. The Australian Opera tended not to do it, presumably because of the expense of the sets and such.

In 2009, it's still expensive, with the large chorus and costumes, but the sets are no longer an issue. Most of it is projected on to backdrops, including strips of fabric posing as Egyptian columns. Very clever, and they can get on with the singing and dancing (the choreographer was the legendary Graeme Murphy). After this, they will have the costumes and the software to do the projection, so the main expense will be the performers. You don't need elephants, no matter what the old stories say!

Of course the story is silly - opera plots always are. Terry Pratchett certainly had fun sending them up in his novel Maskerade.

Aida loves Radames. Radames loves Aida. Princess Amneris also loves Radames. Aida is a captive Ethiopian princess (but keeping her ID secret, very sensibly). After Radames has gone to fight her homeland and she has sung about it a lot, he comes back and Princess Amneris says, "Nyah, nyah, I'm the Pharoah's daughter and I'm having him." But Aida's Dad is captured and manages to persuade her to winkle military secrets out from her boyfriend, who is then arrested and sentenced to death, despite Amneris's pleas for the idiot to defend himself. Fortunately for all the singing in the last scene, he is sentenced to live burial and he and Aida, who has returned to die with him, can do some final singing, while Amneris sings above them on a spectacular double stage.

In this production, they did have to sling a bridge across the stage to get in the double stage scene.

The fanfares in the Grand March were played by six trumpeters in Egyptian costume on the stage - were they regular members of the orchestra, I wonder, or hired for the occasion? Anyway, it looked good.

Amneris looked good, as did the High Priest Ramfis. Aida was, as the lady next to me described her, a "rather solid girl". I was immediately reminded of Rita Hunter, a fabulous singer of many years ago, whose personality was as huge as her body. She played Abigaille in Nabucco and Norma in the Bellini opera. But her voice made you forget her size. And this one had a fine voice too. (Radames was also rather solidly built.)

Only trouble was, Aida didn't look remotely Ethiopian, apart from a wig. I mean, I know what Ethiopians generally look like. We have several kids from that country at my school. They're generally not as dark as the Sudanese kids, but still, they're - well, dark. Was it the recent issue over white people here going blackface on a TV skit, offending a visiting American? I think the singer was American. Had they decided to be "unconventional"? Did it not go well with the sets?

Hard to tell, but it made her less convincing to me.

And now, having seen the opera on stage, I don't feel the need to see it again. I'm just as happy to listen to a good recording. I have lost my enjoyment of both Il Trovatore (another silly storyline) and Madama Butterfly (not so silly, but they've done it too many times) because Melbourne tends to get all the repeats, while Sydney gets the new productions. I don't want to lose my taste for this one.

Final opera for the year is Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte, which should be good fun. Stand by.

Seeing Things Differently.SLAV Conference November 13 2009

I have just been to this year's end-of-year library conference. I usually hold out for this one, because, unlike the earlier ones, it's book-related. Writers and artists speak about their work and some of the talks are directly related to libraries. It's not that I have anything against conferences that give you ideas for running the library. It's just that I have found most of them are aimed at the kind of school where they have more than one part-time teacher-librarian and part-time support staff and that have budgets I can only dream about. The last straw was when I attended a SLAV conference at which one of the guest speakers, who came from a Grammar School, stood on the podium and told us smugly about all the fabulous things they were doing at her school ... with dozens of staff and budgets in the 100,000-or-more range. And then expected us all to applaud her for doing writers and publishers out of their hard-earned money by scanning their work on to a school web site. As if the rich kids at her school couldn't afford about $12.95 for a copy, or the library couldn't buy some class sets of them! It was illegal, of course, but what point in getting up and accusing? I just stopped going to "those" conferences. That was years ago.

So I was looking forward to this one, which was held at the National Gallery of Victoria on St Kilda Rd.

Well, there were some very good presentations. I took notes on the use of Web 2 in libraries and on graphic novels in the curriculum. I did wonder if having to study them wouldn't spoil them for the kids, but I'm prepared to try it out. "Visual literacies" was the theme of this conference, which was natural for a conference held at the gallery. And the keynote address by Dr Mark Norman, marine biologist and children's non-fiction writer, was worth the price of the conference by itself. He was delightful. I could hardly wait to get down to the book stall to pick up some of his books which I knew would thoroughly engage our reluctant readers. He began by showing a picture of a vampire and a real-life fish with fangs and showed us, in the course of the talk, how truth really is more bizarre than fiction and that there are so many wonderful things in real life that you couldn't invent.I was sitting next to Sue Ann Barber, programmer for Aussiecon 4, and suggested she see if we could get him for the con's science stream. I am certainly going to get hold of some of his books for myself, before my new budget next year, to use in my own research.

The only trouble was: there was no book stall. No publishers showing off their stuff. No useful stuff for schools. No graphic novels of the kind that speakers were urging us to buy for our libraries. A library conference with no books, except those on the screen? It reminded me of the time, years ago, when a friend and I took her son to the Book Week Fair at the Arts Centre and the poor boy stopped and asked, "Where are the books?" The only books at that event were on the YABBA stall, on display, not for sale.

Now, I know I can't get at my budget for next year as yet, because the books are closed and there has been a death among the admin staff and no time to replace her, not to mention a business manager on leave. But I have never seen a book stall not swarming with customers, even in November. What happened? Did the gallery object, perhaps, because they have their own bookshop? But that wasn't connected with the sort of stuff normally sold. Did the booksellers simply not bother this time? I'm sure I will find out eventually, but right now I am puzzled and disappointed.

No writers as speakers, either, except for the delightful Dr Norman. I really look forward to this conference because of something that wasn't there this time. While I found the talk on Asian art enjoyable and the talk by a painting conservator fascinating, including his description of the research he had to do to get it right, they just weren't what I attended the conference for.

I assume they had to use the gallery's caterers too. There was no afternoon tea, as in the past, so we had both sessions before lunch,when we went to the Great Hall - a lovely place for lunch. And if you like dead animal on your plate, I'm sure the egg and bacon and chicken sandwiches and party pies and sausage rolls were fine. For those of us who prefer not to eat meat, there were only roast vegetable sandwiches, and while I am in a minority in this, I believe vegies belong on the side of the plate, not in bread. I ate them because there was nothing else except fruit on sticks, which I also ate. I was hungry when I left, though, and dinner with my family wasn't till 7.30 p.m. And no coffee urns when we arrived. When coffee was available at morning tea, you had to wait for a staff member to pour it for you.

Still, there was Dr Norman and there were some really useful suggestions about the use of Web 2 and graphic novels in the library and classroom (we are already buying lots of graphic novels, especially manga, though not teaching them).

I can only hope that next year, though, the event is held elsewhere and is more like what I look forward to.

HEART’S BLOOD By Juliet Marillier. Sydney: Pan Macmillan, 2009.

Young scribe Caitrin, fleeing an unwanted marriage with a violent cousin, finds herself on Whistling Tor, whose chieftain, Anluan, needs a scribe to do a summer’s work, translating Latin documents. Anluan’s family has been cursed for a century, since an ancestor conjured up a ghostly horde from the Otherworld and then couldn’t either control them or send them back. Anluan can handle them as long as he stays on the Tor, but if he leaves, the spirits could go on the rampage. They want to go back too, and something- or someone - is driving them insane, unable to control themselves. There may be a counter-spell in the Latin documents that will help. Everyone is relying on Caitrin to find it.

Despite the curse and the fact that Anluan can’t be the chieftain his people need, Caitrin finds friends on the Tor, some of them supernatural, and also finds love.

This Gothic-style romance has moved the story of “Beauty and the Beast” to mediaeval Connacht, a part of Ireland facing imminent invasion by Normans from England. Anluan is not a fairytale Beast, but crippled by a childhood illness. The “heart’s blood” of the title is a plant used to make very expensive ink, but also has a much more important use, as Caitrin finds.

It’s an interesting setting for the story, and it works. Western Australian-based novelist Juliet Marillier’s other Celtic fantasies are set in Ireland and she knows her period well. She reminds her readers that Irish law was fairer to women than the laws in other places at the time. Women had positions of responsibility and they had more property and inheritance rights.

The story is very readable; it was my first time reading one of this writer’s books and it won’t be my last. It is, admittedly, something of a Mary Sue. But I have been known to enjoy Mary Sue when well-written and at least this one is lacking long-lost princes, quests, elves and high priestesses. The only evil sorcerer is the hero’s ancestor, who was unpleasant and stupid, but hardly Sauron. And I must admit that "Beauty and the Beast" is a fairytale I like, and the author has done a good job of putting it into an historical context.

If you haven’t read Juliet Marillier’s other books, this one might be a good place to start, as it is a stand-alone and not part of a trilogy. If you have read her other novels, you probably won’t need me to convince you!

AND ANOTHER THING … Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. Part Six of Three. By Eoin Colfer. Camberwell, Penguin, 2009.

I first discovered The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy when I was studying librarianship, many years ago. We used to throw quotes at each other over coffee, between classes. “Forty-two!” we would cry. “The answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything!” We needed the humour; librarianship was a heavy, exhausting course which gave us very little time to ourselves.

At home, my brother was taping the radio series. We listened to it and developed a passion for that. The story was over-the-top hilarious. It became a TV series and a movie and recordings.

I loved the first two books. The third was not quite as good, though it was still very funny - and since then, I have listened to Douglas Adams reading the talking book and decided I liked it better than the first time around. The fourth book came along and it was not as good as the third. It still had some fun, but it was almost serious. In it, Arthur Dent got a girlfriend, Fenchurch, but she suddenly disappeared from his side and never returned. The fifth book, Mostly Harmless, was such a disappointment to me that I gave away my copy and never read it again. My re-reading rarely goes beyond the second book and never past the fourth

I mention all this so it will be understood that I am a major fan of this universe, but I acknowledge that even Douglas Adams, who created it, had lost the plot, so to speak, by the end. So when I heard that Eoin Colfer, author of the wonderful Artemis Fowl novels, had been commissioned to write a sixth book in the series, I was in two minds about it. If Douglas Adams couldn’t keep it up, how could anyone else, even Eoin Colfer? But the author’s widow had approved him and of course, I was curious to see how he would get Arthur, Ford and Trillian out of the impossible situation in which they had been left at the end of Mostly Harmless.

This book has been written to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of Hitcher’s. It starts with a summary of the story so far, written in an Adams-esque style. It may have been to refresh the reader’s memory, and in any case, Douglas Adams did it himself. It may have been for any potential new readers, but my advice to these readers is not to read it till they have read the original. There’s no point. And Another Thing... was clearly written for people familiar with the universe.

I must admit, Mr Colfer does a good job of getting Ford, Arthur, Trillian and their daughter, Random Dent, out of the fix they were in at the end of Mostly Harmless. I couldn’t imagine how it could be done, but he did it.

He makes a fairly good fist of Adams’s style, except for an irritating tendency to stop for asides. Douglas Adams did it, but nowhere near as often.

The story brings back a lot of characters from the third book, Life The Universe And Everything, including Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged. He was the green-skinned immortal who was trying to liven up his eternal existence by insulting everyone in the universe in alphabetical order. Now, he has returned and he wants to get rid of the immortality; we learn that his insults are aimed at getting someone to kill him.

The original character was there as a single joke. He was funny. Now he has become, of all things, a romantic interest for Trillian. He isn’t funny any more.

Zaphod Beeblebrox is back too, with one head; the other one has replaced Eddie as the ship’s computer on the Heart of Gold. He has a quest of his own: helping Wowbagger get killed. This involves searching for the Norse god Thor, original owner of Wowbagger’s ship.

Also in the novel are the Vogons, who are still trying to wipe out the last humans to tie up loose ends - not only Arthur and Trillian, but a colony of middle-class Earthlings who have bought the Magrathean-built planet Nano. The Vogon captain, Prostetnic Jeltz, who destroyed Earth in the first novel, is back, with a son who may not agree with him.

The story bounces around from one storyline to another, but all the ends are tied, although the very end suggests there may be more to come.

I got the occasional chuckle out of this book, but no more. It starts well enough, but just isn’t funny. A friend of mine suggested that Tom Holt might have been a better choice, but personally, I don’t think anyone could handle it.

Eoin Colfer is a brave man to have had a go at something like this, which has a passionate fandom. I commend him for it. I don’t believe anyone could have done it, but he has done as well as anyone could and at least he seems to be a fan.

If you are completist, buy it by all means - hey, if you’re reading the book at all, you almost certainly are a completist. At least this story extracts our heroes from an impossible situation!

WHO WASHES THE DISHES IN RIVENDELL? THOSE ARISTOCRATIC ELVES

This was written for a fanzine, some time ago. I can't recall which one, alas! But I think it's worth a re-visit.


I have recently read a glut of fantasy novels and have been re-reading the original classic Lord of the Rings in preparation for the films and it has occurred to me that no one in any of them ever seems to explain how all those elves can be aristocrats. Tolkien, I’m afraid, much as I love him, is the worst offender. All his elves are rulers; we’re never told who they rule.

At a literature conference I attended recently, Tamora Pierce, a great Tolkien fan, remarked - not without affection - that no one ever seems to go to the bathroom in Tolkien, but it’s worse than that. We know Bilbo Baggins can cook, from The Hobbit, which may be why he is so welcome in Rivendell, because no one else appears to do any menial work, yet they seem to have no trouble whipping up a feast. The Elves who meet Frodo and Sam early on their quest apologize for their plain fare, but of course, it tastes superb - bread, fruit, wine - as you would expect of Elvish cuisine.

Everyone in Rivendell is a warrior or a musician or a scholar. No one is ever seen growing food or preparing it, let alone cleaning up after the party. There are elven smiths, true, but they are all too occupied creating magical rings or repairing swords for long-lost kings to be bothered doing horse-shoes or nails or anything so plebeian. I keep picturing some pointy-eared elven smith wiping his sweaty forehead as he says apologetically, “Sorry, sir, we’re a-makin’ of a mass order of armour for Ragnarok next week, no time to look after your ‘oss’s cast shoe. You tried the hobbit smith down the road?”

We know that Galadriel and her maidens in Lothlorien weave fabulous cloth for magical cloaks, but this, like making magic rings, is an acceptable aristocratic occupation. Somebody makes the lembas (journey bread), I suppose, but we’re not told who - or where the ingredients come from. Come to think of it, who looks after the sheep whose wool is used in elven cloaks or grows the cotton or flax?

They do make rope in Lothlorien; when Sam is leaving, he's told that actually, they would have shown him how if they had known he was into rope-making. But it's magical rope, of course!

Possibly they trade with the communities of Men or hobbits, but this wouldn’t be a very practical way to survive in out-of-the-way Rivendell or Lothlorien - what if you were cut off from your suppliers by war or the Dark Lord or something?

In folklore, we are told that the Fair Folk live on illusion. Their palaces only seem to be beautiful, their clothes grand. In fact, they live in holes, their clothes are rags and their food, if you’re silly enough to eat it and be stuck in Faerie, is tasteless. Not only that, but their gold turns into dead leaves overnight. My theory is that the reason for this is because they’re all aristocrats and find it beneath their dignity to cook, clean or make and repair clothes.

To be fair, we do see some plebeian Elves in The Hobbit - but this is in Mirkwood, whose Elves are not of the High variety and never went to the West back in the earlier ages.

Perhaps Rivendell and Lothlorien are Elvish artist colonies? ;-)


If anyone knows of a serious fantasy novel that presents elves, Faerie, whatever, who actually work for a living - or go to the bathroom - I’d be interested to hear of it.

Jacinta washes dishes for the tsunami victims

It's nearly 4.00 p.m. on a Friday afternoon. I am the last person left in the library. The last three weeks have been exhausting if satisfying. I meant to be out of here by 3.30.

Jacinta didn't care for the other Girlfriend book, but is now reading my book, Crime Time: Australians behaving badly, which has short chapters and is easy for a reluctant reader to get through in bites.

This afternoon, she and some other girls were washing dishes that had been donated for the Samoa appeal. Some were so filthy that they simply couldn't bring themselves to send them out, even though the recipients will wash them anyway. It is disrespectful.

They continued to pack boxes. We can't get anywhere near enough boxes for all the donations flowing in!

The girls who had made cakes and sweets finished selling them to staff and students and raised $82.30 in all.

Three students went to the local charity shops today and picked up what must have been $2000 worth of second-hand - but clean - toys for about $160. They had raised the money and were entitled to have a say in how it was spent. The token male student made sure there were toys for boys.

These will go to the children who have lost homes and perhaps parents through the tsunami.

Two of my students designed a card to go with each box. They asked me for suggestions about what they should write, but I advised them to write what was in their hearts - and they did. One of them, James, had shown a gift for design, so I asked him to do it, while Adrian had been on the shopping trip for the toys - which range from small plastic dolls of both genders to huge fluffy toys. We scored a Pooh Bear, giant animals, and someone seems to have donated a purple elephant!

We hope that next week we can get one or both of our large newspapers to come and grab the photo opportunity, as long as they don't dismiss it as an education story.

And yet, the kids have learned a lot - some have discovered talents they never knew they had. They have shown entrepreneurial skills which will stand them in good stead later.

This is all I can say about it for now. Stand by for some book reviews - I have the new Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy title, the new Juliet Marrillier book and the latest Scott Westerfeld YA title.

Forgive the diversion!

Writing, small press and technology

I seem to have gotten into such a nice discussion with Adelaide about technology, I thought it might be better to do a post than continue with the comments chatter.

Recently, I did a panel on small press at the Continuum 5 SF convention. On my way to the panel, I found a lot of tables in the dealers' room, all selling small press science fiction books. That, of course, included my own, the Andromeda table.

Small press has been around for a very long time,as I remember from my early days in SF fandom. In Australia we had several, over the years - Norstrilia, Aphelion, Corey and Collins to name just a few off the top of my head. And those are just the ones that did books.

They worked hard and got their stuff printed and they published writers and artists who went on to become famous. Sean Tan, who did art for Aurealis when he was very young, has become an award-winner with many books under his belt.

But since computers became available to everyone who wanted them and then the Internet arrived, it has become a lot easier to publish. There's do-it-yourself desktop publishing that lets you do something that looks good without worrying about hiring someone to do the layout, and publishing on-line and artists can submit their work overseas if they want, by email; we commission plenty of overseas artists to do work for Andromeda Spaceways, both covers and internals, and we don't have to wait days and days for it to arrive and worry about whether it might have been damaged on the way. I remember the wonderful Marilyn Pride telling me once that she couldn't send her work overseas because publishers had tight deadlines. Well, Andromeda is done entirely on-line, until the printer gets the hard-copy to us. We meet on-line, slush on-line, edit and receive the finished product on-line; I've never even met most of the Andromeda co-op members.

Technologically, it is a wonderful time for small press to flourish. And technology means I no longer have to re-type entire manuscripts. Mind you, I do copy and paste into a new file when I am going to edit, so any future university academic who wants to do a PhD on the works of Sue Bursztynski - if any - will have no problem accessing my original MSS.

My last few books have been done almost entirely on computer, the editing done by email. I do like to meet editors, but there are some I have never met at all. My second editor, Sarah Brenan, was just a voice on the phone to me till after I had handed in the full manuscript of Potions To Pulsars: Women Doing Science, although I must admit it was a little before the time of email for me; we exchanged letters.

Research has become easier for me since the Internet. I do still use plenty of books, but because I am a librarian I can understand the difference between a good site and one that isn't likely to be of use, and it's amazing what you can find on the web. My book Rolling Right Along, a history of the wheel, included a chapter on the Ferris wheel, with a description of what the builder's wife was wearing at the launch. "Are you sure?" asked my editor. I was fairly sure, because my Internet research had unearthed a newspaper article written at the time by someone who was there. The World Wide Web is, for me, a massive library on the other side of the screen, just waiting for good researchers to use it properly.

For my book Crime Time: Australians behaving badly, I did research in books, web sites and newspapers. Many of those newspapers were on-line archives. Only a few years ago, I would have had to go to the State Library and spend the evening hunting through microfilm - and I would have had to know exactly what I was looking for and when it happened before starting. Now I just need some keywords - well, duh - librarian! Pity the newspapers are planning to start charging to view their sites.

Now I'm off to do something a bit less technological - I am spending the rest of the day researching guitars for a possible book on musical instruments, and reading photocopies and printouts somewhere quiet with coffee...

Jacinta and the Tsunami

Jacinta came back from holidays with the book read and enjoyed. I have made arrangements with her literacy teacher to see if she can tempt her with another humorous Girlfriend book. (See my earlier post, "Jacinta and the Girlfriend Fiction boook"). Stand by for further information.

Meanwhile, a disaster happened in a number of countries in the last few weeks. If you have been reading the papers you will know. In Samoa, it was a tsunami. Because we have some Samoan students at the school, Amanda and I decided to pool our Year 8 homeroom students and get them collecting, fundraising and packing to send supplies to Samoa, with the help of the local primary school, whose Principal has contacts.

They have gone to it with a huge good will, and while all my students have made me proud the last two weeks, Jacinta has blossomed! This has become important to her and she has been rushing around with other students, packing and organizing. Because it meant so much to her, her sister Jamaine, who was in my class last year, had a word with their mother, who works for St Vincent De Paul, and they have sent a truckload of goods.

Jacinta is not only reading more, she's done some things to make her mother proud - and her homeroom teacher - me!

What if Conan Moved In Next Door?

Originally published in Janine Stinson's fanzine Peregrine Nations. PN is now on-line among other on-line zines and very good it is too, though it closed down some time ago. I am a fan of Robert E. Howard and in recent years I have discovered Kull as well, in the beautifully-illustrated omnibus editions. The Kull adventures are generally more light-hearted than the Conan ones and because Kull isn't travelling around as Conan does, there can be a number of regular characters.

But I wrote the article below in a fit of whimsy. It should be read in that spirit.


First, I’d like to make one thing quite clear: as a female fan of Robert E. Howard’s work, I have no desire to be crushed, panting, to Conan’s mailed breast, and never did have. If I was going to go out with a heroic fantasy hero, I’d rather have Tolkien’s hero Faramir, thanks. He’s a guy who’d not only be able to protect you from the baddies, but would remember your birthday and take you to some nice Minas Tirith restaurant for a birthday dinner, where you’d discuss art and music. If Conan remembered your birthday, he’d probably bring you a treasure from some ancient cursed tomb and you’d spend most of dinner watching in terror as he battled a slimy monster from before the dawn of time, come to take back its possession.

No - Conan wouldn’t be my idea of a boyfriend.


But he would make a very good next-door neighbour. He might not mow your lawn, and probably he’d have noisy feasts every other night, but he would make you feel utterly safe. Any stalker or burglar to invade your property would find himself hanging in midair, staring into a blazing pair of blue eyes under a long black mane, probably the last sight he ever saw. Any ex-boyfriend who tried to keep up a relationship you no longer wanted would be shaken thoroughly to make him understand that no means no and that a man of honour should understand this - then would be kicked down the street like a football. He would also knock on your door when you came home late from work to make sure everything was okay, or even come and pick you up from the station.

Conan appreciates an attractive woman, as we know from most of his adventures, and is only too happy to accept an offer from a charming lady - or a buxom wench - but never, ever forces himself on one. (You can’t really count the Frost Giant’s daughter - she’s just a challenge like any other, and Conan never turns down a challenge). It’s a part of his barbarian honour. In story after story, his behaviour is contrasted with that of arrogant, depraved noblemen of decadent civilizations. (I’m getting these visions of Conan showing his contempt for chardonnay-sipping yuppie males... Probably not a good idea to invite him to your dinner-party, though the backyard barbecue should be safe.)

I always liked it that the love of Conan’s life was Belit, a pirate queen. He had no problem with strong women, just with the ones who were trying to sacrifice him to some ancient demon, but the same applied to male priests who were doing the same. So he should have no problem with a strong professional woman living next door, as long as she showed him courtesy.

Well, Conan isn’t my next-door neighbour, alas, though the gentleman who lives in the next flat is nice enough. I can only find him between the covers of a book - in my case, one of the old Lancer editions which I first picked up on a remainders table, many years ago. I remember the wonderful Frank Frazetta covers, with Conan battling some monster or other, and the sheer joy of losing myself in his adventures. He may not be sitting with me in my study when I write, but I would probably never have had a go at heroic fantasy if not for those tales, or have joined the Society for Creative Anachronism, where I learned, at least, what you can’t do with a sword (it would have been much more fun to learn from Conan. I think he’d laugh at the idea, but help you out if you really wanted to learn).

The only thing is, if Conan moved in next door, he wouldn’t stay long. He would become restless for the next horizon - and probably run out of money and need another job. I think I’d miss him, too. Then again, he would probably leave you a souvenir ... such as a treasure from some ancient cursed tomb from before the dawn of time...

END

Welcome Merrilee Faber - and - er, the other one

Welcome to my blog, Merrilee. I see you are also a writer, and an artist (I'm not!) and seem to be writing a novel. And you enjoy spec fic, among other things which is great. I did enjoy your post about the iPaq, whatever that is. I grew up in the generation when computers were the size of rooms and we were all very impressed with Isaac Amaterstein, who had a tape recorder, which he kindly brought over to let us record our radio show for school. Even video was a long way in the future!

Which basically means that I have revelled in every new bit of technology that has made it easier for me to write and research and listen to music. So I know where you're coming from.

I see I also have a new follower who is signed in as a number of upper keyboard thingies and while I assume he/she has a blog, I can't find it, only the others
(s)he follows. I hope I will get to know who you are, person without a profile!

Superman The TV Series

This was originally published in one of the last issues of Centero, Nikki's White's wonderful media-based letterzine. It went for over 100 issues and I had something in nearly every one of them. I honed my reviewing skills in it, and sometimes I just wrote letters or raved about old favourite films or TV shows with which I had become reacquainted through video or - later - DVD. I love the way DVD has brought them back, and all the extras on the better ones.

Superman the TV series was a childhood favourite - and now I'm reading and loving Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier And Klay, about a couple of Jewish boys in the 1930s, creating a superhero comic, a bit like the ones who created Superman. When I was a child, I was not allowed to read comics at home, so I went to visit my friend Denise, who lived in her parents' boarding house. We exchanged soft drink bottles left by the boarders for deposit money with which we bought more drinks, ice cream and Superman comic books, which we read as we feasted. It's a fond memory for me.

So here's a re-run of my comments on the DVD version of the George Reeves Superman series. Enjoy!
* * *

I have been re-viewing old favourites over the last couple of months.

I bought the first season of the George Reeves Adventures of Superman and binged on it. Strange to watch it all again, after Christopher Reeve’s films and Lois and Clark, Smallville and this latest movie.

The scenery wobbles and the effects are primitive, but each episode is like a mini-movie. You’re surprised when it’s over in twenty-five minutes. The SF is minimised. There is, of course, the opening episode which brings the baby to Earth (and by the way, the Kents are not called Jonathan and Martha, as we’re used to). There’s also the one with the robot and the one where the scientist has created a mind-controlling machine. Mostly, though, it’s Superman versus crooks. Even the Jimmy Olsen episode, The Haunted Lighthouse, hasn’t any actual ghosts in it, and the voice crying for help is a parrot. I’m pretty sure there was kryptonite eventually, but not in this season.

I always did wonder what happened to Clark’s suit while he was in his Superman costume - he always seems to be able to change back to Clark Kent no matter where he is - and where his Superman costume was stashed meanwhile. This series made it even more interesting. It’s implied that he’s wearing the Superman costume under his regular clothes (hopefully there’s a fly in those shorts), because in one episode he has to go for a staff medical and leaves it in the wardrobe, where a crook finds it and steals it. This means he can’t tell anyone what has been stolen from his cupboard! That’s the one where he has to leave the crooks on a mountain top till he can decide what to do with them, because they know his secret identity - fortunately, they get killed while trying to climb down. Not his fault - he did tell them to stay there and seek shelter in a nearby hut.

Which brings us to the next point - anyone who finds out his identity is doomed. They always, always end up dead by the end of the episode. The show is specifically set in 1951, when it was made, so the crooks still seem to be gangsters and their molls, wearing 1940s clothes.

George Reeves’s Clark Kent is not Christopher Reeve’s bumbling ,”Aw, gee, Lois...” character. He’s the one who solves mysteries - Superman just mops up and comes on the scene when speed or strength is needed. Lois competes with him for the best stories. Like Dean Cain’s later Clark, he can stand up to her. He doesn’t even pretend to be a bumbler, and has a regular arrangement with the police, who seem to respect him.

First season Lois is Phyllis Coates. This Lois Lane is a tough chick, not scared of anything. She’ll go anywhere for a good story, but has never heard of the word “teamwork” and as a result tends to rush off when the villains send a note, without letting anyone know where she’s going. The villains are usually very, very sorry they have tangled with her, but she still needs to be rescued by Superman. In one episode, the villain has been sticking a drug into coffee that turns you into an obedient zombie. Lois is suspicious of the coffee, saying she’ll pour it, then lets herself be distracted and still drinks the coffee!

Jimmy Olsen is played by Jack Larsen, who is perfect for the role. He is a wonderful comic relief, who can make his eyes bulge when he’s having a “Jimmy” moment.

John Hamilton is Perry White and also perfect for the role. This Perry is a long way from the Elvis-loving Perry White of Lois and Clark. He’s the “Don’t call me chief!” and “Great Caesar’s ghost!”, cigar-chomping editor of “a great metropolitan newspaper”. Interestingly enough, he never seems to tell the reporters to stop investigating crime and get on with meeting the deadline.

There are two extra features and commentary on four episodes. One of the extras is a delightful little featurette about the making of the series, and fascinating it is, too. Among those interviewed is Jack Larsen, who is a LOT older than when he was playing Jimmy, but whose voice is still recognisable. The other extra, “Pony Express Days” remind you that George Reeves had a life before Superman. In it, he plays a young - very young - Buffalo Bill Cody. If you’ve ever seen Gone With The Wind, of course, you might remember him as one of the Tarleton twins.

A classic series and well worth a re-viewing.

Two more SF links

I figured, since I mentioned Specusphere and Of Science And Swords bookshop, I should add links to make them easier to check out. If you're either living in, or visiting, Melbourne, Of Science And Swords is in the Strand Arcade in Lonsdale Street. It's small and friendly and the proprietors know their SF and know your name once you've been there a couple of times. Since we lost both Space Age and the SF bookshop run in the same spot by Justin Ackroyd, it's nice to still have a fannish shop in the CBD. Justin is still dealing in books and turns up to conventions, but it's just not the same. The shop's web site has an attached blog with chatter about the new books. Well worth checking out.

Welcome Satima!

Welcome to my blog, Satima Flavell! I see Satima has joined my small list of "followers" and I have done the same for her. Satima has been involved in Australian SF for some time and has written dance stuff for the newspapers as well. She has recently joined our list of Andromeda slushers and reviews for Specusphere, the SF review site. Go take a look at Specusphere for a whole lot of SF stuff, and a review of my crime book by "Hypatia", another reviewer - and have a peek at Satima's blog as well. It's a good one. See the side of this web page for a link.

A Whale of a Tale

Last night when I got home, I found something new in my letterbox. It was a parcel I had been expecting but it was wonderful to open up and take the book out, as well as the handmade ceramic whale tail pendant. Edwina Harvey's novel The Whale's Tale has been coming for a long time. Looking at the book, I remembered when the cover artist, young Eleanor Clarke, was born. She is the daughter of my friend Susan Batho, whom I have known for years, and has grown up into a beautiful, talented young woman who can produce amazing art. As well as the gorgeous cover painting of a whale diving into the ocean, she designed the delightful logo for the new publishing imprint, Peggy Bright Books, a clothes peg clasping a star.

I remembered when Edwina started writing for children and young adults. She had been a penpal, back in the days before email, and never realised that her whimsical over-the-top style was just right for kids. Then she started entering the Mary Grant Bruce Award for Children's Literature and got a Highly Commended, twice.

The second time it was for the original short story on which this novel is based, "Restitution." I was the judge that year. I read the stories "blind", but the style was unmistakable. When Adrian Penniston-Bird, the head of the Victorian Fellowship of Australian Writers, told me the story was by "Edwina -" I was able to finish it. "Edwina Harvey, right?"

Well, it deserved the prize. I actually gave the short list to children to read, and they decided on the order.

Then Edwina turned it into a novel. It was the novel of her heart and she was determined to see it in print. I read the original MS and had some suggestions to make about it, but on a flip-through, I think the problems have been fixed. I'll do a proper review a bit later, with the cover image. At the time, I also handed the MS to a young reader, Samantha Wilson, who loved it.

It's a joyous piece of writing. I think I will love it too.

Welcome Ruzkin!

I have added a link to the new web site of Ruzkin, writer extraordinaire and enthusiastic counter gent at Of Science And Swords Bookshop. Ruzkin, aka Chris, is a writer of speculative fiction who would like to be published in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine and hopefully will be at some stage. We read our slush blind, so I have no way of knowing if I have rejected any of his work or not.

Go take a look at Ruzkin's blog. It's worth the time.

Nobel Prizes and other blogs

Checking out a comment on a January Magazine review I did, I found another free blog site and visited it out of curiosity. One of the "blogs" linked to the main page was a CNN report that "three Americans" had won the Nobel prize for Medicine. There was no option to comment on that site, so I am mentioning it here. Sorry, CNN, but Elizabeth Blackburn, one of the winners, is not American, she's Australian. She lives and works in the US, but isn't American.

She is, in fact, the first Aussie woman to win the big one and I couldn't be more pleased. Pity I didn't know about her when I was writing my book on women scientists some years ago!

Comments and Spam

I don't get many comments, though I know plenty of people are reading my blog, due to my "invisible" counter. (Until I got the counter, I was wondering if anyone ever checked out my site!) Sometimes I get a comment with a name on it; mostly, for some reason, the most innocuous comments are added anonymously. Don't know why - do you think I'm going to sue you? Or stalk you? :-)

I do prefer to have people name themselves, but I have published a number of anonymous comments - only one was rejected, because it was having a personal go at someone whose book I had reviewed and that's not what this site is for.

However, today I came across four "comments" on the moderation page and guess what? They were all spam. So as of now, those of you who do want to comment - and I do urge you to do so, even if you disagree with me - will have to put your names on your comments. I have changed my settings so that the ID is necessary. I have a burning hatred of "direct marketing". Especially when the "direct marketers have bought their lists from people who had no right to sell them my personal information.

From here on, any comments will hopefully be real ones.

Sweet Mary Sue: Female “types” In Fan Fiction

First published, in a somewhat different form, in Centero and in Spaced Out #17

I first wrote on this topic for Nikki White’s letterzine Centero, back in the days when fan fiction was limited to print fanzines, when there were a relatively small number of media fanzines in Australia and only a few SF/F universes in which to write. Now, on the Internet, there is more opportunity than ever before to write about Mary Sue and the mind boggles at what they’re doing with it. When I was writing fan fiction - and doing the occasional Mary Sue for fun - we were writing original Trek and Blake’s 7 and not much else(I think I recall coming across a Dr Who Mary Sue once, involving the Tom Baker version and a companion who never appeared in the live series). Nowadays, no universe is safe. There’s even an entire sub-genre that pokes fun at the Tolkien-related Mary Sue. I can’t quite bring myself to read the stories at which they are laughing, but judging by the send-ups, the genre hasn’t changed much. The object of Mary Sue’s affections is still pointy-eared, but these days his name is Legolas or Elrond. Poor J.R.R. would turn in his grave. For the purposes of this article, I’m going to stick to the universes I know best, though I think the sub-categories apply well enough across the board.

So, who is Mary Sue? What is the Mary Sue story? She is the heroine of a sub-genre of fan fiction, though she occasionally turns up even in the shows on which the fan stories are based, or even in regular print fiction - hey, I have even reviewed one on this blog!

Originally, the term as applied to fan fiction really only covered the area I'd call Supergirl. It has grown to the point where it falls roughly into three broad categories, each containing its sub-categories. Let’s call them, for convenience, "The Sweet Young, Thing", "The Nightclub Singer" and “Supergirl”.

The Sweet Young Thing comes in a variety of flavours. She is a priestess, a princess in distress, a slave-girl or a rebel leader's daughter - occasionally a scientist's daughter. Her usual function is to tend the hero's wounds and nurse him back to health. As her reward, she gets his undying love and conceives his child.

Alas, his undying love is often her death sentence! Our pregnant heroine would be a bit awkward to take back to the Liberator or Enterprise , wouldn't she? For an excellent example of this, see the original Trek episode "The Paradise Syndrome". Poor Miramanee - she was doomed from the moment Kirk fell in 1ove with her.

If the Sweet Young Thing is a princess, however, she has some chance of survival. Firstly, she has an "out" - her duty to her people, which doesn't allow her to run off with brooding Vulcans or handsome rebel computer experts. Secondly, for some reason, fan-writers seem to like the idea of Avon/Spock/whoever becoming the father of royalty. It's next best to his being a ruler himself.

The Nightclub Singer is mostly to be found in the Blake’s 7 universe, far more rarely in the Trek universe. (If you're old enough to know what I'm talking about when I mention Blake's 7, good on you. If not, go and find it on DVD - it's well worth it! )

She is a little older than the Sweet Young Thing. Often, she is a widow, with or without children, making her living singing for her supper. Her husband died fighting in the rebellion, which has understandably soured her on the whole business, but she ends up helping our heroes anyhow, complaining all the way, and has a quiet romance with one of them(usually Avon) before waving them goodbye; at least she survives the story and rarely gets pregnant! One Australian fan-writer who made this variety of Mary Sue her own was the late Monica Mitchell, who showed how well the genre could be done in the hands of a competent writer. Her heroines usually had romances with the villains of Blake’s 7 - Travis was a favourite - but occasionally leered lustfully at Avon.

The Nightclub Singer may also be a professional woman - a doctor or scientist, for example, who was working for the Federation and has broken away. She boards the Liberator and saves the crew before continuing on her way. She usually fancies Vila or Avon. If it’s Avon, she spars with him for most of the story, of course


Third is "Supergirl", who is more a Trek type than anything else, but sometimes appears in other fan fiction, and often in mainstream fantasy, such as Kylie Chan's White Tiger.

She may be even younger than the Sweet Young Thing - usually about sixteen. Despite this, she has a string of university degrees and a pilot's licence. In the original Trek universe (I assume there are parallels in the spin-offs), she will probably be telepathic and brought up on Vulcan. Despite the difference in their ages, she usually knew Spock back home.

All the male characters fall in love with her, but sadly, she is not for any of them, in the end; she sacrifices herself saving the Liberator or Enterprise and is remembered fondly by all, or she flies off into the sunset(so to speak) to save the day elsewhere. Or - sometimes - she marries the hero of the author's choice and live happily ever after, playing a major role in the civilization of which her man is the leader...

Jacqueline Lichtenberg’s classic “Kraith” series had a Mary Sue of this variety (well, she may have been over sixteen, but she had been brought up on Vulcan, etc.). She became pregnant by Spock and died in an ancient Vulcan ceremony that had a tendency to kill pregnant women, but had to be performed.

Although Lichtenberg was a big-name fan writer at the time and went on to write professionally, the Supergirl story is mostly created by younger writers trying their hand, and is the female equivalent of the space-battle stories written by earnest young boys. Possibly the author will progress beyond it, but if not, she is having fun and so are her readers.

I rather suspect there are professional writers out there still writing Mary Sue stories for their own enjoyment! In fact, I know there are; at least one major Australian novelist admitted at a conference that she did this.

And when you've written a whole lot of mainstream books, or even worthwhile genre novels, it's very relaxing to kick off your shoes, turn on the computer and wander the galaxy with sweet Mary Sue.

TIME OF TRIAL. Volume 4, The Laws of Magic, By Michael Pryor. Sydney: Random House, 2009

This is the fourth of the delightful Laws of Magic series, set in an alternative Edwardian England.


Once again, Aubrey Fitzwilliam and his friends George and Caroline are needed to save the world, as one of the characters observes wryly in the novel. This time, after the usual opening scene of magical mayhem - in this case, cloud ships attacking a university cricket game in which George and Aubrey are playing - it’s during a trip to Holmland (Germany in our universe) where Lady Rose, Aubrey’s mother, is speaking at a symposium.

But this is where the evil Dr Tremaine, Aubrey’s nemesis, is living. He has influence in high places. Very high places. And then there are the golems, which are far from the lumpy clay things of folklore; you can make them very lifelike, so that it’s impossible to tell them from real people till they’re deactivated. Who can be trusted? Certainly not characters who can get sucked into telephones, as in one memorable scene.

Then there’s the pearl which Aubrey took from Tremaine in the last novel - what mystery does it hide? Our heroes are about to find out - and they won’t like it.

It’s not all bad, though. Aubrey now has a Beccaria Cage, which reunites the body and soul he tore apart in a stupid experiment before the first volume began. If only it hasn’t been sabotaged...

As always, the adventure tears along at a breakneck pace, and is very funny. And it doesn’t let you go easily; there’s a twist near the end, just when you think the main story is over.

I found myself falling comfortably back into this universe, enjoying it as much as ever. It’s rarely that a series can continue for this many volumes without losing something, but though it will need to finish some time, at least for this story arc, The Laws Of Magic is one series that doesn’t go downhill.

I think the series will become a fantasy classic.


Bring on Volume 5!