This is a follow-up to my Facts Are Cool post, which was a follow-up to John Scalzi’s post on the SWM Setting in the Game of Life. Because sometimes blogging is all recursive and meta and stuff.

My post generated a fair amount of discussion, much of it thoughtful, some of it not so much. My favorite is the individual who tried to argue that the whole post was despicable because trying to attach morality to skin color (which isn’t what anyone was doing) caused the holocaust. Yeah, that comment got banhammered into next week. But there were other comments and arguments I wanted to respond to.

Don’t your facts show that straight/white/male culture is superior? Well, no. The facts are what they are. How you interpret those facts is another matter. You could try to use them to make an argument that straight white men are somehow superior to other groups, but I think that would be a poor argument.

For example, the fact that LGBT youth are up to seven times more likely to attempt suicide — if you think that’s because straight kids are inherently stronger than LGBT kids, as opposed to being due to bullying, threats, and hatred specifically directed at LGBT kids, then you’ve got your blinders on. Likewise, it’s rather absurd to argue that blacks receive longer jail sentences than whites for the same crimes, with the same criminal history and backgrounds, because whites are somehow superior.

Statistics and facts aren’t the be all and end all of the discussion. They’re one part of the discussion. However, it looks to me like the facts tend to support Scalzi’s argument about SWM being an easier setting, at least in my society.

Race is irrelevant. It’s all about class! Nobody said class wasn’t important. The fact that race, gender, and sexual orientation are all factors in the challenges people face (or don’t have to face) doesn’t mean they’re the only factors. Disability. Geography. Education. Lots of things intersect. Life is messy.

Asians have lower dropout rates and are more likely to earn a degree in four years. Shouldn’t we be talking about Asian privilege? The studies I cited showed that Asian/Pacific Islanders had slightly lower dropout rates (by .4%) and were slightly more likely to earn a degree in four years (by 3.5%). Of course, I also pointed out that Asian Americans were more likely to live in poverty (by 3.1%) and were severely underrepresented in Congress. Why the differences? I’m not entirely sure, but I’m going to repeat my previous point: a lot of things intersect. While racism against Asian Americans is still going strong, it’s not the only factor.

I don’t actually know what all of those factors are, but it’s something I plan to read up on and try to understand better.

By focusing on these things, you’re perpetuating the problem! We should be blind to race, gender, orientation, etc! You know what perpetuates a problem? Silence. Not talking about it. Turning our backs, plugging our ears, and pretending it doesn’t exist. As for ignoring race, gender, orientation … there’s a much larger conversation here, but in brief, these things are part of who we are. Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations is a good thing, and I’d rather celebrate diversity than ignore it.

Finally, please read this post by Michelle Sagara: Please don’t tell me how I should feel oppressed, thanks. It’s powerful, and addresses a lot of the things that came up during the discussions, things like intersectionality and individual vs. shared experience.

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And now, a few more facts. Because as we know, facts are cool.

A study of orchestra auditions found that “blind” auditions, with no way of identifying the gender of the musician, led to a 50% increase of a woman advancing through the preliminary rounds, and increased severalfold the chances of a woman being selected in the final round. To phrase it another way, when the people in charge knew the sex of the musician, they were more likely to favor men over women than when they had to judge by skill alone. (Orchestrating Impartiality. 2000.)

“Black offenders spent a longer time in prison awaiting parole compared with white offenders, and the racial and ethnic differences are maintained net of legal and individual demographic and community characteristics.” Note: because the study was restricted to young men, the authors can’t say whether or not the results generalize to female prisoners. (The Role of Race and Ethnicity in Parole Decisions. 2008.)

In 29 states, it’s legal to fire someone for their sexual orientation. (The article refers to the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. As of today, that act has not been passed.) (The Rights of Gay Employees. 2009.)

“The majority (73%) of family violence victims were female. Females were 84% of spouse abuse victims and 86% of victims of abuse at the hands of a boyfriend or girlfriend. While about three-fourths of the victims of family violence were female, about three-fourths of the persons who committed family violence were male.” (Family Violence Statistics from the U. S. Dept. of Justice. 2005.)

A study of how race is portrayed on prime-time TV for ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox found that “significantly more Latino (18%) and African American (9%) characters were portrayed as immoral compared to white (2%) characters … [and] significantly more Latino (18%) and black (9%) characters were viewed as despicable television characters, rather than admired ones, compared to white (3%) characters.” (The Portrayal of Racial Minorities on Prime Time Television. 2010.)

Looking at the world of books, Kate Hart did an in-depth study of YA book covers in 2011. 90% featured a white character. 1.4% featured a Latino/Latina character. 1.4% featured an Asian character. 1.2% featured a black character. 10% featured a character of ambiguous race/ethnicity. Compare that to the census numbers from my previous post: “In the total [U.S.] population, whites make up 66.0%, Hispanics are 15.1%, Blacks are 12.8%, APIA (Asian and Pacific Islander American) are 5.1%, and AIAN (American Indians and Alaskan Natives) are 1.2%.” (Uncovering YA Covers 2011.)

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

I think this exchange is rather telling about my writing. What it tells … well, that’s another matter entirely.

From Lynn Flewelling’s LJ: Today’s best typo - He took his position beside the table and wove a peeing spell on the air.

My response: I actually wrote about a spell like that in one of the princess books.

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Speaking of Lynn, her tenth book Casket of Souls [Amazon | B&N | Mysterious Galaxy] came out yesterday. Happy book week!!!

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There are 20 copies of Libriomancer [Amazon | B&N | Mysterious Galaxy] up for grabs over at Goodreads. This one is limited to U.S. residents only, but I’ll run a giveaway of my own soon, and will open that one up worldwide.

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Finally, here are two more moon pics. I got a mount that attaches to the eyepiece of my telescope and — after a few frustrating nights of trying to figure out how to get everything lined up — holds the digital camera steady. I haven’t managed to get any planetary pictures this way yet, but I really like the moon shots.

You can click the pics for larger versions, or go to my Flickr page.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

First off, happy book day to my friend Lisa Shearin, whose book All Spell Breaks Loose [Amazon | B&N | Mysterious Galaxy] is out today. And last week marked the release of Mira Grant’s Blackout [Amazon | B&N | Mysterious Galaxy].

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This year will be my first Worldcon, and the first time I’ve voted in the Hugos. I’ve been diligently downloading and devouring the Hugo Voters Packet, starting with the short stories, because … well, they’re short!

Shadow War of the Night Dragons: Book One: The Dead City: Prologue, by John Scalzi. I wonder how I’d feel if a story I wrote for an April Fool’s Day joke made the Hugo ballot. On one hand, it’s delightfully random and unexpected. At the same time, I think I’d have this nagging sense of, “Wait, what about all the stuff I wrote that wasn’t a joke?”

As a joke, this was marvelous. Tor and Scalzi went all out, including cover art, and the story was an amusing read. It’s nice to see humor on the ballot. And there’s an actual story here amidst the jokes and the over-the-top fantasy tropes. I can honestly say that when I finished reading, I wanted to know what happened next.

You could tell Scalzi was having a good old time with this one. That said, some of the humor felt a little forced. While it’s a fun read and you should check it out, I don’t see this one taking home a rocketship.

Movement by Nancy Fulda. This is a first-person SF story set in the near future about a girl named Hannah with temporal autism. Hannah’s parents are trying to decide whether to pursue a new technology which could help her integrate into society, but becoming more “normal” isn’t always a good thing. This made me think of Elizabeth Moon’s award-winning novel The Speed of Dark, which I reviewed here. Like Moon, Fulda does a very good job of capturing her protagonist’s voice, showing us the world through Hannah’s eyes. As the father of an autistic child, it’s hard for me to be entirely objective about this story, but I really appreciated it, and I thought the ending worked well.

Also, even though Hannah doesn’t think it’s terribly effective, I totally want to invest in shoulder-mounted mosquito-killing laser technology!

The Homecoming by Mike Resnick. Resnick is one of the most prolific writers in our field, and “The Homecoming” has a lot going for it. It’s an emotional story of an estranged son (Philip) coming home to visit the father who wants nothing to do with him. His mother has Alzheimer’s, and has only a few lucid minutes each day. Philip left Earth years ago, after radically redesigning his body into an alien form, in order to explore another world. His father took it as a rejection of family and humanity.

To me, it felt like a metaphor for a father unable to accept his son’s sexuality. I could be reading into it, but this is how the story resonated for me — the father mourning his lost grandchildren, hating the life his son has chosen, while the mother takes on the role of peacemaker, bringing them together despite her infirmity.

While the SFnal elements were wonderful, the ending felt too quick and easy, and didn’t really work for me. It didn’t feel true.

The Paper Menagerie by Ken Liu. This is, in my mind, a good example of that sense of truth I’m talking about. Jack’s mother was a mail-order bride from China. When he’s young, she makes origami animals and infuses them with life: a paper tiger purrs and prances, the tinfoil shark swims, and so on. It’s amazing and beautiful. But as Jack grows older, he rejects his Chinese heritage, wanting to fit in with his “American” peers. In doing so, he rejects his mother as well. Only after she’s gone does he learn the rest of her story.

There is no neat ending here, but there is … understanding. Movement. Regret and loss, but with a thread of connection through the story’s magical element.

One of the things I admire about this one is that it’s not overstated. Jack has little understanding or compassion for a mother who sold herself in a catalog, but there’s a line later on where he’s prepping resumes and says, “I schemed about how to lie to the corporate recruiters most effectively so that they’d offer to buy me.” It’s just one line, and Jack doesn’t see the connection, but the reader does. One line is all it takes.

This story has already won the Nebula award, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it take the Hugo as well. Yeah, it’s really good.

The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees by E. Lily Yu. Let me put it this way: this is a story that made wasp nests beautiful and magical in a mere two paragraphs. It’s a story of clashing civilizations, in which the wasps colonize the less powerful bees, a situation with many real-world parallels. The wasps take tribute from the bees, but offer them “the honor of watching us elevate [you] to moral and technological heights you could never imagine.”

This kind of story could become preachy, but it never does. It is what it is, unapologetic and disturbing. Yu takes advantage of the shorter insect lifespan to show the evolution of a new line of bees: anarchists who set out to create a new future.

Like Liu’s story, the ending isn’t neat or happy, but it feels right. There’s a sense of movement that feels circular even as it moves forward. There’s a lot going on in this one, and I may have to reread it to catch things I missed my first time through.

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Discussion is welcome, and since the stories are all online, you don’t even have to be registered for Worldcon to read them.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

We just watched the latest (I think) episode of Legend of Korra, “The Aftermath.” I’m continuing to really enjoy this show for a number of reasons.

MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD

Pacing: One of the things that bugged me was the love triangle between Korra, Mako, and Asami. It felt, not necessarily cliche, but easy. It’s an oft-repeated trope, one that could push characters into more cardboard, stereotypical roles and — if other shows are any example — drag out for far too long.

Instead, Asami’s character quickly developed more depth and conflict. The plot moved along, changing her role in the story. The conflict between Korra and Asami progressed through conflict into understanding and sympathy. I loved the quiet moment at the end where Korra tells Mako, “She’s going to need you.”

I’ve seen that pacing elsewhere, and I appreciate that the show doesn’t seem to get bogged down. There’s always a sense of movement.

Lin Beifong continues to be awesome. In many ways, I think she’s my favorite character. Partly because she’s an older woman kicking all sorts of ass. Partly because she, more than anyone else I’ve seen, seems to take full advantage of her bending abilities. The firebenders throw fire. Earthbenders throw rocks. Beifong, on the other hand, manipulates metal cables like Spider-Man, grows blades from her armor to punch through mechs, and seems to push the “What else can I do with this?” angle.

Complexity: The scene with Tahno’s character really jumped out at me. This is a character who’s introduced as a full-on asshole. He’s arrogant, he cheats, and you really wanted Korra to kick his butt in the tournament. Instead, the White Falls Wolfbats won … and thus became the targets of an Equalist attack.

In the next episode, you see Tahno without his powers, and he’s utterly broken. Korra feels for him. She knows what he lost and how close she came to losing her own bending. It was a fairly short scene, but that’s all it took.

The relationship between Tenzin and Lin Beifong is another interesting example. Their history, the contrast of their apparent discomfort with how well they work together in a crisis … I have no idea where that’s going, but I like the dynamic, and at this point I’m trusting the show not to go somewhere overly cliche with it.

While there are certainly characters who seem flat-out Evil, at least at first, I appreciate that things generally aren’t presented in a simplistic black-and-white way. Neither people nor power are simple, and this show respects that fact.

The Animation: This is a very pretty show, particularly in the way it portrays movement and the grace of the different benders. I get done watching, and other cartoons suddenly seem clunkier.

Trusting the Viewers: I was trying to figure out how to phrase this last bit, and “trust” is the closest I can come. I’ve never seen a single episode of Avatar: The Last Airbender, but it hasn’t stopped me from enjoying Korra. It doesn’t surprise me that they wanted a show that could welcome new viewers as well as old, but it struck me that there just isn’t a lot of exposition or hand-holding, period. There’s no talking down, no assuming that things will be too complicated or difficult to understand. Elements are explained as they become relevant to the story.

I know there are things I’m missing from Avatar, but I can catch up on my own, and I like that they don’t slow down the story to spoon-feed information.

In Conclusion: Okay, I get it. I’m officially a fan, and I have added Avatar: TLA to my list of things to catch up on (when I find the time).

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Why did you choose to make Princess Danielle white in your princess books?

Isaac Vainio, the protagonist of your next book, is a straight man. Why did you decide to write about a heterosexual protagonist?

Jig the goblin is smart, resourceful, and in an admittedly nontraditional sense, rather courageous. What made you want to write about a strong male character?

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

The first time I read one of Ann (A. C.) Crispin’s books was during my Star Trek phase, back when I was about 11 years old. Back then, it was actually possible to collect and keep up with all of the Trek books. I had almost all of them, and I remember Yesterday’s Son standing out as one of my favorites. I snatched up the sequel, Time for Yesterday, a few years later.

The premise was that, during the Star Trek episode All Our Yesterdays, when Spock and McCoy are trapped in Sarpeidon’s ice age, Spock gets his pon farr on with Zarabeth, who becomes pregnant. When Spock discovers he had a son, he uses the Guardian of Forever to go back in time… I loved them.

I discovered Crispin’s Starbridge series next. Starbridge was a story of first contact, one which captured the wonder and danger and excitement of discovering alien life. (I still remember loving “Doctor Blanket.”) The books were YA-friendly, and while there was plenty of conflict, the overall feeling was one of hope and optimism.

Crispin is also part of Writer Beware, an invaluable source of information on writing scams. Along with Victoria Strauss and Richard White, Crispin has devoted herself to helping new writers avoid various pitfalls, and to exposing the scammers. There’s no payment for any of this. Writer Beware is an all-volunteer effort.

Last week, Crispin shared that she’s fighting a nasty and aggressive cancer.

Her post hit me hard. I’ve not met Ann Crispin in person, but she and I have corresponded a bit online, and her books have been a part of my life since I was a child. When I set out to be a writer, her work with Writer Beware was one of the most important resources I found.

Cancer and treatment have taken up a great deal of her time and energy. She notes that her only source of income this year will be from the Starbridge novels.

I loved these books as a teenager, and can happily recommend them. You can find out more on Crispin’s website or go directly to Amazon, B&N, or Ridan Publishing.

There’s a quick shoutout to Ann in Libriomancer, because she and her work have been important to me, both as a reader and an author. I’d like to publicly thank her for everything she does, and I encourage you to check out her stuff.

Get well soon, Ann.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Congratulations to the Nebula Award winners!

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I’ve posted the first chapter of Libriomancer [Amazon | B&N | Mysterious Galaxy] on my website here as a .pdf file. I’m hoping to get an .epub file up as well, but one step at a time.

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The Hugo Voter Packet is up. Attending and supporting Worldcon members can now download a whole bunch of cool stuff from the Hugo nominees, including books, stories, artwork, and more. My thanks to the Worldcon volunteers for putting this all together.

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My guest article at Booklifenow went up late last week: Do I Have to Have a Facetwiblogger+ Page?

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Metalbending is awesome. (This observation inspired by the Legend of Korra episode And the Winner Is…) I never saw the original Avatar show. I think I need to remedy this.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

After reading John Scalzi’s post on SWM being the lowest difficulty setting in the game of life, and then reading the 800+ comments, I figured I’d join the crowd who decided to write a response. So I’ve dug up some information for those commenters who seemed to completely lose their minds…

I’ve done my best to find reliable, objective sources for all of the following information. Like Scalzi’s post, the following is focused on the United States, though the trends certainly aren’t exclusive to the U.S.

“[B]lack males receive [prison] sentences that are approximately 10% longer than comparable white males with those at the top of the sentencing distribution facing even larger disparities.” -Racial Disparity in Federal Criminal Charging and Its Sentencing Consequences, 2012.

“The ratio of women’s and men’s median annual earnings was 77.0 for full-time, year-round workers in 2009 … African American women earned on average only 61.9 cents for every dollar earned by white men, and Hispanic women earned only 52.9 cents for each dollar earned by white men.” -The Gender Wage Gap: 2009.

Poverty rates in 2009, from Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States (2009).

• For non-Hispanic Whites: 9.4%
• For Asians: 12.5%
• For Blacks: 25.3%

Hate Crimes in 2010, from the U. S. Department of Justice Hate Crime Statistics.

• Race: 69.8% were motivated by anti-black bias, compared to 18.2% that stemmed from anti-white bias.
• Religion: 65.4% were anti-Jewish and 13.2% were anti-Islamic.

At birth, the average life expectancy of a white baby in the United States is four years longer than the average life expectancy of a black baby. -U. S. Census Bureau, Life Expectancy by Sex, Age, and Race: 2008.

“30.4% of Hispanics, 17% of blacks, and 9.9% of whites do not have health insurance.” -Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“Nearly 1 in 5 women in the United States has been raped in her lifetime (18.3%) … Approximately 1 in 71 men in the United States (1.4%) reported having been raped in his lifetime.” -National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (2010).

“Nearly 1 in 2 women (44.6%) and 1 in 5 men (22.2%) experienced sexual violence victimization other than rape at some point in their lives.” -National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (2010).

Lesbian, gay, and bisexual youth “are nearly one and a half to seven times more likely than non-LGB youth to have reported attempting suicide.” -Suicide Risk and Prevention for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Youth (2008).

39.3% of white first-time, full-time college students complete a degree within four years, compared to 20.4% of black students, 26.4% of Hispanic students, 42.8% of Asian/Pacific Islander students, and 18.8% for Native American students. -National Center for Education Statistics (2010).

The event dropout rate for white high school students in 2007-2008 was 2.8%, compared to 6.7% for black students, 6.0% for Hispanic, 2.4% for Asian/Pacific Islander, and 7.3% for Native American students. -National Center for Education Statistics.

U.S. population vs. representation in Congress. “In the total population, whites make up 66.0%, Hispanics are 15.1%, Blacks are 12.8%, APIA (Asian and Pacific Islander American) are 5.1%, and AIAN (American Indians and Alaskan Natives) are 1.2%. In Congress, whites make up 85.8%, Hispanics are 5.8%, Blacks are 7.5%, APIA are 1.7%, and AIAN are 0.2%. Men are 49% of the total population, while women are 51%. In Congress, men are 82% and women are 18%.” -Ragini Kathail, Race, Gender, and the US Congress (2009).

There are only four openly gay/lesbian members of Congress (0.7%). -Congress gets 4th openly gay member (2011).

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I could go on, but this seems like enough to present a glimpse of the playing field.

Now, if you say, “I don’t care about race/gender/orientation. I only look at the individual!” these are some of the things you’re looking away from.

If you say, “Why are you attacking straight white men?” then let me reiterate that I’m presenting facts and research. Are you suggesting that reality is attacking straight white men?

If you say, “But I’m a SWM and my life wasn’t easy,” I’ll tell you to take Remedial Logic. Nobody here or in Scalzi’s original post suggested otherwise.

If you say, “Women have it easier because they can use sex!” I’ll probably just ban you for being an idiot.

If you ask, “Well what do you want me to do about it?” then I’ll say I want you to be aware. I want you to recognize the problems. I want you to take some responsibility — not for historical injustices you weren’t personally a part of — but for trying to make this country better for everyone.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

In early April, I went to talk to the doctor about depression, and walked out with a prescription for Zoloft.

It’s been an interesting month. One of the things that surprised me was how many people talked to me about their own experiences with depression, both on my blog post and in person. When I went to Penguicon, the depression post came up in conversation almost as frequently as my cover poses. Depression is far more common than I realized … which reinforced that I had made the right decision to blog about it.

Almost immediately after I left the doctor’s office last month, I started feeling a little better. Since it takes time for the meds to build up in your system, I ascribed that initial improvement to the fact that I was doing something about the problem instead of feeling stuck and hopeless.

I’ll be honest, I wasn’t expecting much from the pills. I wasn’t convinced the meds would help — I wasn’t even entirely convinced that I was really depressed as opposed to just feeling stressed out — and even if it was, I wasn’t sure the dosage I was on would be enough. But damn if I haven’t noticed an improvement. I’ve been able to take things in stride that would have been far more upsetting a month ago, from the suicidal raccoon that busted up my headlight to schedule snafus with my wife and kids to the Great Flea Invasion at home to assorted work stuff.

It’s not all happiness and rainbow-farting unicorns yet. The other day, something knocked me back into that ugly/hopeless/fugitall morass, and it took about two days to pull myself out. But overall, I’m doing better.

I feel more like me.

This isn’t the first time I’ve experienced this. Back in 1998 when my pancreas took early retirement, the diabetes seriously messed me up before I got diagnosed and brought my blood sugar under control. I was, to put it bluntly, a cranky, miserable asshole. And it had snuck up on me over weeks or months, so slowly I hadn’t even noticed. When I finally got on insulin, I was amazed at how much better I felt, how much I had missed me, if that makes sense.

It happened when I lived in Nevada, too. Elko did not agree with me, and looking back, I was seriously depressed by the end of it, though I didn’t recognize it at the time. I quit my job and moved back to where I had friends and family, and just like in ’98, I found me again.

I missed me. And I’m a little disturbed that I seem to make a habit of losing myself…

I’ve kept an almost paranoid eye out for side effects. I noticed a little bit of dry mouth early on, but that might have been psychosomatic. I’ve heard people talk about antidepressants making them mentally fuzzy, which was probably my biggest fear. I don’t think that’s happened, but I’m not completely sure. I’m struggling with the sequel to Libriomancer, but I was struggling before I started the meds too. I think it’s just a pain-in-the-ass first draft, not a consequence of extra mental sluggishness on my part.

The current plan is to stay on the Zoloft for six months to a year, then reevaluate where I’m at. I’ve also got a list of possible referrals for counseling that I’m planning to follow up on. (I’ve been procrastinating, partly due to lack of time, and partly due to the lingering shame of needing help.)

I really dislike the idea of being dependent on pharmaceuticals for my happiness and mental/emotional well-being. Insulin for a messed-up pancreas? No problem. Medication for a messed-up brain? That’s harder to accept. But I’m even more scared about the idea of going off the pills and sliding back into the space I was in earlier this year. I’m hoping the counseling will help with this and give me some longer-term solutions.

For the moment though, things are pretty good. I’ve been able to enjoy more of my life than I was before. The good parts actually feel good, and the bad parts, while still present — damn fleas! — aren’t as overwhelming.

Score one for the happy pills.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Nnedi Okorafor’s Who Fears Death [Amazon | B&N | Mysterious Galaxy] won the 2011 World Fantasy Award for best novel and made a number of other award shortlists and “Best of the Year” lists. This is a powerful book, one that looks unflinchingly at issues like rape and genocide, slavery and female circumcision. Unlike many books I’ve read, Okorafor’s approach never felt exploitative; she writes honestly. The book is sometimes brutal and sometimes beautiful and occasionally both at once.

The book is set in post-apocalyptic Africa, and tells the story of Onyesonwu. The bones of Onyesonwu’s story will be familiar to fantasy readers. She is an outsider in her village, marked as a child of violence by her sand-colored hair and lighter skin. She possesses magical powers that she must learn to master. There is a prophecy she hopes to help bring about, one which leads her to leave her home and set off on a quest with her companions.

But Who Fears Death is so much more than a quest story. What impresses me most is that this book never looks away. It never glosses over beauty or ugliness, love or hate. It doesn’t present simple answers, and never shies away from the complexities and contradictions of life. Good things can come from the most evil or brutal acts, while evil and darkness can come from the best intentions.

Okorafor has talked about the genesis of Onyesonwu’s story, some of which is posted on the Amazon listing for the book.

“My father’s passing caused me to think about death, fear, the unknown, sacrifice, destiny and cosmic trickery. Only a week or so after my father’s passing, I read the Washington Post article, We Want to Make a Light Baby: Arab Militiamen in Sudan Said to Use Rape as Weapon of Ethnic Cleansing by Emily Wax. I was absolutely infuriated. The storytelling spider in my head started weaving faster. I realized that this article was showing me why the people in my story’s town disliked Onyesonwu and why she was so troubled.”

The result is a book that feels both universal and intimately personal.

The ending was fascinating, and while I’m not going to spoil things by going into details, I’ll say it’s another example of Okorafor refusing to follow the simple, oft-trod paths of the fantasy genre.

I suspect the book would be triggering for some readers due to rape and other violence, but with that disclaimer, I strongly recommend it.

I know a number of you have also read this one, and I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Today we have the fifth and final interview with the finalists for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. You can read them all by clicking the Campbell Award tag. Please welcome Karen Lord, who writes about trickster spiders and is therefore extra-awesome.

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1) In exactly 26 words, who is Karen Lord?

Lover of paradox finding dreams in reality and reality in dreams, freedom in rules and order in chaos and now, as a writer, play in work.

2) Tell us about the kind of fiction you write, and where we can find some of it!

I write speculative fiction, by which I mean fiction that contains elements of science fiction and or fantasy. My debut novel Redemption in Indigo is mainly fantasy. The US edition was published by Small Beer Press and the UK edition by Jo Fletcher Books/Quercus. There is also an audiobook by Recorded Books beautifully narrated by Robin Miles (also on Amazon’s Audible.com, Barnes & Noble, etc.) A list of bookseller and publisher links is available in the sidebar of my website.

My second novel, The Best of All Possible Worlds, is mainly science fiction and it will be published in February 2013 by Del Rey and Jo Fletcher Books.

3) What has been the best moment of your writing career thus far?

Winning the Frank Collymore Literary Award for the second time, two years running. I’d been terrified that the first win, which was for the Redemption in Indigo manuscript, had been a fluke. Hearing my name announced again for The Best of All Possible Worlds was a real ‘this is it’ moment. This is it, this is when I call myself a writer, without excuses or equivocation.

3b) And if you’re comfortable sharing, what was the worst?

There are always challenges, and while there have been one or two bad moments, it’s when several slightly bad moments pile up in a heap that I really stumble. It’s hard to be creative in the face of many small crises happening all at once, even more so when a portion of your work consists of thinking, which can too often resemble doing nothing to the untutored observer.

4) You won’t be at Worldcon this year, which makes us sad. Give us your best, most outlandish and creative excuse for missing the convention…

Sadly, the most outlandish and creative excuse I could give is that I’d be relaxing on a beach, sipping a cocktail and watching the sun sparkling on the waves of the Caribbean Sea. It could happen so easily, and it won’t. I’ll be closed up in my office chasing deadlines and forgetting that the beach even exists, as usual.

5) As a writer, where would you like to be in ten years?

Surprising people, including myself. I’d like to keep challenging myself and improving as a result. I want to try different forms of storytelling, varying the length, the style and the medium. I hope I will always be able to keep the ‘play’ aspect of writing in whatever I do and however long I do it. I think that’s where the core of my creativity lies.

6) A review of REDEMPTION IN INDIGO mentions the presence of trickster spiders. I’m very much pro-trickster spiders! Could you tell us more about these spiders and the other magical characters in the book?

A trickster spider, yes … also a godhorse, a ladybird, a beetle and various other insects! They’re disguises for the real troublemakers. Should we call them magical? They’re hard to explain or understand, certainly, and even harder to predict. Some are playful mites, easily swatted, and others are implacable forces. They belong to that part of the world which lies beyond the ken of our five senses, and at times they like to interfere in the part that we call ‘reality.’ That’s what creates the tension, the complication and the resolution of the story.

More on my Trickster – a nancy story deserves an Anansi character, and mine turns up early in the book – drinking in a bar (why not?), fooling two minor characters (of course!), and then weaving his way lightly in and out of the story until he gets himself tangled up a bit more than he expected.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

1. I’ll be at the Westland Public Library tomorrow as part of their Local Authors Fair. At 11:00, I’m giving a presentation on “Publishing with the Big Wigs.” Details here.

2. Raechel Henderson has been reviving Eggplant Literary Productions. Raechel was one of the first editors to buy my stuff, so I’m excited to see this. She’s doing a kickstarter for Spellbound, a children’s fantasy magazine. A pledge of $5 earns an electronic sampler that includes my story “Like Father, Like Daughter,” a sequel to my Writers of the Future tale “Blade of the Bunny.”

3. Whedon and the Avengers Cast discuss the need for more women on the team. Thank you calico-reaction for the link. I particularly appreciate Johansson’s comments here.

4. Bechdel: Not Actually a Test. An essay by Rawles Marie Lumumba that nicely articulates some strengths and limitations of the Bechdel Test.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

I want to start by thanking people for their contributions to the discussion on Avengers and Black Widow. While I don’t expect or want everyone to agree with me, and I didn’t agree with everything that came up in the comments, you gave me a lot to think about and helped me to refine some of my thoughts and reactions to the film.

That was a weird discussion for me. Again and again, I found myself talking about the bits of the film I found problematic. After a while, I started feeling like I was just hating on a movie I generally loved. (Overall, I’d rank it as one of the best superhero movies I’ve seen.) It started to feel uncomfortable.

I also saw responses that felt less like argument over the points I was making and more like, “HOW DARE YOU CRITICIZE JOSS WHEDON???”

I’m not surprised by this. If anything, I’m surprised there wasn’t more of it. But it led to something I feel is important. Namely, the fact that we love a story or its creator does not and should not make it immune from criticism.

I love Doctor Who. I think the show does a lot of things well, particularly in some of the matter-of-fact ways they portray race and sexual orientation. On the other hand, the season six episode “Closing Time” opens up with the tired stereotype of Craig the overwhelmed and clueless father, because as we all know, guys aren’t supposed to be able to care for an infant. That’s the woman’s job!

You could argue that this was about Craig’s character, not a broader statement about men and women and caregiving. Or you could say, “But Doctor Who is awesome Donna Noble saved the whole universe you’re crazy you’re only seeing sexism because you’re looking for it stop inventing problems that don’t exist!”

The former has the potential for discussion. The latter kills discussion and gives a free pass to any problems that crop up in the show.

It’s hard to criticize stuff we love. The cognitive dissonance can get nasty. Am I a bad person for loving something that includes sexism or racism or whatever? If I watch or read it anyway, am I excusing or even supporting those flaws?

I don’t think so … unless we choose to excuse or ignore those flaws.

Joss Whedon has done a lot of things I like and respect. He’s also made choices that leave me banging my head on my desk. Looking at this as an author, I spend a fair amount of time trying to fight things like sexism and sexual violence. That doesn’t give me a free pass, and to this day I continue to make mistakes or trip over my own sexist assumptions.

It’s easy to criticize people and things we don’t like. (Star Wars prequels, anyone?) But I think it’s equally important — probably more important — to be willing to take a critical look at the stuff we love, to accept them as perhaps awesome but also imperfect, and to talk about the warts, too.

What do you think? And how do you reconcile it when a story you love makes that kind of misstep?

See also: How to be a fan of problematic things.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

This is the fourth of my interviews with the finalists for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. You can read all of the interviews by clicking the Campbell Award tag. Today we have author Stina Leicht, whose interview includes the immortal phrase, “…kick Snork ass.”

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1) In exactly 27 words, who is Stina Leicht?

I’m a perky goth with technicolor hair, sometimes known as the acorn of death. I’ve a light and a dark side. “Driven,” “perceptive,” and “serious” also apply.

2) Tell us about the kind of fiction you write, and where we can find some of it!

I write historical urban fantasy with an Irish crime edge. I also enjoy writing science fiction and plain old fantasy. At the moment I’m working on a fantasy series for older teens. You can find my work at your local bookstore as well as Barnes and Noble. My novels are also available online and in electronic format (DRM-free and Kindle) at the Night Shade Books website, IndieBound and Amazon.

3) What has been the best moment of your writing career thus far? (And if you’re comfortable sharing, what was the worst?)

There are a number of great moments. They seem to come in pairs. Two are from 2005 when I attended a writer’s workshop. Jim Minz asked for my first novel manuscript based on reading my short story entry. That same weekend Charles de Lint introduced himself and then asked to read that story. The next two great moments involve Joe Monti. First, when he called to tell me he wanted to be my agent and the second when he called to say he’d sold my first book. This year I’ve been given two major award nominations — being short-listed for a Crawford Award and then being nominated for a Campbell Award.

The worst moment was my first real agent rejection in 2007. We’d been communicating and discussing manuscript changes for a year. Then that first novel manuscript, the one that Jim Minz was interested in, didn’t sell. After that, I wrote the first draft of Of Blood and Honey and the agent promptly lost all interest. At the time, I was convinced that I’d done the best work I’d ever produce, and it still wasn’t good enough. It felt like lightning had struck (with the second short story I’d ever written, no less) and I didn’t think I’d get another chance. Everyone knows lightning doesn’t strike twice. I’d screwed it up. I’m so thankful for that experience as painful as it was. It taught me that there’s always room for improvement. It also taught me that writers have very little control over the outside forces that shove them about. However, they do have one thing that they can control: the quality of their writing. In the end, it’s best to focus on what you can control and not what you can’t. Doing otherwise will drive you insane.

4) Who would win in a fight, Papa Smurf or Spider-man?

Papa Smurf wouldn’t fight Spider-man. Spider-man wears smurf colors and is therefore, an honorary smurf.  Everyone knows smurf doesn’t fight smurf. As for Spider-man, he wouldn’t fight Papa Smurf because he isn’t a member of Spider-man’s rogues gallery. In fact, Papa Smurf and Spider-man would join forces and hire Matt Murdock to file an IP suit against the Snorks because Spider-man knows what it’s like dealing with evil impersonators. If that fails, they would then team together to kick Snork ass.

Or maybe they’d just opt to hang out with Rainbow Brite, listen to The Clash, eat veggie curry and get drunk. You never know.

5) As a writer, where would you like to be in ten years?

I’d like to have produced as many great novels as I can and to have sold every one and for them to be successful and well read. It’d be nice to have had some film options too, but it’s not the be all end all.

6) What drew you to write about Ireland in the 70s for OF BLOOD AND HONEY and AND BLUE SKIES FROM PAIN? What was the biggest challenge?

The Troubles (1968-1994) is a fascinating and utterly tragic time period in Irish history. (Although, there isn’t much in Irish history that can’t be described as tragic.) I’ve always been drawn to stories about ordinary people trapped in horrific circumstances. A lot of it has to do with the fact that I don’t believe reality operates in absolute black and white. Yet, absolute good versus absolute evil is a fantasy trope. That kind of thinking doesn’t work in realistic settings, and I prefer realistic settings. Extreme situations tend to bring out the very best in people as well as the very worst. I guess you can say it’s my way of finding a real situation that fits extreme good versus extreme evil. Again, the real world is far more complicated. But I find it much more moving to read about the ordinary person who is changed into a hero than I am by an already perfect person doing perfect things. Sometimes I wonder why we have that particular fantasy trope. Is it because traditional fantasy relies on older history and older history is often edited to create the black and white picture? I wanted to play with that. The only way to do so was to chose a more recent history. Current events are far too muddled to even attempt the bigger picture. We need distance before that dichotomy starts happening. Also, the British deliberately changed the record of events and got away with it.

We often hear the phrase “History is written by the victors.” It isn’t just a truism. Bloody Sunday (1972) proves it. It was a rare incident in which the finger prints and DNA had yet to be wiped clean. I found it horrifying that so few people outside of the UK had bothered to notice. (Note: I started writing two years before the British apology of 2010.) Everything Sinéad O’Connor got so much flack for ranting about was true. So, Of Blood and Honey was, in many ways, my reaction to that. In addition, there is much Americans can learn from The Troubles. I see no reason we should repeat what the British did. That’s outright stupidity. So, I wanted to draw attention to the similarities. Personally, I enjoy sci-fi and fantasy that addresses difficult topics and makes me think. My hope is that my readers want to think too.

I enjoy music a great deal. It helps me get my head in the right place and time when I write. So, part of my research was what sort of music might Liam like? Punk rock was born in 1976. As I saw it, punk would appeal to him. Liam is, in many ways, the embodiment of Irish rage. Punk music is a great outlet for anger. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that punk was a factor in Northern Ireland and not in the way I (as an American) would have thought. Kids from both sides of the wall came together to rebel against the extremist politics and violence. They used punk as a means for peace. Outside of Northern Ireland, punk lasted nine months. I loved that. Who wouldn’t? Again, it’s something that very few Americans are aware of. So, when I sat down to write And Blue Skies from Pain I decided to bring that aspect into the story.

As if writing about a place you’ve never been wasn’t challenge enough, the fact that I’d chosen to write about a foreign culture that I had no connection with was pretty difficult. However, I’d say the biggest challenge was the research. The established record had been tampered with. That meant not only gathering all the information I could, it meant having to discern the truth of, as well as the motivations behind, its contents. It meant gathering more than one account of events — checking and triple checking. It meant having locally written materials shipped to me because I wouldn’t have any other access. It made interviewing at least one person who’d lived through The Troubles a necessity. Frankly, I had all the problems of a non-fiction writer. Also, I knew I had a hard sell on my hands. I had to earn that setting with all my might. Sloppiness just wasn’t an option.

Oh, and let me just add that it was more than a little bit frightening ordering things like the “Green Book” (the IRA’s old handbook) and Cage Eleven by Gerry Adams online during the Bush era. [shudder]

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

I’ve been thinking more about Avengers, particularly about Black Widow. I liked her character, but something wasn’t sitting quite right. It wasn’t until I read cleolinda’s post on LJ that things started to click into place for me.

There be minor spoilers ahead…

When we first see Black Widow’s character, she’s captured, tied up, and being interrogated by nameless Russians. We see the Standard Villain Torture Kit waiting on a nearby tray. But when SHIELD calls, Black Widow goes from helpless prisoner to fully in control in an eyeblink. By allowing her captors to see her as weak and vulnerable, she got them to tell her what she needed to know. It’s set up as a reversal of expectations: the men expect the woman to be powerless, and she does a masterful job of turning that against them. She was in control the whole time, and you know it.

So far, so good. I liked the scene. I also liked the way it set up Black Widow’s later confrontation with Loki on the Helicarrier. Once again, Black Widow allows a man to play on her apparent vulnerabilities and weakness, and in doing so, tricks him into admitting his plan.

But this time, as she turns away, you realize the vulnerability wasn’t faked. She wasn’t in control the same way she was in that earlier scene. Loki got to her. You see it in her expression, and you see it again later.

Some of what bugs me is the intersection of Black Widow being both the only female Avenger and the only one to use her vulnerability as a weapon like that. In a way, it feels like a subversion of sexism, since she’s using her targets’ expectations against them. But it also feels seductive in a way that disturbs me — in the case of Loki, “I’m going to let you paw all over my very real pain so I can get the answers I need.”

And look at the way Loki treats her. He rips into her more viciously than he does anyone else in the film, including his own brother. That level of scorn and loathing is reserved for Black Widow alone — for the woman who dares to be as powerful as the men. He also — and I missed this in the theater — calls her a “mewling quim.”

I wasn’t familiar with that particular verbal assault. I believe the modern U.S. equivalent would be “whining c**t,” making it the most hateful and sexist insult in the entire film.

All right, so Loki is an asshole. But then I thought back to when Black Widow went to recruit Bruce Banner. Banner was calm and cool, except for one moment when he slammed the table and shouted something like, “Stop lying!”

Black Widow jumped back, visibly shaken. Banner immediately calmed down, saying it was just a test to see how she’d respond. He was fully in control, of himself, and of the situation. He learned she didn’t come alone, and that he’s completely surrounded by SHIELD agents. I.e., he learned what he wanted to know.

Yet the way he did it resonates with Loki’s treatment of Black Widow later on. He lashed out in a way we never see directed at men, and in that moment, everyone knew exactly who had the power and who didn’t.

I’m certain some people will read this and say I’m overthinking, or that I’m reading too much into it. To be clear, I loved this movie. And I liked Black Widow’s character a lot. She’s capable, competent, and kicks plenty of bad guy ass. However…

• The only female Avenger is sent in to use her vulnerability as a weapon of interrogation.
• There are at least two scenes that feel like she’s being “put in her place” by a more powerful man.
• The phase “mewling quim” was utterly unnecessary and not at all in keeping with the rest of the dialogue, so why it used?

I find this problematic.

Comments and discussion are welcome, as always.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Tonight at 7 p.m. I’ll be joining Emmy Jackson, Bethany Grenier, and Gary W. Olson at Nicola’s Books in Ann Arbor for reading, Q&A, and signing of books.

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Like so many others, I saw Avengers this weekend. Short version: I liked it. A lot. I don’t read comics, so I can’t say what they did or didn’t change from the canonical Marvel universe, but overall I thought it was a wonderfully fun story. My inner seven-year-old was thrilled. So was my actual seven-year-old, for that matter. (He particularly liked the Hulk.)

And now, on with the spoilerific specifics…

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Welcome to the third of my interviews with the finalists for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. You can read all of the interviews by clicking the Campbell Award tag. Today’s author is E. Lily Yu, who is also on the Hugo ballot for Best Short Story.

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1) In exactly 21 words, who is E. Lily Yu?

A tetchy paper caterpillar with teeth. That’s all. And I’ve got the scrappiest cat and purdiest sister east of the Mississippi.

2) Tell us about the kind of fiction you write, and where we can find some of it!

The vast majority of my work is on my hard drive, and you can find it by hacking or stealing my laptop. For the less larcenously inclined, I have two stories in The Kenyon Review Online, here and here, one stock-market fairy tale in the May/June issue of Cicada, and half a novel on my computer that I’m hoping to finish this summer. I have several stories circulating and picking up rejection slips, and others in various drafts, which might or might not appear soon.

3) What has been the best moment of your writing career thus far? And if you’re comfortable sharing, what was the worst?

There’s nothing like the first time you have something published. I was fifteen, heading home on the school bus one afternoon in March, when I checked my rarely-touched Nokia and found a message over a month old, telling me my entry had won The Writer’s 69-word story contest and that I needed to call them to get my $50. The check arrived, the story was put online, and my parents, lovely people, were happy for me but pointed out that this was not a good way to make a living. There. I just made both of us feel old.

I was rejected from my university’s creative writing program almost exactly a year ago. That’s small beer, though.

4) Which is better: yo-yos or juggling? Defend your answer!

Juggling, hands down. You can’t set yo-yos on fire and perform the same tricks with any real panache. Neither can the common yo-yo stand against a juggler’s clubs, knives, and torches. If you mean diabolos, though, which under the right conditions are lethal spinning wheels of death, complete with nunchuks, then I’d have to abstain.

5) As a writer, where would you like to be in ten years?

Snoozing on a towel beside a small pile of elegantly bound books that I’m proud of having written, amid the wreckage that is the draft of the next one, with wavelets slinking up the white sand to just below my toes.

More realistically, it would be nice to have access to a good public library system, perhaps also access to a very good university library system, and health insurance. I’ve just started sending out job applications and thinking about these things, and what I’m thinking isn’t too good.

6) You’ve also been nominated for the Best Short Story Hugo for “The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees.” Congratulations! I love the voice and imagery of those opening paragraphs. How long did it take before you felt the story was ready?

That’s kind of you. I had about four full drafts of the story between December and the third week of March, when Clarkesworld accepted it, and I was tinkering with it up until the last minute. There was one clunky sentence that I was deeply unhappy with, but I couldn’t figure out how to fix it. The deadline kept crawling nearer. I was biting through the caps of my pens. Three days before it was published, I came up with a better sentence. The audio had been recorded by that time, though, so if you try to listen to the story while following the text, you’ll notice that the first paragraph is different in each version. Escape Pod is just about to podcast the story again, this time including the change.

7) So what do you do when you’re not writing fiction?

Poetry. Plays. Actually, the last year has been all schoolwork and applications. Two academic theses: one submitted, one I’m struggling with. The deadline’s been extended to three days after the Nebulas. I’ve put everything else aside to work on those.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

My thanks to everyone who participated in the Rape Crisis Center Fundraiser. We raised a total of $3573, more than double what we raised last year. That’s wonderful and amazing. Thank you so much!!!

Thanks also to everyone who donated prizes. I’m in the process of drawing names and contacting winners, and will be working with the donors to arrange delivery of said prizes as quickly as I can.

And I spent all of last night finishing up page proofs for Libriomancer, so that’s all I’ve got for today…

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Welcome to the second of my interviews with this year’s finalists for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. You can read them all by clicking the Campbell Award tag. For now, meet Mur Lafferty: author, podcaster, and owner of a very cool hat.

1) In exactly 25 words, who is Mur Lafferty?

A carbon-based life form, podcaster, editor, and writer (obviously). I like martial arts, gin, and dogs. Contrary to popular belief, I do own dresses.

2) Tell us about the kind of fiction you write, and where we can find some of it.

All of my fiction can be found linked at Murverse.com - I wrote superhero satire (Playing For Keeps, Swarm, 2008), afterlife adventures - aka Bangsian Fantasy - (The Afterlife Series), lunar gladiatorial adventures (Marco and the Red Granny, Hub, 2010), and zombie audio dramas (The Takeover). I also write for scripts for others (The Leviathan Chronicles, audio, and Nanovor, animation scripts), have a history of writing for role-playing games, and have a love of writing Christmas short stories. I have a book (title TBA) coming out in 2013 from Orbit concerning a woman working on a travel book for monsters.

ETA: Shortly after this interview went live, Mur announced that she would be giving her fiction away for free for the next two months. Details are here.

3) What has been the best moment of your writing career thus far? (And if you’re comfortable sharing, what was the worst?)

Gosh. One best moment? Campbell nomination? The phone call from Orbit? Those two tie, I think.

Worst moment was coming to terms that my afterlife series, which is by far my listeners’ favorite of my work, would not find a home with a publisher, and I’d have to be content with it living in audio and epub.

4) If you had to incorporate that wonderful red hat into a superhero costume, what would your superhero name and powers be?

OMEGA MUR - a mild-mannered woman who, upon imbibing caffeine, loses all fear and gains super strength and rage. A child of Daredevil and the Hulk, if those two wacky kids would ever get together.

5) As a writer, where would you like to be in ten years?

One thing I’ve discovered is a love of writing for many different media. I’d love to be writing books, but also scripts for web series, and still putting out original, episodic podcast fiction. Of course, being a best-seller, Hugo-winner, and “making enough money to live off of” are nice goals too.

6) You run or work with several different podcasting sites (Escape Pod, I Should Be Writing, Princess Scientist’s Book Club, and the Angry Robot Books Podcast), and have podcast at least one of your novels as well. What is it that draws you to podcasting?

I was drawn to podcasting in the beginning, 2004, when it was a new medium - that excited me. I wanted to play with all the new ways of storytelling. I didn’t need NPR to publish essays, I didn’t need the BBC or a US radio station to do an audio drama, and I didn’t need a publisher to make an audiobook. I was able to build an audience for my work well before I got a book deal. Podcasting has been instrumental for building my career, when I never expected it to.

7) For anyone who might want to get into podcasting, what resources would you recommend, and what’s the most important lesson you’ve learned about doing a successful podcast?

Microphone: Start small. A  $20 mic from the store will do just fine.

Software: Windows - Audacity is free. Mac - Garageband is free. (Aside - Audacity is also available for the Mac, but crashed a lot for me, so I got Amadeus Pro, which is quite affordable and much like a stable Audacity.)

Host: Libsyn.com - The first podcast host, designed to handle the greater demands of large audio and video files.

Other resources: Tricks of the Podcasting Masters, by Lafferty/Walch (Come on, I had to!), Podcasting for Dummies, by Morris/Terra

Advice: Interact with your listeners. Give them a place to contact/follow you and respond to them; when your voice is in peoples’ ears, it creates an intimacy not found in providing text.

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.

Of the five items on the Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form) category for the Hugo awards, there are three episodes of Doctor Who. I recently received season six on DVD for my birthday, which means I’ve been able to watch and rank all three.

Spoilers ahead…

Third Place: A Good Man Goes to War

I feel like this should have been the best of the three episodes. The setup was there: Rory and the Doctor have to rescue Amy and newborn Melody from a heavily guarded space station. To paraphrase River Song, this was an episode that was supposed to show us the Doctor’s finest moment, and then his darkest.

I wasn’t feeling it. It felt like the show was trying too hard, and cramming too many plot revelations into the episode. The Doctor was certainly clever and efficient, and it was interesting to see him calling in debts and putting together an interstellar A-Team. The Silurian and her human companion were my favorites. But it all felt rather by-the-numbers.

There were some great moments. Badass of the Year award goes to Rory for the scene when he marches onto the bridge of a Cyberman ship. I liked the “Melody Williams” vs. “Melody Pond” exchange between Amy and Rory. And I think it’s good for the show to explore the consequences of the Doctor’s “Basically, run…” reputation. But ultimately, while it was a quick-paced and exciting plot, I think that worked against the emotional side. It never stopped long enough to let me feel.

Second Place: The Girl Who Waited

I loved the central problem of this episode. After arriving at Apalapucia, we discover the planet was quarantined due to a disease that kills two-hearted species within a day. Through timey-wimey manipulation, they split off multiple timelines that allowed the sick to live entire lifetimes in that day, while healthy people could look in on them. Amy accidentally enters an accelerated timeline, and lives 36 years on her own before Rory and the Doctor find her. And since the robotic doctors would be deadly to a human, Amy spends those 36 years fighting to survive…

This was a “smaller” episode than “A Good Man Goes to War”: just our three main characters and a bunch of robots. I loved seeing Karen Gillan’s older, harder version of herself, complete with armor made up of the shells of old medibots, armed with a sword and club, and even her own cobbled-together sonic screwdriver probe. I loved seeing how she changed, and her hatred for the Doctor who once again failed to return for her. I loved that she stopped waiting for rescue, that she saved herself.

The last ten minutes or so were incredibly powerful. The Doctor can yank young-Amy from the timestream, but it would erase old-Amy from existence. I loved that old-Amy didn’t want to die. The moment when the Doctor shuts the TARDIS door on old-Amy was brilliant. I love that the show didn’t take the easy way out, that the Doctor knew what he had to do and did it. It showed the alien Time Lord side of him in a way I hadn’t seen in a while.

I did have some nitpicks. How did Amy learn to make a sonic screwdriver or a katana capable of decapitating a robot? What’s with this season trying to bypass the Doctor’s regenerations? (The plague would kill him permanently. Another episode referred to his regenerations being “offline.” Huh???) But overall, I thought it was a very good episode.

First Place: The Doctor’s Wife

I loved it. The plot itself was pretty typical — sentient superbeing called the House lures the Doctor past the edge of the universe in order to feed on the TARDIS. But first House has to remove the TARDIS’ matrix, and tucks it into a human form.

The relationship between the Doctor and Suranne Jones’ personified TARDIS was amazing. I loved their early conversations, when her perceptions were out of synch with normal time. I loved the history between them, and their obvious joy in one another. I loved the smaller moments, like when the Doctor is looking out at ruined TARDISes and seeing the parts he can use to rescue his friends, and Jones’ character points out that she sees the corpses of her sisters.

It was the ending that pushed this into the number one spot for me. Because a human body can’t hold the energies of a TARDIS for long, as we learned back at the end of season nine. And that means the Doctor will never again be able to talk to and interact with his longest companion the way he has in this episode.

In those last minutes, when he’s all but begging her not to leave, you see just how powerfully lonely a man the Doctor really is. It’s heart-wrenching, and it’s some of the best acting I’ve seen from Matt Smith so far.

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For the Doctor Who fans out there, what do you think? Agree or disagree, or is there another season six episode you’d rank higher? (I haven’t seen the final few episodes of the season, so please don’t spoil those for me…)

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.