You're Never Too Old

There are a few people who know that I used to teach piano lessons; I worked in a music school before I met my wife (and I proposed to her at the year-end recital), then did private lessons in my own home studio for two years after that. Since then, though, the only teaching I've done has been sporadic with my own sons, and my own playing has fallen by the wayside as life has gotten in the way of playing and practicing.

However, with my mother visiting us for a couple of weeks to escape the boredom of quarantining alone, things have changed. My middle son was practicing, and my mother mused on how she wished she could have learned the piano when she was younger. Unfortunately, her own mother (my grandmother) didn't like pianos, and got rid of them when my grandfather would bring them in to refinish. My own father didn't want a piano either; we ended up with an organ when I was twelve, which is what I got my start on. So, my mother's love of piano settled into appreciating what I, and later my oldest son, would learn and play.

However, since she's here, and we just went through all of our stuff in the basement post-flood, I decided to pull out a couple of books that survived and give it a whirl with her. I'm not a big fan of modern piano method systems, because they are mostly geared to kids, or are too simple for adult beginners who don't want (or don't have the time) to spend years learning to play a simple sonatina or waltz.

Being a fan of older things (I've mentioned that before once or twice), I have a copy of Carl Czerny's Opus 500, the Complete Pianoforte School. Czerny was a student of Beethoven, and was one of Franz Liszt's teachers, so he knew a thing or two about how to tickle the ivories. Yes, that's a really old expression. I like old things, remember?

Anyway, I pulled out the Czerny book and got right to it with my 77-year-old mother. She had a little bit of music training back in the day, so she wasn't coming at it completely cold, but I know her well enough to make sure she gets a chance to stretch her mind and do some problem-solving. So, I just went over a couple of basic fingering exercises, and demonstrated the first exercise piece in the book. It's a simple piece, although if it was in a Conservatory book it would definitely not be a beginner's piece. Maybe a Grade 1 Etude. Anyway, she liked the sound of it, so we started working on it. She's excited about it, and did some diligent work before going to bed. She's even reading the Czerny book, which very few people today do. A lot of piano students today don't even know who Czerny is, which is a shame; the man is a titan in the history of piano pedagogy.

When she goes home, she is considering getting a piano herself. She was worried about finding a teacher who would use the same method (understandable, since no one in North America has likely ever used it anyway, and no one in Europe's used it in nearly 170 years). Fortunately, we live in the Digital Age, and the internet is just a click away, so I'll be able to continue teaching her online, if that's what she wants.

I like the idea of it, because it will encourage me to get back to playing again, something I've struggled with over the past few years because of school and work commitments. Now, I can get back into the habit and work on the pieces I've wanted to do for years. I'll also be working on the Czerny book, of course, to make sure I can teach it to her. My son might use the same method as well, which will be interesting. I'm teaching him the finer art of liking old things, one old thing at a time. Hey, gotta keep the memories alive, right?

His First Time...

Well, I went ahead and did it. If my wife reads this blog post, so be it; it's better to beg forgiveness than ask permission.

My son had his first chance to play D&D today. Conditions were right, and he got his work done, so I decided to take him across the Rubicon for his first taste of role-playing games. It went about as well as I could have asked.

Although my wife is very opposed to the game and always has been (she maintains that if she'd known when we first met online that I was a D&D player that she wouldn't have gone any further in the relationship), I still have a lot of my old books from the BECMI system. That's Basic, Expert, Companion, Masters, Immortals for you non-gamers, a series of five boxed sets that introduced the game and gradually increased its complexity back in the early and mid-1980s. The Basic Set from 1983 is still considered by many the best introduction to role-playing games ever written. So, naturally, I pulled it out, handed him a 20-sided die, a pencil and a blank sheet of paper, and let him get started. At first he wasn't thrilled that there was reading involved instead of getting to his character, but Frank Mentzer wrote a great introductory story, and drew him in to the setting and the most basic concepts of the game. I did some of the reading at the beginning, but he quickly got absorbed in it and didn't need my supervision after that.

He thrilled at chasing the goblin away, had a big grin when he killed the snake, and got upset when he failed his saving throw against Bargle's charm person spell. But he didn't get angry about not 'winning,' so that's good. He enjoyed it quite a bit, and it was quite the experience for both of us.

I did it for a couple of reasons. First, because I wanted him to experience the game while he's still young. Two, because it's something of an incentive for him to keep up with his homeschooling and chores. The other benefits (the improved vocabulary, the critical thinking and problem solving, the eagerness to read) will come in time, assuming his mother lets us play again. Or, gets out of the house long enough for us to pull out the box and see what happens next.

If all goes well, I'm going to let him read the Player's Manual in the Basic Set, then run him through the introductory adventure in the DM's book. Once he's gotten the hang of that, I'm going to let him run his own adventure, using B1 In Search of the Unknown. That should be exciting, especially with all the advice included in the module.

After that, though, I've got something else in mind for him: A bound set of D&D books that I put together as part of my Ultimate D&D Project. I've redone the original 1974 boxed set using the 1st Edition Advanced D&D rules. So, it's a pared-down version of the game, with only 138 monsters, three classes, limited spells and magic items...it's going to be an interesting trip. If he enjoys it, there's a lot more after that.

Just don't tell my wife yet.

To read something inspired by my Ultimate D&D Project, check out The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival, available on Amazon in both e-book and paperback.

Still Plugging Away

It's funny to think of where my writing career was just one year ago: It didn't exist. I hadn't written anything original in years, and hadn't pursued any kind of publishing deal in over two decades. Now, I'm writing daily, I have five books published and more on the way, and I'm expanding my operation.

I've hired an editor, which is quite the experience. Not a professional editor at a publishing house; I'm indie all the way. But having someone go over what I do and pick up the mistakes and issues that I missed is a big help. It's costing money, of course, but it's considered a business expense now. That, plus hiring cover artists, is the extent of my costs at this time. It's not much, but it does add up.

Of course, the idea is to promote more sales, so I can afford to have someone design a gorgeous cover and pick out my mistakes in the writing. We'll see how that goes. In the meantime, though, there's always more writing to do, and more stories. I've got more story ideas than I've got time to write them, which is never a bad thing for a writer. Off the top of my head, I have ideas for three more murder mysteries, three entire fantasy series, a science fiction space-opera series, sequels to books I've already written, short stories galore...

I might not be the best-selling writer of my generation, and I might not win any awards, but my goal is still to be the most prolific writer of this generation, if not of all time. It's a long-term project, but that's what I specialize in. Occasionally, I even finish those projects.

The thing that matters most to me in all this is that I'm not only getting the opportunity to be creative, but I'm also leaving a legacy for my family. That's a pretty big deal, especially in uncertain times like these. Who knows how long this quarantine thing will go on? For some people, it's starting to end now; for others, it's going to go on and on for months longer. Where does my community stand? I have no clue; no one's talking about it yet. But I'm not optimistic.

I'd better get back to work, though, or my editor might wonder what's holding me up. Weird feeling. But, if you can't wait for my latest work, try my first one, Final Exam, available for the low introductory price of only $0.99 U.S.

Looking Back on the Future

I've mentioned science fiction classics before; I find them fascinating and fun. One of the interesting things about reading older books, especially science fiction books, is the author's take on what the future will be like. Some, such as Jules Verne, are meticulous in their efforts to ensure as much scientific accuracy as possible. Others, like E.E. 'Doc' Smith, are just out to write a rollicking good story, and the science is secondary. Depending on the author, the second type is usually more fun, although Jules Verne was a master at telling a great story while still talking about the science. He used the science as a backdrop, and while it was certainly accurate, it never got in the way of the actual story.

Some writers, unfortunately, aren't quite as good at that. I'd prefer not to mention names, but some writers think the science is the only thing that matters, and the plot (and characterization) are secondary concerns. That kind of story really isn't very fun to read. In fact, it's as boring as Mr. Yasnick's Grade 10 science class, and you don't even get the chance to burn the school down accidentally.

The fun part about reading the old authors, as I mentioned, is their take on the future. Edgar Rice Burroughs, who wrote some of the most fantastic stories ever, is known best for Tarzan and John Carter. But he also wrote a book during the First World War called 'Beyond Thirty.' It is a tale of a future where the Great War never actually ended, and America never got involved. Instead, America (and Asia) stayed out altogether, and cut off all contact with Europe and Africa, to the point of forbidding any vessel from traveling east of 30° E longitude (hence the title). The background is described in the first few pages, and the story takes place two centuries into the future (one century to us; it's the early 22nd century, and no one in the now-unified Americas has been across the Atlantic in over two hundred years.

Since it's Burroughs, it's a fun and exciting adventure, but it really gives a sense of what people thought of the First World War while it was going on. Some people believed that it would never really end, and that Europe would be engulfed in mortal combat forever. People forget that America was largely isolationist at the time; President Woodrow Wilson won re-election in 1916 by promising to keep America out of Europe's martial affairs. It wasn't until after the war that America changed its policy to a more interventionist one, culminating in the Cold War with the Soviets after the Second World War.

Burroughs tells a story of a naval vessel (which can fly, like a Heli-carrier from the Avengers movie) that gets damaged in a hurricane and can't divert its course, thus breaking the unbreakable law and going Beyond Thirty. They find a Europe that is utterly devastated, human beings living as primitive savages, London overrun by wildlife and tribesmen who remember nothing of their history, including the fact that they were at war with Germany (which also doesn't exist in recognizable form any longer). Of course, Burroughs couldn't conceive of some of the weapons that would exist less than forty years after he wrote Beyond Thirty, but he understood the devastation of industrialized war better than anyone else writing at the time. Even Tolkien, who lived through the Great War, didn't present that sense of destruction. Of course, the war actually did end by the time he started seriously writing about Middle-Earth, so he obviously had a different perspective than Burroughs, writing in 1916.

It's an obscure book, but it is public domain, so it's available online for free at places like Roy Glashan's Library. Surprisingly, Project Gutenberg doesn't have it (though they have a lot of other Burroughs titles in e-format). I recommend it; as I said, it's a Burroughs adventure, so it's got a lot of action. It's a short book, running at about one hundred pages on an e-reader, so you can finish it in a single day without much difficulty.

After you're done reading that, if you're looking for some more action and adventure, A Universe of Possibilities, my short-story anthology. There's plenty of action, adventure, and fun there, as well.

Finding Inspiration

I just finished watching Amadeus with my mother and my son. It's quite the movie, well-deserving of its reputation. I've seen it before, but it's been quite a while. Mozart is a fascinating subject of study; a musical genius without equal, dying at the age of 35, and buried in a mass grave because he was so poor when he died. How does that combination work, exactly?

Mozart, as portrayed in the movie, had entire operas, concertos, and everything else perfectly formed in his head. As Salieri, the narrator and Mozart's rival in the movie, put it: "It was as if he were taking dictation." He simply wrote down what was already there, no mistakes, no corrections, no edits. The movie does take liberties, of course; Mozart didn't actually write a concerto at the age of four; his first compositions were written at the age of five, and they were just simple keyboard minuets and such. He actually wrote his first symphony before his first concerto; Symphony No. 1 in E-flat was written at the age of eight; the first piano concerto and opera were both written at age eleven. I'm still trying to get my eleven-year-old to make his bed in the morning, and this guy was writing concertos and operas.

But it's that 'taking dictation' part that interests me. After all, that's what writers do, essentially. Sure, we take time to think about what we're writing before we actually write it, but really, once it's there, we just write it out. We usually have more corrections and mistakes to worry about than Mozart, of course. But the principle is the same; write the story. It's usually pretty much done at that point. There usually isn't much editing that needs to be done, other than typos and such. Rewriting is just our way of telling the subconscious mind that it didn't do its job properly when coming up with the story in the first place. Why insult the most creative part of your mind like that?

So, while we'll never even come close to matching Mozart's level of genius, we can at least try to match his work ethic. And that means, time to get back to writing.

While you're waiting for my next masterpiece to spring, fully-formed from my forehead like Aphrodite, take a look at my latest murder mystery, Best Served Cold, available now on all Amazon platforms.

Keeping Busy With Nothing to Do

That's right, it's Quarantine Time! Everybody is still stuck at home, going through all the things that we keep putting off because we don't have the time, only now we're running out of those things because we have nothing but time on our hands. So, what to do in these boring times when there's nothing new on TV, no new movies, and the only sport we have is watching the dogs go nuts when they can't go and sniff other dogs on their walks?

I mean, my wife is not a baker, but she has baked more stuff in the past month than in her entire life prior to this. Cookies of all shapes and sizes (and flavors), brownies, squares, even a full-blown lemon meringue pie, from scratch, including actual lemon rind in the middle! She was worried about the 'COVID-15,' the fifteen pounds she expects everyone to put on during this forced confinement with nothing to do but eat. I told her I wasn't going to be gaining fifteen pounds; I'm aiming for twenty-five.

What? She's a great cook to begin with, and now she's baking, too. I'm going to look like Michael Moore by the time this is done.

Apparently, the one industry that's loving the quarantine is the board game industry. You can't even find a game of Scrabble on the shelf at Wal-Mart anymore. Everyone's been buying all kinds of games, from Risk to Battleship to new stuff I've never even heard of before, all to keep from being bored out of their minds.

Crawl spaces are being cleared out; houses are being cleaned from top to bottom so thoroughly that their market value is jumping up; it's pandemonium, folks. And from the looks of things, it's not going to improve any time soon. I hope I'm wrong, of course, but I'm not feeling too optimistic about it.

Anyway, we're finding lots of things to do that we hadn't done in a long time. We've played cards, a lot. We pulled out the bouncy castle from underneath the house, and the kids have spent hours jumping between that and the trampoline. We've eaten a lot of home cooking, of course. We've watched movies, we've read stories, we've gone for walks...and yet, we're still restless.

Let's face it; we're all yearning to get back to a normal life, where we can go to work, come home to our families, and go out and meet friends. Especially that last part. We miss our friends. Even those of us that don't have any friends miss them. Because at least then, we could pretend that we might meet a new friend. Now, nothing.

It's tough, folks. Hopefully, it gets better before it gets worse. But, in the meantime, why not do some recreational reading? No preaching, no politics, no 'messages,' just plain fun stories of action, mystery, and adventure. What better way to pass the lonely hours than with a good book? I recommend The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival, available now in e-book format, or in paperback. Hopefully, you'll recommend it to your friends, as well.

Good luck, folks!

Why Homeschooling?

My wife and I have gotten a lot of flak from people over the years because of our desire and interest in homeschooling our children. "You're not trained to teach!" "They won't be properly socialized!" "They'll be just like you and won't think for themselves!" And that's just a sample of the kind of things we've heard.

Here's the thing: None of those objections have any value. Not at all. Not trained to teach? Give me a break; we teach our children from the moment they're born. We teach them how to use the toilet, how to brush their teeth, how to hold a fork and spoon, how to eat solid food...our children learn right from the start, and always have. Who else would they learn it from?

No, the notion that you have to be 'trained' to teach comes from the public schooling mentality, where there's only one way to teach and one way to learn. The problem with that is that it simply isn't true. People learn in different ways, and just because one child doesn't do well with 'book learning' doesn't mean they're unintelligent, no matter what the report card says.

Public education has been so watered down (and I'm being polite in using that terminology) that it's effectively nothing more than a babysitting service for two-income families. And it's not a particularly good babysitting service, either; some public schools have descended into a Lord of the Flies-level social order; the kids are in charge, and the adults are hamstrung by the latest 'don't do anything to hurt the kids' feelings' rulings that come down the pipe. Bullying is rampant, as are drug use, sexual assault, and outright violence. I don't really need a degree from a teacher's college to tell me that's not a good situation for a child.

As for socialization, well...see the above paragraph. How is that supposed to be 'socialization' that is good for the child? Seriously, what's the point of complaining that homeschooling parents aren't sending their kids to spend time with other kids when those other kids are smoking cigarettes or watching porn on their iPhones? And that's the kids in elementary school; let's not even get into what the high schoolers are doing. And that's not the kind of socialization we need, anyway.

A Harvard law professor just came out and insisted that parents shouldn't have absolute authority over their children. However, she's just as adamant that people like her SHOULD have that same authority. Parents are slowly being pushed out of the school system altogether; sure, there's 'meet the teacher' night once or twice a year, but really, parents are seen as a nuisance and an inconvenience. And I say that from personal experience.

Anyway, this professor is concerned that kids will only get their parents' viewpoint on religion, social justice, politics, and whatever else the parents teach their kids. How dare the parents instill their own values into the next generation? How horrible that we aren't subjecting our children to the political and social indoctrination they get from the public schools? Sorry, Ms. Harvard Law professor, but last time I checked, we live in a free society where people are still allowed to have opinions that differ from yours.

And I haven't even touched on the obvious benefits of homeschooling, such as the statistical evidence that homeschoolers do much better on standardized tests than public school kids, or how homeschooled kids have a much wider range of experiences with people of various ages, since they aren't cooped up in a room for six hours with people their own age.

Kids in public schools today are learning to read from Cat in the Hat, if they're lucky. Homeschoolers learn to read unabridged books at a young age: Fairy tales, fables, poetry, and novels. My son, who is not yet twelve, started reading Virgil's The Aeneid, one of the greatest epic stories of all time. Can the public schools boast like that?

He also wants to read my own books, which is nice. He especially wants to read the latest one, Best Served Cold, available now on Amazon.com. You should read it, too. Even a twelve-year-old can understand it; how hard can it be?

Best Served Cold

Well, it's happened again. That's right, another book is available on Amazon.com right now. It's called 'Best Served Cold,' and it's the newest Cameron Vail mystery. That makes three of them already this year, more than half my total production thus far. It's available now for only $3.99 in e-book format. Here's the cover blurb:

Once, Martino's Restaurant earned rave reviews. Today, the once-great restaurant has drawn the attention of Kitchens from Hell, the most-watched restaurant makeover show on television. But their dreams for rehabilitation and resurgence in the community run into a roadblock when the growing tension in the kitchen boils over into murder.

But when the police gobble up a suspect, not everyone believes they have the right man. As the plot thickens, it's up to Cameron Vail to grill the suspects and carve his way through the lies and hidden truths. Will he peel away the layers of deceit in time, or will the murderer avoid their just desserts?

It's funny, because I didn't start out planning to do a lot of murder mysteries; I was focusing on doing science fiction, and especially fantasy. I had lots of ideas for fantasy stories, some of which I have already written (one of which is published). But mysteries? I haven't been interested in writing mysteries since my days at the University of Toronto, back in the early 1990s. Yeah, I'm old; deal with it.

But, one of the projects I got around to finishing last summer was Final Exam, the book I started writing back then. It was, obviously, the first Cameron Vail mystery, and it happens to be my first published book, available for the low, introductory price of $0.99 US. The reason I decided to publish it first wasn't because I thought it was my best work, or because it was a surefire hit. In fact, looking at my planned schedule for writing and releasing this year, it wasn't going to be released until six other books had already been published.

So, why did I start with a murder mystery? Well, because it was the easiest one for me to publish, because I didn't have to pay anyone to make the cover for me. The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival, my first fantasy novel, was supposed to be released first, but it's not easy to find a ready-made cover to fit a fantasy story involving a troll with cracked, flaming skin and seven clawed fingers on each hand. So, I had to get someone to make that cover for me, and it took some time to find the right fit. I believe I did; Alex Lechev, a.k.a. thegreyghost, did an excellent job.

But, to do the covers for murder mysteries, all I need is a picture that fits the theme of the book, which I was able to find for Final Exam and The Missing Magnate, the second Cameron Vail mystery to be published. After that, it's easy to just add the appropriate text to turn a straightforward image to a snazzy-looking book cover. Even I can do it, which means anyone can.

So, I'm still going to write the fantasy and science fiction; those are my go-to genres, after all. But mysteries are actually fun to write, as I discovered. I've got a few other ideas for more Cameron Vail adventures, and I might branch out into other detective characters as well. For now, though, Best Served Cold is ready for you. I hope you'll enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Loving the Classics

Classical music and classic books have quite a few things in common. First, you can experience them over and over again and always feel like you're getting something new from them every time. Second, they're free of a lot of the modern conceits of literature and music. They're timeless, so they can be experienced at any time, always fitting into a situation.

Right now, I'm listening to Chopin's Ballades. They are incredible pieces of music; I'm especially fond of the first one, which was my dream piano achievement; if I could learn that, I would feel like I'd accomplished everything I needed to musically. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to learn it; I can't seem to acquire the technique necessary. Too bad; it's a gem.

I'm also reading Edgar Allan Poe right now, as well as Abraham Merritt's Conquest of the Moon Pool. I've read quite a few of Poe's stories and poems so far, although none of his 'classic' ones yet. I did, however, read "The Unparalleled Adventures of One Hans Pfaall", which is quite an interesting story of a man who rode a balloon all the way to the moon. In 1835. The science is plausible, for 1835; it's an early science-fiction story, although obviously we now know that his method of getting to the moon wouldn't actually work. But for the time, it's quite scientific. And a fun story, too. In a sense, it's like a proto-Jules Verne story, where the science is plausible, and there's a lot of description of just how the science works, while still being an adventure.

Of course, a story doesn't have to be scientifically accurate to be an rollicking adventure story. In fact, sometimes the science gets in the way. Sure, the idea of science fiction in the 1930s and 1940s was scientific realism above all else, but that often got in the way of the actual story. It doesn't do much good to write what is essentially a treatise on plausible future tech when the plot involves walking across the street to buy groceries. There isn't a lot of adventure in that premise. Unless, of course, the terrain between the house and the grocery store has been seeded by alien invaders with mines and laser cannons. Now, getting the groceries can be an adventure. But Asimov wouldn't have written that, because it wouldn't be 'realistic' enough.

Realism is fine in its place, but adventure stories that attract readers aren't going to be all that realistic. The Fantastic Four was one of the best-selling comic books in history in the 1960s, and realism wasn't exactly the watchword when dealing with people who can stretch, turn invisible, lift tanks, and fly around sheathed in flame. But it was fun, exciting, and an adventure. Tarzan of the Apes doesn't have a very realistic premise, considering that it hypothesized a race of ape-men who were a little higher than gorillas on the evolutionary ladder, though still below humans, and the notion that a human infant could be raised by these apes and become what is essentially a superhero doesn't exactly rank high on the plausibility scale. But it's one heck of an adventure, isn't it?

Adventure over scientific realism is one reason to prefer the classics of the genre; adventure over political and social discourse is a reason to prefer the classics over most of today's literature. The men and women who wrote the classics understood their audience. They weren't writing to make socially relevant points, they were writing because they wanted to sell books and make money. And they did so because their stories were, above all, FUN. Without that key ingredient, no one is going to read the book unless their forced to. Ask any high school student stuck in English class reading the latest Cure for Insomnia.

For some more modern examples of the kind of fun adventure I'm talking about, take a look at my latest book, A Universe of Possibilities, available now on Amazon.

I'm Only Human: Race in Fantasy and Science Fiction

One of the things I've noticed over the past few dozen years of reading fantasy and science fiction is that non-human characters are quite a big deal. Star Trek and Star Wars are famous for having gazillions of aliens as major, if not main, characters. Spock and Chewbacca led the way for their respective franchises, but they most certainly aren't alone. Even Enterprise, the Star Trek prequel set before the Federation exists, had a Vulcan science officer and an alien (Denobulan) doctor onboard. Heck, Spock was the only alien on the Kirk-era Enterprise, at least on TV.

Fantasy. of course, is the realm of elves, dwarves, hobbits, and assorted other 'demi-human' characters. In game-related fantasy (such as the D&D novels that have been around since Dragonlance in 1984), the ranks of non-human characters have expanded well beyond Tolkien's 'standard' races. Tieflings, dragonborn, and dozens of other options have shown up over the years, becoming less and less human.

What's wrong with being human, though?

One of my favorite fantasy series is David Eddings' Belgariad. One of the things I like about it is that the characters are all human; there are no elves, dwarves, Vulcans, or anything else. Sure, the dryads are not quite human, but they certainly look human, and the only one who gets any real screen time is Princess Ce'Nedra, who is only part-dryad. Even the Ulgos, who are pretty darn close to looking and acting like dwarves (who are also religious zealots), are still human; they just look different because they were living underground for about five or so thousand years. Everyone's human, so the differences become cultural, not racial. Of course, the people are still viewed as being of different races, because that's how we think of ourselves. But they're all human.

The trend toward non-human characters began, of course, when Terry Brooks rewrote Lord of the Rings into Sword of Shannara. Oh, look...more elves, dwarves, gnomes and trolls. Suddenly, Tolkien was the fountain from which all modern fantasy sprung, and the majority of writers threw in elves, dwarves, and other non-humans. But there's a much longer history of fantastic fiction beyond Tolkien.

Edgar Rice Burroughs' Princess of Mars involved a grand total of one human, John Carter. Everyone else is a Martian. The first book in the series, Princess introduced the Red and Green Martians; the Red, of course, are very much like humans in appearance, while no one is going to look at an eight-foot-tall, four-armed Green Martian and think 'he could pass for human.' Later books introduced the White, Black, and Yellow Martians, all of whom looked at least nominally human; the Greens were the outliers, not the norm. Robert E. Howard didn't include many non-humans as characters in his stories, at least not as protagonists. After all, one of the cardinal rules of writing is, 'write what you know.' Nobody knows what it's like to actually be an elf. Cosplay doesn't count.

I'm guilty of the 'demi-humans' in fantasy writing; the first story I ever wrote, back in high school, was a Tolkien-inspired (rip-off would be more like it) based on the D&D game. I couldn't publish it today without the wrath of Hasbro coming down on me like a ton of bricks. But it included lots and lots of non-human characters, because that's what I thought fantasy was all about. I never finished it; I wasn't aware of Heinlein's Rules yet.

I've considered rewriting it, minus the demi-humans, or at least with a lot fewer of them. I'm inclined to pull back from the 'aliens & elves' mentality and do what Eddings did: everyone's human, they're just different kinds of humans. The same applies to outer space adventure; sure, there's all kinds of speculation about whether or not we are 'alone' out there. Well, right now, we're alone. If there is anyone else out there, they haven't noticed us, and we haven't noticed them. For all intents and purposes, we're alone. So, what will the galaxy be like if it's inhabited only by humans? And how long will it take us to find out if there is someone else out there?

I thought of a few rationales for gaming in a humans-only world (or galaxy). Writing is easier; just don't write about non-human characters. But in a game such as D&D or Traveller, where elves and aliens are assumed to be part of the landscape, it becomes a bit trickier to get around them. Of course, you don't have to include them (and the original Traveller rules didn't include any stock aliens anyway). But it's harder to remove them from the game than to add them. However, here are a few ideas for a humanocentric game, where demi-humans and aliens are still the stuff of myth, literature and movies.

1. A fantasy world where humans were driven away from their ancestral homeland by devil-worshiping elves (no, not drow!). Thousand of years later, they have rediscovered this lost continent, only to find that the elves are still there, as evil as ever. The dwarves are under the mountains, and exhibit the absolute worst traits of every stereotypical dwarf ever imagined: greedy, taciturn, untrusting, and untrustworthy. No one in their right mind would trust any elf or dwarf, since their primary goal is to sacrifice humans to their gods.

2. A galaxy where humanity has expanded to the stars, but the predictions of alien life everywhere have proven to be sadly overstated. Even on worlds that are hospitable to human life, only animals have been discovered; no other form of intelligent life has surfaced.

3. A galaxy where the only intelligent life form discovered is a paranoid, xenophobic species that wants to wipe us out because of their fanaticism and warlike culture.

4. A fantasy world where the demi-humans existed, but have died out like the dinosaurs. Remnants of their cultures might still survive as archaeological treasures, but nothing else remains of them.

These are just a few spitballed ideas for writing or gaming in a world where humans are the only intelligent lifeforms. Because while it might be fun to pretend to be a gnome for a while, in the end, we're only human.

Of course, I broke that 'humans only' rule in my first fantasy novel, The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival, available now on Amazon in both e-book and paperback formats. But it's still a good story, so take a look.

A Flood of Memories

The nice thing about a flooded basement (yes, you can find the positive in anything if you look hard enough) is that it finally got us to go through all the stuff we had sitting in the crawlspace for a dozen or so years. Despite the flood damage that cost us a lot of stuff, including most of my sheet music collection, there is still plenty of stuff left to go through and sort. And we've been doing that for the past week.

Some of the goodies we've found include old family photos for both my wife and I; back-up CD-Roms and 3.5" floppy disks with tons of old files on them, including the original version of a book I recently re-wrote from fragments of memory twenty-five years old; homeschooling books I used with my oldest son back in 2003-2004, some of which will still be useful for the younger boys; and enough books to start our own children's library.

Yeah, it's an interesting trip down memory lane. I even found my collection of the Complete Mozart Edition CDs. 170 CDs that encompass all of Mozart's works. I collected the twenty-six boxed sets that make up the complete set before I met my wife, and they've been sitting in the crawlspace since we moved in together, never listened to. How sad. She isn't much of a classical music fan, being more into pop, hard rock and Christian rock music. I'm more eclectic in my tastes, and Mozart is definitely my jam. So are Bach and Beethoven (I also have their complete works; I'm listening to Beethoven's 1st Symphony right now as I type this).

When's the last time you looked through old family photos? I don't remember where and when all of them were taken, but the stack I looked through today were quite the trip down memory lane. My sister had very short hair; my brother had very long hair. My parents looked young and in love; and my grandmother, gone for seventeen years now, looked vibrant and happy as she held my firstborn in her arms all those years ago.

Things change, of course; my wife remarked (more than once) how much skinnier I was back then. Well, I was half the age I am now, and I hadn't yet consumed half the food I've eaten. I also wasn't driving back then, so walking everywhere kept me in decent shape. Besides, she's such a good cook that I can't help but take a little bit more at mealtime.

Still, looking back can bring out memories of a happier, more innocent time in one's life. We tend to gloss over the not-so-good parts and remember when things were going well. I mean, let's face it: How many people get into a rough patch of their lives and think, 'I want to record this on film so I can look back on it in twenty years and remember how miserable I was'? We take pictures of happy times, because that's what we want to remember.

Sometimes, it's nice to just reminisce about the good times. But looking back for too long takes your mind off of the future and what's coming. So, we'll share a few stories about the pictures, show them to the kids who won't believe we were ever that young, and laugh about the silly things we used to do. Then, we'll put the pictures back and save them for another day, and get back to the rest of the boxes and bins we have to go through.

Man, did we ever have a lot of stuff.

If you're sitting around, bored because of this seemingly-eternal quarantine, why not grab a book and while away the hours reading? Here are a few suggestions:

Final Exam
The Missing Magnate
The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival
A Universe of Possibilities

And, if you aren't into reading electronically, well, what are you doing reading a blog about writing? Just grab a physical copy of Meterra, my first-ever paperback release. It might take a while to arrive thanks to the slow downs, but it's worth it.

Paperback Writer

It's alive! The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival is now available in paperback! It's not a large book; it's only 132 pages long, but it's chock-full of action, adventure, and fun.

Doing a paperback was an interesting experience. There was a lot more detail to worry about; e-books just need a decent cover and a formatted file. The paperback process was more in-depth. But, it was fun, and it was a learning experience.

Of course, since Amazon is shipping as slow as molasses now, it might take a while to get the book in the mail. If you just can't wait to read this exciting book, consider the e-book version instead. And, if fantasy doesn't float your boat, there are mysteries and an anthology available as well. Lots of options!

Another short post, but this was an important announcement. Tomorrow, I'll have something else profound and fascinating to share with you.

Another Milestone...

My first fantasy novel, The Chronicles of Meterra, has been out since late February as an e-book. However, I spent last night and today preparing it for a paperback release! It's in review now, but it should be live within a day or so. This is exciting; I'm looking forward to seeing my book actually in a physical form.

There's more work involved in putting together a paperback book than an ebook, obviously; you have to do more formatting, and you have to make sure that the cover elements are all just right. I went with this book as my first paperback because I already had the cover art; thegreyghost, who did the artwork for me, gave me both an e-book cover and a paperback book cover at the same time.

I will be putting out my other books in paperback as well, but I want to get this one out of the way first. The mysteries are going to most likely be bundled together, two to a book, so as to pad the page count; I had to charge more for Chronicles than I wanted to, but that's just the way it goes. Next time, there will be more to read, more bang for the buck.

Still, it's an exciting thing, and I'm looking forward to getting a copy myself. You should to. But, since it's not out yet, feel free to check out my latest e-book, A Universe of Possibilities while you wait. It's a short-story anthology to demonstrate a wide variety of genres, and I had fun writing it. I hope you'll have fun reading it.

Why Literature Matters

As a homeschooling parent, I have some pretty strong opinions about education. One of those opinions is that without a proper grounding in classical children's literature, kids aren't going to be educated, no matter how many courses you put them through.

Back almost a century ago, a few perceptive men saw how adults were losing their ability to reason and discuss issues beyond the lowest common denominator. Sports, pop culture and the latest fads were all they really cared about, and when it came to more important issues, such as who was running the country and how they were doing it, people weren't able to look past the most basic surface level, nor could they even articulate what it was that was bothering them about it in the first place. Sure, they knew that So-and-So was doing a lousy job, but nothing beyond that, including how he should actually be doing the job in the first place, or even what the job was!

I know, it sounds familiar, doesn't it? I could be talking about people today. But, that's the point.

So, these perceptive men began the Great Books Movement. This was an opportunity for adults to learn about the classics, the books that defined our culture, the writings of the most profound thinkers in history, and understand not only what they were saying, but why they were saying it, and whether or not we should agree with what they were saying. In short, they were educating people in how to think, not merely what to think. They were teaching them Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Shakespeare, Newton and dozens of other great writers.

Unfortunately, you've probably never heard of the Great Books Movement, because despite more than forty years of effort, toil and sweat, not to mention some sweet encylopedic sets of these Great Books, they couldn't sustain interest. The adults just weren't able to connect with these great writers. They didn't 'get' it. And the reason they didn't get it was that, unlike those great writers and their intended audiences, the modern adults didn't have the cultural backdrop, the fertile soil developed in childhood by reading great works intended for children. Fairy tales, nursery rhymes, Aesop's fables...unless it showed up in a Disney cartoon, kids of the past century don't have a lot of experience with them. And that is a crime against generations of humanity. It is a theft of our cultural heritage, a heritage we not only have a right to, but an obligation to pass on to future generations.

My middle son, who is eleven, loves to read Percy Jackson and Captain Underpants. Yikes. He also watches Cartoon Network whenever he can cajole myself or his mother into allowing him TV time. I made the mistake of sitting in briefly on his viewing time, and what I saw was horrifying. The 'artwork' wouldn't pass muster in a kindergarten class; the 'humor' is atrocious and largely centered on bodily functions or thorough emasculation of whatever unfortunate male character gets selected for the writer's abuse, and the 'plots' are ridiculous. There's more plot in a Road Runner cartoon (a fact my son was able to verify when I challenged him to watch a few of those instead).

I know, I know...old guy, get off my lawn, etc. Well, I might be old, but I'm not wrong. Kids today don't have any real value in their entertainment. Just getting them to read is a challenge and a half. But it's a challenge that's worth it.

I found the children's literature books I had purchased when I was homeschooling my oldest son, more than a decade earlier. I offered him a few of them to read, and he expressed some interest, promising to check them out before heading back to staring at the brain-drainer.

Then, he read Call of the Wild, by Jack London.

Well, that did it. Suddenly, he's interested in reading real books instead of The Day My Butt Went Psycho. He's reading fairy tales, he's reading Edgar Rice Burroughs...he's reading real books now. And, while he still wants to stare at the brain-candy, he's genuinely interested in reading these stories, and even asking me to read him Aesop's fables at night. Hey, moral lessons before bed is never a bad idea, is it? And, while our youngest boy is autistic and doesn't get the whole 'reading' idea, I've started reading some short children's poems to him. Even if he's not looking at the pictures or the words, he can hear my voice. It's a start, anyway.

I know, I'm long-winded. But here's the point: Education is a life-long process; it doesn't end when you graduate high school, or even university or college. But those early years are critical for determining what kind of an education will even be possible for you or your child to get. That's not to say you can't learn later on, but you're starting with a major handicap.

If you're a parent with young kids, don't stick them in front of Netflix or the Cartoon Network while you exchange Facebook posts. Sit down with them and read to them. Grab Lang's Blue Fairy Book, or Beatrix Potter, or Tarzan of the Apes if they're older, or Little House on the Prairie for the girls. Give them a solid literary foundation, and you will change their lives.

And, if you want to practice reading yourself, I've got a few options for you, including my newest release, A Universe of Possibilities. Look me up on Amazon and see what else I have to offer.

A Universe of Possibilities

And there was much rejoicing!

My newest publication, A Universe of Possibilities, just went live on Amazon on all platforms. This is different from the first three books I published; this is a cross-genre anthology. There are ten short stories, some longer and some quite short. Only $2.99 US, so click on the link and offer up your hard-earned shekels!



I'm very excited about this; it's a different format for me. I'm used to writing longer works, and for me, eight thousand words is a short story. So, writing these stories of much shorter length was a challenge, but one I had fun with.

Here's the table of contents:

Bard Conley and the Star of Cassiopeia, science fiction-adventure
Adventure of a Lifetime: Flash fiction, humour
The Raven: Pulp crime-fighter
Diamonds are Forever: baseball (not spy)
Bughunt: science-fiction space opera
Grand Central Station: flash fiction
The Price of Friendship: fantasy
Edge of the World: superhero
Worth the Wait: I can't really describe this one; it's told entirely in dialogue.
The Devil's Playground: fantasy, ties into the Chronicles of Meterra books.

Some of these stories are intended to be introductions to other series that I will be writing; Bard Conley, Bughunt, and the Raven, in particular (Edge of the World, to a lesser extent). The others were just fun one-offs, although some of them could conceivably be expanded if I was in a particularly strange mood.

There you have it: ten stories to dig into and enjoy. I hope you like them as much as I enjoyed writing them.

School's Out!

Well, that's that. Another fun-filled, exciting semester of university completed. Technically, I was done as of yesterday, when I did my Astronomy exam (150 multiple choice questions) and handed in my Cold War History take-home exam. But the second exam officially closed today, so that's it. No more, finished, done.

So, now it's just a matter of waiting for my grades, and it's on to the summer term. I'm only taking a couple of courses, on Modern Europe and Ancient (Classical) Humor. I was also going to take a course in Children's Literature, since as a homeschooling parent, that's important to me. However, I was informed that I had to take a prerequisite English course first, and that course started off with a unit on Margaret Atwood's Handmaid's Tale. Yeah, I don't need the Children's Lit course that bad. I don't need anything that bad. Handmaid's Tale is exactly the sort of book I'm rebelling against in my own writing. I'm sure as heck not going to take a course that requires me to read it.

This isn't my first go-around with university-level English reading requirements. Way back when I was young and foolish (as opposed to old and foolish, as I am now), I spent a year at the University of Toronto, taking courses that had absolutely no bearing on what I wanted to do with my life. Of course, at that point, I didn't actually want to do anything with my life, so no course would have had any real impact on me.

Two of the courses I took were in Science Fiction and Detective Fiction. I rather enjoyed the detective fiction; I discovered some great mystery writers such as Rex Stout, S.S. Van Dine, and Dorothy Sayers. Stout is a strong influence on my own mysteries, by the way, so if you like Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin, you might like Cameron Vail and Bill Potts.

However, the science fiction reading list just didn't work for me. They skipped over the early pulp writers such as Burroughs and even E.E. Doc Smith (two of the seminal influencers on science fiction, especially Star Wars), and jumped right to the so-called 'Golden Age' of science fiction. I remember Olaf Stapledon was on the list; so was H.G. Wells, I think. I honestly can't remember any other writers or books from that course. I do remember that it was some really boring writing, though. There was no action, no excitement, just bland, dry writing that was meant to be deep and meaningful, but ended up feeling pointless. I eventually dropped the course. A course on science fiction. And I was writing at the time; Final Exam got its start back then. But this...no, it was bad.

It's an unfortunate thing that science fiction went from being about exciting adventures while exploring the depths of the solar system, and later interstellar action, down to philosophical tracts about how socialism and humanism are the inevitable fate of mankind. No wonder sci-fi went from being hugely popular in the 1930s to a neglected field today. Why would anyone want to read that?!

Well, at least the detective stories were fun. I was introduced to Edgar Allan Poe in that course, which remains eye-opening to this day. I also met Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, which was quite the change from the genteel parlor-mysteries I was used to up until that point. I'm still not comfortable writing the hard-boiled detective stories, but I don't mind reading them.

Well, time to celebrate the end of a term, and get ready for the next one in less than a month. It never ends, I guess. Well, that's not true; it will end in about a year when I finally get my degree, thirty years after I started way back when.

In the meantime, though, I've got more writing to do. And you've got reading to do! If you haven't already looked at my first fantasy novel, take a peek at The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival. And watch this space, because there will be something else coming out soon.

Time After Time

Well, let's complete the setting trilogy of posts with a discussion of time. Specifically, how to provide the illusion of how time passes in the setting. We've already seen how location and character can set the scene, but to make a setting feel real, it has to have a sense of history to it. It doesn't have to be an in-depth timeline spanning thousands of years; nobody needs to know that, and nobody will care.

No, the key to giving a setting history is to make small notes to that effect in the story (or game). For example, my science fiction pulp adventure stories are, so far, set in the same setting: The far future, in our own solar system. So, how do we give that setting a sense of history? There's no need to go into long discourses about how the history happened, descriptions of how the spaceship engines work, or anything like that. Something simple, like a paragraph talking about the cities of Mars and how they're run down and slummy now instead of being the shining beacons they used to be. Or perhaps a brief bit of news on a broadcast stating that people are protesting the upcoming celebration of the millennium since the original Moon landing. That certainly provides a sense of time passing, doesn't it?

The key to making it work is to keep it subtle. If you're outlining the story, give yourself a few brief notes to give your setting a sense of history. A few names and dates that you can drop in at any point in the story will do nicely. If you're pantsing it, instead, then you can throw in any details you want that give the story that sense of depth that you're looking for, and as long as you go back after you're done to make sure the details match up with each other, you can leave the illusion that you carefully developed the setting ahead of time. It's like magic!

If you're doing a one-shot story, then the historical details can be literally anything you want. If you're writing a series of short stories, whether for an anthology or over time, you do need to at least keep track of what you put in before so you don't drop an egregious contradiction in the fourth story of a series. Establishing in your first story that the Galactic Empire was founded in the year 3125 is great, but if you set the sixth story in 2952, you'd better not put a mention of the Galactic Empire in there. Even if you don't notice it, your readers will.

The most important thing is not to throw them in the readers' faces. Let's face it: People today don't walk around discussing historical details very often, unless they're students at a university or something like that. For the most part, we just assume that we all know the general history; everyone knows that World War II happened, even if they can't always tell you what years saw fighting. Or, everyone remembers where they were on 9/11, but people don't bring it up all the time. Likewise, when writing a story, write the historical details as if people are familiar with them, even if you're making them up. It gives the story a better sense of realism, even if the reader can't quite put all the pieces together. Eventually, they'll get enough of a picture to understand what the background is.

The Noose Tightens

Well, I see someone is reading my posts (but not leaving any comments). Hello, whoever you are! Glad to see your footprints on my blog!

So, I was going to talk about setting some more, but there's something else that needs to be surgically detached from my chest. This COVID-19 thing is getting annoying as hell now. I know, everyone's in the same kind of mood, but it's getting ridiculous.

See, we're getting more and more restrictions on what we're allowed to do, limiting our options even further. For example, all sports have been canceled for the foreseeable future. Not just what's on TV, but kids in their own leagues, too. No baseball this summer; it just isn't going to happen. Our middle son is disappointed, but we were going to take some time to go down to the ball park and at least throw for a while.

Oh, wait...they just posted signs saying nobody is allowed to use the sport fields, either. Well, that sucks. Hey, I know! We have a fire pit in the backyard. We'll just toast some marshmallows and relax around the fire, and...

Oh, they just issued a province-wide ban on backyard fires because the fire department is afraid of getting COVID-19.

What?

So...we can't even have a perfectly safe, legal small bonfire in our backyard, because the fire department doesn't want to have to deal with calls from annoying neighbors about people having fires in their backyard fire pits?

Forget the right to assemble peaceably, we can't even assemble in our own yards anymore without more rules getting handed down from our governmental overlords. How much more of this crap are we expected to take?

Here's what's going to happen: People are going to get fed up with the ever-growing list of restrictions and limitations, and they're just going to say 'screw it.' This is looking like more of a social experiment to see how far people will tolerate being put into smaller and smaller cages. How long, people? How long before we've had enough? Oh, but they've got that covered, too. Because police departments are opening up hotlines for people to call in to report their neighbors for doing ANYTHING that might break the monotony.

Who wants to live in a society where people are trained to spy on and report their neighbors for minor infractions against the latest whims of an overbearing government? Show of hands, please?

If you're raising your hand, I hope you don't live anywhere near me.

I've already seen people gathering in groups, playing darts in their garage with friends, playing on the sports fields that have been forbidden...and I don't care. Let them! It's their lives, let them live them the way they want to! They aren't hurting anyone, so let them be!

There's going to be a boiling point soon; everyone has one, and the longer this enforced confinement goes on, the faster that point will be reached for a lot of people. And when it does, the results are not going to be pretty.

If you're stuck inside, and you're looking for something to do, read a book. I have a few to recommend:

Final Exam
The Missing Magnate
The Chronicles of Meterra: Arrival

It's All About Character

So, in the last post, I spoke about location in setting, where things take place. Today, I'm going to talk about the second aspect of setting, which is character.

Whether you're writing a story or running a game, you need characters for the heroes to interact with. Sometimes those characters will be villagers and farmers, sometimes they'll be allies, sometimes they'll be enemies. But regardless, they have to be defined as people, individuals who have their own lives outside of whatever their interaction with the heroes might be.

Now, this doesn't mean that they have to be fully-realized people with eighty pages of backstory to explain their motivations. In fact, that would be pointless; the story (or game) is about the heroes, not the people they run into along the way.

No, it just means that you have to give them some sort of reason to be wherever they are. The knights are riding through the countryside and come upon a farming village? Great! There are a bunch of farmers and villagers to talk to. The first farmer might be a pious, deeply religious man who sees the knights as great protectors of the faith and will treat them with the utmost respect, offering them his meager hospitality if they need it (and even if they don't). But his neighbor is a bitter old man who lost his wife and children in an accident ten years ago, and has no one to take over the farm from him when he dies. He's lost his faith in God, and wants nothing to do with the knights, who he sees as having an unfair advantage over him solely because of their noble birth.

Meanwhile, the miller is anxious that the knights are there to seduce his innocent daughter, and the village priest has a job for the knights to do on behalf of the Church. Oh, and the bartender at the inn? He's a retired soldier himself, who gave up army life when he was badly wounded. But it was one of the members of the knightly order who got him to safety, and he treats all the knights as long-lost brothers.

That's five people with five different personalities and motives; I came up with them on the spot with just a couple of minutes of brainstorming. Distinguishing them in the story (or game) won't be difficult, as long as you remember who's talking any what they want.

Character isn't difficult to come up with, and don't worry about clichés. Clichés are a good way to get a handle on characters, a sort-of shorthand way of identifying them. Not all characters should be based on such clichés, but having them crop up now and again is perfectly fine.

Alright, so after personality, what else makes characters stand out? Physical description, certainly. The pious farmer might be tall and strong, while the bitter old man is short and stunted from his years of back-breaking labor. The miller is a strong man, almost as strong as the local blacksmith, while the priest is young and vigorous, his hair tonsured and his robes kept spotlessly clean. The bartender has a noticeable limp and a bad right arm, but his boisterous laugh and good spirits make people forget about his past injuries. Again, quick brainstorming to give these people some simple identifying marks.

Of course, some characters need no more than a couple of sentences to describe them, if that; they're background, unimportant save for perhaps a quick cameo appearance in the tale being told. Others, however, need a bit more than that; they are the characters that drive the narration, who give the heroes a reason to be heroes. And it doesn't always have to be the expected characters, either. That bitter old man? Turns out he's under a witch's curse from having insulted her in his younger years, and now he has lost hope that the curse can ever be broken. But maybe the knights have the wherewithal to help him, if they can somehow learn of the curse...

Meanwhile, the priest with a mission for the Church just needs the knights to carry a message to the abbey a few miles away and return with the reply. Why the knights instead of a standard message-bearer? Well, the bandits are especially bad this year...

Characters drive plot; without them, there's really nothing to do, or at least no way to find out what needs to be done. Having characters that stand out from the crowd is the key to creating a good setting, which in turn will make for a better story, one that stands a better chance of people actually wanting to read it.

Next time, I'll talk about the third part of setting: Time and its effects.