Updates, or Waasup?

As I gradually regain my energy, my thoughts are returning to Evan and his world, other writing activities and marketing.  I’ve identified goals and begun working, slowly, in tandem with daily life demands and rest to conserve energy.

WRITING

1.  I’ve begun work on a short-short story.  Deadline for completion is in about 10 days.  This deadline is not in stone, however….  The story is science fiction, much to my surprise, with time wormholes and space wormholes and the perception of beauty vs. the truth of beauty.  Sounds profound, as I describe it here, but it’s actually more whimsical and fun.  At least, if I can pull it off…..

2.  Printed out the chapter I was working on in Perceval in Love when I took my “leave.”  I’ve discovered from past writing interruptions that it could take me a few weeks to get back into the groove of the story.  I’ll also begin listening to the classical music in this novel.

3.  One essay idea for a magazine I’ve been batting around but I’m not certain I’ll write it.  Not terribly excited.  It feels more like a school exercise.  Deadline is July 15, if I choose to go for it.  Could conflict with work on the short-short story and my low energy level.

MARKETING

1.  Send follow-up letter to the literary agent who requested the complete manuscript of Perceval almost four months ago.

2.  Develop another list of ten agents to query, research them, assemble and mail queries to them. 

READING

Chronically behind with everything — trade publications, general publications, novels and nonfiction.  It astounds me how much time checking e-mail and working on the internet gobbles up time that I once used for reading.  Currently reading: Granta 100, Janet Evanovich’s Two for the Dough, the most recent PW, the most recent Time, the July-August The Atlantic Monthly, Summer 2008 Zoetrope All-Story, and the December 2007 Writer’s Digest.

RESEARCH

Recently I purchased a really interesting book about people who adopt alternate identities like spies, con men, actors, etc.  This fits in perfectly with my research for the Perceval novels and I’m always interested to read more on this topic.  The book is Art of Darkness: Ingenious Performances by Undercover Operators, Con Men, and Others by Sara K. Schneider.  I’m excited to dive back into that world…..

“Ferengi” and Duck — Fun with Names

This morning, as I read Lucy Eyre’s essay in Granta 100 entitled “Human Safari,” I encountered a word used by the Hamar tribe in Ethiopia that jolted me back to watching Star Trek: The Next Generation years ago: ferengi.  According to Eyre, this word means “white person.”  Now, in the Star Trek universe, a Ferengi is a biped sentient being who lives to acquire things, has specific laws of acquisition, and possesses quite large ears that serve as their primary erogenous zone.  A Ferengi male is also short, bald, ugly and devious but limited in his creativity because all he’s thinking about is acquiring things in order to sell them and acquire the money to acquire more things.  Hmmmm…were the writers on the Star Trek shows making a sly comment on “white people” by using the word “ferengi” to name these Star Trek aliens?  Or is it a totally unintended coincidence?

Oh, the minefield writers traverse when deciding on names for characters, fictitious places, or space aliens!  Or what fun!

This past week, one member of a German conversation group I attend showed up wearing a T-shirt for the fire department of Duck, NC.  Duck?  Turns out, Duck, NC, is on the Outer Banks just north of Kitty Hawk, which suggests the residents of Duck decided on their town’s name in response to the Wright brothers’ flying experiments.  Or maybe in response to hawks.  So, instead of the bird, which was my first thought (and what would the town’s residents be called? ”Quacks” or maybe even “Quackers”), perhaps the name is one of pride in how well the residents moved to avoid the Wright brothers’ planes…or progress?   Or maybe they love the bird….

Ferengis are also excellent duckers!

I have chosen in the Perceval novels to use real locations for the most part, although sometimes it’s necessary to create fictional buildings within those real locations.  So, I’ve needed to name characters, sometimes title fictional books and musical compositions. 

Names are important.  They can add to or detract from a character in personality, ethnicity, nationality, gender.  I think of it as like a parent naming a child.  It requires careful thought.  And there’s nothing wrong with also being playful about it, if appropriate for the character.  Fiction writers name a lot of characters.

I have used the names of people I know/knew when those names are fairly common ones.  Using uncommon names risks reference to the real person when not intended, so I don’t use them (although I’ve run across some I’d love to use because I like them).  I often use name books and I collect names in a file that I pull out and peruse at the beginning of a project.  

For example, Evan Quinn, the main character of the Perceval novels.  Originally, I wanted to name him John because of the layers of meaning in that name or its usage as slang but not John because it was so common and biblical, so a variation of John.  I consulted my old paperback of E.G. Withycombe’s The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names which provides the history and variations of each name.  (I love name books.)  John, which means “Jehovah has favored,” has quite a few variations for different languages — Johannes/Hans, Jean, Giovanni, Juan — but I wanted something not quite as recognizable as meaning “John.”  I found it in Welsh — Evan.  Would Evan have a middle name or more than one?  No.  Just first and last names. 

Family names can apply to more than one character in a book and need to fit all the characters that will carry it.  I stumbled on “Quinn” – I saw a TV listing for a movie entitled “The Mighty Quinn.”  It stuck in my head for Evan and his family, especially his father.  I found out much later that it’s an Irish name which fits perfectly.  Evan’s father’s name came from “randy” — not the name, but the adjective.  I formalized it in a later draft to Randall. 

In the search for the most suitable name for a character, all possibilities are fair game, although I have not yet considered using the name of a bird…. 

   

 

Politics in 2048 — An American Dystopia?

With the shocking and sad news of NBC political journalist and “Meet the Press” host Tim Russert’s death, my mind has been on politics today, specifically American politics and the future.  This year’s presidential election will simply not be the same without Tim Russert, especially on election night, with his astute observations and conclusions.  And he seemed like a genuine Mensch.  My condolences to his family on their loss.  He will be missed.

America’s politics continues down the road to November and the elections.  We have a flawed democracy (Electoral College, length of primary season) but the system has worked fairly well since the country’s founding.  No coups, not even after JFK was assassinated, which would have been a prime moment (and some conspiracy theorists believe that it might have been a “failed coup”).  However, even elections can produce non-democratic results, e.g. the German election that brought Adolf Hitler to power. 

Which started me thinking when I began writing Perceval.  If the novel is set in the future, what kind of a future did I imagine and what would American politics be like?  What would the rest of the world be like?

First of all, in 2048, I saw the European Union as democratic and including Russia.  China would lead a coalition of nations called the Asia-Pacific Coalition.  America would continue to dominate North America and play an important economic role in the world.  The rest of the world, for narrative purposes, would not be as clearly defined as these three, and much of the definition would depend on Evan’s perceptions. 

When Evan was about three, the American population voted in a government led by the New Economic Party which had campaigned on the issues of insuring national security and strengthening the economy.  The NEP had formed out of two groups: one had split from the Republican Party, the other from the Democratic Party (I’m an equal opportunity splitter).  After that first election, the NEP consolidated its power at both state and federal levels, creating a “permanent majority” or dictatorship.  The context of democracy framed this dictatorship, i.e. elections occurred regularly, the three branches of government continued to operate, the opposition was token, and a certain level of representation existed in Congress.  The NEP believes it’s the best political party for America, that it can preserve and protect the country and its institutions.  Its methods, however, resemble the Kremlin’s during the 1930′s — social oppression and control, purges, and a secret police.

Oppressive social control and an authoritarian or totalitarian government characterizes a dystopia.  Those in power in a dystopia don’t care about doing or being good.  All they care about is their power and control.  The NEP believes it is doing good, however.  They believe that their social and economic policies are the best for America and the world.  So, America in Perceval is not a dystopia. 

America in Perceval is an anti-utopia , i.e. a society intended to be good but a fatal flaw or other factor (the NEP) destroyed or twisted the end result.  Americans believe their system of government is basically good and beneficial for their society and people in general, including the democratic process that elects an NEP president and majority in Congress.  The NEP continues to call America a democracy.  Resistance to the NEP government began early, triggering a civil war and an active Underground of “freedom fighters” that the NEP calls “domestic terrorists.”

Perceval is set primarily in Europe, in Vienna, so America remains in the background, an essential part of Evan’s life.  Unlike most dystopian/anti-utopian future fiction, the action does not occur within the dystopian/anti-utopian society but outside of it.  Evan arrives in Europe an outsider as an American and America is his psychological home so the dystopia/anti-utopia exists within him.  I wanted to explore how Evan (an individual) would respond to European society, what effect it would have on him as he forges a new life in Vienna, not focus on the American anti-utopian society itself. 

The futuristic element of the Perceval novels is anti-utopian, not dystopian, which I suppose technically makes the series social science fiction: the cultural and psychological clash between American and European societies as experienced through a musician and conductor…. 

Books, Books, Books

Interesting report in the June 2 Publishers Weekly (www.publishersweekly.com) in the “Foreword” section: entitled “On-Demand Output Soars,” it summarizes the number of books published in 2007. 

For fiction titles, last year 50,071 were published, a 99% increase over 2002 (25,102 titles), and a 17% increase over 2006 (42,777 titles).   That’s just fiction.  ”Literature” also increased albeit more modestly with 9, 796 titles published last year.  Now I wonder, what’s the difference between “fiction” and “literature”?  Perhaps the former is genre fiction and the latter refers to literary fiction/criticism.  This wasn’t clear from the article.

The report does not include sales figures for each category.  

Are too many fiction titles being published now?  Is the market saturated?  This could be a problem for someone like me trying to get my novel published.  Finding an agent and getting published are really not that easy….