Book Review: Distrust That Particular Flavor by William Gibson at Digital Science Fiction

Over at DigitalScienceFiction.com, my review of Distrust That Particular Flavor by William Gibson is live. This is my first blog post written for Digital Science Fiction; and, hopefully, the first of many. Here’s an excerpt:

Take the trope of the cyborg, for instance. A symbol, a science-fictional image as well as reality, Gibson argues that in today’s world we fail to see the forest for the trees, so to speak — that our “literalist” sensibilities blind us to the truth of our existence: that the Net, or cyberspace, is itself a very real, very vital, and utterly enormous cybernetic organism.

Questions about the merit of ideas like the so-called Technological Singularity, or transhumanism, posthumanism, et cetera, are rendered moot in Gibson’s view, in light of the reality that we already exist — in a fully physical sense, whether we’re readily aware of it or not — as organic units within a larger cyborg (he employs the metaphor of the capital-B “Borg,” from the fictional Star Trek universe). That we are, quite literally, participants in a global, liminal state of being — transhumanist, if you prefer — that points to the inevitability of science-fictional concepts like human drones with a shared consciousness, or hive mind, and “a humanity where unaugmented reality will eventually be a hypothetical construct, something we can only try, with great difficulty, to imagine.”

First Reviews of “El Mirador”

Two reviews of “El Mirador” have cropped up across the net, one by Writers of the Future winner and author Ryan Harvey on Amazon and another on a personal blog, and the general impression seems to be positive.

Harvey, who gave the story four out of five stars, writes:

It’s tough to write a story entirely in second person and not have it come across as an unreadable gimmick, but Alex J. Kane pulls it off in this high-tech SF thriller about a female assassin laden with cyber-enhancements tracking down a murderer in order to pay off her own debts. The future-noir setting is well-realized in the confines of the short story, and overall the work is a fast and rewarding read.

The other reviewer explains:

I was very much caught off guard by the story. I really didn’t have any idea what to expect based on the title, but I definitely had not expected a second person story, but that’s what I got. Interesting choice that. The ideas are good, the pacing is good, the story overall is good, although it left me wanting more. More depth, more detail, more Tzitzi. I guess realistically being left wanting more is definitely a better thing than wanting less. I also expect that it’s something that’s totally common among people who are primarily book readers, and even more so in my case as I primarily read series. So going from stories which typically are told in hundreds of thousands to millions of words, and instead down to something that’s more appropriately counted in hundreds of words. Odds are that it’s going to leave you wanting more. Even stories that very clearly have a completed arc are likely to leave you with questions like: but what happens next?

Bottom line, I enjoyed the story and would consider reading more work by Alex J. Kane, but at this point I’m not going to go to any particular effort to seek it out.

Hey, fair enough. I’m pleased the story has gotten a reaction at all, let alone a humbling bit of praise from a writer as fine and hard-working as Ryan Harvey. I’m honored.

Writing Goals 2012

Okay, so 2011 was a year spent largely riding on the fumes of 2010′s few modest successes. Why lie? But, on a positive note, I must say that the quality of my fiction, while perhaps yet inconsistent, continues to increase, both in my own eyes and those of readers. I sold a short story from 2010 that I loved (“In the Arms of Lachiga”) to Digital Science Fiction at SFWA-standard professional rates (i.e. hundreds of dollars, praise the cosmos — and many thanks to Michael Wills, Christine Clukey, et al.!), and in doing so got my name on the cover of a pro publication next to none other than Nebula Award-winner Eric James Stone. I wrote fiction I’m proud of — “El Mirador,” which sold to Tom Carpenter’s Mirror Shards anthology springs to mind; as does the story “Prospect of a World I Dream,” which has yet to find a home. And, perhaps most importantly, I read some really great fiction: Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor, Choke and Damned by Chuck Palahniuk, Fuzzy Nation by John Scalzi (and a zillion other books and short stories I can’t remember at the moment).

I can hardly call 2011 a failure…but it was a disappointment. I saw all the hard work I did in 2010, with the exception of a small press collapsing under its own weight and canning three of the books I was supposed to appear in, finally come to fruition in the form of books. These things were great. But I didn’t do the writing I’d hoped to do; what I did, I’m proud of, sure, but I could have accomplished so much more… Instead, I chose to bask in the glory of yesterdays, to dream and ponder instead of getting my hands dirty. For the most part.

So here it is, folks. My official declaration of intent for 2012. It’s modest, and extremely doable, but that’s the point. In the course of the next year, I will:

  • Apply to Clarion, Clarion West, and Odyssey
  • Complete and submit my current novel project, Doomster
  • Write, revise, and submit 12 new finished short stories
  • Continue to enter Writers of the Future every contest quarter
  • Follow Heinlein’s Rules henceforth without exception
  • Begin making lists of nouns, titles, concepts, and story ideas a la Bradbury’s essay “Run Fast, Stand Still, or, The Thing at the Top of the Stairs, or, New Ghosts from Old Minds,” from Zen in the Art of Writing
  • Graduate college with a B.A. in English
My “dreams,” then — and these can happen anytime before I die, not necessarily in 2012:
  • Sell a novel to a major SF/F/H publisher (i.e. Tor, Daw, Ace, Nightshade, etc.)
  • Sell a short story collection to a similar publisher
  • Get nominated for a prestigious award in the SF, F, or H field (i.e. Stoker, Nebula, Hugo, etc.)
  • Attend a workshop like Clarion, Clarion West, or Odyssey
  • Sell a story to one or several of my dream markets: Strange Horizons, Lightspeed, F&SF, Clarkesworld, Asimov’s, Analog Science Fiction & Fact, Cemetery Dance, etc.

More on the Twisted Library Press Fiasco

Over at a small-press blog called Books of the Dead, James Roy Daley elaborates on his own writing and publishing advice — namely, Yog’s Law — and cites my own discussion of the recent implosion of Twisted Library Press‘s anthology-factory business practice:

I did see one ray of hope while wading through the mess: a newbie writer named Alex J. Kane. Despite the fact that he has few writing credits to his name, he spoke words of wisdom that were – for the most part – overlooked by his peers. But they weren’t overlooked by me.

Glad to see that my post on the matter hasn’t been entirely overlooked. It’s an important example of what can go horribly wrong in this industry, and all the early signs of trouble were blatantly obvious for all to see. We were just too anxious and naive to see them. Traditional publishing is slow, but when the conditions of contracts are approaching their expiration date, it’s worth reconsidering whether or not you’ve submitted your work to a worthy market. Sad but true.

Still Alive

Okay, okay: Quick update.

School is coming to a close. Not winding down, as the expression goes, not yet — but it’s getting close to being over. I have a ten- to twelve-page research paper I’m working on, I have two or three major essay-based tests to study for, a ten-minute presentation to do, but then I’m fucking done.

At least until next semester. (The last one, finally.)

After that? Well, okay. Here’s the official announcement: I’m writing my first novel. I’ve got a couple of short story ideas brewing in the back of my mind, science fiction stories, but I’m saving those for afterward. I don’t want to get in the way of what has the potential to become a really, really interesting dark fantasy novel. Or horror novel. Or weird transgressive satire. I don’t give a shit what people end up calling it, because chances are that no one will want to read it. It’s a first novel — maybe you didn’t catch that part.

I’m calling it DOOMSTER, but you can call it whatever you want. Don’t call it crap, ’cause that’s rude as hell. Just ignore it, if you think it’s crap. Please.

I’ve got a lot of brainstorming notes and a very broad outline written, with some truly inspiring characters and ideas, but I honestly have no idea what it will end up being. It may prove to be a trunk novel. It may end up self-published. It may sell to a small press publisher like Raw Dog Screaming Press, who I think are doing some fantastic work in the field of horror and the weird right now, or somebody bigger. I dunno.

I just want to write a novel, and have some fun with it.

To write the book — here comes that advice bubbling up again — that I would want to read.

(Meanwhile, I’ll also be filling out applications to Clarion, Clarion West, and Odyssey. Fingers crossed.)

So what have I been reading? That’s relevant.

First: Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk’s earth-shattering debut novel from 1996. My favorite book, well, ever. Must’ve read it a hundred times. It’s been instrumental in motivating my lazy, stressed-out ass to hunker down and get a novel done. Finally. Before that: things like Horns by Joe Hill, and Palahniuk’s Damned. More recently, Jeremy C. Shipp’s Cursed, George Carlin’s posthumous memoir, Last Words, and The Dharma of Dragons and Daemons: Buddhist Themes in Modern Fantasy. I’ve been watching my favorite childhood anime series, Robotech.

This is where my head has been, when it’s not at school. Doing schoolwork.

By the time I get around to diving headlong into the novel draft next week, my head is still going to be here. I think that’s okay, even a great thing. These are books I love. The myths I’ve built my life around, to put it boldly.

They’re the reason I’m managing to make my homework fun in this last, final stretch.

Here’s the block quote that opens my final Buddhism term paper, for fun:

I would put forward that the next thing is going to be a story, because right now, people really don’t have a big story, a big software… They don’t have a big meta-narrative story; they don’t have a big story like Christianity was a big story. So right now, we need a really big story… And that story doesn’t have to be in conflict or in reaction to the current story, because I would say, right now, you don’t change anything by protesting anything… You give people a more effective way of living their lives, they won’t give a shit about foreign oil, you know? You give them the right story, and you make their cars obsolete, it’s gonna be like, “We are just swimming in oil. What are we going to do with all this oil?” And you can do that within the culture without reacting to the government, the war, whatever. Because in a way, by reacting to it, you’re wasting energy…you are making it stronger by giving it this token little resistance, keeping it in place. So your job, I would say, is to come up with a story like that, that makes all of the things we worry about so much right now completely beside the point… We won’t even think about them, because your story will be so incredible. I don’t know what that story is, but that’s why…if I can make my case, somebody’s gonna come up with that story.

–Chuck Palahniuk (Postcards from the Future)

The paper is called Karmic Demons and the Power of Compassion: Buddhist Philosophy as a Basis for Modern Myth, and I’m hoping to craft it into a kind of short fiction-writer’s manifesto. A foundation for the rest of my literary career, at the risk of sounding presumptuous, or even pretentious.

Because I’ve come to love the ideas that lie at the heart of Buddhist thought (even though I’m not, nor will I ever be, a Buddhist), I seek to imbue my stories with them — but only if I can achieve that without growing deliberately didactic. In this essay, I’m going to explore Buddhist ideas in existing stories and the larger philosophical truths they represent, and then explain the utility of such ideas from a contemporary storyteller’s perspective.

To give you an idea of the paper’s meat-and-potatoes content, the preexisting basis for my argument, here’s my works cited bibliography:

  • Bacigalupi, Paolo. “Pocketful of Dharma.” Pump Six and Other Stories. San Francisco: Night Shade, 2010. 1-24. Print.
  • Dick, Philip K. “Beyond Lies the Wub.” Paycheck and Other Classic Stories. New York: Citadel, 1990. 27-33. Print.
  • Hill, Joe. Heart-Shaped Box. New York: Harper, 2010. Print.
  • Hill, Joe. Horns. New York: William Morrow, 2010. Print.
  • Loy, David, and Linda Goodhew. The Dharma of Dragons and Daemons: Buddhist Themes in Modern Fantasy. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2004. Print.
  • Mitchell, Donald W. Buddhism: Introducing the Buddhist Experience. New York: Oxford UP, 2008. Print.
  • Okorafor, Nnedi. Who Fears Death. New York: Daw, 2010. Print.
  • Palahniuk, Chuck. Damned. New York: Doubleday, 2011. Print.
  • Palahniuk, Chuck. Fight Club: A Novel. New York: Henry Holt, 2004. Print.
  • Postcards from the Future: The Chuck Palahniuk Documentary. Dir. Dennis Widmyer, Kevin Kölsch, and Josh Chaplinsky. Perf. Chuck Palahniuk. Kinky Mule Films, 2003. DVD.

Total Geekout

Over at io9.com earlier today, horror novelist Joe Hill — author of my all-time favorite novel, Horns — participated in a digital Q&A. Fortunately, I finally got the chance to ask Hill the very question that’s been burning in my mind for over a year now:

Hey there! Thanks for the great questions guys. So I guess I’ll just quote your questions, and see what I have (if anything) for answers. First up, from Alex J. Kane:

Q: “What I’d love to know is: How do you develop your characters? Do you write extensive sketches in place of a plot outline? Or do you craft them as you draft the story? I’d love to know where these folks came from.”

A: For the most part, I just sort of feel my way along. Every day, when I sit down to work, I hope I’m going to learn something new about one of my characters: what music they like, how they feel about their mother, what turns them on, what they won’t tolerate. Developing an extensive character sketch ahead of time would rob me of the most enjoyable part of the process.

At the same time, this is also the most challenging part of working on a story, and can lead to setbacks. In all three novels – HEART-SHAPED BOX, HORNS, and the new (unpublished) one – I wound up writing lots of material about certain characters, trying to find the right sound to their voice, struggling to find their emotional center. And most of that material never makes it into the book. I had to write it, for myself, but it isn’t inherently interesting to the reader.

Cat-Faced Goblin Fruit Merchant

Cat-Faced Goblin Fruit Merchant

‎Cat-Faced Goblin Fruit Merchant | Ink Drawing | 11″x14″

For Sale! This piece is available as a framed original black-and-white drawing; as a custom, one-of-a-kind eBook Cover with titles; as a custom web graphic or banner/header image; or as a framed, full-color illustration. Color available in any category upon request. Email me via the contact form, or leave a comment below, if you think you might be interested.

(The above image is a low-resolution, slightly cropped preview.)

Alex’s Halloween Flick Recommendations

One of the presumptions I make with this blog thing is, anyone who comes here and reads this puppy probably values my opinion somewhat. Another is, most folks who read this will already be reading horror novels and other fantastic fiction year-round, so instead of tossing out some ideas about what to read this Halloween, I’ll give you my prescribed list of the ten best fright films ever, ’cause, you know, I wouldn’t want you wasting your time watching bad movies:

  1. George A. Romero’s Creepshow (1982). This fun, campy tribute to the old horror comics of the 1950s and -60s is scripted by none other than terror maestro Stephen King, who stars in the film alongside his son, writer Joe Hill, Ed Harris, Hal Holbrook, Leslie Nielsen (in one of his most memorable performances ever!), and Ted Danson.
  2. Frank Darabont’s The Mist (2007). This tale of cosmic terror, starring Thomas Jane, Laurie Holden, Toby Jones, and Marcia Gay Harden (in a role to rival the villainy of even Anthony Hopkins’s Hannibal Lecter, or Darth Vader), follows the harrowing struggle of a father and son trapped in the supermarket — as if that isn’t horrifying enough! — during a mist-borne invasion of otherworldly terrors. What is terrifying isn’t necessarily the interdimentional spiders, mammoth insects, or even the Lovecraftian Behemoth-Flea-Thing, but rather the individuals who polarize and wage war among a microcosm of humanity (inhumanity?).
  3. Michael Doughert’s Trick ‘r Treat (2007). Brian Cox, Dylan Baker, and Anna Paquin bring unforgettable performances to this episodic web of interwoven terrors. A kind of Halloween-themed Creepshow homage, this film shines on the basis of a solid, tightly woven (if a little understated, or even vague) script and some genuine scares.
  4. John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978). I don’t call myself a purist, and I’m definitely no snob when it comes to picking films, but I’ve so far refused to watch Rob Zombie’s modern retelling of the classic Michael Myers film that launched the “slasher-flick” subgenre that has come to define horror cinema in recent decades, for better or worse. A chilling soundtrack, an organic story that flows like a deep, deep knife wound, and career-defining performances by veteran actor Donald Pleasence and a young Jamie Lee Curtis make this timeless film both a visceral and psychological exploration of evil that will live on long after its imitators have faded into obsolescence.
  5. Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow (1999). Perhaps Burton’s most underrated, and subtly terrifying work, Sleepy Hollow is rich beyond measure with atmosphere, stellar performances from a mind-blowing cast, and convincing studies of supernatural tropes such as witchcraft, the undead, and that cheerful little place we call Hell. Stars Johnny Depp, Christina Ricci, Miranda Richardson, Jeffrey Jones (Edward Rooney from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off), Emperor Palpatine — er, Ian McDiarmid, Michael Gough (the original Alfred Pennyworth), Michael Gambon (Dumbledore!), and Christopher Walken, minus his head.
  6. Dennis Iliadis’s The Last House on the Left (2009). Iliadis takes first-time director Wes Craven’s brilliant 1972 premise and gives it the visceral, adrenal, downright savage production it deserves. A young girl is brutally raped after watching her friend get stabbed to death in shockingly believable fashion. When she shows up at home, bloody and too exhausted to speak, her parents realize they’ve been giving shelter to the most vile band of murdering rapists — played brilliantly by Garret Dillahunt, Aaron Paul, and Riki Lindhome — they’ve ever had the misfortune of meeting. Revenge ensues.
  7. Mary Lambert’s Pet Sematary (1989). Stephen King adapted the script from his own novel of the same name, so one would almost be better off just reading the damn book — a masterpiece of macabre literature — but since it’s Halloween and movies are the flavor of the night, this haunting little film should keep you up all night. Or for several. Fred Gwynne (of Herman Munster fame) plays the cautionary-uncle figure Jud Crandall, who knows the secret of the Pet Sematary — and warns Louis Creed (played by Dale Midkiff) of the dangers of playing God through ancient, death-defying magic. I remain convinced to this day that this is the film that warped my young, impressionable mind as a child; it’s the reason why I “write this awful stuff.”
  8. Ti West’s The House of the Devil (2009). A retro horror flick reminiscent of the 80s but twice as good as anything that inspired it, The House of the Devil is a suspenseful tale of a Satanic cult seeking a babysitter for a job that doesn’t involve children. One of the most satisfying — and downright unforgettable — climaxes in the history of horror cinema.
  9. John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982). This exploration of the alien other, of Cold War-era paranoia, and of humanity’s dissolution in the face of unthinkable terror is one of the finest horror films ever crafted, not because its special effects are stunningly real (they’re not), or because the acting is Oscar-worthy (most of the performances are merely workable, with the exception of Kurt Russel’s and Keith David’s), but because it deals with abstract sociological concerns on a microcosmic scale, and with unparalleled brilliance. The description of the alien, and the scene toward the film’s middle, when one of the humans bares its alien instincts in an inhuman shriek, and is set swiftly ablaze with a flamethrower, make for one of the most thought-provoking portrayals of science intersecting with a deeper, psychological brand of horror that ends on a resonant, haunting chord more than worth the price of admission.
  10. Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960). Janet Leigh’s infamous shower scene, punctuated with the artful dilation of her pupils and the spiral washing of her blood (rendered black, due to the film’s appropriate lack of color) down the drain, is one of the most memorable moments not only in the history of horror and suspense, but in all of cinema. Anthony Perkins’s portrayal of quiet, repressed sociopath Norman Bates — and, let’s not forget, mother up in the bedroom window — is another example of a performance that will outlive most of its predecessors, excepting only the likes of Hopkins’s Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon. Vince Vaughn’s performance in the contemporary remake is by no means bad, but I have to argue that it’s yet another example of a modern film reboot that is simply unjustifiable, artistically and otherwise.