Character Interview with Honnu, a young Vushlu

Here's another character interview, this time with Honnu, one of the main Vushlu characters in my SF novel Water to Water. Honnu's family are fisher folk and live by the sea. This interview takes place around the time the story begins, on the beach, in late afternoon. Honnu is cleaning a fishing boat.

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Q. Hello. I hope I’m not disturbing –

A. Watch out! I’m using seawater here.

Q. It’s splashing all over you. Isn’t that a problem?

A. Not with this suit on. [He gestures along his body.] It’ll keep the water out for years and years yet.

Q. Do you have such suits for visitors? For rent, perhaps?

A. Sorry, no. They take a long time to make. We only get them when we’re done growing, and then we keep them for a long time. Let me just finish up here, and we can talk.

[a few minutes later]

All done! I have a few minutes before I go do chores.

Q. I gather you fish for a living.

A. That’s right.

Q. Do you like it?

A. [a slight pause] Pretty well. I like working with other people. More when they appreciate my help, which they mostly do. Of course, I like it better some days than others. In hot season, it’s cooler out on the water than on land – though the suit does make me warmer than I’d be otherwise. Cold season, that can get, well, cold, suit or no suit. And I get pretty tired by the end of the day. But it’s better than being bored. [another pause] Not that I’m never bored.

Q. Do you picture yourself doing anything different, later in your life?

A. [scuffs a hind foot in the sand] I’d like to see more of the world, someday, somehow. I hear stories – mainly from the Weesah peddler who comes here – and I want to see for myself whether they’re true, and what other stories might be out there waiting to be found.

[someone calls Honnu’s name from a nearby dwelling]

I’d better go. Chores, like I said. It was nice talking to you. If you want to come with me, you could maybe stay for dinner. The peddler brought sausages, and we’ll be having a campfire.

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(Preorder links: Amazon and other retailers.)

Yup, another excerpt from upcoming SF novel WATER TO WATER

How many excerpts can I extract from my October 17th release, WATER TO WATER, and still avoid spoilers? We'll find out!

This one is from Chapter 3.

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Terrill was almost home.

They would be home too soon. A bleak prospect, that. Da would be gone; and everyone would be talking about him, on and on. And Terrill would have to take on some new role, whatever it might be, or whatever his family might decide it should be.

It could be a long time before he went anywhere again.

The pain of giving up the journey he would have made with the friends of his year, the joyful adventure that he would never experience, pierced him afresh, a pang as cold as the season to come.

And this cold season, Da would not be there building up the fire, or draping a blanket over Ma as she slept, or preparing the garden for its coming nap. Terrill would never again see him come in from the garden, smelling of soil and fresh air, rubbing his hands together to warm them, spreading the dirt on them in the process.

A scene he had forgotten — that he had wanted to forget — came back to him, as clearly if he had remembered it over and over. He was very young. His father’s mother had been sick, moving slowly, not talking much; and then she had gone away, hugging him as tightly as she still could, and Da had gone with her. And after a long time, more days than Terrill could count yet, Da had come home again. He had come through the door, and looked around, stared around, as if everything had become strange and different while he was gone. It had scared Terrill enough to make him cry.

What would it be like for Terrill to walk through that door, with his father gone?

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(Here's the Amazon preorder link and a Universal Buy Link for preorders at some other retailers.)

Character Interview -- Kititit the Weesah peddler

It's time for you all to meet some of Water to Water's characters.

Kititit, the Weesah peddler, is what you might call an important secondary character. Look hard enough at something that happens, and you might see his long fingers stirring around in it. And I, for one, find him entertaining. Here's an interview with Kititit.

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Q. How did you become a peddler?

A. Well, now. That’s a ways to think back . . . . When I was a young sprout, we had a neighbor who was a peddler, wagon and all. I thought her wagon was about the prettiest thing I’d ever seen, all painted up as it was. And she used to let me help load the goods in the back – leastways, helping is what she called it. Getting in the way is what I’d call it, remembering. And when she’d been away and came home again, she always had stories to tell about the places she’d been. I’d never been anywhere, and I got to hankering after a life like she had.

Q. Your wagon – did it used to be your neighbor’s?

A. Right you are! Though by the time she figured she was ready to stay home and play with her grandchildren and take it easy, the wagon was what you might call used up – the canopy, anyway. My folks gave me a new one, and I picked what to paint on it.

Q. You have a mate and children, I hear. How have you managed to strike a balance between traveling and family life?

A. Well, I don’t have just any mate. I made sure to find a lady as liked to hear stories. I promised to always bring back plenty of stories. And she’s an independent sort – doesn’t need someone at her elbow all the time, telling her how to do things. A mate as hung around every day might get annoying for such as her. So we suit each other. And the longer I’m away, the longer I stay home and do my bit with the young ‘uns and the beasts and the garden and all. And now that some of our young ‘uns are grown, she has plenty of help when she needs it.

Q. You’re acquainted with Terrill and Honnu, I believe. How did that come about?

A. I’ve known Honnu a good piece of his life, I’d say. I visit a few different fisher villages, and he lives – or lived, I’m not sure which is right just now – in one of ‘em. I was the first Weesah he ever saw, I reckon, and how he would stare! Anyhow, he’s a curious fellow and always likes to hear my traveler’s tales.

Q. That brings up an interesting point. Aren’t you somewhat given to exaggeration in those tales of yours? Should Honnu believe everything you say?

A. (laughs) No, I can’t say as he should. But I reckon he knows that. Now, I wouldn’t say he knows just what to believe and what not to. But if he ever asked me, serious-like, I’d tell him.

Q. And Terrill? How did you meet him?

A. That was luck, if luck is something that happens, as to which I’ve no firm opinion. His da took ill, and Terrill was one of the funeral party as took him to the sea. I left Honnu’s village about the time they left to head home again, and we got to talking on the road. A nice young fellow. On the serious side, and tending to worry more than is comfortable for a youngster his age. I did my bit to cheer him up, when I could.

Q. And how did Terrill and Honnu meet each other?

A. (chuckles) Well, I’ll maybe let you ask one of them about that. I’d best be packing up and heading on, pretty soon. Any last questions? Or might you be wanting something from the wagon before I go? I’ve got some good knives I picked up a few towns back. Or if you’ve little ones at home, I have toys -- balls for juggling, and these dolls. See the bits of shell that make up the armor? And of course, I have fish. Always plenty of fish.

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You can preorder Water to Water on Amazon and elsewhere.

Another excerpt from upcoming SF novel WATER TO WATER

Time for another short excerpt from my upcoming SF novel, Water to Water? Why not? After all, the book is now up for preorders on Amazon and elsewhere :-).

This one is from Chapter 2. Terrill, a young member of the Vushlu species who has just watched his father's death ritual, is on the way homeward.

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Terrill should spend this time remembering his father, calling up all the memories he wanted to preserve. What was his earliest memory of Da?

His earliest memory of any kind . . . he would have liked a more pleasant one. Someone had smacked his hand, on the unarmored palm, for making some mess or other. But he couldn’t remember who had done it. It wouldn’t have been Da, not for such a young child making a mess. Ma, maybe, in a moment of exasperation. Or his uncle, visiting.

Terrill might have been a couple of years older the time Da gave him a ride, telling him to put his arms around Da’s torso and hold tight, Terrill’s baby legs splayed wide across Da’s broad back. Da had put just a little bounce in his gait, enough to be thrilling, but not enough to loosen Terrill’s clasped hands . . . .

What arose next was from a few years later, but still from childhood. A hot day, the hottest so far that year, with the end of the season seeming forever away. Da going from creek to creek to find the coolest one, and pouring a bucket of almost-cold water all over Terrill, Terrill gasping in pleasure and relief . . . .

Another memory, very different, almost as far back: Terrill standing outside, watching the sky colors shift from day to night, wondering if the sky looked the same everywhere, even in the far-off cities where his older siblings wanted to go. He had turned to go back inside and only then seen Da, walking back and forth, slowly, in the road a few paces away, his shoulders slumped, a posture Terrill could not remember having seen before. Something was wrong, and Terrill had no idea what it was. He had never had the courage to ask about it.

He would never know.

Excerpts from upcoming SF novel WATER TO WATER

My SF novel Water to Water is due out on October 17th, so it's high time I posted an excerpt.

Well, more than one, really. First, you'll need this bit from the Preface to understand the excerpts proper.

Nitpicky note (for all the excerpts): the formatting here is not identical to either the ebook's or the paperback's.

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When a Vushlu reaches the age of adulthood, its family, or if it has none, respected community members, take it to the ocean. Traditionally, it will never have been there before, unless its family catches sea creatures for a living. Often many families will travel together, a pilgrimage of celebration.

On its last day of life, a Vushlu swims out to sea, or if too weak to swim, wades in and lets the waves carry it. The ocean swallows its front legs, its rear legs, its back, its torso, its arms, its shoulders, and finally its head. Immersion in the water softens its living armor, its exoskeleton, until the plates sheet off and wash away, followed by the soft flesh within.

No Vushlu has ever returned to its home with this process incomplete. But Vushla splashed with seawater report no pain.

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Now for the first Actual Excerpt, a short one. This comes early in Chapter 1, and introduces us to Honnu, one of two major Vushla characters.

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Honnu squatted by the campfire, all four legs comfortably sunk in the sand, his lower armor sealed tight to keep sand out, and watched the procession approach the sea. It was a small group, with only one young Vushlu among the older ones. A funeral, then. The young one must be the son or daughter of the Vushlu, aging or ailing, whose funeral it was.

Honnu turned away before the group reached the edge of the water. He knew, of course, what would happen, but he had no wish to watch. After all, he lived with the ocean, lived from it, rode out every day to toss the nets and haul them back. He and his family depended on the ocean. But he often thought he must feel like a farmer with a very, very large and powerful bull. Such a useful animal — it sired strong beasts like itself, and it pulled plows through earth too sticky for pull-cycles. But it could, any time it chose to, trample the farmer into jelly. The farmer could hope that the bull would never turn on its master. Honnu lived with the certain knowledge that one day, the ocean would reveal itself as the largest possible beast, and devour him whole.

No, he had no need to watch it happen to others, not when he would be paddling the boat out again tomorrow morning.

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Here's one more excerpt, a longer one. It starts shortly after the first, and switches partway through from Honnu's POV to that of Kititit, a visiting peddler. (Kititit is a Weesah, not a Vushlu. The two species' anatomy differ substantially, a fact to which Honnu makes a passing reference.)

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The last taste of dinner was fading from Honnu’s mouth. Even food was different when the peddler came. This very night, around this same fire, they had roasted and eaten plump sausages spitting with juice, made from some crawling creature that pushed through underbrush and rooted in the earth of far-off forests.

Honnu stretched his arms and upper body to soak in the warmth of the fire, welcome as the end of hot season brought cooler night breezes. Which of the peddler’s tales might actually be true? Honnu had never traveled farther than the nearest market town — far enough away from the shore that the sea could not be seen, but not too far for its smell to carry, competing with the smell of the fish he sold and the pastries and spices and flowers in the stalls all around him. Were there really trees so tall that a Vushlu would have to rear back on its hind legs and lean against something sturdy in order to see the tops? Did mountains soar even higher? Did rivers of water pour out of those mountains? Did the mountains rise above the air itself, so that the air strained and grew thin, and one could look down and see the thicker air below? Did fountains of fire leap up from hidden places to consume travelers? Did birds, glowing as bright as any fire, swarm over the fields in springtime, keeping farmers from sowing seed until the birds had flown away? Did a species of giants, giants who never came near the ocean, giants with two legs and two arms like the Weesah but each limb twice as thick as a Weesah’s trunk, raise beasts for farmers, never leaving their ranches, requiring farmers to come to them? Were there places where the sky was always red, and others where the sky was always black?

Honnu’s family must know the answers to those questions, or to some of them, but his aunt never wanted to talk about it, and his grandfather changed his story from one time to the next, and his mother said none of it was true. Honnu refused to believe that.

Unless he found a way to go see for himself, he would never know.

Now he heard sounds of movement and conversation, and tires pushing through sand. The procession must be leaving, with one of its members gone forever into the sea. They would probably not go very far in the dark. There was an inn serving such travelers in the market town. But by morning, they would be on their way back to wherever they came from. To one of the many, many places Honnu had never seen.

 * * * * *

Kititit looked at different Vushla in turn as he told the story about buying a beast from a giant and tricking the fellow into lowering the price. The Vushla’s armor mostly left their faces bare, so you could see them drink the story in, especially the young ones. All right, maybe his mate’s uncle’s cousin wasn’t exactly a giant, but he was big enough that none of his neighbors gave him any backtalk. Kititit had come out of that exchange well enough to enjoy bragging about it, even if he did embellish the details a bit for effect.

It was a fine way to spend an evening. It would have been, even if the breeze hadn’t been a trifle nippy. He’d always liked campfires, but he particularly enjoyed them in villages like this. Vushlu armor wasn’t exactly reflective, but almost, enough to catch the firelight and play with it a bit. And while he always liked the smell of a campfire, it mingled especially nicely with the unique tangy smell of the sea. As for the traces of fish odor, he didn’t mind them. He did wonder, looking around at the Vushla, how much of it all they could smell with those small holes in their faces. His big mesh-covered nostrils had to do a better job, unless they somehow didn’t.

He caught the fisher lad’s eye for just a moment before the lad looked away. A bit shy, that one, but with thirsty ears, always soaking in whatever story Kititit chose to tell. Kititit’s oldest son had been like that, when he was a good bit younger. And when the boy and his sister had come with Kititit on his journeys, there had been plenty of time for telling tales.

Naturally the boy, or rather the proud young father, had started staying home now that he had a mate and little ones. And Kititit’s daughter, once proud to be included, had lately been more like willing. A good-hearted lass, ready to help her father in case he was too old and feeble to handle things alone; but it was time for her to live in the center of her own life, and Kititit to go back to how he used to travel, enjoying his own and the beast’s company.

Still, it was nice to have a youngster or two around the campfire.

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Well, what do you think? Want more? The ebook, and possibly the paperback, will be available for preorder on Amazon if their website starts cooperating just a little better. Stay tuned!

Cover reveal for my next release!

I've been vacillating about when to do a cover reveal on this (much neglected) blog, but the time has come. I'm thrilled to show off the cover that Damonza did for my upcoming novel Water to Water.

Here is my (tentative) teaser for the book.

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Two young Vushla questioned what everyone knew about death. What should they do with the answer?

When the time comes for Vushla to die, they go into the ocean and are dissolved away. Or so Terrill has always believed, and still believes after accompanying his father on the latter’s final journey. But after meeting another young Vushlu, Terrill must confront new information that calls this fundamental belief into question. Will the two of them discover the truth? And what should they do with what they find?

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If all goes well, the book will be out on October 17, 2018.

One more poem -- this time, a curse (general issue)

For my probably-last poem post, here's one with no autobiographical aspect. I particularly wanted to point that out because the poem is, as the title indicates, a curse (in the ill-wishing sense). The final lines may suggest a spurned lover, but could cover other situations. Feel free to recite it at any enemies you may acquire.

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Curse

May your blood boil by night,

and freeze by day . . .

May the passing of clouds across the sky

be to you

as nails dragged shrieking

across flat dry stone . . .

May the trees whisper soft nightmares

as you shivering pass by . . .

May the moon’s light be blinding

and the sunlight

dim . . .

May you know no more piece

than I

and may you never forget me.

Even more serious - poem about a murder, plus some backstory

I went to Stanford University for my undergrad degree (English and American literature). I liked spending time in the Memorial Church, enjoying the quiet, looking at the impressive stained glass windows. (You can see photos of the windows at this link.)

One night, when I'd been visiting the church again, I tried to leave and discovered I'd been locked in. The minister had failed to notice me when he locked up and left. This was long before cell phones, and there was no pay phone anywhere I could see in the accessible area. After a while, however, the minister came back for something, found me, and let me out.

I believe it was a couple of days later that a girl was stabbed to death in the church at night. As you can imagine, what would have struck me as tragic and shocking in any event had an extra impact, given my recent experience.

So I wrote this poem. The imagery refers to several of the windows.

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On the Murder in Memorial Church

Strange impotence:

stained glass night-frozen,

unable to beam

its pictured Salvation;

Jesus the healer,

caught trapped in a corner;

Christus crying into the darkness,

take this cup away! –

the Agony presiding

invisibly helpless;

unillumined, the desperate

disciples

will drown.

Another, more serious poem, siding with Lot's wife

Here's another post about my decades-old poetry, recently unearthed.

I can only remember writing two poems with Biblical subjects, and one -- re Job -- is hiding somewhere. But here is the other, untitled but basically siding with Lot's wife rather than Lot.

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When Lot’s wife

turned to salt from grief;

her posture proclaiming,

I will be a dry monument to tears,

her protest,

I give not my leaving to this, God;

Lot

stood

stunned

still

Lot looked up

The Lord rumbled faintly

Lot looked down

Salt crystals gathered at his feet

Lot

looked up

looked down

and proceeded on,

careful not

to look round.

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Next time, a poem with a truly serious theme -- murder.

Well, I used to write poetry . . . (first of several)

I started out -- no later than age nine -- wanting to be a novelist. I wrote my first novel-of-sorts at age ten. But I didn't write my second until after I turned 55. What, if anything, did I write in the meantime?

Well, first I tried poetry. I kept at it through high school and the beginning of college. Later in college, I tried short stories, until I let myself be discouraged as to all creative writing by a stunningly clueless teaching associate. For decades, all I did was jot down a line or two of potential poetry once every blue moon. Then, while I was pregnant with Daughter #1, I started writing picture book manuscripts. Fast forward seventeen years or so, and I followed that daughter into National Novel Writing Month (aka NaNoWriMo or NaNo) -- and the rest, if not history, is a total of eight novels with two more in the pipeline.

But back to poetry.

Recently, pondering the awe-inspiring bad luck of a friend, I was reminded of a poem I wrote long ago about Job (as in the Biblical figure). I dug up a folder of my poetry and looked for it. I didn't find it, but I did find a few others I liked enough to bring into the light of day.

Here's the first, one of the lightest in tone. I believe I wrote this during or after my high school physics class. If I were writing it today, the title might include the word "nerd."

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Love Song

Every mass
has an attraction for every other mass
which varies as the inverse square
of the distance between them.
That is,
if you allow me
to decrease the radius of my orbit
you will find me
increasingly attractive.

I wish to
race toward you at ever-increasing speed
(known as acceleration)
(which, times my mass,
which is constant,
would become the force with which I would
collide with you,
hopefully
"knocking you off your feet")
until we engage in
a perfectly inelastic collision
(in which the two bodies concerned
collide and
stick.)

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And yes, I know the punctuation at the end is incorrect, but it works better that way.

Here's one more, untitled, frivolous and fanciful.

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The conductor and the violinist
are near each other.
Bow and baton
time after time
come perilously close.
Will they cross swords?
The conductor looks angry.
We can expect a duel
any minute.

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Next time, a poem or two with more emotional heft behind them.

The Dangers that Grow in the Dark

I've been pondering the very unwelcome news that the candidate running closest to Senator Dianne Feinstein in California's primary (which does not separate out Democratic and Republican candidates) is Patrick Little, an unabashed anti-Semite whose rhetoric would make Adolf Hitler purr in his grave. I'm trying to explain it to myself, since I don't believe either that a large number of Americans actively hate Jews or that Californians are significantly more inclined toward such hatred. I've had a few thoughts on what might be going on.

What came to mind first were some memories from my youth. I'm not ancient enough to have seen the movie Reefer Madness when it first came out (in 1936), but for much of my life, there have been teachers and government officials doing their best to convince young people that marijuana was highly addictive and wildly dangerous. And for much of my life, young people have looked around at their weed-smoking friends, or at their weed-smoking selves, and observed that these claims were largely invalid. Some of them almost certainly overgeneralized from this observation and concluded that all claims about the dangers of illegal drugs were just killjoy hokum. (Indeed, some of those other claims were grossly exaggerated -- but not all.) How much better young people would have been served by open, accurate discussion of the effects and qualities of various drugs.

Then there's the perennial problem of kids with insufficient accurate information about sex learning about sex from other kids. How many pregnancies and STDs have resulted?

Finally, and most controversially these days, we have the issues of ethnic, religious, and gender differences. It's a rare and brave soul who dares to discuss crime statistics concerning different ethnic groups and ask whether social and cultural factors have anything to do with those statistics. Or to point out that the male/female distinction, though far from all-encompassing and inadequate to describe some individuals and conditions, has a fundamental basis in Terran biology, and to ask whether such a fundamental distinction might indeed have some correlates in human psychology and behavior.

What difficulties might result from the prohibition on these last areas of discourse? Well, when open discussion is loudly declared to be taboo, and when well-informed, well-meaning, rational people yield to that prohibition, who's going to be left standing and talking? The haters, that's who. The actual haters, not those who for fear of that label have fallen silent. And who will be left listening? Those who resent political taboos but themselves know little about, e.g., ethnic groups outside their own acquaintance.

When speech is suppressed, many will admire anyone who defies that suppression, little as a particular defiant individual may deserve admiration. When people are berated or threatened for discussing such questions as whether a disproportionate percentage of Muslims embrace religiously motivated violence, some of those people will be more ready to believe slanderous claims about other religious groups, including Jews. And the woefully inadequate teaching of history in this country, lo these many years, fails to provide an antidote to such slanders.

It has always been a core American value that the answer to false speech is true speech, not suppression of speech -- even if laws and lawmakers have not always kept that in mind. And the consequences of suppressing speech show us the wisdom of that maxim. The candidacy of Patrick Little should provide a loud and alarming wake-up call.

Appropriate Census Questions and the Fourteenth Amendment

As often happens, I am posting what my husband could post in more detail, had he the time and inclination.

There is much agitation at present about the plan to add a question to the census concerning citizenship status. This is not a new idea. In 1950, every household was asked about citizenship. For much of the time since then, the long form census questionnaire (received by a smaller sample) included the question as well. However, that history doesn't answer the question of whether asking about citizenship is constitutionally appropriate. (What, we're supposed to consider the Constitution in figuring what questions belong in the census? Well, yes, since our federal government is supposed to exercise only enumerated powers, quaint as that restriction seems to many.)

Before the Fourteenth Amendment, the language of Article I, section 2 provided that "Representatives  . . . shall be apportioned among the several States . . . according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons . . . three fifths of all other Persons." It went on to prescribe the schedule for "the actual Enumeration." Note the use of the term "persons," and the inclusion of three-fifths of the number of slaves, who were obviously not voting citizens.

The Fourteenth Amendment, section 2, replaced this language with the following: "Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State . . . ." We're still counting persons, not citizens. It went on, however, into new territory: "But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial Officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, shall be denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State." (The Nineteenth and Twenty-Sixth Amendments extended the right to vote to female citizens and citizens eighteen to twenty years old, respectively.) There is no mention of, and hence no change in, the language setting out the schedule for counting "persons," aka the census. It seems a logical inference that, since the new language requires knowing how many citizens with the franchise there are in the state as well as which of those citizens are being prevented from voting, the census is the appropriate tool to find that out. Based on those numbers, a state that prevents citizens entitled to vote from voting should find its number of members in the House of Representatives cut back in proportion to those so prevented.

It is thus not only appropriate, but necessary that the census, while continuing to count "persons" resident in the states, also count citizens entitled to vote, and quite possibly inquire whether any of those citizens have been unlawfully barred from the polls.

Masterpiece Cakes case and freedom of and establishment of religion

Opening clarification: I have not the slightest objection to same-sex marriage and hope to attend one, co-starring my daughter, someday.

Reading live blog accounts of the Masterpiece Cakes argument at the U.S. Supreme Court, it seemed (though not having attended, I could certainly be wrong) that there was insufficient exploration of two First Amendment issues other than free speech: freedom of religion and, especially, establishment of religion.

If the state may say that only those whose religion accepts same-sex marriage may practice certain professions, isn't that not only an infringement of the freedom to practice some religions, but a broad-brush state establishment of religion via exclusion of some religions?

Those arguing on the baker's behalf, I got the impression, did not defend the right of a makeup artist or hair stylist to decline same-sex wedding business. But, as Justice Kennedy suggested out in a complex-cake hypothetical, actually needing to be present at a service is different from selling a product or providing a service months and miles away. Would Oregon allow a makeup artist or hair stylist to say, "I am not available for on-site services for same-sex weddings -- you must come to my shop and then travel to the wedding venue"? I have my doubts.

What about a Muslim hair stylist who believes that no woman, or at least no woman claiming to be Muslim, should appear in public in front of men outside her family with her hair showing? Can she be compelled to provide her services to a woman self-identifying as Muslim who intends to be married in the middle of Harvard Square with her husband's frat buddies as his attendants and all sorts of male strangers walking past? If so, is the state infringing on her freedom of religion and/or establishing less restrictive forms of Islam over more restrictive ones?

Feel free to discuss these issues in the comments.

Book release! -- and the book's dedication

As promised, here's my It's Here! post about The Link, my fourth near-future and first YA novel. (I'm posting it a few hours early after an Internet connection scare.)

First, the back cover copy.

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Kayla knows whatever her dog knows -- but neither knows enough.

The neural connection between Kayla and her dog seems unimportant, until her father's cryptic message.

Your mother and I are in danger, and I'm afraid that means you are too. I've gone into hiding. Don't try to find me unless I contact you, and don't let Saffi find me. You and Saffi should go too. Go and hide together.

Kayla doesn't really trust her father. After all, he left her mother and dragged Kayla off to live in the country. And when Kayla's mother gave her Saffi, her father somehow won the dog's loyalty.

But Kayla can't reach her mother. She has to decide, on her own, what to do. Should she hide in the forest with Saffi? Should she try to find her father? And what danger threatens?

-----

I posted the cover yesterday, but I'm quite fond of it, so here it is again.

You can find two excerpts from The Link via links in yesterday's post on this blog.

This book arose directly from my dog-walking duties. I'm usually the one walking our dog, a "Heinz 57" mutt. Here's a photo of her.

Of course, she sniffs one spot after another after another. And of course, I have no idea what she's learning from all those sniffs. At some point, I wished I could see a digital readout of what she's smelling, floating in the air above her. Well, that isn't exactly what happens in my book, but the idea inspired the technology involved.

Finally, I wanted to address the dedication and the publication date, which are related.

I published several earlier books on my older daughter's birthday, October 15th, in recognition of the fact that her participation in National Novel Writing Month led to my finally writing a novel, some decades after I gave up on that ambition. I decided to release this book on October 30th, my late father's birthday. The book isn't autobiographical, and my amazing father (about whom I posted yesterday) isn't much like my protagonist Kayla's father; but he's a father, and he made me think about mine. This is my dad's first birthday since he died last April, and I wanted to mark the occasion and to honor him. So the book is coming out on his birthday and is dedicated to him as well.

I love you, Charley Wyle.

You can find the ebook on Amazon, iTunes, Google Play, and eventually at other retailers including Kobo and the Nook Store. The paperback is on Amazon and Barnes & Noble (where, as of 10-29-17, it was marked down quite a bit!).

Happy reading, all!

About my dad, who would have been 95 tomorrow

I thought I'd blogged about my father before, but I can't find any such post. So I'm posting what I said at his memorial last April.

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All of you know that my dad was a remarkable man. And for a little guy, he leaves an enormous hole.

The difference between his physical size and the size of his impact on those around him can be illustrated by what happened when he started to cut back on his workaholic schedule, before the illness that forced him to retire at age 80. Ismeca, the Swiss company for which he was a consultant, started looking for someone to perform some of the many tasks they’d been relying on Dad to perform. They said they were looking for a “little Charley.”

My dad’s combination of intelligence, resourcefulness, courage, and self-discipline made him particularly good in a crisis. Some crises required more of one quality, some more of another. One that required his courage and self-discipline occurred when he was in Basic Training in the Army. They were camping in or near Death Valley, with sleeping bags in the desert – no tents. He awoke quite a while before reveille one morning to discover that a rattlesnake had cuddled up to him for warmth during the night. He knew that if he moved in a way that startled the snake, he might get bitten. So he lay motionless for two hours until someone noticed that Carl Weihrauch was late getting up.

I remember another crisis that called on different qualities. Many of you know that my brother David had serious psychiatric problems at times. One day when David was living on his own in Berkeley, he called my folks in L.A., or they called him, and it quickly became clear that something was seriously wrong, that he had suffered a psychotic break. Calmly and casually, without missing a beat, Dad said, “You know, I’m going to be in Berkeley this afternoon. Should I stop by?” Then he flew north and got David the psychiatric care he needed.

Another of Dad’s defining qualities was his special brand of determined optimism. He used to tell an anecdote about a man who somehow offended a king and was sentenced to death for it. The man, apparently glib of tongue, managed to convince the king that if he were only spared, he could teach the king’s horse to talk. The king postponed the sentence for a year to allow for these lessons. Afterward, a friend asked the man what good this postponement would do. The man replied: “A year is a long time! Anything can happen in a year. I may die; or the king may die; or the horse may talk!” Another example: one of Dad’s favorite books was the children’s picture book Ferdinand. Ferdinand was a bull who had no interest in fighting and just liked to sit and smell the flowers. When he sat on a bee, his reaction appeared so ferocious that he was chosen for a major bullfight. When he arrived in the ring, surrounded by finely dressed ladies with flowers in their hair, he sat down and smelled, refusing all efforts to make them home. In the improbable conclusion my father loved,
“they had to take Ferdinand home.
And for all I know he is sitting there still, under his favorite
cork tree, smelling the flowers just quietly.”

I could go on for far too long telling Charley stories, from his boyhood in Berlin to his Army days during the invasion of Europe to his business career to his many years of political involvement. You’ll hear a few of those stories from others.

Dad changed over the years, of course, in obvious and unimportant ways. He stopped dancing the kazatska. His vision, never great, got worse. And instead of striding along briskly, arms swinging, head tilted a little to one side, he moved slowly, bent over, with a cane. But he never lost his sense of humor, his generosity, his commitment to civil liberties and social justice, his good cheer, or his indomitable spirit.

I count myself as exceptionally fortunate to have had this stalwart, honest, forthright, moral, modest, bright, funny, loving man as a parent and role model – and to have had him, not long enough, but for so long.

Did I somehow miss posting a cover reveal for tomorrow's book release?

Well, let me remedy that omission forthwith! Here is the cover of the near-future YA novel coming out on Monday, October 30th.

Cover designer David Leek and I collaborated on the cover, but the principal design work was all his.

I've already posted two excerpts (here and here).

Expect another post tomorrow, including the back cover copy and how the book came to exist (hint: I'm the one who walks our dog).

When a Change in Routine Proves Deadly: Children Left in Hot Cars

I'm not writing this post to gratuitously share my horror that children are sometimes accidentally left to die in closed cars on warm or hot days. I write, rather, in the hope that by sharing what I've read about how these tragedies occur, I just might reduce the chance of another.

Parents who leave children in cars for prolonged periods aren't necessarily thoughtless, irresponsible, neglectful, or uncaring parents. But like the rest of us, they are creatures of habit. Few of us drive to work consciously keeping track of the distance to the first right turn, or reminding ourselves to drive 3 and a half miles past the bridge before crossing the railroad tracks. We do these things automatically, as part of our daily routine. Working parents with children in day care include dropping off the child as part of such a routine. A common thread in many heartrending accounts is the departure from the usual way of delivering a child to the day care center, or Grandma's house, or wherever the child is supposed to spend the day. A parent who routinely drives straight to work is instead assigned the task of taking the child somewhere first.

The problem, the terrible stumbling block, is that making the single decision to do something differently may not be enough to overcome the force of routine. A few minutes after the child has been tucked into a car seat, the parent can fall back into the automatic sequence of usual events. If the child falls asleep or is otherwise quiet, and especially if the parent has work-related matters on his or her mind, s/he may drive to work, lock the car, and head on in without remembering the child was ever in the car. It may take a frantic phone call to flood the parent's mind with recollection. And that call may come too late.

What can a parent do to prevent such an irrevocable mistake? There are a few approaches that might help. Don't reassign the job of taking the child to day care from one parent to the other unless absolutely necessary. See if someone reliable with no morning routine is available to step in instead. If not, tape a prominent note to the dashboard near the steering wheel, a potentially lifesaving variant on "Baby on Board." If feasible, arrange for someone to call the parent who's taking the child as soon as that parent gets to work, confirming that all went as planned -- and then the parent should go back to the car and make sure.

It may be too much to hope that we've heard the last such story. But we can hope not to hear as many, or as soon.

Another excerpt from early in The Link

        One more excerpt, which I'll cruelly (or kindly, if you hate spoilers) cut off just before revealing crucial information.

        ---------

Dad left it up to Kayla whether to stay home sick. He knew she had no great objection to going to school, given how little else there was to do hereabouts during school hours. So when she woke up with a scratchy throat, or rather, failed to wake up very thoroughly, her head foggy and her arms and legs heavy, she fumbled to her father’s desk and scrawled a note on the edge of the paper with the strange haiku. Making her way back to bed, she noted Saffi’s absence. Her guess must be correct: Saffi must make her way, or be summoned, to Dad’s side while Saffi slept. It would be easy, either way: Kayla slept with her door closed and the dog outside it. Before crawling back into bed, she connected with Saffi, expecting to confirm her guess; but Saffi was noticing only the high-pitched squeal of mice in the walls, communicating beyond the range of human hearing. She would have to remember to tell Dad about the mice.

When Kayla woke up again, a good deal better and very hungry, she saw by the light outside her window that she had slept through half the afternoon. She checked in with Saffi and found her restless and unhappy. Had Dad ignored her while Kayla slept?

Now that Kayla was awake, Saffi wanted her to do something. Saffi wanted Dad, even more than usual, and Kayla was supposed to make him appear, apparently. Kayla disconnected. “Sorry, mutt. Not until I eat something.”

Dad had gone shopping before he headed off wherever. The pantry and refrigerator were as full as she had ever seen them, and a loaf of bread — the good stuff with seeds in it — and a bag of apples sat on the kitchen counter. She rooted around in the fridge and freezer, putting together something of a feast, and dug in.

When she had made her way through all the food and done some minimal cleanup, she connected to Kayla and headed out back. “All right, let’s see if he’s out in the workshop.” Though the dog would have looked for him there — but she may as well rule it out.

As she expected, the workshop was empty. Saffi nosed around, whining. She stopped and sniffed closer at the low bench by the door, identifying traces of metal and cloth and dirt. What did that add up to?

Saffi did not want to leave the workshop — at least, not to go back to the house. She pointed toward the woods, whining again. The urge filling her was so specific it was almost verbal. She wanted to Find.

“No, Saffi. I’m not feeling that much better. This is not the time for a trek through the woods, chasing Dad. Come!”

Back at the house, she went back to bed with a pile of books, the childhood favorites with which she indulged herself when under the weather, and called Jean. “Yeah, I felt like crud and took the day off. . . . I might be contagious, but if I am, you’re already doomed. . . . Of course we have homework. No, I don’t want to see it, but I’d better. Thanks. See you soon.” She’d left the door unlocked; Jean could let herself in. Kayla picked up Where the Wild Things Are, then hesitated. Dad had read that book to her, often. So had Mom, sometimes. She looked at the next book in the pile, then shook her head a little, opened the book in her hand, and settled back in bed to read.

She awoke from a doze to Jean’s cheerful greeting and Saffi’s surge of recognition. Apparently Kayla’s sleeping hadn’t kept Saffi from staying somewhat alert. Kayla hauled herself back out of bed and waved Jean toward the kitchen. “We’ve got tons of food for a change. Grab something.”

Jean picked up an apple, dug in her backpack for the homework sheet, and tossed it to Kayla. (They used paper for homework assignments here. Her classmates back home would have died laughing.)

What was Saffi going on about? She was nosing Jean’s backpack, looking back toward the back door and the workshop and back at the backpack. Kayla could sense nothing clearer than a contradictory sense of “same/not same.”

Jean’s backpack, more of a knapsack, was made of a sturdy canvas, not too different from the fabric of Dad’s backpack. But Dad’s had a frame, with a place to fasten a sleeping bag.

Saffi barked, almost a yelp, just as Kayla pictured the backpack. Jean looked baffled; Kayla looked into Saffi’s eyes. “That’s what you were smelling? Dad’s backpack?”

What had Dad been doing with it? And where was it now?

And where was he?

Saffi’s nervousness, her insistence that something was wrong, would have infected Kayla even without the link. Connected, it was close to unbearable. Kayla disconnected, but now Jean was in league with the dog. “What’s wrong, sweetie? Can you show us?”

“Now you’ve done it,” Kayla muttered. As if seizing Jean’s suggestion, Saffi headed to the back door and butted it with her nose. “All right, all right, we’ll go out there! Maybe you’ll find something.”

Saffi shot out the door and headed for a patch of dirt, rough as if recently disturbed. At once she started digging, the dark dirt flying to both sides behind her. Kayla looked into the rapidly growing hole and saw something off-white about half a meter down.

Fetch! But Saffi had already seized the edge of the object in her teeth and was tugging it gently, pulling it loose. As soon as she had freed it, she hustled over to Kayla and held it up near Kayla’s hand. It was a piece of paper, the paper Dad used to print his woodcut proofs, folded over and over, folded small.

Kayla took the paper and hid it in her hand, feeling foolish and frightened at the same time. “Let’s go back in the house.”

As soon as the three of them, girls and dog, had crossed the threshold, Kayla locked the door and threw the bolt. She made her way shakily to the kitchen and sank into a chair, silently waving Jean to another. Then she opened the paper. It was crammed with writing, writing smaller than her father liked to write, squeezed in and hard to read.

Don’t tell anyone what I tell you here, unless you must.

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For the rest of the message, you'll have to wait until the book comes out in October. :-)

An excerpt from Chapter 1 of my upcoming YA near-future novel, The Link

Appropriately enough, I'm posting an excerpt from The Link in order to have a link to share with prospective reviewers. . . .

But first, the cover!

Here's the beginning of Chapter 1.

        -----

Saffi snored, her side rising and falling with the rhythm of the soft snorts, her tail draped over the end of the couch. Kayla, perched on the other end, dug away at the chunk of wood in her hand, trying to copy the way the dog flowed into the furniture.

Kayla’s friend Jean sat back in the armchair, feet up on the handmade table. She waved a hand at Saffi and asked, “Can you link to her when she’s sleeping?”

“I’ve done that.” Kayla’s mouth twitched. “It’s hard to stay awake.”

“What’s it like when she dreams?”

Kayla shrugged. “It’s not as cool as you might think. Her dreams are pretty — ordinary. She’s smelling stuff, or she’s running in the woods, or whatever.” Though all those smells, so many all around, and so strong — that was still a long way from ordinary.

“There she goes!” Jean pointed. Kayla craned over to look. Sure enough, Saffi’s eyelids were twitching with the motions of REM sleep. Jean looked up at Kayla with big, pretty-please eyes. Kayla shrugged again, but gave the subvocal command that opened her neural connection to the dog.

There were, of course, no words; not even what she would call thoughts. Instead, Kayla sensed curiosity, then growing interest and concentration on a familiar scent. Slow-moving prey.

Kayla laughed. “A possum! She’s dreaming she found a possum out back.” She broke the connection and went back to her carving.

Jean leaned forward and studied the carving, the dog, and the carving again. “That’s pretty good. How did you learn to whittle, anyway?”

“Dad taught me. I guess he learned from someone around here — a neighbor, I think.”

“He taught you other stuff, didn’t he? I mean —” Jean grinned. “You’re not half as clueless as most city kids.”

Kayla suppressed a sigh. How could she sum up all those hours in the woods with Dad, learning survival skills and woodcraft because that was what he had to teach and it gave them more time together? “Yeah. He showed me how to do a few things. Make a fire, tie knots, shoot, set traps, come in out of the rain.”

Jean mock-gasped. “Shoot, set traps? You mean you eat meat? And you from the city!”

Kayla smirked back. “Yup, even before we got this ferocious carnivore here.”

Jean got out of the chair and wandered over to the mantle over the fireplace, picking up the wooden bust in its center and running a finger along the short carved beard. “Did you do this one too? That’s your dad, right? It really looks like him.”

“Thanks.” Kayla could hear that she sounded sulky. That was hardly fair to Jean, who hadn’t meant to poke a sore spot. But Kayla remembered working long and hard on that carving, starting over twice, doing her best to capture her dad’s expression and the tilt of his head. And Dad had acted so happy and grateful. . . . The girl who had cared that much, who had put so much work into pleasing her father, seemed a stranger now.

She didn’t want to remember that girl. And she really didn’t want to miss her.

Jean might have picked up on Kayla’s mood; at least, she changed the subject, turning back toward Saffi and pointing back and forth between the dog and Kayla. “It’s a pretty sweet setup you have. At least, it seems that way to me. Your mom helped come up with the human-dog connection tech, didn’t she?”

“Yeah. My dad did too. He’s just as good at that tech stuff as Mom is, even if he ditched it to move back here.” Ditched his job at Edenar Corporation; and ditched Mom while he was at it.

“Was Saffi one of the first dogs to get hooked up? Did you get her as a puppy?”

Kayla shook her head to both questions. “She was already a year old or so. She had months of special training before we got her. Besides, they don’t want the customers having to deal with puppy craziness.” She found herself grinning. “What if they chewed their own shoes?”

Jean guffawed; Kayla went on. “We didn’t get her until Dad — decided to move. Mom thought having her would make the move easier on me. Not that it’s exactly worked out that way.”

Jean wrinkled her forehead as if to ask the obvious question. As if answering it, Saffi stirred, lifted her head, jumped to her feet on the couch, then started barking frantically. Jean stared at the dog. “What’s she on about?”

Kayla reconnected, then winced at the flood of excitement, the total joy, so much stronger and simpler than how she felt. “My dad’s home.”

Saffi leaped down from the couch and ran toward the door, then back a few steps toward Kayla, then toward the door again, over and over as if trying to pull Kayla along with her. But Kayla’s own feelings must be passing through the link: Saffi’s delight faded away, and she paused, her tail falling low.

Why spoil things for Saffi? Kayla disconnected; the dog looked at her for a moment, then ran off toward the door.

Soon Saffi was wriggling and whining in eagerness, her tail whirling in circles like a propeller, as Kayla’s father opened the door carrying a large wooden crate easily under one arm, a sack of groceries in the other.

------

A process peek from a writing workshop

I attended a workshop in world-building yesterday, and thought folks might be interested in my second-guessing as to how I came up with the contents of a writing exercise.

The author leading the workshop posited a world where the threat of frequent, serious flooding had been solved in some novel technological way, and what societal problems our chosen solution might pose. She gave us around fifteen minutes to write.

Here's what I wrote (very slightly tweaked for consistency and flow). After, I'll share my thoughts on where it came from.

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Jan slammed her Tiny Terry doll into the floor, then kicked it across the floor. The doll bounced off the wall, narrowly missing the baby's playpen. "I'm TIRED of staying inside! I want to go OUT!"

The baby started to wail. Robin scooped him up and carried him over to the wall. "Let's see what's going by! There's an eel -- that long wavy thing. See how it wiggles? And there, that's a scooter! Someone got careless, didn't they, honey?"

Jan, ignored, upped her volume. "I want to ride MY scooter! I want to go OUT!"

Robin clamped down on her urge to out-shriek her child, waiting for a gap between syllables to say at a reasonable volume, "You know it's going to be at least a week before we can go outside, even in our wetsuits. Too many big, pointy objects will be bobbing around. We just have to be patient--"

"I HATE being patient! I hate everything in this house! I hate how it smells! I hate Jake!!" She glared at the baby, who fortunately didn't notice, absorbed in watching the debris being carried past the house. Jan stomped on the floor, managing to produce only a dull thud, and opened her mouth for the coup de grace.

Robin sighed, answering what she knew came next. "But I love you, sweetie." And you can't possibly miss the smell of plants and earth more than I do.

Thwarted, Jan plopped down on the floor in a sullen huddle. The flotsam and jetsam continued to flow past, gliding smoothly over and around the ceiling and walls.

------

Someone else at the workshop had mentioned the idea of submerged dwellings, so I built on that, not being good at technological invention in less than a minute. I made my house out of resilient, waterproof, transparent material. Then I moved on to the societal problem -- cabin fever -- and ways to describe the setting and show the problem without too much of an infodump.

For the characters, I drew on my own experience as a mother of two, and in particular on the way parents have to put their own desires and emotions to one side in order to cope with those of their children. (Any parent who's afraid of spiders and has children similarly afflicted is likely to know just what I mean.) I also, though I only realized it later, borrowed the overwhelmed feelings of a mother with three young children (and two equally difficult cats) in a Lois McMaster Bujold short story, "Barter."

So there it is, for what it's worth: a glimpse at how one writer produced a short and insignificant bit of writing.