BLOGS

Just messing around, Im practicing new techniques of drawing characters. Let me know what yall think.

-Rob

"What are you trying to do?" the creature asked peevishly. "Wake the dead? We're already awake and we're very, very angry with you!" She narrowed her eyes. "You've allied yourself with a terrible evil. You should be ashamed!"

So reads a bit of dialog in Valjeanne Jeffers' Immortal II: The Time of Legend.  You can't beat writing and an attitude like that!This is an incredibly complex and well thought out novel.  It's a fast and furious read, too.  Werewolves and demons, time travel and mythological creatures, drug addiction and rehab, saints and sinners, streets gangs, mucho sex and action, and oh yeah, some Immortal beings, too. This is such a unique blend of fantasy, horror, and science fiction that it's hard to nail down. So I won't try. It's a fantastic world to get lost in.  It has humor and drama, a touch of the street and the 'hood, and is wrapped  in what I think is a very cool 1960s flavor.  Think the Equal Rights Movement, the woes and sorrows of places like Alabama and Watts, student demonstrations and the Viet Nam War protests all sort of joined together and set in a future -- or futures, if you will -- that is both beautiful and terrible at the same time.  I look forward to reading Immortal III: Stealer of Souls.  Valjeanne has definitely topped book one!!

It depends on how you ask the question, I never learned to draw people. I have a buried desire but no skills.

You take a photo of a person, you steal a part of their soul, I kind of believe that. You can read the imprint of light captured by the camera, it does not lie. What did you capture, just an image or a part of that person, the light that is/was that person.

It is so compelling to draw faces, bodies in poses. The artist trying to put a soul into a likeness to give it a life of its own. Attribute after layered attribute the person designers hard at work. Who is playing god now? Even writers talk of characters taking on a life of their own.

I don't draw people, never developed the skill. I do imagine people standing in front of my art, all kinds of people of a specific mentality, artist, poets, dancers, quantum mechanics, star gazers. These are archetypes, beyond personalities. Filling in the soul with lower vibes, coarser harmonies makes them real people we can comprehend, our friends and what not. So complex and subtle the gradations, god would craft each one and we persist to dress up or mess up what he has done. We drift from plain to different to just weird but that's from our vantage point. We too are looking at light like a camera with a complex eye and even more complex neural-net, yes we are light aware beings.

My 93 year old mom-n-law, former art teacher, always tries to press me into art the way she learned it. I resist because even though I am 34 years younger than her, a youngster to her, I am not starting from scratch setting aside my non-art training to learn something else. I've been drawing on the computer since the 70's, it is so different. The tactile experience is different, even if you draw like you do on paper, the whole thing is different. The only thing not changed is composition and color.

I am an artist I say, they always ask me to do their portrait. I should say I am a graphic designer, they would ask "am I a commercial artist?" I think folks are stuck with job descriptions. Don't google, the first description of an artist is a musician or a singer.

I think labels have been used widely, I can't even say I do abstract art because most think you take something known and abstract it. I know, "I do sci-fi art!" Now there's a can of other worldly worms.

So as I watch the parade of people pass by my eyeballs I imagine what I can draw behind them, a stage, a view, an environment. I let others draw the people.

Why don’t you like science fiction? Is it because you think only Geeks enjoy science fiction. Or is it because you think it will turn you into a Nerd. Or is it simply because you think it is not cool and only the lonely, social outcasts follow science fiction. It is a common misconception that people who like science fiction are Geeks or Nerds.

This is not so. Science fiction is a misunderstood genre. Science Fiction is a complicated genre made up of many genres that tell love stories, adventures, mysteries, spy thrillers, and even comedies with imagination, innovation, technology and science. Science fiction stimulates the imagination with eye popping, jaw dropping scenes and plots that move a story along while dealing with the future, alternative timelines, space travel, aliens, time travel, dreams, wars, and even comic book superheroes.

Think of James Bond movies, Jason Bourne movies, Harry Potter, Avatar, Iron Man movies, Inception, X-Men movies, Transformers movies, I Am Number Four, Tron, Priest, Star Trek movies, Paul, Green Lantern, Thor, Cowboy vs. Aliens, Alien movies, Predator movies, The Adjustment Bureau, Hitchcock, Megamind, Superman movies, Batman movies, Species, Monsters vs. Aliens, Time Travelers Wife. The list is too exhausting to write, but you get my point. You’ve probably seen a science fiction movie and didn’t realize it. Now think of your favorite T.V. Shows, Lost, 24, V, Walking Dead, The Event, Undercovers, Charmed, and Supernatural just to name a few.

Hopefully, you can see, science fiction is where man first dreamt of computers, flight, rocket ships, moon landings, cell phones, laptops, iPads, smart phones, Velcro, GPS, Radar, calculators, HDTV, microwaves. Face it, without science fiction or at least the imagination that science fiction stimulates, we would still be riding horses, sailing in wooden ships and hunting for our food.

So no…liking science fiction doesn’t make you a Geek or a Nerd, it makes you exciting, stimulating and insightful. It fuels you as a soldier of the future.

Do you still think science fiction is only for the Geek or Nerd? Sound off; let me hear your voice.

Malcolm D. Petteway, Rage Books LLC

Eun Mi and her brother Jorge were in last place and gaining on the other contestants. This was the third year and a row that they competed in the cave races and Eun did not want to lose again. Jorge was scared and barely helped guard their box cart, but Eun kept pushing at full speed. As they came closer to the next turn.....

a drabbler is a story with exactly 100 words here is my first go at it hope enjoy. leave comments.

It was just a handshake, that’s it. But it turns out that’s how Glarcarians reproduce. Galactic Space Exploration Incorporated`s mission specialist didn’t bother telling us that though. So as soon as I jump of the ship on Glarcon, the first thing I see when I jump off the ship is a Glarcarian female with an out stretched hand, and you can guess what I did next, yep that’s right.
We`re headed home now, with my slimy light blue Glarcarian- Human hybrid son in the cradle. I`m going to keep him, I just have to explain that handshake to my wife.

I guess I admire all the cosmic beings cooked up in the pages of comic books and such, but what rattles my cage is the kind of science fiction where technology crosses over. Technology is always an extension to man's natural talents and abilities. What happened to me is I dream and struggle to get my art in print, even print in a larger size or context. I get a wide format printer and my perception of things changes. In sci-fi I think of that movie 'Contact' where the woman has an other dimension experience for a good while but in her native dimension only a heart beat of time passed. The amazing technology that supported that opened window, did it open outside of her and she was immersed or was it opened in her mind, her spirit?

My new printer sits there waiting for me to give data and spit out words, 2d forms, vistas. What happens if it records pictures from the ether, since my PC is connected to the 'ethernet? Or I can print out a device, like the portable stargate I found in the back of a sci-fi paperback. I could print an array of them, go anywhere. Doorways, it prints doorways. Simultaneously it prints both sides, in two worlds.

If I met myself in another universe would I recognise me, like me, hate me. Would we be the same or a mirror image (why does he shake with his left hand?) or polar opposites. Would we struggle, trade places unknowingly (what I knew is somehow different sun sets in the east, toilets whirl in the other direction).

Why is it when I print the same doorway again, it goes elsewhere? Or when I find an old doorway print, go through, I am tattered and worn? Maybe it's not the printer but the ink. When I was a child, there was a story about a boy with a purple crayon who drew his world. Maybe he grew up, went digital and I stumbled upon his melted crayon in my ink cartridge.

Jack Dempsey was the last of the great actors of 2026. His dashing smile and trademark Kung Fu made him the action hero other actors wanted to be for more than a decade. His star as an action hero finally lost his luster in the last series of movies he made, Planet Raiders III: The Unforsaken. The movie, while grossing well barely covered the production costs and the injuries incurred by Jack's drinking problem caused his agent and the company Screen Brothers, to finally drop his contact.

"We love you, Jack, but we're gonna have to let you go. There is a new wind blowing and its AICGI," his agent Florence Butterman told him over the vidcam. He was sitting in his Malibu home drinking his morning Mai Tai and nursing yesterday's hangover.

"You are not serious. That stuff they do with computers and factors?" Demsey had a bit of a slur going already. Florence just grimaced and tried to ignore it.

"They are not fake actors. They are based on real people, who used to be actors. Many of the screen tests have been quite favorable and several hundred movies were released straight to the 'Net from Nollywood and Ballywood. If we want to keep up we have to do our part to stay with the times. Those Nigerians are eating our lunch in southern Africa and they have already expanded into the South American markets. I'm sorry Jack, the margins are just too tight nowadays for living actors." Florence looked down at her watch.

"What, you got someplace to be? You too busy for the man who made you rich? Everything you have in that house, I bought you Florence. How can you be thinking about turning your back on me? What about helping me out? Can you farm me out to one of your friends over at Light Industrial Films? I heard through the 'vine they are still planning on making movies with real actors." Jack downed the rest of his Mai Tai and nodded to his butler to bring him another one. The butler winced and then moved on reluctantly to bring another. There, was however, no reason to rush.

"Look Jack, I am not blowing you off. I will be putting in a word for you, but I would not get my hopes up with Light Industrial Films, they are still going to be making movies with actors, but they are going to be working in the mountains of Tibet, telling the stories of the remaining survivors of the Great Purge of Tibet in 2016. That's going to be done on location with local actors. I might be able to get you a role on the Chinese side as a consultant or as a White who worked as a servant to the Chinese."

"A slave? That is the best hope you can give me? A slave in a Chinese melodrama? You got to be kidding me. You know what Florence, I don't want your goddamn pity. I don't need you. I am Jack fucking Dempsey, the best thing to happen to Hollywood since Clint Eastwood. I will be alright." Jack stood up and pointed at the monitor. "When I make my comeback, you remember it was me who told you it would happen."

Having stood up too quickly and after having twelve Mai Tai's before breakfast, Jack Dempsey fell to the floor unconscious. Florence Butterman shook her head, watched the butler throw back the Mai Tai and signed off. She did not think about Jack Dempsey for another seven years until the Academy Awards mention his name seven years later.

"And the nominations for Best Actor in a Science Fiction Film are, Kren Davis in Sundiver's Six, Kazuo Koke in Inner Space, and Jack Dempsey in Planet Raiders: Neutron Star. No, no folks, I'm just kidding. You know scifi hasn't paid an actor in years. The award will go to the company that has created the most awesome representation of these amazing actors in their AICGI movies created completely on computer. I mean, can anyone remember the last time anyone saw that drunken bum, Jack Dempsey."

The theater explodes in laughter, that long mean laughter when you are talking about someone behind their back. The laughter that comes from an uncomfortable position that you know you might find yourself in, akin to being in the bathroom without toilet paper. The doors fly open from the side of the stage and Jack Dempsey staggers onto the stage. A security guard with a swollen eye, tries to stop him and is returned back stage with a sound kick.

"How's that," was picked up from the mikes all over the stage. "Real enough for you? You might want to put some ice on that. So how is everybody? Go on, open that envelope. No, let me" Jack snatches the envelop from the comedian who stands shocked and quiet on the stage.

"The Award for Best Actor in a Science Fiction Film goes to... Factor Jack Dempsey. Factor Jack Dempsey can't be here to get his award, cause he was made on a damn computer, so Jack Dempsey is going to take that award for him." The young woman who carried out the statuette hands it to Jack and scurries off the stage.

The director continues to move the cameras around and filmed everything as if this was what was expected. "Since I am here to take my award from my factor, yes FAKE ACTOR, I think I should say a few words. All you people sitting out there laughing at me, thinking you are better than me, and won't have to worry about this because you can really act, can kiss my ass." A collective gasp sweeps the room.

Jack reaches into his jacket and pulls out a flask, takes a hit and continues. "Once upon a time, I was just like you, thought I was something, on the top of my game and nothing could ever touch me. I had a great time, spent my money, partied all day and all night. I made twenty movies in my career and most sucked, I know that, now. I watched them when I was living in the streets, sitting outside of Electronic Huts playing my movies while I panhandled."

Jack looks down and pauses for a second. "I realized I got paid because it was what people wanted to see, not because I was any good. I got ahead of myself and didn't pay attention when I needed to. I did not see the world changing around me. I signed contracts without reading them. And all of you did too. Because if you did, you would not be sitting here today."

Three security guards came to the edge of the stage and hesitantly began to make their approach. None of them were in a hurry to tackle Jack Dempsey because while he may have been an actor, he did his own martial arts movies and those were not stunts. Many a stunt double went to the hospital and the tabloids loved talking about it. He waved at them and made the sign for two minutes and they retreated to the edge of the stage.

"I just wanted to say to Florence Butterman, I am sorry I didn't listen to you when you told me to read everything. You told me that the industry would take advantage of my stupidity. You see, I don't have anyone to blame about Factor Jack Dempsey. In my contracts, I made it possible for him to exist. In my contracts, I signed away my likeness to be used in any kind of AICGI based movie for the next twenty years. And they do not have to pay me anything because I did not read the contract well enough." His voice was bitter and sharp.

"But the best part of this, is I had time on my hands and more that a few favors. I know that almost none of you read your contracts either. So when you lose your mind, or piss someone off, or when they get tired of you getting old or weak or crotchety, they will replace you with a factor, too. So, you guys enjoy your awards, one day there won't be anyone in the theater to accept one, unless they can teach a computer to walk too. Y'all have a good night. Come on, boys, I haven't got all night."

It took twenty security guards before Jack Dempsey was dragged off stage. The Academy Awards had never had higher numbers.

And the Award Goes To...  © Thaddeus Howze 2011. All Rights Reserved

While doing some research on the Marine Corps for an old space opera of mine I hope to rewrite one day soon, I discovered this fascinating piece of history. 

On August 27, 1776, a black man named Isaac Walker enlisted in Captain Mullan's Continental Marines. He was listed as "Negro," as was another recruit later that year. There may have been others, but records are sketchy and incomplete. However, when the Marine Corps was reeastablished in 1798, the official recruiting regulations clearly stipulated "no Negro, Mulatto or Indian to be enlisted." The Corps was to remain lily white until the eve of World War II.

On June 1 (my late Dad's birthday, btw) 1942, Alfred Masters and George O. Thompson became the first modern black Marines. Two months later, the first black unit was activated -- the 51st Composite Defense Battalion, at Montford Point, a new camp near Camp Lejeune. However, all the officers were white.

Early black recruits were exceptional. Charles W. Simmons held a masters degree from the University of Illinois. Gilbert H. "Hashmark" Johnson had been in both the Army and the Navy. Pvt. Luther Woodard, a truck driver from Memphis, was awarded the Silver Star, the highest decoration earned by a black Marine in World War II. 19,168 black Marines served in that war -- 12,738 of them overseas. Nine were killed during the war, and seventy-eight were injured.

President Roosevelt's Executive Order 8802 in 1941 was the first major step toward ending segregation in the armed forces. Sceretary of the Navy Frank Knox insisted that the Marines take a thousand black recruits a month.

In 1967, Sergeant Rodney M. Davis gave his life for his country and his fellow Marines, in Viet Nam. Two years later, his Mother received the Medal of Honor her son had finally been awarded for his bravery. On May 9, 1987, Davis's Mother and Widow and two children watched the commissioning of the U.S.S. Rodney M. Davis, the first warship to be named in honor of a black Medal of Honor winner. 

I know we've come a long way over the years, still have a long way to go as a nation and as a people, and sometimes I fear that we may never get to where we should be -- but the election of our first black president, and stories like those of Rodney M. Davis continue to give me hope. Semper Fidelis!

I came across this post and thought I'd share it with everyone:

22 Ways for Readers to Support Authors

I always get contacted by both authors and readers about how they can support authors or how authors can get support from fans. I don’t always have time to answer this accurately. However, I do have a method to my own madness. Therefore, I think that it is best share what I do in hopes that it will help both authors and readers connect.

There are many different ways to support the authors that you love to read. Although, authors reading this blog post may think, “Sheesh just buy a book already…” I believe that there are a number of ways to support authors that will ensure that the authors you love get the support that they need, the books you love get the exposure they deserve, and the authors get feedback on their work to create better work with each release.

I have been writing for about a decade. I currently have three children’s book releases out. However, with each book release my writing gets better. The reason for this is that I am not afraid to read critiques of my writing, and I depend on fans (mainly kids) to tell me what they enjoy about my work. The support and feedback allow me to push my own boundaries as a writer without fear. This way I can feel liberated to create work that inspires children to become creative, proactive, and adventurous. Below is some of the wisdom I accrued over the years of interacting with authors, readers, and fans about how to support authors.

22 Ways to Support Authors

 

1. Follow an author’s blog.
2. Buy one or all of the book releases by an author.
3. Write a one or two line review of the author’s book on a blog, Amazon, social networking site, shelfari, etc.
4. Follow your favorite author on social networking sites.
5. Go out to book signings.
6. Bring friends to the book signing with you.
7. Host authors on your campus, in your church or at meetings.
8. Recommend your favorite books to a friend.
9. Ask a reference librarian to order all of your favorite author’s books.
10. Host a theme night for your favorite book with your friends.
11. Take a picture with your favorite author and post on-line (facebook, MySpace, blogs)
12. Tweet an article about your favorite author’s interviews.
13. Make a YouTube video of your favorite books.
14. Start a blog about your favorite books.
15. Start a book club to discuss your favorite books.
16. Vote for your favorite author to win book awards.
17. Ask bookstores to order copies of your favorite books for their stores.
18. Host a literacy event and invite authors.
19. Skype with your favorite authors.
20. Host an on-line chat with your favorite authors.
21. Listen to interviews or call in when an author is being interviewed on blog talk radio.
22. Participate in contests held by authors.

 

I hope that this blog was helpful.

 

Tiffany A. Flowers is a reviewer, literacy advocate, the literary director foronixlink.com, and the author of three children’s books. You can find out more about her work by logging on to www.goldenbutterflypublishing.com or following her blog atwww.authortiffanyaflowers.wordpress.com.

http://black-authors-books.blogspot.com/2011/05/22-ways-for-readers-to-support-authors.html

Sometimes fans might not know how to support authors they like besides the usual ways--buy the book and tell a friend (which are still great ways to show support)--and I think this is a good list of ways to support.

Take care.

Fox has released a full length trailer for the Steven Spielberg-produced science fiction series Terra Nova, which is set to premiere on Mondays this Fall. The new television show “follows an ordinary family on an incredible journey back in time to prehistoric Earth as a small part of a daring experiment to save the human race.”

Terra Nova is another attempt at a time travel story without time travel. In their future of 2149, the world is in terrible shape. Filter masks are worn by everyone and they are huddled together using broken technology, basically waiting to die in their overcrowded hovels. Until a group of scientists discover a portal through time, into a cross-dimensional rift to another Earth, 85 million years ago.

They are entertaining the idea once flirted with by Julian May in her much better novels called the Saga of the Pliocene Exiles. In May's novels, humanity had not quite destroyed itself but it had fallen on hard times as creativity and self determination had all but been destroyed in their future world. A team of scientists find a hole in space-time that leads them back to the Pliocene era.

http://www.facebook.com/notes/mocha-memoirs-press-llc/an-excerpt-from-ronald-t-jones-warriors-of-the-four-worlds/199401606762572

I'm not great at doing book reviews. I just tell you what I think and what I feel. I don't get into an analytical discussion of a novel, and I seldom quote passages or phrases from one. But I make a rare exception here. Valjeanne Jeffers is a poet. The opening paragraphs of her novel, Immortal, read as pure poetry, to me:

"She was in the basement again. It was pitch black, the only illumination a glowing, quarter moon etched into the floor. A burst of light split the darkness, and she moaned low in her throat.

       Please, I don't want to see anymore. . .I don't want to look.

       Yet her feet moved of their own volition, inching toward the mark. . .and the twisted bundle now lying in its center. A man was curled upon the stone. He wasn't breathing, and his limbs were tiny and withered. But she knew he wasn't dead.  He wasn't human."

And then we're off into one of the strangest science fiction/fantasy novels I've ever read. Valjeanne Jeffers has masterfully succeeded in combining drug addicts, addiction and rehab with shape-shifting, time-travel, demons, past lives and haunted dreams, and the sheer beauty of horror to create something that is truly unique. I applaud this novel and look forward to reading the next two volumes in this wonderfully original series. Bravo bravissimo, Valjeanne!

Black people on the moon. Fellow BSFS member, William Hayashi, has taken this premise and built around it a very thoughtful and suspenseful page turner called Discovery. How did this happen? How did a small group of black people manage to depart Earth undetected? How did they gather the resources to contruct a habitat in a lunar environment? On the dark side no less? The first volume in this trilogy, subtitled the Darkside Trilogy, (William is working on volume II as I write this) puts us squarely on the path of answering those questions. But first, the author composes a solid story, taking the reader on an investigative journey, leading to this monumental (ahem) discovery. He provides a series of occurances, seemingly unrelated, but destined to converge.

There are the disappearances of nearly 2,000 highly educated, technically skilled black people over a period of decades; the shoot down of an aircraft in the Middle East, an aircraft with a design and composition unlike anything encountered on Earth; an asteroid on a collision course with Earth, and the invention of a device with unprecedented detection capability.

Discovery is a process of...discovery and I thoroughly enjoyed the process. William takes a very deliberative approach in his storytelling. He makes sure that the reader is ensconced as deeply as possible in the view point of the characters, as the pieces of a grand and complex puzzle are put together. He deftly merges real world tech with science fiction and his superb grasp of the contemporary technology portrayed in the book is an outgrowth of the heavy research he poured into the story.

As I mentioned earlier, Discovery is the first in a trilogy. The answers we didn't get in part one are sure to unfold in the forthcoming volumes. But unlocking part of the mystery in Discovery was very exciting. William has written a most intriguing work of science fiction, one I highly recommend.