Mindscapes -- the Alliance Chronicles

Playing about with covers

2008-04-02T12:39:00.000-07:00

I've been playing around with cover images for OF TWO MINDS, thinking it would be nice to have one on ABNABooks, or for possible future contest entries. Fortunately my husband, Ron, has taken some nice nature photos over the years, and such subject matter will always do in a pinch, especially for the books that have to do with Timu Maarinen and Wythe Weaver. What's in my mind for my real covers is artwork on the order of a cross between Arthur Rackham and Maxfield Parrish. Something a bit pre-Raphaelite/Art Noveau. Wish I were an artist.

This is my current effort.

Playing god

2008-03-13T08:41:00.000-07:00

The other day a friend of mine asked me for a definition of High Fantasy. I gave him a history of fantasy fiction since William Morris in the 19th c., but the real answer ended up being that High Fantasy involves a detailed subcreation, including political situations and systems, religion, philosophy -- a myriad of cultural details.

When I took a notion to subcreate I knew I wanted to base the world of my novels on our world. Mostly I wanted to create a culture derived from my Sami heritage, and treat its belief system as something that was literally real. My Telmi shamans really do share intimate communication with animals and plants, even with places and the spirits of their ancestors.

The "civilzed" cultures in my work are modeled on real-world social history too. I know they're pretty recognizable -- the Albraharan desert culture that spawns religious movements that are at once mystical and rationalistic; the multicultural Xanthian Empire where various pantheons of gods rub shoulders constantly; the Ravellan League that adopts and adapts Albraharan ideas, makes them even more practical and rational, carrying them to the point of atheism; the northern Vaaselian culture with its rigid social structure and pragmatically scientific turn of mind.

The essential conflict in my stories is between the spiritual and the rational -- between science and religion. It's not a dialectical conflict, but one that occurs on a contiuum, from animism to atheism.

What makes the stories stories, rather than a thought exercise, is the characters. The metaphysical and political conflicts are always expressed through their personal lives, and I think the most attractive aspect of my fiction is the fullness and reality of my characters.

Announcing another new website

2008-03-02T13:28:00.000-08:00

www.abnabooks.com

Valya Dudycz Lupescu (wonderful name!), an ABNA semi-finalist, has launched a website to feature the work of all ABNA entrants. Each of us has a profile, a synopsis of our entry, and an excerpt (in some cases longer excerpts than those permitted in the ABNA competition, in all cases complete, not cut off in mid-sentence.)

It's a beautiful, eminently functional site, easy to read and navigate. There's even a forum! ABNA entrants who have published works available to purchase can offer those books through ABNABooks.com, too. Contact information for each author is also available, so readers can view websites and email their favorites.

Three cheers for Valya!

My friend Bill

2008-02-25T12:29:00.000-08:00

has just created his own website, to communicate with the web-world at large about his fiction.

It can be found at

http://sublimetales.googlepages.com

Bill's work is reminiscent of Tom Robbins or Kurt Vonnegut -- satirical, with a sci-fi edge, but directed at the world's immediate problems, ie., the dominance of power and wealth seeking individuals and organizations in all decisions of global importance. Bill's background is Buddhist, and the speculative elements of his fiction draw from Buddhist philosophy and mythology as much as garden-variety 20th c. intergalactic tradition. The notion of "aliens" is only part of the framework for some very funny and philosophically incisive narrative.

If that's the sort of trip you're up for, William W. Wraith is an author to watch.

A little slow

2008-02-24T01:17:00.001-08:00

I'm a little slow updating things here, I guess.

I didn't make the 100 cut in the ABNA, but neither did my hands-down favorite, Swimming in the Rainbow. Other good things didn't make it either. One I liked very much that did make it is The Raider's Wife by Cathy McCallum.

I'm glad for myself to be out of it, because now I can concentrate on my writing. I haven't stopped revising or working on new things, ever, but I'm doing much more work now that I'm not thinking about the contest 20 hours a day.

My new novel on the origins of Lord Valmur Karoli, Chancellor of Vaaseli and definitely arch-villain of the first two Alliance Chronicles books, is moving on apace. That is, I've written several scenes from throughout the story in my mind, and have completed four chapters (available to read in first draft at The Wood Beyond the World on writerscafe.org.)

I'm using a new and slower method of composition, after learning some hard lessons from my summer revisions of Of Two Minds. Writing scenes in my head is a large part of the process. Though I've always done this (usually flat on my back in the bedroom, just before dropping off for a nap) I'm doing it much more consciously now, and working on bits from throughout the story, not necessarily in chronological order. I'm planning to use only the most significant and striking of this material in the actual first draft -- though other bits will be available, of course, if my beta readers think there's something lacking.

I've realized already that this particular story has a definite operatic tone to its plot: madness, murder, rape, revenge, in an escalating spiral. I'm going with my friend Bill's advice to make language more colorful, use more simile and metaphor. Just hope I can keep it from being too potboiler, retain some literary qualities.

Finally found one

2008-02-09T00:16:00.001-08:00

Last night I finally read an excerpt in the ABNA contest that really blew me away. Not only is it perfectly written, in a technical and stylistic sense, it's exceptionally original, and completely compelling.

It's Swimming in the Rainbow, by Rebecca Crandell. A very odd story, but constructed with such grace and aplomb, that only someone rather devoid of imagination could fail to be swept away by it.

It's the only thing I've seen that I really could back a hundred percent to enter the finals and earn the grand prize.

Rebecca, I'm now your biggest fan.

Waiting out the ABNA

2008-02-06T21:42:00.000-08:00

The last days of the ABNA semi-finals are fast approaching. On February 19 our numbers will be reduced from 835 to 100. None of the entrants can figure out how this is going to be accomplished. Some entries have 100 and more reviews with 5-star ratings, but very poor Publishers' Weekly reviews. Some entries judged superior by PW are hardly reviewed at all. The contest administrators have pledged, on the ABNA homepage, to take customer reviews into consideration when picking the 100, but how they're going to reconcile profligate stars and inferior writing, neglected works of great quality, and the more professional judgments of PW and Amazon Top Reviewers is baffling.

As my PW review found serious fault with the last half of Of Two Minds, and made mock of my protagonist's psychological development, I have little hope of advancing, so I'm just waiting it all out at this point, and continuing to work on other things. Reviews still trickle in, almost entirely from fellow-entrants -- very fine, thoughtful reviews, that I appreciate more than I can say.

But somehow 100 good to excellent novels must be selected, and the ABNA will have to at least seem to fulfill its promises.

I haven't looked at more than a tiny percentage of the semi-finalists' excerpts, but I haven't really seen one that I thought was entirely publication ready. I have seen several that had commercial success written between every line, and I expect to see them in the cut of 100.

I wonder what will become of the rest of us?

About time....

2008-01-28T14:29:00.000-08:00

It's been awhile since I thought of blogging, except on my Amazon profile.

Of Two Minds, my entry for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, did advance to the semifinals on January 15, but I was disappointed in the Publishers' Weekly review I received a week later. Actually, I was hopping mad. I got over it, though, thanks to my friend Bill Wraith (soon to be well-known author of War on Error), who pointed out that he'd tried to get me to see the problems my reviewer ran into while helping me revise this summer. I'd fixed them some, but not enough apparently.

So I have little hope of continuing much farther in this contest, but good hope for revising again and being ready to send queries soon.

The reviewer did say Of Two Minds is promising, with an exciting premise, appealing major and minor characters, and prose that suits the antiquated setting. (Actual quotes, not actual size.) I just need to nail down the plot a bit. I can do that.

I've also started a new tale, so far untitled, about my villain, Lord Valmur Karoli, and how he becomes what he becomes. I'm having more fun than I probably should writing from the point of view of a complete bastard. At the moment there are three chapters posted at writerscafe.org.

http://www.writerscafe.org/writing/MindMuse/181375/

And I have a new website, still under construction.

http://leahdavidsontalley.googlepages.com

Plenty to keep me busy.

What's it about?

2007-12-08T10:41:00.000-08:00

Imagine a world where psychic powers are as common as artistic talent or a knack for learning languages. Minds can share information and knowledge, including memories of video-recorder accuracy, without recourse to oral or written communication; telepathy can be used to converse across any distance; infants use telekinesis before they learn to crawl or walk; some traditions embrace prophetic dreaming and communication with the spirits of plants and animals.

The four nations of the Alliance (the Kingdom of Vaaseli, the Xanthian Empire, the Ravellan League, and the nation of Albrahar) make use of telepaths in civil government and commerce, but the most important function of telepathy is its role in diplomacy, keeping the Peace of Alidor that makes the Alliance possible.

Four centuries before the first story in the Alliance Chronicles, Of Two Minds, the prophet Alidor of Albrahar received visions and locutions from the Creator, and spent his life spreading the knowledge gleaned from these revelations as far as he could, first in Albrahar, and then in Ravella, where they were readily embraced as a foundation for personal and public morality. His Ravellan followers collected his teachings in the Wisdom of Alidor, and the spread of Alidorism began, to Vaaseli and Xanthia.

Advocating the use of mind-powers to increase tolerance and understanding, gathering all ethical and spiritual teachings held in common by the world's various cultures into one moral code, Alidorism soon became a world religion, supplanting local animist beliefs and absorbing principles of atheistic philosophy.

Alidorans gradually rose to positions of civic power in all four nations, with the earliest and strongest center of Alidoran influence in the Ravellan League. In Ravella formal principles of mind-work were developed by powerful telepaths known as mages (neuter plural – magus, masc. sing., maga, fem. sing.) who established the first service school for diplomats, and laid the groundwork for the structure of the Alliance. Meanwhile Albraharan mages devoted themselves to the spiritual and philosophical aspects of Alidor's teaching, though they were quick to adopt the Ravellan model of diplomatic service and shared an interest in political cooperation between nations. In Xanthia high officials in the empire's bureaucracy saw advantage for domestic politics in the teachings of Alidor, and pragmatically embraced Alidorism, while making little attempt to impose Alidoran beliefs as a religion on their highly diverse population. Segments of Xanthian bureaucracy developed into a diplomatic service that often recruited members from the more formally organized of the empire's numerous religious sects.

The feudal society of Vaaseli was slower to embrace Alidorism. Its powerful barons saw no advantage to themselves in the principles of cooperation and tolerance advocated by Alidor. But the new religious and political philosophy gradually gained favor with the more numerous lesser noble houses, and at last the Kingdom of Vaaseli entered the Alliance, ratified the Peace of Alidor, established a diplomatic service, and began to reform itself along Alidoran principles.

For two hundred years the Peace of Alidor remained unbroken, with Councils meeting periodically to establish Alliance policy, and diplomatic missions forging agreements and treaties as necessary. In this time of peace international trade flourished, with the Ravellan League in the fore, expanding beyond regular trade with Albrahar, its neighbor across the Central Sea, to new ventures in the Xanthian Empire, across the Great Sea. Vaaseli remained somewhat isolated, separated from Ravella by a huge mountain range (the Mynath) and from Xanthia by the frigid and often turbulent Northern Sea. Vaaselians excelled in mining and mechanical invention, however, and gradually adapted southern shipbuilding and navigation principles to open trade with Xanthia for the empire's luxury goods. The only organized bloodshed to occur in this period was the occasional predations of pirates along the international trade routes, and of bandits on the caravan routes in Albrahar.

At the opening of Of Two Minds Vaaselian reform has been speedily advancing – but the wealthiest noble houses still hope to halt its progress and reestablish older traditions. As they see their hopes to this end evaporating, they begin to consider regaining their power by any means necessary.