A Beer (or Two) and a Story (or Two)

July 28, 2017 at 6:00 pm (Uncategorized)
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I like reading. I like beer. Sometimes I like both at once, usually when I go out ‘solo’ after work for a quick dinner and drink (or two) rather than go home and rustle up my own food. I thought it might be fun to start blogging every now and then about some of the more entertaining stories I’ve read in this situation, so here goes episode 1 of ??…

The Venue: MacNivens Restaurant & Bar, visited on 7/25/17; picture below from Yelp.com. I once toyed with the idea of founding a “Sir Walter Scott Book Club” that would meet here (since, after all, it’s a Scottish Restaurant) but I found it hard to recruit members…

macnivens

The Beer: Natural Liberty – an American Pale Lager by Black Acre Brewing Company

Did I Eat Anything? Yes, the Poached Salmon Salad, which was, as I like to say, “MacNivenscent!” 🙂

The Story: Ray Bradbury’s “The Dragon”

(photos from Indianapolis Monthly and Google images)

Disclaimer: I actually read two stories and had two different beers on this outing, the other story being Bradbury’s “The Exiles” and the other beer being Confessional IPA from St. Joseph Brewing Co. I’d read the story before (even blogged about it here) so I won’t include it in this post, and though Confessional IPA is a decent brew, it is imho inferior to “Nat Lib,” which is one of my favorite local beers.

The Story

I’m in the process of cleaning up the unread “orphan stories” that I didn’t finish as part of my #24in48 Readathon plans, and the next card I drew was the four of Clubs, to which I had assigned the story “The Dragon” from my copy of Bradbury Stories: 100 of his Most Celebrated Tales. It was originally published in 1955 in Esquire Magazine.

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***Spoilers follow*** It’s a very short story, which I didn’t realize when I started it, having just “jumped” to its location on my Kindle reader. Two intrepid men (I’m assuming they’re knights since they have armor and lances) are somewhere on the moor, seeking a dragon which has apparently been causing havoc in the countryside, eating “men traveling alone between our town and the next.” We learn something of what the men are up against:

“This dragon, they say his eyes are fire. His breath a white gas; you can see him burn across the dark lands. He runs with sulfur and thunder and kindles the grass. Sheep panic and die insane. Women deliver forth monsters. The dragon’s fury is such that tower walls shake back to dust. His victims, at sunrise, are strewn hither thither on the hills. How many knights, I ask, have gone for this monster and failed, even as we shall fail?”

Though the men in this story know the time period (or think they do) in which it is set – “900 years after the Nativity” – there is something special about Time on the moors…

“On this moor is no Time, is only Forever. I feel if I ran back on the road the town would be gone, the people yet unborn, things changed, the castles unquarried from the rocks, the timbers still uncut from the forests; don’t ask how I know; the moor knows and tells me.”

This story wouldn’t deliver the goods if these two brave souls didn’t indeed encounter the dragon they seek, but is it one of their time, or another? Will they vanquish it, or will their bodies be left strewn in its wake, as countless others have been?

I really enjoyed this story and was once again amazed at how some authors can tell such a great story in so few pages.

What about YOU? Do you sometimes find yourself “sitting at the bar” and reading? e-Readers and their associated apps have made this commonplace for me anymore…

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A Quick #24in48 Readathon Update

July 24, 2017 at 8:33 am (Uncategorized)
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Morning all! I have to get to work here in a minute, but now that the #24in48 Readathon is officially over, I thought I’d provide a quick update:

I read for a total of 10 hours and 13 minutes and completed 28 stories (my lofty goal was 52 stories so I waaaaay overestimated my chances there). As most of my readers know, all of the stories were by Ray Bradbury. This is the first time I’ve read so many stories by one author “in a row” and I found that it was a very interesting experience – be the end of the readathon, Bradbury’s voice was becoming very familiar to me. (I’ll publish a more detailed post later on my impressions of what I read)

I tried to stop and tweet about my reading in the breaks between stories and I believe I sent out between 40-50 Tweets, and received 169 “likes” on them. I gained six Twitter followers during the readathon.  The Center for Ray Bradbury Studies gained eight “likes” on Facebook during the readathon, though I couldn’t prove if all (or any, frankly) were due to my tweeting and blogging about it.

I will be tabulating the “entries” to my give away during the next couple days and will announce the winner(s) soon. Likes, comments, and retweets all counted as an entry, and likes and comments on my blog did as well, so I may have close to 200 entries in the hat to draw from. Now I have to find a hat. 🙂

Here are my answers to the wrap-up questions posted by readathon hosts Rachel, Kristen, and Kerry:

  1. How many books did you read? Pages? (If you didn’t keep track, tell me that too!) I read short stories instead of books and finished 28 of them. A record for me during a #24in48 readathon – the last few #24in48 readathons, I’ve read my goal of 24 short stories rather than 24 hours. I didn’t keep track of pages read – I’m such a slow reader that it’s too depressing to do that. I’d estimate 400-450 pages, though.
  2. How many hours did you read? If my records are correct, 10 hours 13 minutes. (In my defense, I had several other obligations during the weekend that each took big chunks of time away from my reading opportunities, but it seems that’s always the case for me.)
  3. What do you think worked well in this readathon? Reading short stories gave me natural breaks, as only a few took me longer than 30 minutes to read. During the breaks I would tweet a couple times and try to like and comment on other ‘thon’ers tweets. This part of the readathon was a lot of fun.
  4. What do you think could be done to improve the readathon for next time? Seems pretty good as it is, to me! 🙂 I wish I weren’t such a slow reader, but that happens with me every readathon.
  5. Will you participate in a future 24in48 readathon? Yes, I am looking forward to it already!

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#24in48 Readathon Updates

July 23, 2017 at 3:43 pm (Uncategorized)

I haven’t taken time out from reading today to write any full blog posts, but you can check out my stream of (almost 100%) #24in48 tweets on Twitter at https://mobile.twitter.com/bibliophilopoly

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#24in48 Readathon – Hour 16 Update:

July 22, 2017 at 12:50 pm (Uncategorized)
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Progress: okay, I got off to a much slower start than I hoped, having decided I should at least put in an appearance at my brother’s birthday party. I got home about 9:45 (I decided to used GMT for my time zone for this readathon, so that means I official started at 8pm here) and hoped to read for at least awhile, but didn’t last too long before ISP started drifting off. I decided to let sleep happen (like I have a choice!) and just hit the ground running this morning, which I did. Immediately getting started by reading a couple stories in bed before I got up. Then it was off to Panera for coffee and breakfast where, for once, no one was in “my spot” and I read pretty solidly untila bout 10:30. At that point I’d read nine of my intended fifty-two stories and drew my card for the tenth one.

Activities: I’ve been pretty active in tweeting updates and trying to read and like a few tweets between each break in stories. This is quite fun for me, seeing what everyone else is reading and even what challenges they may be encountering during the readathon. Seeing some of their progress reports, though, makes me wish I were a much faster reader (this happens every time I participate in a readathon, though.)
Time: I’m averaging around a twenty minutes a story I guess, which means it’s theoretically possible I complete all fifty two during the readathon, but we’ll see.



Locations:

Story 1: Rathskeller Biergarten & couch at home; 2. Couch at home 3 & 4 Bed; 5-9 Panera Bread on Southport Road (where much of this blog has been written over the years)

It seems appropriate to use a space travel-related deck of cards, so I opted for this “Space Center” deck.

space center cards

Stories Read (& my rating) so Far:

7 of Hearts – Way in the Middle of the Air (4.0 Stars)

Ace of Clubs – The Watchful Poker Chip of H.Matisse (2.5 stars)

9 of Hearts – The Martian (3.5 stars)

3 of Hearts – The Third Expedition (4.5 stars)

8 of Spades – The Witch Door (4 stars)

4 of Diamonds – The Man (4 stars)

Jack of Clubs – The Toynbee Convector (3.5 stars)

5 of Hearts – The Fire Balloons (3.5 stars)

10 of Hearts – There Will Come Soft Rains (4.5 stars)



Favorites: It’s odd that random chance thus far has front loaded my stories from The Martian Chronicles. Maybe Fate knows how much I liked that book and wanted to start men out with more favorites. There’s something about “There Will Come Soft Rains” that really gets to me. Something about an “automated” house outliving its creators yet eventually falling victim itself to “The Forces of Nature” that activates my “sympathy subroutine” – and the inclusion of the poem by Teasdale is perfect in this story. A couple stories examined religious themes too,especially “The Man” which I don’t think I’ve ever read before. It offers a somewhat damn good view of humanity – or at least some of its members.

Giveaway Update: I’ve recorded just over 30 entries or “chances in the hat” so far. If I eclipse 100, I will consider adding a second giveaway item. You can enterthegive away by commenting on this – or any – blog post during the readathon, or by liking or replying to my tweets, or – for double credit – liking or following The Center for Ray Bradbury Studies’ Facebook Page. https://m.facebook.com/bradburycenter/posts/1767308936627668

Up Next: I’ve adjourned to the Indiana State Library in downtown Indy – a favorite weekend reading/working spot and am going to try to read for the next three hours straight. Follow my progress on Twitter (@Bibliophilopoly) and let me know how you’re doing as well.

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An All-Bradbury #24in48 Readathon!

July 21, 2017 at 3:00 pm (Uncategorized)
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The time is nigh for the start of the Bi-annual #24in48 Readathon!

What is the #24in48 Readathon?

From the readathon’s home page, here are some details: “If you’re new to 24in48, this is the basic gist: beginning at 12:01am on Saturday morning and running through 11:59pm on Sunday night, participants read for 24 hours out of that 48-hour period. You can split that up however you’d like: 20 hours on Saturday, four hours on Sunday; 12 hours each day; six four-hour sessions with four hour breaks in between, whatever you’d like.”

rb in time machine

(above: Ray Bradbury sitting in the “prop” Time Machine from the eponymous 1960 movie)

What am I Reading?

Now “the rest of the story” is that most participants don’t actually read 24 entire hours, but rather have that as a goal.  In the past, I’ve participated by reading 24 short stories, which is harder than you think.  This year, though, to up the ante, I’m going to try to read 52 stories, all by the master storyteller, Ray Bradbury.  Why? Many reasons, not the least of which being I really enjoy reading his stories. He also doesn’t write many “long-ish” stories, so they might average a short enough length for me to complete 52 in a weekend. The most important reason, though, is that I am hoping to “raise awareness” about a local (for me) literary treasure, The Center for Ray Bradbury Studies. Pay them a visit at the link, and also check out their Facebook page. I’ve had the pleasure of visiting the Center on a couple occasions and it is chock-full of Bradbury artifacts and documents, and a re-creation of his office space. Including his seat of choice, a director’s chair (see photo below).

My Plans – and a Giveaway!

I will try to post here at Bibliophilopolis several times during the weekend, and certainly plan to tweet often about what story I’m on or have just finished, and what I think of it. I plan to do a giveaway at the end of the #24in48 challenge, and anyone who comments or likes a blog post – including this one! – or who replies or likes or retweets one of my tweets, will be entered into a drawing (and yes, if you like/comment/reply/retweet multiple posts or tweets, you will be entered multiple times – limit of one per post/tweet, though), the winner receiving their choice among several books by Bradbury – some in hardcover. (I’ll share what the prize options in an upcoming blog post)  ALSO – If you share in your comment or reply that you have liked or followed their Facebook page, you will be entered into the drawing twice.  Lets see if we can make a modest impact to their total likes tally! The winner will be notified via the same media “channel” (WordPress or Twitter) which they used to earn their entry.

(below: a closer view of some of the memorabilia at the Bradbury Center)


Lastly, this wouldn’t be Bibliophilopolis if I didn’t employ the Deal Me In approach to determine the order of the fifty-two stories I’ll read. I’ve assigned each one to a card in a standard deck of playing cards, and broken the suits into categories as follows:

♦♦♦Diamonds♦♦♦ = “The Director’s Cut” – Stories recommended by the Director of The Center for Ray Bradbury Studies at IUPUI, Jon Eller.

â™ â™ â™ Spadesâ™ â™ â™  = Stories from “The Illustrated Man” or “Quicker Than the Eye” collections.

♥♥♥Hearts♥♥♥ = A red suit for a red planet! Stories from “The Martian Chronicles.”

♣♣♣Clubs♣♣♣ = Stories from “Bradbury Stories: 100 of His Most Celebrated Tales”

Any of these stories marked by an asterisk were also recommended by my fellow book bloggers.

(image below found at http://ru.vector.me/search/playing-card-suit)

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Here are the stories I will be attempting to read during the #24in48 Readathon:

♦♦♦Diamonds♦♦♦

♦A♦ –  The Whole Town’s Sleeping*

♦2♦ –  And the Rock Cried Out*

♦3♦ – The Dwarf

♦4♦ –  The Man

♦5♦ – The Exiles

♦6♦ – At Midnight, in the Month of June

♦7♦– The Lonely Ones

♦8♦ – Changeling

♦9♦ – The Pedestrian

♦10♦ – The Lifework of Juan Diaz

♦J♦ – Death and the Maiden

♦Q♦ – Zero Hour

♦K♦ – The City

â™ â™ â™ Spadesâ™ â™ â™ 

♠A♠ – The Concrete Mixer

♠2♠ – The Finnegan

♠3♠ – Marionettes, Inc.

♠4♠ – Dorian in Excelsis

♠5♠ – The Rocket Man

♠6♠ – Zaharoff/Richter Mark V

♠7♠ – The Fox and the Forest

♠8♠ – The Witch Door

♠9♠ – The Electrocution

♠10♠ – The Veldt*

♠J♠ – Unterderseaboat Doktor

♠Q♠ – The Very Gentle Murders

♠K♠ – The Ghost in the Machine

♥♥♥Hearts♥♥♥

♥A♥– Ylla

♥2♥ – The Earth Men

♥3♥ – The Third Expedition

♥4♥ – And the Moon be Still as Bright

♥5♥ – The Fire Balloons

♥6♥ – The Musicians

♥7♥ – Way in the Middle of the Air

♥8♥ – Usher II

♥9♥ -The Martian

♥10♥ – There Will Come Soft Rains

♥J♥ – The Million Year Picnic

♥Q♥ – The Silent Towns

♥K♥ – The Settlers

♣♣♣Clubs♣♣♣

♣A♣ – The Watchful Poker Chip of H. Matisse

♣2♣ – All Summer in a Day*

♣3♣ – Let’s Play Poison

♣4♣ – The Dragon

♣5♣ –  Darling Adolf

♣6♣ – And the Sailor, Home from the Sea

♣7♣ – The Drummer Boy of Shiloh

♣8♣ – The April Witch*

♣9♣ – The Wonderful Death of Dudley Stone

♣10♣ – The Machineries of Joy

♣J♣ – The Toynebee Convector

♣Q♣ – The F. Scott/Tolstoy/Ahab Accumulator*

♣K♣ – The Fog Horn*

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What Are Master-Pieces and Why Are There So Few of Them – an Essay by Gertrude Stein that I DNF’d…

July 19, 2017 at 8:00 am (Uncategorized)
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The Card: â™ 4â™  Four of Spades

The Suit: For my version of Deal Me IN, this year, Spades is the domain of Clotho, one of the Fates from Greek Mythology who, according to Plato’s Republic sings of “the things that are.”

The Selection: “What Are Master-Pieces and Why Are There So Few of Them” –  from my book “The Best American Essays of the Century.”

The Author: Gertrude Stein –  Born in Pittsburgh, but spending most of her life in Paris and was famous for her being a part of a circle of Lost Generation-y luminaries including Hemingway, Fitzgerald and Picasso to name just a few.

This essay was my 27th Selection of Deal Me In 2017.

What is Deal Me In? I’m glad you asked!  Full details maybe found here, but generally speaking it’s a reading challenge where participants read one short story a week for the year, the reading order being determined by the luck of the draw. See here for a list of the stories/essays I’ll be reading in 2017.

What Are Master-Pieces and Why Are There So Few of Them

I’ve been doing Deal Me In for six and a half years now, and this is the first time I’ve abandoned a story/essay.  It was virtually unreadable, and I can’t understand how it found its way into a volume titled “The Best American Essays of the Century.”  The following “sentence” may help you understand why I feel this way:

“I talk a lot I like to talk and I talk even more than that I may say I talk most of the time and I listen a fair amount too and as I have said the essence of being a genius is to be able to talk and listen to listen while talking and talk while listening but and this is very important very important indeed talking has nothing to do with creation.”

Yes, she has something against punctuation! Thank God at least the . has survived her wrath! I notice the title of this essay is a question, but you have to identify it as such by reading rather than seeing a question mark at the end.  I’ve always found writers who intentionally make it harder for readers to read to be annoying and pretentious. I don’t know much about Stein’s other works, but I am unlikely to explore them after giving up on this one before I’d finished three pages. I was naively looking forward to reading this essay too, as I found the title so promising, but alas…

♫♫ Personal Notes: I think I read a little of Stein before, as I was forced to read (or was at least supposed to read) her “Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas” in college. I likely abandoned that attempt too if it was anything like this one. And how’s that for pretentious, by the way, writing someone else’s autobiography!?


What about you?  Can you help me “get” Gertrude Stein?  What am I missing?

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My First Introduction to Shakespeare’s The Tempest

July 18, 2017 at 9:32 pm (Uncategorized)

Re-blogging this today, as it is the anniversary of Professor Campbell’s death and no doubt many of this blog’s followers have signed on since its first appearance.

Bibliophilopolis

We always hear stories from people – usually those who have achieved some great success and are being interviewed or otherwise lauded for their success – and they often seem to include a specific teacher or two who had a great influence on the person doing the “achieving.”

I of course had a few teachers/professors like this too (it’s just that I haven’t achieved anything yet!). Among them was an English Literature professor at Wabash College, one Thomas Campbell. At the time I was in college, he was one of the younger, “cooler” profs, and I took a class of his – damned if I can remember the exact title of it – on Medieval (& beyond) English Literature, dealing a lot with the Canterbury Tales, Beowulf, and Shakespeare, among others. Campbell was one of those professors who students could tell was genuinely excited about his subject. Professors like this…

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Jeffty is Five by Harlan Ellison – Selection #26 of Deal Me In 2017

July 17, 2017 at 6:59 pm (Uncategorized)
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The Card: ♥5♥ Five of Hearts (image from playingcardcollector.net) Honestly, it was not intentional that I assigned this story to a “5” card, just a happy coincidence.

The Suit: For my version of Deal Me IN, this year, Hearts is the domain of Atropos, one of the “Fates” from Classical Greek Mythology who “sang of things that are yet to be” i.e., things in the future – the setting for this story. Atropos is also frequently represented as holding a pair of scissors with which she snips the thread of life which is spun by her two sisters, Clotho and Lachesis.

The Selection: “Jeffry is Five” – First published in 1977 in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction thus not surprisingly included my copy of The Very Best of Fantasy and Science Fiction volume 2.

The Author: Harlan Ellison – Born in Ohio in 1927 (on my birthday, I just discovered!) I was a little surprised to find that I had never blogged about one of his stories before. If you’re a Star Trek fan, you are familiar with some of his work. He wrote the screenplay for one of the most acclaimed (& rightly so in this blogger’s opinion) episodes of the original series: “City on the Edge of Forever” which featured a young Joan Collins as a guest star. His 1957 short story, “Soldier of Tomorrow” was adapted for the television series Outer Limits’ episode, “Soldier.”

What is Deal Me In? I’m glad you asked!  Full details maybe found here, but generally speaking it’s a reading challenge where participants read one short story a week for the year, the reading order being determined by the luck of the draw. See here for a list of the stories/essays I’ll be reading in 2017.

Jeffty is Five

“It’s a good world, all things considered. It’s much better than it used to be, in a lot of ways. People don’t die from the old diseases any more. They die from new ones, but that’s Progress, isn’t it? Isn’t it? Tell me. Somebody please tell me.”

I’ve always had a fondness for stories that play around with time. (I’m actually reading one right now – Jack Finney’s Time and Again). Vonnegut’s most famous protagonist – Billy Pilgrim if I have to tell you! – is just that because he becomes “Unstuck in Time.” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Benjamin Button puts a different spin on time, aging “backwards” after having been born an old man. There are other stories of those whose time is accelerated somehow, but what of Jeffty in this story? What’s his temporal oddity? What can we learn from a five year old about time? Pretty much, it turns out, because not only is Jeffty five. He’s always five.

We learn this from our narrator, Donny, who, though he has now grown up, was once five together with Jeffty, enjoying all that the magic of the world and the friendship of that age has to offer. Of all the characters in the story – even Jeffty’s parents – Donny is the one person who remains close to Jeffty, somehow appreciating him in spite of his oddity.

How does Jeffty remain always five? It seems this is partly achieved by his somehow being able to tune in to “live” radio shows that are no longer in production. At one point in the story Donny finds, for example, that Jeffty has a brand new decoder badge from the Captain Midnight radio program. That program has been off the air for twenty years, so how did Jeffty get this new “merch?” He simply “sent away for it,” apparently.

Alas, Donny is also a busy and successful businessman, and a stop by his television and appliance store with Jeffty on the way to the movies might spell doom…

“Nowhere… is there recognition of the ferocity the Present always brings to bear on the Past. Nowhere is there a detailed statement of how the Present lies in wait for What-Was, waiting for it to become Now-This-Moment so it can shred it with its merciless jaws.”

Have you read anything by Harlan Ellison? What other stories or works by him would you recommend? (below: from Ellison’s famous episode of ST:TOS)

“He knows, Doctor. He knows.”

♫♫ Personal notes: I became aware of this story a little more than two years ago when a “short story book club” I formed at my office was collecting story suggestions from our readers. This was one that never got picked and, perhaps not coincidentally, the member that proposed it only came to our first meeting. It has remained on my radar though, largely because on the intriguing title. In the intro to the story in my anthology, it is revealed that Ellison once “mis-heard” someone at a dinner party talking about their little boy, Jeff, saying “Oh, Jeff is fine. He’s always fine.” (I love hearing these origin stories about literary works!)

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The Future is Now by Katherine Anne Porter – Selection #23 of Deal Me In 2017

July 11, 2017 at 7:47 am (Uncategorized)
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The Card: â™ Aâ™  Ace of Spades

The Suit: For this year’s Deal Me IN, the suit of Spades is the domain of Clotho, one of the Fates from Greek Mythology who, according to Plato’s sings of things that are (i.e. the “present” for Deal Me In purposes). This story’s title meant I could probably put it with Fate representing the present or future. I went with the present.

The Selection: “The Future is Now” – published in 1950  and included my copy of The Best American Essays of the Century” edited by Joyce Carol Oates. I found a google docs pdf copy of the essay online here.

The Author: Katherine Anne Porter – Born in Texas in 1890 and famous for her novel “Ship of Fools” and countless stories and essays. She’s been featured at Bibliophilopolis before, and my post about her short story “Theft” remains one of my more frequently visited pages.

What is Deal Me In? I’m glad you asked!  Full details maybe found here, but generally speaking it’s a reading challenge where participants read one short story a week for the year, the reading order being determined by the luck of the draw. See here for a list of the stories/essays I’ll be reading in 2017.

The Future is Now

“And yet it may be that what we have is a world not on the verge of flying apart, but an uncreated one – still in shapeless fragments waiting to be put together properly. I imagine that when we want something better, we may have it: at perhaps no greater price than we have already paid for the worse.”

 (above: had to go with an Ace of Spades from my Game of Thrones deck since… Season 7 is coming)

I never fail to be impressed by writing that “holds up” over the years and can still read as relevant in a totally different time and circumstance. Porter’s essay, “The Future is Now” is a good example. Written in 1950, it expresses legitimate concern about the future of humanity and shows how these thoughts are almost always with us.

This essay was written by Porter shortly after her having read an article about what to do in case of a nuclear attack – something that was starting to worry many at that point in history – and the futility in trying to prepare for one (see the underlined sentence in the photo above). Apparently, the testing of first Hydrogen Bomb was also eminent, and Porter had this in mind as well, leading to this essay also musing about the status of the human race and it’s love-hate relationship with technology.

I heartily recommend reading this essay (link given in the intro) to anyone in any time period (that sounds funny when I put it that way – what can someone of the 19th century do about it? – but I hope you understand what I mean). Personally, I choose to be hopeful in a world that often doesn’t seem to offer much hope for the future. Porter seems to choose hope as well, which is why I used the quote I did as the lead in above.

Why is the essay titled as it is? Porter explains:

“I was once reading the writings of a young girl, an apprentice author, who was quite impatient to get on with the business and find her way into print. There is very little one can say of use in such matters, but I advised her against haste – she could so easily regret it. ‘Give yourself time,‘ I said, ‘the future will take care of itself.‘ This opinionated young person looked down her little nose at me and said, ‘The future is now.‘”

Have you read Katherine Anne Porter? This essay would be a good start. Are you an optimist or a pessimist? When people at the office accuse me of being a pessimist, I deny it, borrowing the old line and saying “I’m not a pessimist, I’m just an experienced optimist.” 🙂

 

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The People of Sand and Slag by Paolo Bacigalupi – Selection #25 of Deal Me In 2017

July 10, 2017 at 8:14 am (Uncategorized)
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The Card: ♥2♥ Two of Hearts – *wild card*

The Suit:  For this year’s Deal Me IN, the suit of Hearts is the domain of Atropos, one of the Fates from Greek Mythology who, according to Plato, sings of things that are to be (i.e. the “future” for Deal Me In purposes). This story is set in a distant future where human physiology has been enhanced by the incorporation of machines.

The Selection: “The People of Sand and Slag” was originally published in 2004 and was a nominee for the Hugo and Nebula awards for best novelette. I own it as part of the anthology The Very Best of Science Fiction and Fantasy, Volume 2. This was a wild card selection and I picked it because it was in a source I was already using for Deal Me In 2017 and because I had read the author’s novel “The Windup Girl” last year. This story may be read online at the author’s website.

The Author: Paolo Bacigalupi  – A Colorado writer most famous for his novel, The Windup Girl, which was named by Time as one of the top ten books of 2009. Learn more about him at his website.

What is Deal Me In? I’m glad you asked!  Full details maybe found here, but generally speaking it’s a reading challenge where participants read one short story a week for the year, the reading order being determined by the luck of the draw. See here for a list of the stories/essays I’ll be reading in 2017.

The People of Sand and Slag

“Still, I remember when the dog licked my face and hauled its shaggy bulk onto my bed, and I remember its warm breathing beside me, and sometimes, I miss it.”

I don’t know how much more dystopian you can get than a world where there are no longer dogs, or at least one where they’re so rare that hardly anyone has ever seen one. Such a world, however, is inhabited by Jaak, Lisa, and Chen – three security-guard types who, at the onset of this story, are sent off to intercept and eliminate the source of “hostile movement” within the corporate boundaries of “SesCo’s” mining operations.

What they find is not some perpetrator of corporate sabotage or espionage, but an old, wild, and mangy dog.  They can’t believe their eyes, believing at first it’s some kind of quadrupedal “bio-job.”  Jaak confirms the ID, however, saying “Oh yeah, it’s the real thing all right. I saw a dog in a zoo once. I’m telling you, this is a dog.”

But what would three bio-engineered, machine-enhanced humans of the future do with a dog? Lisa laughs that “It’s hard to believe we ever lived to evolve out that. If you chop off its legs, they won’t regrow.”  (Lisa’s broken femur from the team’s “helo-casting” into the slag pits already having healed.). The company flies in a biologist (“You mean a bio-engineer.” “Nope. Biologist …they study animals”) to take a look at it.  He confirms authoritatively that it is indeed a dog, and the team are surprised that he doesn’t want to take it with him.

One member of the team wants to eat it. One wants to keep it. All are worried about the hassle of taking care of it and providing for it. Food, for instance, is an issue. These humans can eat rock and sand, which provide all the “nutrients” their types of bodies require (“Who needs animals if you can eat stone?”).

What will become of this poor creature while under the “care” of its new masters? You’ll have to read the story yourself to find out the rest.

windup girl

As I mentioned in the intro, I also read Bacigulapi’s novel “The Windup Girl” last year and, while I didn’t quite connect as much as I hoped to, I found it – and it’s own dystopian future – quite interesting.

 

 

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