Review: Philip K. Dick's "Martian Time-Slip"

Disclaimer, PKD is one of my favorite authors and one of the all-time greats. His ability to effortlessly world-build, thoroughly distort the reality of the reader and (for the most part) build engaging characters are consistently great. Just needed to get that PSA out of the way.

In this tale set in the nebulously near-future of a Cold War twentieth century, Mars has been colonized. Importantly, the populace of Earth holds the Martian colony on a pedestal as the future of humanity, unencumbered by the petty trappings of Earth. Mars therefore serves as an ironic microcosm of all the worlds' problems which have followed the settlers to Mars, a fact that must be swept under the rug.

PKD weaves an intricate plot of characters who are threaded together by one Arnie Kott, a wealthy union chief who seeks to reap monetary benefit using knowledge of the future. His prophet is a young autistic child with an altered time sense. To help foster communication with the mute child, Arnie enlists his repair man and former schizophrenic Jack Bohlen to build a communication device, and so the tale begins to weave.

The characters are engaging enough to float the narrative, even though some of them are barely more than stock characters. Jack's psyche plays center stage, and probably underscores some of the author's own struggles with mental illness. Given these difficulties, this may not be surprising, and this particular work may have been written by the author for himself as a form of catharsis.

Although it requires some suspension of disbelief given our modern knowledge of the Martian atmosphere and climate, the world building is staggering in its vitality. The novel teems with feelings of capitalistic exploitation, isolation amid the loneliness of frontier life, and ultimately the futility of looking to the stars to escape mankind's failures.

I enjoyed the work overall, but like some other offerings of PKD that I have read, the narrative left me a bit unsatisfied. There was no real punch given by the story's climax. Still, that would not stop me from recommending this work, not just to PKD fans, but to fans of the genre itself. 3.5/5 stars.

Vignettes from the End of the World is now live, featuring my story "Tears on Vega"

I am very proud to be a part of this anthology- 58 short tales of the end of the world- each horrifying in their own way.

Vignettes from the End of the World

I recently received an EBook and Print copy, and both look fantastic. 

The book is being very well received by critics as well as by those who have bought the book on Amazon and reviewed it.

I was honored that my own piece, Tears on Vega, was the subject of very kind praise in one of these reviews:

A solitary woman on an outpost station on a desolate planet witnesses the tardy visual proof of the apocalypse in "Tears on Vega" by Erik B. Scott. Yes, another favorite. It's beautifully told and glows with grief and loneliness. I could see it all play out in my head: "Her telescope sat at the hill's zenith in lonely anticipation of this day. Lydia was not sure whether the device really was casting humanoid-looking shadows or if it was just her subconscious wishing for some company."

If you are interested in apocalyptic fiction or just want to support me as a writer, I encourage anyone interested to pick up an Ebook copy- you really cannot beat the price!

BLOG HOP ON THE WRITING PROCESS

I’m participating in a blog hop with other writers in which we answer questions about what and how we write. Before I answer these questions, I’d like to thank Tom Doyle for inviting me to participate. I met Tom at an event at the Baltimore Science Fiction Society and was immediately impressed by his writing. We shared a mutual love of classic civilizations, and that is reflected in our writing. Congrats to Tom on his recent book publication, American Craftsmen- find him at http://www.tomdoyleauthor.com/news-and-blog/

Well, here goes…

1) What am I working on? I currently am working on diversifying my portfolio of science fiction short stories. I have a special place in my heart for flash fiction (fiction under 1000 words)- I find the ability to transport someone to another place and time and do it in under 5 minutes to be incredibly powerful. I am also working on a feature-length screenplay, entitled Tantalus. Screenwriting has been a fun experiment for me and has honed my ability to write dialogue and imagery.  

2) How does my work differ from others of its genre? My work tends to focus on cyberpunk themes (high tech at the expense of our humanity), as well as themes of what constitutes humanity and being alien or otherwise alienated. While these themes are by no means unique to science fiction, I try to set these themes against a backdrop of space opera. Recently, I wrote a piece of retro Cold War era science fiction comedy, which I found to be very unique amongst its competitors.

3) Why do I write what I do? I often wonder that myself. I tend to write whatever speaks to me, whatever I am feeling in the moment I set out to write. Given that my work deals with some aforementioned dark themes, my wife and mother often worry about what dark thoughts are kicking around in my head. It’s not all doom and gloom, however, as I have recently branched out into writing science fiction humor. Ultimately, to use a bit of a cliché, I try to write things that I would like to read myself.

4) How does my writing process work? As stated above I write a lot of flash fiction. Given the considerable time constraints of my day job as a medical student, short writing sessions of 1-2 hours are generally my norm, and these generally come on weekends or late at night with plenty of coffee. I sit down to write when I am struck with a new idea, so I usually know where my story is going when I start- I have a beginning, a middle and an end in my head. That said, I leave myself open to course corrections along the way as my characters and my tale unfold before me. Once finished, I do a few read-throughs to correct any typographic errors or awkward phrasing/dialogue, and then I am done. This is rather controversial, but I rarely if ever do rewrites. I try to follow Heinlein’s rules of writing science fiction, one of which is that you must never rewrite except by editorial instruction. The thinking goes that the time spent rewriting could better be spent writing the next story, and I have stuck to it thus far into my career.

That’s it for now, I will soon be updating shortly to add the next participants- friends and author colleagues who will be repeating this exercise on their own blogs!

Officials Urge Public to Change Locks After Thieves Steal NSA’s Copy of Everyone’s House Keys

Amid swirling public concern regarding internet security breaches and password failsafes, consumer advocates were alarmed to learn Thursday that physical locks may also now be compromised, after reports circulated late Wednesday that hackers had gained access to a secret room where the National Security Administration keeps a key to every home in America. “This is a very serious situation,” said NSA chief General Keith Alexander. “Not only is the security of countless Americans potentially at risk, but this theft has also compromised the NSA’s ability to enter anyone’s house whenever we feel like it.”

Indeed, this key repository has been viewed by many as a cornerstone of the NSA’s spying programs, which infamously gathered meta data on millions of people worldwide. “This key repository greatly facilitated those efforts,” said Gen. Alexander. “Without the ability to enter peoples’ homes, crucial security data on what TV shows people are watching, and what color underwear they like to wear might never have been recorded.”

The hackers perpetrated the bold raid Tuesday night, gaining access to the room with false security credentials, and were able to escape due to an NSA oversight whereby the key to every door in the NSA headquarters was also present in the room.

“We had the thieves contained to one wing of the building,” said Alexander, “But when we breached the wing, we saw that they had simply unlocked the back door and walked out using the key from inside the repository.”

“This room was designated only for storage of the keys of citizen homes,” he went on to add, “And so we are currently investigating this breach of policy.”

“We hope that this incident will raise public awareness about the importance of security,” said Alexander. “If measures aren’t taken to correct these types of problems, soon the public might have to worry that someone other than the NSA has unlimited access to their homes.”

“That is a world that I never want to live in,” the general added gravely.

“We encourage all Americans to be vigilant, but also to change their locks immediately, and to send a copy of the new key to NSA headquarters,” said Gen. Alexander.

He went on to add that the NSA had, for public convenience, already made arrangements to acquire the copied keys directly from the locksmiths, in case anyone forgets to send them in.

(Disclaimer: This has been my first piece of Onion-style satirical, fictional news. I hope you enjoyed it)

Recap: A great event for a great project- DSF Book Launch Party in Baltimore MD

On Saturday, I had the good fortune to be invited to read my previously published story, The Exterminator, at the Daily Science Fiction Book Launch Party at the Baltimore Science Fiction Society in Baltimore MD.

I was part of a cadre of very gifted writers who volunteered to read our works aloud. Below is a group photo at the event.

There was also video taken of my reading at the event. If you ever wanted to experience my fiction in a visual medium, you can find the video here.

What is Success? A Primer (and possibly pep talk) for my Fellow Young Writers

If there is one topic that writers are generally obsessed with, it is success, and it seems to mean different things to just about everyone. Success is a mythical being to some, or taken for granted by others. A lot of writers experience angst about how to "make it" and be a "success."

I do not preach to be an astounding "success" (at least not yet) in the writing world. I consider myself a capable writer, I have multiple professional sales under my belt and other self-published works. But one of the demons that every writer must wrestle with is the self destructive attitude that a quest for success (and an intolerance of failure) can have on the mind of a young writer.

Let me back up, this post came in response to a conversation that I was a part of in a professional writer's group. Some writers were struggling to find what the outside world might consider "success." The discussion centered on the nature of success, and what it means. I added to the discussion, retelling my own personal journey to figuring out what it means to be a success. My words were well-received in the conversation, and so I have structured this post around them. What I said went something like... 

Many people define success as monetary success. Your writing becomes insanely popular and puts you on easy street. You know, your George RR Martins, things like that. However, for the vast majority of writers, success comes from a combination of writing money and money from a "day job." The relative contributions of the two may vary, but you can be "successful" as a writer long as you can sustainably do the writing that you love, and keep the rest of your life in order.  

Personally, I think that's a great way to look at it. If you love to write, then you are a success as a writer as long as you can do it and take care of your responsibilities.

A problem that writers who are early in their pro careers face is that even a small modicum of success brings higher expectations. I made a somewhat prestigious pro sale of a short story on only the 2nd short story I had ever written, on only the second rewrite of said story, to the first market that I sent it to. That gave me a much higher expectation of myself, and a much lower assumption on the ease of getting published in big markets. It took another year of rejection hell and 6 months of time off due to "writer's block," or more correctly "failing writer's sadness" for me to be able to write again. My expectations had me all out of whack. Turns out, even publishing one story is hard. Almost indescribably hard.

Eventually, I made another small sale, and it upped my confidence again, and suddenly my craft began to improve with the confidence. I was no longer thinking about getting published, I was letting it flow. I took additional comfort in the fact that if you believe the subtext of Heinlein's Rules, then by making a pro sale you are already better off than 99%+ of the people who claim they would like to write. That effort- to write, to edit, to submit, to sell, to be perseverant- is admirable in itself, and a "success." The accolade of being published is just the cherry on top.

However, I am not saying that this laid back attitude about success is a license to accept mediocrity. I think we all owe it to ourselves to be honest with our benchmarks, and never be satisfied. To be hungry is healthy. The trick is just to avoid the self destructive behavior that feeling a failure can bring to one's psyche and careers.

Time to party! Book release party, that is. I will be doing a live reading!

I am happy to report that I was recently invited to read aloud my first pro sale, The Exterminator, at an upcoming event for the magazine in which it was published, Daily Science Fiction.

Daily Science Fiction Book Release Party "Rocket Dragons Ignite: DSF Year Two"

They are releasing their latest anthology which I feel is one of the best values in all of sci fi. You get over 200 stories in the huge volume for a very reasonable price.

I look forward to meeting any fans of the magazine, as well as my fellow authors who will be attending this event! Details are in the link above.

Teaser Spotlight: Upcoming Publication

Want to read more of work by @Erik_B_Scott ? A work of my flash fiction will appear in upcoming themed anthologies. Publication details to follow!