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An excerpt from an email conversation I've been having with a friend:
"That being said, a different sort of story about an alien invasion modeled on the conquest of the new world would be extremely interesting. Better yet, model it on China or India, which were carved up by colonial powers then mastered the alien technology, gained independence, taught the aliens something new, and became major world players.
My problem with War of the Worlds is that I am far more interested with the long term consequences of the invasion than with the invasion itself. I don't like how the disease makes everything go back the way it was. That never happens with a foreign conquest. Look at Africa, which is a pretty good match for war of the worlds. Even though the foreigners were subject to African diseases and set up few successful colonies, they still radically changed Africa's history. Imagine if that happened in war of the worlds. The Martians mostly die, but they still have destroyed most of Earth's infrastructure. The next time they come, they do not try to live here, but enslave us to mine resources. Earth is carved into regions controlled by various Martian factions, and as the factions fight, humans are conscripted, traded, killed, or ignored. When human states are left to become independent, they'd evolve into anarchy or dictatorship. A story set in this world would consist of solving these problems, and readers would learn something about the situation in Africa, and what they might do about that.
Actually that's kind of an awesome idea. The story could be set now, in the 2000s. The history of the 20th century was one of war with various Martian colonial powers. Some of them want to establish colonies on Earth, which necessitate pressurized domes and sterilization of huge tracks of land. Others want resources or slaves. Others want to set up missionaries to spread their religions. Others don't particularly care about the Earth, but want to use it as a staging point to get to Venus (imagine human slaves being taken to work on the Venus terreforming, forming a triangle trade rout between Mars, Earth, and Venus). The moon is also useful real-estate. The history of the twentieth century is composed of some countries falling apart, others striking deals with the Martians, and others frantically trying to reverse-engineer Martian technology and build some sort of defenses. The Martians, meanwhile, are busily having their own wars and technological developments. This could be a fascinating way to examine Africa, Europe, and the New World in the 15 and 16 hundreds. Dude!"
"That being said, a different sort of story about an alien invasion modeled on the conquest of the new world would be extremely interesting. Better yet, model it on China or India, which were carved up by colonial powers then mastered the alien technology, gained independence, taught the aliens something new, and became major world players.
My problem with War of the Worlds is that I am far more interested with the long term consequences of the invasion than with the invasion itself. I don't like how the disease makes everything go back the way it was. That never happens with a foreign conquest. Look at Africa, which is a pretty good match for war of the worlds. Even though the foreigners were subject to African diseases and set up few successful colonies, they still radically changed Africa's history. Imagine if that happened in war of the worlds. The Martians mostly die, but they still have destroyed most of Earth's infrastructure. The next time they come, they do not try to live here, but enslave us to mine resources. Earth is carved into regions controlled by various Martian factions, and as the factions fight, humans are conscripted, traded, killed, or ignored. When human states are left to become independent, they'd evolve into anarchy or dictatorship. A story set in this world would consist of solving these problems, and readers would learn something about the situation in Africa, and what they might do about that.
Actually that's kind of an awesome idea. The story could be set now, in the 2000s. The history of the 20th century was one of war with various Martian colonial powers. Some of them want to establish colonies on Earth, which necessitate pressurized domes and sterilization of huge tracks of land. Others want resources or slaves. Others want to set up missionaries to spread their religions. Others don't particularly care about the Earth, but want to use it as a staging point to get to Venus (imagine human slaves being taken to work on the Venus terreforming, forming a triangle trade rout between Mars, Earth, and Venus). The moon is also useful real-estate. The history of the twentieth century is composed of some countries falling apart, others striking deals with the Martians, and others frantically trying to reverse-engineer Martian technology and build some sort of defenses. The Martians, meanwhile, are busily having their own wars and technological developments. This could be a fascinating way to examine Africa, Europe, and the New World in the 15 and 16 hundreds. Dude!"
Doing Good
So there we were, giving this stranger 200 leva. "What? Are you serious?" He wasn't being sarcastic. He really wanted to check that what he thought was happening was actually happening. His face scrunched up, trying not to cry. That was when I was finally sure this wasn't all a scam. read on
Congratulations, Your Nightmare Came True
(see posts like this a week earlier on my Patreon for $1 a month) Our little blue car emerged from the tunnel and hummed up Botevgradsko Boulevard. To our left: a mural of chains melting off someone's forearms. The kids were looking out the windows, there was nobody to interrupt us and nothing that needed cleaning, and I relished the ability to complete a thought. "Ha!" I said. "What?" asked Pavlina. We stopped at a red light. "Congratulations," I said. "My nightmare came true. I've been called a racist on the internet." "Well, not exactly," said Pavlina. "Okay, I was called – " I corrected myself, " – my work was called 'problematic' in an email. That's like halfway there. That's a benchmark." "Yeah, okay. Congratulations." She wasn't being sarcastic. We turned and headed south toward Mount Vitosha, and I burned with joy. (see pictures and good formatting here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/63082454 ) In Man's Search for Meaning, psychologist Viktor Frankl talks about his brand of
The River Toenail
In my dream, I was peeling layers of the nail of my left pinkie toe. The nail had flared out from the small digit into a palm-shaped platter, which was worrying. The layers broke of easily, though, without any pain. Just a dull snap, like brittle acrylic. They were surprisingly thick, transparent as mica and eaten through with tunnels. The tunnels were branching and tentacular, less like trees than the tracks bored by woodworms, less like lightning than the deltas of rivers. When I woke up, I knew I had to stop playing with that map. read on https://bit.ly/3rl61Kb #mentalhealth #writing #fantasymap
October Newsletter: A Piece of My Mind
(see this link for better formatting: https://bit.ly/31RQ8BZ ) I rolled over angrily in bed. Enough of this! Enough of you, author-with-whom-I-disagree! I was going to give him a piece of my mind. I snatched for the cord of my light and pulled on it until it yielded the switch. Squinting, I rattled around the top of the bedside table, feeling for my notebook. American culture is a crazy old man shouting at the invisible people at the bus stop, I wrote. There, that was one piece of my mind, now safely on the page and out of my head. Gold reflected on the eastern face Of the panel block This is a chronic problem for me. Partly, I think it's because I've learned enough about writing to recognize the tricks of a lazy author. Another thing is that the Anglosphere has had a rough decade, and English-language literature has gone into an understandably dark place. But most of the problem is the state of my mind. Something came off of me when I was sick. I lost some sort of protective film
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good idea...that will be a good story i would read.