Winter’s world

Today is the winter solstice and shortest day here in NZ – so “Happy Solstice” to those that celebrate it as a festival.

The Maori New Year festival of Matariki will be marked a little later, on July 2 – traditionally the celebration commences when the Pleiades reappear in southern skies and is aligned to the new moon rather than the sun.

Kowhai: flowers in winter

On Thursday I refeatured a post on winter worlds from the blog backlist and mentioned Ursula Le Guin’s The Left Hand Of Darkness in that context. The world of Gethen, also known as Winter, is probably one of *the* defining winter worlds of speculative fiction.

Yet when it comes to solstice and new year festivals, Ms Le Guin’s Sunreturn, in her enduring children’s classic, A Wizard of Earthsea, is among my favourites. It’s a midwinter festival marked throughout the archipelagoes of Earthsea, with people drumming and dancing through the torch and bonfire lit darkness of the longest night, to invoke the return of the sun and life.

The essence of the festival is evoked in a handful of sentences but like so much of Ursula Le Guin’s writing, it captures the imagination and endures.

In Hogwarts, of course, they would have a glorious banquet. I suspect there may have been a few midwinter feasts here in NZ over the past weekend, with more coming up for Matariki – if only to fortify ourselves for the colder weather that tends to follow the solstice, i.e. as the days grow longer the nights get colder, for a time at least.

A feast of colour, if less “stupendous” than Hogwarts. 😉

The ideal season for storytelling, wouldn’t you say? 🙂

Under snow …

As promised on May 31, on the 11^th anniversary of the blog, I’m going to be revisiting posts from the backlist on a semiregular basis, because after eleven years there’s a fair amount of backlist to revisit. 😉

On 31 May, I was tossing up whether to revisit the backlist in a totally random way or go for themes. I still haven’t finally decided, but I suspect it’ll probably end up being a bit of both, i.e. I may settle on a theme for a while, then randomly leap to something else.

To kick things off, since winter solstice is almost upon us here in the Southern Hemisphere, I thought I’d revisit a winter-themed post from 2012: The Magic of Winter Worlds.

The post is by no means an exhaustive list of winter-themed works and was never intended to be, but if you like, you can join in the fun by adding “winter world” fantasies that have been published since 2012 — or from before it for that matter! Particularly if they’re a favourite!

Otherwise, enjoy!

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The Magic Of Winter Worlds from 21 July 2012

Recently I posted my poem “North” here, and alluded to a journey into the far north of Sweden, to Arjeplog just south of the Arctic circle, which inspired it.

Again recently, I have begun reading Australian author Jo Spurrier’s debut Fantasy, Winter Be My Shield, first mentioned under “Just Arrived” here — and these two posts got me thinking about what a great tradition winter worlds are in Fantasy-SciFi.

Here are a few of my favourites:

The Narnia of CS Lewis’s The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe, of course. I have think that moment when, together with Lucy Pevensie, I stepped through the back of a wardrobe and into the snowy landscape of Lantern Waste was definitely one of the most magical of my reading childhood.

As an adult, Ursula Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness provided a similar defining moment, with the physical world of Winter (Gethen) absolutely dominating the cultural, sexual, and political landscape of the story.

From there, I moved on to Michael Scott Rohan’s “Winter of the World” series (the first trilogy comprises The Anvil of Ice, The Forge of the World, The Hammer of the Sun), in which the encroaching ice (think ice age) is an aware power and the Norse myth influences on the storytelling — perhaps fittingly given the world — are strong. (Just in case you’re wondering, I think this is a good thing and the series a very interesting, if at times grim, one.)

And then there’s Mark Helprin’s Winter’s Tale — which is more like historical urban fantasy (meets the Gangs of New York) and is rich, mythic, magic realist imbued — and where winter undoubtedly ‘colours’  the entire story.

More recently I’ve read Kate Elliott’s Cold Magic (the first of a “Cold’ trilogy) which also picks up the idea of an ice age realm where the ice influences magic — but in a world where alternate history means the Carthaginians fought the Romans to a standstill, retaining their maritime empire, and North African (Mali) magicians have emigrated (ahead of a ghoul/zombie horde) to hook up with Celtic druids, I think you’ll already be getting that the story is going very different places to Michael Scott Rohan’s ice…

Nor should stories such as Peter Hoeg’s  Miss Smilla’s Feeling For Snow be overlooked, if only for the wonderful descriptions of winter and snow; this is a very atmospheric book. And how could I forget Joan Vingt’s “The Snow Queen”? Short answer, I can’t—again it’s a favourite novel and one where the prolonged winter world of Tiamat, but also the imminent transition to an equally prolonged summer is essential to the story being told. Picking up on extended winter/summer worlds again, “Winter is Coming” in George RR Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” series, even if it is not quite here yet — but the giant wall of ice and the Night Watch definitely set the scene from book one, A Game of Thrones.

And now I am reading the new Jo Spurrier epic, Winter Be My Shield, where winter and snow also dominate the world building.

There are also distinctive winter elements to wider worlds, such as the Winter Country in my own “The Wall of Night” series, and the north of the Finnish witches and panzer bjorn in Philip Pullman’s The Golden Compass.

The more I think about it, it seems fairly clear that winter worlds hold an enduring fascination, so now I’m thinking about why that might be… In part, I suspect it is because winter landscapes and worlds are so dramatic, stark and elemental. Physically, they challenge us — and the white on white of snow worlds is also a very strong aesthetic.

Can you think of other reasons for their enduring popularity in Fantasy-SF or literature generally?

And what are your great winter worlds that I’ve missed mentioning?

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The books mentioned in the 2012 comments were:

JV Jones’ SWORD OF SHADOWS Series

Brian Ruckley’s GODLESS WORLD series (Winterbirth, Bloodheir, Fall of Thanes )

John Farrow’s City of Ice (which is a thriller not fantasy but it’s set in Montreal during a bone-chilling winter).

Susan Cooper’s The Dark Is Rising

‘Winter’s Night’ by Boris Pasternak (a poem)

Matthew Kirby’s Icefall.

First off, I have to confess to some queue jumping. A few weeks back I posted on Reading Older Books, but Prodigal Summer was not one of the books mentioned. Although it’s a little more recent than some of the others discussed, being first published in 2000 – as opposed to Maquis in 1945, for example – the main reason was that I was just starting to read it.

Now here it is, jumping the Reading Older Books queue.

For the very good reason, dear readers, that I loved this book! I really enjoyed everything about it: the strong and compelling environmental themes; the equally strong sense of place (West Virginia / Appalachians, I believe), interwoven with family, community, and historical continuity – along with the contemporary challenges to that; the characters (dear readers, I adored the characters); the storylines; the strong beautiful prose – and just the sheer heart of the narrative.

In fact, it’s one of those books where I kept going back and rereading previous chapters, just to ensure I hadn’t missed any of the goodness.

Needless to say, I recommend it highly, although I’m quite sure any number of you may have beaten me to the draw and read it long ago.

Prodigal Summer is also my first Barbara Kingsolver novel (I “know”, how can that be – nonetheless, so it is!) but now I know what I’ve been missing out on, it’s great to know she has a fifteen book backlist. 🙂

I’ll very likely start with The Poisonwood Bible, given it’s probably the author’s most well-known work, but we’ll see… Watch this space!

Oh, what’s it all about you say? Well, I would call Prodigal Summer “contemporary realism” (twenty years not being so very long ago!) but basically there are three point-of-view protagonists, two women, one man, but with a number of other, important non- point-of-view characters. All three reside in a small rural community adjoining a national/forest park and wildlife reserve. The story is about the impacts of human settlement and development on nature, both historically and in the present time, but also about how nature works full stop.

Prodigal Summer also centres on what binds small rural communities – and the families that make them up – together, and the challenges of keeping both viable. Finally, it’s a story about three people and those closest to them, who they are, what draws them together, and what drives them apart – and it’s a story about life and death, love and purpose, family and friendship. I think that sums it up, pretty much. 😉

Overall, though, Prodigal Summer is just a really great read, imho.

I read a trade paperback edition, 444 pp, published by Faber & Faber in 2000, which I acquired secondhand.

USA

The About The Characters post series focuses on the minor characters in The Wall Of Night series, in large part because:

“I think it’s the presence of the smaller characters that “makes” a story, creating texture around the main points of view.”

~ from my Legend Award Finalist’s Interview, 2013

Initially, the series focused exclusively on characters from The Heir of Night, but now I’m continuing on with minor characters from both The Gathering Of The Lost and Daughter of Blood — in alphabetical order, by name, of course!

Currently, we’re traversing the plains of “L” – which are “great plains” indeed. 😉

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UK/AU/NZ

Lien: an assassin of Ij, a city on the River
.

“What else is there, besides the owls?”

The listening silence returned. “Nothing,” the assassin said at last. “Just hay, and I’ve run a sword through that. I’ll go through this window and onto the roof, check that, too.”

“No need.” The Master was crisp. “Lien and Miro have just gone over the roof of the house and can see the stable from there. They say it’s clear, too, so we must spread the net wider. I want this quarry found.”

“The night is not yet over.” The Darkswarm warrior’s voice carried clearly to the three beneath the ivy. “We still have time.”

~ from © The Gathering of The Lost, The Wall Of Night Book Two – Chapter 5, The Guild House

Reading older books

I haven’t forgotten that I promised to report back to you on some of those new-to-me, but otherwise older books that I’ve read recently, or to repost material from the backlist – and those posts are in the pipeline. 🙂

Reaching the chaos gate…

For today, however, although I’m mindful that it’s only two weeks since I let you know that Malian had reached the chaos gate (which provides the working title for WALL #4), I thought you might like to know that this past week I’ve been working on what is probably “the” big series reveal.

Or as fans of the Piggitty-Wiggitty series of children’s books might put it, the “biggitty-biggest” of series reveals. Although to be fair, this is the part of the book and series that is all about reveals and completion, so the “biggitty-biggest” title may yet go to another sequence.

In the meantime, though, it’s always good to share that the story is rocking on – although it’s also a long weekend here, so I’ve downed tools for the greater majority of that time. Interestingly, though, downing the pen and keyboard has also provided the opportunity for reflection in terms of refining some of the narrative action and character interaction. All of which seizes the pause to bubble to the surface.

Not quite so much sunshine this long weekend…

Just to make the case for downtime, holidays, and long weekends. 🙂

Amanda Arista

Wow! 1 June has been and gone already — the year feels as if it is sprinting by!

Nonetheless, you know what the first of the month means: I’ve posted on Supernatural Underground (Which I have also been doing for eleven years, along with m’own blog, as mentioned on Monday.)

This month’s post is with fellow Supernatural Underground author, Amanda Arista, who writes two urban fantasy series: Diaries of an Urban Panther and the Merci Lanard Files.

Amanda writes heroines with strong ‘voices’, spins tales with a great sense of place, and rocks a pretty good mystery/thriller to go with her paranormal urban world and Wanderer (predominantly but not exclusively Shifter) societies.

Here’s a sample of what Amanda has to say in the interview:

“As I look back on what I have written and the stories that interest me the most, it is the universality of the traditions that interest me, where I find real magic and meaning in life. For example, every folklore has a Shifter story. Japan, German, Native American. There is a fundamental story about a person who slips their skin into another form. Some are the good guys and some are the bad guys. That informed the origins of my own story, that wanderers came first, before humans, and then humans spread out across the world telling the stories of these magical creatures. Again, it was all about finding something in the real world and building the magical explanation around it.”

There’s so much more and all of it good: just head on over to Supernatural Underground to read the rest:

Amanda Arista Talks the Magic In Her Diaries Of An Urban Panther & Merci Lanard Files Series

I am scheduling this post ahead of time, as we are currently in the middle of a Very Heavy Rainfall Event, with a state of emergency declared in the area where I am and the possibility of both power failure and evacuation on the cards. So I thought I’d get this loaded, no matter what occurs between my now (midday Sunday) and when this goes live at 6.30 am on Monday morning.

Aside from all of that, Monday 31 is the 11^th anniversary of my “…on Anything, Really” blog. (I don’t know if you’re thinking “wow”, reading this, but I sure am, typing it. 🙂 )

As it turns out, the blog is mostly about writing and books — including my books and writing — along with genre and its influences, as opposed to anything else, really. 😉

While this is unsurprising, in looking back over the blog I realized that it contains a considerable backlist of material on these key topics, much of which is still of interest.

I have begun tweeting posts from the backlist, with the more recent instances including:

• “Which Speaks, Book or Author?” http://helenlowe.info/blog/2014/06/12/which-speaks-book-or-author/…
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• One Day Out Writing — I Check In On A Favourite Cliche http://helenlowe.info/blog/2016/12/16/one-day-out-writing-aka-a-favourite-cliche/…
  .
• A Passion for Fantasy http://helenlowe.info/blog/2012/08/13/a-passion-for-fantasy/…
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• Hazards of the Writing Life http://helenlowe.info/blog/2016/05/20/hazards-of-the-writing-life/…

To mark the 11^th year, I will also be refeaturing some of the posts I think you may find interesting, aiming for at least one a month, but no more than four maximum.

Open for some serious worldbuilding business…

Just for fun, the tweets tend to be selected at random, but I *may* take a more thematic approach on the blog – watch this space to see how it all evolves.

I also want to say a big thank you to all of you for being part of what “…on Anything, Really” means, because I do think part of the blog’s vibe over the past eleven years has been one of community. I look forward to rocking on together. 😀

…& here, too, be dragons!

I was going to say “bookmarks” but in fact my assortment of airline boarding passes, supermarket dockets, old envelopes, and postits, with the very occasional actual bookmark, probably can’t be graced by that title.

Similar placemarkers do feature in books I’m reading as well (and sometimes remain there to be refound several years later), but the sheer number in my “working set” of The Wall of Night #1 – #3 is indicative of the work in progress.

In other words, if I’m referring back to earlier volumes, either to fact check and ensure consistency, or to ensure the right “echoes” are carried through into Wall #4 (The Chaos Gate) I usually deploy a placemarker — grabbing whatever comes most immediately to had — in an “X marks the spot” kind of way.

In this sense, the placemarkers also constitute an artefact of the writing life. 😀

Arguably, having quite so many of them does sometimes limit their effectivness. Then again, I have a pretty good idea of roughly where in a book the relevant passages or pages occur, and the placemarkers serve as a useful starting point, from which I can then work either forward or back.

Yes, the table of content may help, too, assuming I know the correct chapter title — but regardless, somehow it always feels more expeditious to use the placemarker navigation system, with the ToC as a fallback: which could be a case of “the heart… having…its reasons, that reason knows not of.” (Blaise Pascal, 1623 – 1662)

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Inside the writing life

Previous Bulletins From Inside The Writing Life:

• A Little About The Writing Itself
• About Those Muses, Then…
• Naturally Self-Isolating
• Writing Novels, Posting Blogs
• Another Milestone Ticked Off
• A Game Of Two Halves
• Further Reflection on Writing Transitions
• Fun With Friends
• Those Moments Of “Grr-Argh”
• Sometimes It’s A Case Of “Oh Frabjous Day!
• “O Frabjous Day” Reprised
• Listening To The Silence
• Characters Behaving Badly

For those of you who are not on Twitter but are The Wall Of Night series readers, this probably counts as last week’s most significant tweet:

“Newsflash for #TheWallOfNight #readers — Malian has reached the Chaos Gate! Is this significant? Answer: THE CHAOS GATE is the #workingtitle for The Wall Of Night Book #4 … 😀”

It’s still not “the end”, but it is a pretty big sign post pointing that way – and a destination envisaged from the outset of the storytelling process.

There is still writing to do, so I couldn’t tarry, but as I wrote to Kate, the series’ editor, I did allow myself a “Snoopy dance” – and the tweet – by way of enjoying the moment.

And now, fully channeling the spirit of Mondays: onward. 😀

Harking back (again – because I did so on Monday as well 😉 ) to the May 6 post in which I discussed rereading books that count as very old friends, you may recall that the “old friend” in question was Patricia McKillip’s The Riddlemaster of Hed.

My favourite cover treatment — but not my edition!

I was still mid reread when I posted, but alas, when I came to the end of the book I discovered that time and not infrequent rereads have both taken their toll, because the last ten pages have completely separated from the spine.

Oh no!

Although I first discovered the series via the library, my editions (of the trilogy) are relatively early in its now forty-five year life, i.e. Riddlemaster (Book #1) was first published in 1976, and this was a 1985 reprint.

My edition. 🙂

I have had it quite a while, but am pretty sure it was acquired in the mid-late 1990s, at a then specialist bookshop in Dunedin (NZ) called (most fittingly) Bag End Books.

There’s a tribute site to Bag End Books here — check it out! Meanwhile, here’s a pic of the “other” Bag End: 😀

Bag End, Hobbiton

Although the book’s still in print it’s mainly available as an omnibus edition, so as I have the second and third books intact, I’ll probably see if I can repair my copy of Riddlemaster, since otherwise it’s in very good condition for a paperback.