{"id":23457,"date":"2013-12-12T06:30:15","date_gmt":"2013-12-11T17:30:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=23457"},"modified":"2013-12-08T19:12:49","modified_gmt":"2013-12-08T06:12:49","slug":"heres-specficnz-wellington-featuring-jonathan-james-todd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2013\/12\/12\/heres-specficnz-wellington-featuring-jonathan-james-todd\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cHere\u2019s SpecFicNZ\u2013Wellington\u201d: Featuring Jonathan James Todd"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I am currently running a blog \u201cmini-series\u201d titled \u201cHere\u2019s SpecFicNZ Wellington\u201d<\/a> in which my fellow members are introducing themselves using a series of\u00a0 common headings:<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s Who:<\/strong> a short, first person introduction to the member
\nHere\u2019s Why:<\/strong> the member writes or works in speculative fiction
\nHere\u2019s What:<\/strong> an example of the member\u2019s work
\nHere\u2019s Where:<\/strong> you<\/em> can find out more about the writer and their work\u2014and I really hope you will!<\/p>\n

This week, my penultimate SpecFicNz Wellington guest is Jonathan James Todd: welcome!<\/p>\n

\u2014<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s SpecFicNZ\u2013Wellington: Featuring Jonathan James Todd<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/a>Here\u2019s Who:<\/span><\/h3>\n

Well hello! I am and have been variously a writer, film-maker and musician.<\/span><\/p>\n

I did a post-grad degree in Psychology, then spent a decade as a caregiver to a family member, which allowed me to read widely and teach myself things across many disciplines. Thus my writing reflects a rare, comprehensivist perspective.<\/span><\/p>\n

So far I have written five book length manuscripts \u2013 three novels (two near future SF, one fantasy) and two non-fiction. A nonfiction manuscript about consciousness and reality was shortlisted for the 2009 Ashton Wylie Unpublished Manuscript award<\/a>. Currently none of these manuscripts are published, and sadly I have done very little about seeking publication… I get distracted by creating. (I see why agents exist!)<\/span><\/p>\n

Somewhere along the way I played in some bands and made a feature film and travelled the world. Now I am setting up my own business as a life coach. Aiming to crank out a couple of first drafts by the end of the year \u2013 one non-fiction, one contemporary fiction \u2013 then get back to polishing the fantasy and submitting things places.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s Why:<\/span><\/h3>\n

When I was 14 I knew I was a writer. Just knew.<\/span><\/p>\n

Fantasy seems like the language of story which I internalised. While my first two novels wore the trappings of SF, they obeyed the rules of fantasy. Ultimately genre is meaningless. Story is about propelling us into a transcendent space beyond words. What gets you to that place is a matter of taste; and the best stuff transcends any genre limitation.<\/span><\/p>\n

The archetypal nature of story is that of the shaman traveling into the otherworld and bringing back the tale of what they encountered to their community. Fantasy is a modern variant \u2013 the author takes us into an alternate world which is unavoidably a mirror to and comment upon our own. The challenge is to make what we bring back from this journey relevant and useful to people now. As well as entertaining.<\/span><\/p>\n

Why specfic? Because it is fun. It lets the imagination run free, and gives complete freedom to explore. But much as I love it, I don’t feel at all bound to specfic. I will write whatever comes out, be it contemporary or non-fiction or the most beautiful and demented fantasy.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Here\u2019s What:<\/span><\/h3>\n

From Harvesting the Gyre<\/em><\/strong> (published in Regeneration<\/strong>, Random Static Press, 2013)<\/span><\/p>\n

“So this video shows this guy with his machine. It looks like a miniature washing machine, or a pressure cooker \u2013 yeah, that’s it. A baby piece of whiteware. You dump the plastic in the top, screw the lid down with these tap like handles. Turn it on. Slowly it heats the plastic, melting it down. First it liquefies, then turns into gas. As a gas it rises and makes its way along the thin metal pipe from the lid, which decants into a large flask of water. As the gas passes into the water, it cools, and turns back into oil.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

He pours out the oil from the machine into a long glass flask, goes outside, pours some into a metal pan, sets it alight. Whoosh. It burns vibrant like the future.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

The rest of the video \u2013 it is only a few minutes long, but time stretches out like childhood wonder \u2013 shows him all around the world, the third world, in front of kids, mostly black and brown, demonstrating that you can turn garbage into oil. Explaining to them that garbage is in fact treasure. Because most people just don’t know.”<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s Where:<\/span><\/h3>\n

If you wanted to know about me, try http:\/\/about.me\/jonathanjamestodd<\/span><\/a> for personal data;<\/span>
\n www.undulatingungulate.com<\/span><\/a> for a long running sporadically updated blog \u2013 these days mostly just reviews of what I am reading, but there is a lot of stuff from across the years, and it will likely revive at some point.<\/span><\/p>\n

You can watch my documentary about Kiwiburn (the NZ regional Burning Man Festival) free at www.combustinunity.com<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The story Harvesting the Gyre<\/em> came out this year in the anthology Regeneration,<\/strong> ed. Anna Caro & Juliet Buchanan, Random Static Press, 2013.<\/span><\/p>\n

The piece The Anatomy of Inequality<\/em> is forthcoming in issue 31 of the literary magazine JAAM<\/strong>, ed. Clare Needham & Harvey Molloy, 2013.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014<\/p>\n

The \u201cHere\u2019s SpecFicNZ\u2013Wellington\u201d series will conclude next week, Thursday 19 December.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am currently running a blog \u201cmini-series\u201d titled \u201cHere\u2019s SpecFicNZ Wellington\u201d in which my fellow members are introducing themselves using a series of\u00a0 common headings: Here\u2019s Who: a short, first person introduction to the member Here\u2019s Why: the member writes or works in speculative fiction Here\u2019s What: an example of the member\u2019s work Here\u2019s Where: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","category-other-writers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23457"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23457\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23478,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23457\/revisions\/23478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}