John B. Rosenman

Some folks don’t like Shakespeare.

Some folks hate Beethoven.

Some folks despise Rembrandt.

I’ve always felt that there was an absolute standard for art.  Do it right, take care, use your craft and knowledge and experience, and everyone should agree that what you did was mighty fine.   But a recent incident with a friend reminded me of what I already knew: that such a view is naive.  No matter how brilliant and flawless a work of art is, somebody somewhere won’t like it because tastes and perceptions and backgrounds differ.  Indeed, there will always be people—bright, intelligent, well-read, cultured people—who don’t like Shakespeare or think he’s greatly overrated.

The moral?  It’s simple: whether you’re a writer, painter, musician, composer or whatever, you should be prepared for bad reviews and negative critiques no matter how hard you strive to make it perfect. 

I recall one of my stories, “Only a Stone,” which two editors disagreed on.  One editor gave cogent reasons why the ending was too subtle.  Another editor gave cogent reasons why it was too obvious.  What do you do with that?  Well, what you do is weigh both their opinions and judge for yourself what to do.  My point is, that intelligent folks will often disagree and you alone must decide who is right.  Just remember that writing a flawless masterpiece does not always mean others will see it your way or give you rave reviews.  Or even one rave review, for that matter.

Be prepared to be slammed.

Recently I saw a 2007 science-fiction movie, MAN FROM EARTH, which is based on a Jerome Bixby short story.  I dug the guts out of the movie.  I loved it.  The Providential Journal said that the movie “Quietly Restores Dignity to Science Fiction Of The Mind.”  The movie won the Grand Prize for Best Screenplay and First Place for Best Feature at the Rhode Island International Film Festival.  It was also an Official Selection of the San Diego Comic-Con International Film Festival.  Okay, these aren’t Academy Awards, but the movie has received some critical acclaim. 

Having seen the movie three times, I decided that it was one of my four favorite movies of all time.  (The other three are the 1939 The Wizard of Oz, the 1953 The War of the Worlds, and the 1950 Cyrano de Bergerac.)   I realized that for those who like action and scenery, Man from Earth is static and probably won’t fly.  It involves “talking heads” – that is, people basically just talking to each other, and it takes place almost exclusively in the main character’s house.  There’s no eye candy; nothing blows up; there’s no X-rated bump and tickle.  But I loved it.  For perhaps the first time I could remember, there was a prolonged and intelligent exchange of ideas and concepts, which is what the best science fiction is often primarily about.  According to the DVD, Professor John Oldman informs his incredulous colleagues that he “has migrated through 140 centuries of evolution [which means he is 14,000 years old] and must move on.”  Is he Real or Memorex?  Sane or nuts?  The movie builds and rebuilds on its premise, discusses historical patterns and events intelligently, presents interesting, well-drawn characters, and builds “to a final” and shocking “revelation” and a satisfying conclusion.  Plus, it is so rich and dense, that you can watch it multiple times and continue to find something new.  What more could you want?

And all this in just 87 minutes.

I lent this movie to my good friend and fellow writer, Richard Rowand.  We don’t always agree on things creative, but often we do.  I thought he might be put off by the static, talking heads, dialogue-heavy quality of the movie, but to my mild surprise, he offered a more critical, all-encompassing critique, which he had posted online at www.recipedujour.com.  I offer it in toto, with his permission, for your consideration.

 Rich’s Note:   “Try it. You’ll Like It.”

Ever see or hear or experience something you liked so much that you urged everyone you know to see or hear or experience the same thing because you were just positive they would love it as much as you did? You raved, maybe?  Went on and on until you became a bit of a bore on the subject? Urged and cajoled until you finally wore them down and they just weren’t as impressed as you had been? It’s happened to me a million times. Sometimes we build something up so much it can’t possibly live up to the expectations we’ve planted. Sometimes others just have different tastes. Sometimes their minds just weren’t as ripe as yours was. No one quite likes the film The Legend Of 1900 as much as I do. It’s okay. I’ve come to accept that. Susan [Rich’s wife] doesn’t share my fascination with Cool Hand Luke or The Godfather. I’ve come to accept that too.

Tim kept a film recorded on his DVR for over a year, waiting for Walt and me to visit so he could share the movie with us. Walt and I didn’t like it at all.

Recently, my friend John leant me a DVD of the film Jerome Bixby’s Man From Earth. He explained that it was a thinking person’s film with very little action: just a bunch of characters sitting around having a discussion. Most people, he claimed, wouldn’t like the movie, would be bored. 

Now I have to tell you that Jerome Bixby wrote the most frightening story I have ever read, which was “It’s A Good Life.” There have been a couple of attempts to translate that story to television and they have not worked for me. It wasn’t the commercial interruptions so much as the fact that sometimes the printed word, and the way the words are used, can convey so much more than a director and actors can portray.

Such, I’m sad to say, is what I thought as I watched Jerome Bixby’s Man From Earth. I have to tell my friend John that the direction and acting ruined what might have been a pretty good story. . . had I read the story first. Though made in 2007, it seemed like they were presenting something as it would have been shown on television in the late 50′s or early 60′s. Even some of the characters were more caricature than fleshed out, almost as if they were lifted from a street corner in a frame from an old comic book, their clothes more props than costumes, their make-up more masks than reflections of their inner thoughts. For me, the director (with, I’m sure, others) just didn’t have the vision needed to captivate me.

I wanted to like this film. I wanted to share John’s enthusiasm, but I just couldn’t.

There you have it: two (supposedly intelligent) people sharply disagreeing.  It happens all the time.  In the end, whether as creators or consumers of art and literature, we have to be prepared for the reality that we are human beings who have different tastes and perceptions.  Also, we come to our experiences with different backgrounds, experiences, and histories.  Wouldn’t it be a boring world if we all agreed and felt the same way about things?  Yes, it would, and I tell my students that frequently.  Different strokes for different folks.  Vive la difference!  No matter how good you are, or think you are, somebody’s gonna disagree or cut you down.  Accept it.

So how do I feel after reading Rich’s intelligent review?  Well, I’m a little more disposed to accept the possibility that Man from Earth is flawed and imperfect and isn’t The Movie of the Century.

But I still like it . . . a lot!

My SF action-adventure novel, Beyond Those Distant Stars, published by Mundania Press, recently won AllBooks Review Editor’s Choice Award.  In their judgment, the book was one of the eight best they reviewed in 2009, and while there’s no $$$ prize involved, they plan to promote and advertise the novel in dozens of places.  If you’re interested in checking the book out, visit Amazon and other links, or click on http://www.mundania.com/book.php?title=Beyond+Those+Distant+Stars/

Winning the award has made me think lately of awards in general.  Specifically, what do they mean?  Okay, an award might mean more sales, especially if you promote the book actively and intelligently.  Also, some folks are impressed by awards, even if they don’t understand the details.  The word “Award” carries a certain luster, and I will try to use this modest honor to enlarge my reading audience, which certainly needs to grow.

Despite winning an award, my main point here is that in general, awards don’t mean that much intrinsically.  I think that usually, though not always, fiction awards reflect something else than just merit alone.  Sometimes it’s taste.  People just like the book more, perhaps because of its subject matter, its sexual explicitness, or some trend or quirk it embodies.  Then again, sometimes a book or story wins because the author has more friends and acquaintances who will vote for it, or because he promotes it more energetically and effectively, sometimes dipping into his wallet to do so.  Also, sometimes a book has a bigger, better known publisher, or a story appears in a slick, popular magazine.  You could have one hell of a tale in a small rag and never get noticed.

I’m sure there are other reasons too why merit often gets overlooked or only partly considered.  Whatever the case, it’s not a level playing field out there, folks.  Rarely is the process completely fair.  And when it is—well, I think it’s the exception rather than the rule.

I recall Dustin Hoffman winning an Academy Award and saying in his acceptance speech, that he “refuse[d] to believe” that the other nominees were less worthy.  When we talk about movie awards, other factors are involved in the Awards process.  If the actor has never won before and is a venerable fixture on the Silver Screen, then hey, his time has come.  Younger actors can wait a while to hoist a trophy.  After all, they have a lot more time.  The same occasionally applies to older directors, who may win Best Director or Best Picture awards because of their seniority, and because they have more friends who are qualified to vote.

This year I saw Avatar on a huge IMAX screen in 3D.  I loved it.  It’s a great experience.  But Inglourious Basterds may be an even better picture.  However, I bet that Avatar will carry off more Oscars, including the one for best picture, because of its novelty, hype, and the X or Wow factor.  If Avatar doesn’t win, then other factors that have nothing to do with the movie’s greatness may be at work, such as ingrained prejudice against genre flicks or even the 3D process, which some may see as a cheap gimmick.

So these are my latest thoughts on Awards, which are wonderful to get but which we writers probably care about too much.  On occasion, they may even be a distraction that lures us away from our writing.  Folks, the next time you see a work of fiction or nonfiction that has won an award, whether it be a Stoker, a Hugo, a Nebula, a National Book Award, or even the Nobel Prize itself, stand back a bit, out of the glare of glory, and ask yourself if the award was truly deserved and if it should matter to you at all.

{This is a controversial blog I’ve posted at http://www.thedeepening.com/horror/  Some folks have strenuously disagreed with parts of it.  However, I remained concerned about our current leadership and feel you can be polite and kind without constantly apologizing for your faults and advertising them to the world.}                                                                                                        

Remember Neville Chamberlain?

In 1938, this British prime minister negotiated with Adolph Hitler and said of the Munich Agreement that it promised “peace for our time.”  We know now that the Agreement not only gave the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia to the Nazis but tempted the Fuhrer’s desire to conquer and subjugate all Europe.  Granted, Germany’s long-term territorial aims were basically unknown, but appeasement has an historical tendency to open the door to insatiable tyrants whose ultimate goal is to conquer the world.  In 1939, following Germany’s continued aggression, especially its invasion of Poland, Europe was plunged into World War II.

In the realms of Horror, whether we’re talking fiction, movies, graphic novels or what-have-you, the periodic weakness of our nations’ leaders in international relations is an important but  insufficiently explored theme.  This is regrettable, for on the world stage, appeasement and weakness can have colossal, unrivaled consequences.  Indeed, as we know, with the advent of nuclear weapons, billions can die and LIFE AS WE KNOW IT can end.   

My father taught me never to run from a bully because you may never stop running.  Also, it only whets the bully’s appetite for your blood and sharpens his hunger to humiliate you.  Significantly, there are many ways to run, whether it’s by turning tail and scampering off, or by looking someone in the eye and blinking first.  You can even display weakness by letting the other guy talk too long or by letting your emotions distract you from your main task.

This is what happens in my novel, Beyond Those Distant Stars (Mundania Press).  Stella McMasters is finally given her first command of a starship.  However, at the beginning she has difficulty displaying firm, focused, and decisive leadership.  She lets an officer continue to question their orders during an executive meeting.  Later, her first officer bluntly tells her, “Our physician is your subordinate.  He answers to you, not the other way around.”  Stella’s leadership is threatened further when she becomes romantically attracted to a dashing pilot and finds herself distracted when it comes to her duties.

These particular scenes remind me of similar problems involving America’s highest leaders: President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.  Nile Gardiner, Director of the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom, states that Clinton “has been the most low-key secretary in recent times.”  Certainly, she has been upstaged and sidelined repeatedly by figures such as her own husband traveling to North Korea to negotiate the release of two imprisoned Americans, and Virginia senator Jim Webb embarking on a similar mission in North Korea and Burma.  The perception is that there has been a sharp detour around Clinton’s State Department, which has been marginalized and ignored.  Some observers’ confidence in Clinton has been shaken.  “Who’s in charge?” they ask. “Who’s really representing the Obama administration?”

Some have argued that Hillary Clinton is not at fault here, particularly in the case of North Korea  which requested Bill Clinton’s visit and has a contentious relationship with his wife.  Still, the impression created is that of weak and ineffective leadership, a dangerous situation in the shark-filled waters of a post 9/11 world.  Pursuing short-term goals by placating people who rule by bloody force is a prescription for failure because it is based on a failure to grasp the savage, irrational nature of your enemy.

Doesn’t the present situation with North Korea, a dictatorship seeking to become a nuclear power, sound like the basis of a great international thriller, a spine-tingling novel of diplomacy gone wrong?  If current events continue in the wrong direction, we might not even have to change the names of this page-turner.  Life could imitate art in the most frightening way.

When it comes to President Obama, the failure in leadership may be even graver.  I voted for the man, though I was troubled by his slender resume and lack of foreign affairs experience.  Obama has repeatedly apologized for Arrogant and Impolite America, usually overlooking the historical sins of those he wishes to charm.  To young Europeans in Strasbourg, he announced, “there have been times when America has shown arrogance and been dismissive, even derisive.”  To Russian Prime Minister Putin, he said, “I think it’s very important that I come before you with some humility,” and “in the past there’s been a tendency for the United States to lecture rather than to listen.”  Though honesty and self-criticism are admirable, they can be extremely harmful when you are the sole super-power in a world of nations that almost never admits fault or apologizes for anything. 

By the same token, I think it’s a mistake for the Attorney General to assign a special prosecutor to go after CIA interrogators who may have crossed the line in prying information from terrorist suspects.  Second-guessing the past is fraught with peril.  If we have all these faults, why should anyone respect or listen to us?

President Ronald Reagan once said, “We maintain the peace through our strength; weakness only incites aggression.”  This is a truth that leaders—whether they’re fictional ones like Stella McMasters, or real, contemporary ones like President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton— would do well to remember.

“Where do you get your ideas?”  It’s a common question that writers get, especially famous ones.  I’m not famous, but I thought I’d talk a little about the origins of some of my stories and novels, and how they came into being.

One day I was walking through Barnes & Noble, and I saw a book title: The Calm Technique.  Wham-o!  All at once a similar title leapt into my mind with one chilling word change.  The Death Technique.  And I knew at once it would be about a man with a morbid “artistic” gift: the ability to will his body to decay as if he were dead.  Gruesome and sick?  Yes, but it found a home with Dark Arts, a professional hardback horror anthology published by Cemetery Dance Publications. 

And here’s how the story begins:

I discovered the Death Technique the day after my twelfth birthday.  Perhaps it was puberty that made it possible, or the fact that I simply did the right thing at the right time.

It’s more likely, though, that I was genetically predisposed to discover the DT, that it was in my nature to lie down one day and concentrate on a realm somewhere beyond this one and start to dissolve as a result.  Well, “dissolve” isn’t the word.  “Decompose” is more like it, as in ashes to ashes, dust to dust.  “Decompose,” as in there goes my right eyeball, there goes my left.  And darned if I can’t feel my bones emerging from where my flesh used to be.

Charming, huh?  Well, here’s something a little more pleasant, though the origin, as with many of my stories and novels, is extremely slight.  One day I found myself wondering what would happen if a person found that every time he made love or had sex, he changed into the opposite gender, and the only way to change back was to have sex again.  The result was a story called “When I Was Michelle,” and the experience of his first transformation goes like this:

When Michael Truman was seventeen, he made love to his first girl.  It was the most wonderful and exciting experience of his life.

An hour later, his whole world fell apart.

It started with a tingling in his genitals that soon intensified and spread to his entire body.  It felt like a thousand crazed insects were scurrying over his skin and biting deep into his flesh. 

Alarmed, he locked his bedroom door and tore off his clothes.  What he saw made him whimper.

Uh, sorry, folks, I can’t go any further.  This is a PG site, after all.  But I hope you get my basic point, which is that many, not all of my tales originate from the flimsiest of sources.  One story, “High Concept,” sprang full bloom from just glancing at a page when a book fell open.  I didn’t read a single word.  Another, “Ancient Art,” which I just finished, came from watching a documentary on ancient Australian cave art which in ancient days, was accompanied and complemented by musical instruments.  Suddenly the basic plot and theme were just there.  All I had to do was expand them a little.

I even wrote a novel inspired by a single evocative word: Dreamfarer.

Occasionally my stories do have a more substantial foundation and ripen a while in my mind.  That’s the case with my longest and most ambitious novel, A Senseless Act of Beauty, published by Blade Publishing and available at http://www.bladepublishing.org.  Beauty is African SF that takes place on a distant, exotic world in the 24^th century, and its hero, Aaron Okonkwo, is a Nigerian scientist who has to save this “New Africa” from colonial exploitation—just as the original Africa was conquered and colonized.

Where did I get the idea?  For many years I had taught at three historically black universities and was immersed in African-American culture.  Then one day I was sitting near a bookshelf at Norfolk State University and suddenly just knew that if I reached out and picked a book from a shelf, the book would inspire me to write my next novel.  So I reached out and picked a book at random, and when I brought my hand back, I saw that it held Things Fall Apart, a novel by the great Nigerian writer, Chinua Achebe.  In it, Nigeria is conquered by colonial exploitation—something that my hero on the planet Viridis tries to prevent against overwhelming odds.

First, though, since all my novels involve romances, Aaron has to resist a more immediate threat by a delectable native girl who will soon prove to be irresistible:

Peering through the shining leaves of a sarberry bush, Aaron Okonkwo watched the naked alien girl dive into the pond. Her green body lithe, and breasts full and firm in the sun. He wet his lips, feeling his blood course as her delicate, sinuous form glided through the water faster than any human could swim. She moved smoothly, with barely a ripple, her webbed hands flowing with graceful precision. Watching the water caress her long, slender limbs, he felt his body respond.

So where do I get my ideas?  Like many writers, I get them from many places, although it seems that often I reap when I have done only the barest of sowing.  Whatever the source of my ideas, I’m grateful for every one and invite you to come explore them with me at http://www.johnrosenman.com.

John B. Rosenman

Many of the readers of this site already know the following fact.  Still, it bears repeating: in the world of fiction, Romance Rules!

As Leigh Michaels states in “Studying the Romance Novel,” “Romance novels are the best-selling segment of the paperback fiction market in North America.”  They “account for well over 50 percent of mass-market paperback fiction sold in the United States.”  In addition, “more than a third of all fiction sold in the United States (including mass-market paper, trade paper, and hardcover books) is romantic fiction.  Paperback romances outsell mysteries, literary novels, science fiction novels, and Westerns.  More than two thousand romance titles are published each year, creating a $1.2 billion business in 2004.”

Now the focus of this blog is not on why romance novels are so popular, whether or not they’re good or bad, or even on why many people, including literary critics, look down on them as an inferior genre.  Those are all interesting subjects, but my main point here is that it would benefit many of us to take into consideration the great popularity of romance fiction when we write and market our own novels. 

This is especially true because the modern romance novel has branched off into many different directions and covers terrain which non-Romance writers may regard as belonging to them.  Michaels states that in a romance novel, “the core story is the developing relationship between a man and a woman.”  Perhaps so, but she also acknowledges “that there are exceptions,” such as “gay romances.” 

These days, there are many varieties of romance fiction, a fact that we all should remember.  To take just one example, in the growing world of electronic publishers, Blade Publishing publishes over a dozen different types of romance.  They are Contemporary, Erotica, Fantasy, Gay-Lesbian, Historical, Inspirational, Interracial, Menage, Paranormal, Romantic Comedy, Sci-Fiction, Suspense, and Western.   

What does this mean – that we should all put attractive couples in our novels and throw in some feverish bump and tickle?  I’m suggesting we should at least consider it in moderation, if it doesn’t violate the integrity and intent of our storylines.  After all, romance and sex sell.  Their appeal is universal, timeless, and fascinating, and they are not about to go away.  According to Michaels, “22 percent of all romance readers are male,” for God’s sake.  We may snort at the genre, but love and sex are still what makes the world go around.  Together, they largely account for the perpetuation of the species. 

This also means that when we market our “non” Romance novels, we should not automatically exclude romance readers, writers, and reviewers, or avoid their society.  There is in fact a sea of such folk.  In two of the Yahoo groups I belong to, romance enthusiasts predominate.  Whatever our differences, I feel it’s useful to pitch my stuff with excerpts and sales lines and to emphasize what we have in common, which is an interest in torrid human relationships. 

One last area here involves two of my own novel covers.  The examples may be somewhat skewed, because these are online e-book and POD (Print on Demand) publishers.  In general, they appear to emphasize sex and romance more on their covers than do traditional print publishers.  Still, I think these two cases are instructive. 

The first cover is for Beyond Those Distant Stars.  Published earlier by NovelBooks, Inc., it will be reissued by Mundania Press with a new cover.  In the novel, there is a romance between a heroine and a sexy stud.  However, the romance is different from that in romances because while it is important, it is not the main focus or the core story.  The heroine herself is in her late thirties and only mildly attractive.  Also, because of a radioactive accident, she has been converted into a superhuman cyborg who doubts her attractiveness and sexuality.  With good reason: nearly two-thirds of her body is artificial. 

What did the Mundania artist do?  If you’re interested, click on the link below.  On the cover, the hero’s all right, but they turned Stella into a Barbie Doll.  In the first version, she was so stacked and well endowed up-top, she would have tipped right over and fallen flat on her face.  I had the artist downsize her, so she could at least walk.

 http://johnrosenman.com/?page_id=9

Now that you’ve clicked on the cover, is it any good?  Perhaps a more important question is, will it sell?  Sex and sexy people don’t automatically translate into big sales, but romance often does help, which to me is an important consideration. 

The second example involves Dax Rigby, War Correspondent, another action-packed science-fiction novel.  As in Beyond Those Distant Stars, there is an important, but not central love story.  If you click on the link below, you may agree that the artist did a striking job on the cover.  Lyrical Press, though, does have a romantic/erotic slant, and I can’t overlook the hero’s sculpted abs and manly chest.  If the cover were longer, perhaps we’d see a half-naked babe clinging to Dax’s right leg.

 http://johnrosenman.com/?page_id=64

SO, if you can’t lick ’em, join ’em.  Consider using romance elements in your novels and on your covers to enlarge their appeal and to sell and promote them.  After all, romance readers outnumber all other groups and like to buy books too.

By John B. Rosenman

[Illustration (“Carpet”) courtesy of Kiavash]

What’s the Figure in your Carpet?

C’mon, you know what I mean. I’m not talking about whether you write science fiction or paranormal romances or historical thrillers or outright smut. All that is related, of course, but I’m talking about something finer and more subtle. Something you have to search for and peer at. Something that’s staring you right in the face but is concealed by the fanciful design of your words or by paths you too often have traveled.

Your personal Figure is as essential to you as your soul and the way you walk. Only it involves the distinctive way you write and even the way you think about the way you write. It’s your personal style, part of the filter through which you process the world.

The Figure in the Carpet is a composite of many things. Some can be as delicate and small as a tendency to overuse a certain word or phrase. Plain speaking Ernest Hemingway believed you should do things “truly,” and William Faulkner loved solemn words like “avatar” and “repudiate.” The Figure in the Carpet can also involve larger, more significant patterns such as your basic writing style and the lengths of your sentences. Also, specific themes and images you use over and over again. If you’re typical, you have many quirks. Some of them are strengths, some of them weaknesses. Whatever they are, they are precise fingerprints of your mind, which differ from all others.

What’s my point? I suggest that if you can detect the Figure in your psychic Carpet and recognize it for what it is, that you not only can (1) develop a better understanding of yourself as a writer and person, but (2) improve the quality of your writing and story-making.

Let’s use me as a guinea pig.

Recently, an editor for one of my novels pointed out that I overuse ‘but,’ ‘then,’ and ‘and then’ throughout. Now, if I had used the “Find” feature under “Edit” on my PC, I could have spotlighted those habits and corrected them in advance. However, to do that, you at least have to suspect the precise nature of the problem(s) in advance. But, uh, thanks to her, I’m now on guard, especially when it comes to beginning a sentence with “But.”

A minor problem? No, the devil is often in the details. While overusing a conjunction once may not be a cardinal offense, excessive repetition can become a serious irritant, undermining the effectiveness of your prose and damaging your prospects for a sale.

To mention one more example in this area, my editor also said I don’t use contractions enough, e.g., preferring ‘he had’ for ‘he’d.’ A picky point? No, for too many ‘he hads’ can slow your style and make it seem stuffy. Ultimately, these and other weaknesses are not just cosmetic considerations. They weaken the way you think and express yourself and need to be recognized for what they are.

Okay, let’s consider a larger part of the Figure in my personal Carpet, a main part of the design rather than a minor thread. In my novels, I like to focus on the Hero or Heroine as savior and as messiah. In Beyond Those Distant Stars, only Stella McMasters, a cyborg, can save the human race from alien annihilation. More recently, in Alien Dreams and Dax Rigby, War Correspondent, we also have saviors. Both are painted in cosmic, spiritual colors and upon their shoulders the fate of billions depends.

Okay, nothing wrong with that. Superheroes, as good old Joe Campbell would tell you, have a thousand faces, and many novels, movies, TV programs and the like depend on superheroes to save humanity in one way or another. But these two particular heroes – Eric Latimore in Alien Dreams and Dax Rigby in Dax Rigby – strenuously resist the notion that they are special and that their destiny involves a divine or cosmic mission.

Now I was aware of this thematic pattern and that Latimore and Rigby closely resembled each other in some ways. However, I viewed them as variations on each other, sufficiently different to warrant their mutual existence. When I went over the galleys for Dax Rigby, though, I found that a character tries to convince our hero of his great role with the same words used by an earlier character to Eric Latimore:

“Don’t you know who you are? Don’t you know who you’ve always been?”

Whoa. Too similar for comfort. When I wrote Dax Rigby, I was not aware of this parallel, of the fact that I have a character repeat what a character in another universe previously said.

Is this a weakness or a justified variation on a theme? Perhaps it’s the latter, but one thing’s for sure: I must not do it a third time. My point, again, is that writers need to be aware of the infrastructure of their stories and novels, of the perils involved in repetition. The Figure in our Carpet exists whether we see it or not, and perceiving it enables us to know more fully who and what we are as writers and to accentuate strengths and avoid weaknesses.

One last point: probably the major theme in my fiction is transformation in all its imaginable permutations. A woman contracts a deadly, horribly disfiguring disease that makes all her friends shun her, and in the end she turns into – a radiantly beautiful, angelic creature. In other stories, humans become aliens, or emerge like butterflies from a miraculous chrysalis. Sometimes the transformation is psychological or spiritual and involves a sea change of attitude rather than form.

Obviously, this theme is a broad, worthy one and I’m deeply fascinated by it. But how much is too much? No matter how resourceful and inventive I am, do I run the risk of being a one-trick pony and limiting my scope? Either way, it’s something I must at least be aware of.

So, gentle reader, as I asked before, what is the Figure in your Carpet? While it’s difficult to be objective and self-analytical, it’s still something we must do.

Here’s an assignment: Sit down and make a list of ten distinguishing traits of your writing. They can be small, concerned with word choice and punctuation, or they can be large, such as repetitive themes and character types, or a tendency to telegraph your endings. Or those traits can fall somewhere in the middle, like a tendency of your heroes to dream or share similar gestures, facial expressions, or mannerisms. Whatever they might be, your task is to recognize them and determine if they’re assets or liabilities.

If it helps, study the illustration at the beginning of this post. Put yourself in the Carpet and try to see the Figure in the depths of your own mind.

by John B. Rosenman

Before we begin, here are two quotes from an article that presents the whole subject of book reviews from a somber perspective.

Newspaper book reviews don’t make money.  Ever.  Anywhere.  And they are dying like polar bears in the Artic.

. . . Publishers don’t appear to believe that newspaper ads can sell books.  Well, not ads in book review sections, which studies have found to be the least-read section of the Sunday newspaper.

       – Steve Carper, “Writer’s Bloc – The Sad State of Book Reviewing.”  The SFWA Bulletin, Winter 2008.

On May 27, Richard Dansky posted an excellent article on writing reviews, titled “Upon Further Reviews.”  It inspired me to review my past and travel down Memory Lane to a time twelve or so years ago when I reviewed short fiction for Tangent Magazine.  Since Rich’s blog seems to focus more on books and novels than short stories, I thought I might share my experiences in reviewing short fiction in an effort to supplement his comments concerning the review process.  Specifically, in the words below, I hope to answer three questions.

1.  What’s the best way to review short stories?

2.  Should short stories be reviewed differently than books, especially novels?

 3.  Does the best way to review short stories tell us anything about the way to write them in order to sell them?

Two great things Rich says are that a book review should answer two questions for the reader: first, it should determine whether the book is “worth a reader’s time and money,” and second, “If so, why?  If not, why not?”

I believe that reviewers of shorter fiction (e.g., fiction up to seven or eight thousand words) should answer these same two questions.  However, for obvious, practical reasons, if you are reviewing a book of a dozen or more stories, it will probably be important for you to get to the meat of the matter immediately.  When I started reviewing short fiction for Dave Truesdale of Tangent, I felt a need to explore every nuance of a 2,500 word short story.  After all, I had been a member of a writers’ group for several years and knew how exhaustively we critiqued each other’s stories, even if it was a drabble or flash fiction.  But the more I reviewed short fiction, whether it was in Asimov’s Science Fiction, Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Fantasy Magazine, or Little Deaths, a 24-tale collection of erotic horror fiction edited by Ellen Datlow, the more I saw the necessity to keep it short and sweet, or as Dave Truesdale said, to “get in and out” as fast as possible.

It reached a point where I tried to review a short story in under a hundred words, perhaps as few as seventy or eighty.  Think it over: If you have one or two dozen stories to review, you want to get to the heart of them ASAP.  What folks want is a quick, hard and fast rating, one they can see at a glance.  Does the movie get three stars or four?  If you want to fine-tune it, make it two and a half or three and a half.  While my reviews did not provide a visual rating symbol of this kind (though many book reviews do), I tried to make it plain in those ninety words or so if the story was worth the reader’s time and money, and to what extent it was worth it.

Some readers may disagree with my approach, and initially I resisted the need to “go short.”  I loved short fiction and wrote longer, more analytical reviews to plumb their depths.  But for practical reasons, I soon found that brevity was often the soul of good reviews.  If you reviewed a novel, you could take more time, but with short fiction, less was frequently more.  Basically, in evaluating a story, you wanted to do the following:

      *Identify the author and summarize the plot or its highlights.

      * Identify its strengths and weaknesses, or as Rich Dansky said, tell to what extent it’s worth the reader’s time and money. 

As an example, here’s a sample review, with a few details changed for discretion’s sake.

Sarah Martin’s cover story, “The Eternal Kiss,” shows the consequences of not heeding a father’s warning to stay out of a dangerous forest.  After Cassandra walks in it, she unleashes a warrior imprisoned there for 300 years, who turns her into an old crone with a kiss.  The question is, can her father, a skilled sorcerer, turn Cassandra back into a young girl? Though this is a well-constructed story, it could have used a little more tension and a more cleverly concealed ending.

After readers read this review, I hoped they would know (1) what the story was basically about, (2) what was good about it, and (3) how in the reviewer’s opinion it could have been improved.  In general, then, was the story worth reading and if so, to what extent?

In giving an overall assessment of a collection of short stories, articles, and the like, whether it be a periodical such as Asimov’s or a book of stories such as Little Deaths, the same general principles apply: i.e., get in and out quickly in no more than a hundred or a hundred and twenty-five words, and cover the really important stuff.  Below, for instance, is my introductory paragraph to Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Fantasy Magazine, # 31 (Spring 1996) in the Fall 1996 issue of Tangent. 

This is a good but not great issue with cover art by James Balkovek and an interview with Poul Anderson by Raul S. Reyes.  One nice feature is the inclusion of a “Cauldron” ballot so that readers can vote for their favorite stories and artists, and a report of the results for the previous issue.  However, it would be even better if they included the number of votes received so we could tell how close the three winners were.  Regarding the fiction, my personal feeling is that MZB’s avoidance of sexuality sometimes leads to blandness and limits characterization.

 By this point, I believe we’ve answered two of the three questions I asked earlier.  In general (there are exceptions, of course), individual short stories should be reviewed much more briefly than novels or books for practical reasons such as space, which require the reviewer to leave a lot out.  Assuming this is true, though, does it tell us anything about the best way to write short fiction so we can make that big sale? 

In my opinion, it does.  A short story is a complex creation requiring much artistry and thought.  There are many mistakes the writer can make, so many choices.  It follows, therefore, that very few stories will be perfect or nearly so.  However, if the editor/publisher likes the basic story itself, the plot and character and essential flavor, then they are more likely to purchase it and deal with the defects later when it comes to the editing process.  Generally, do they like it or not?   

Too simplistic?  Perhaps so.  However, here’s a suggestion.  The next time you write a story, follow it up with a 100 word personal holistic review in which you briefly summarize its plot and evaluate its strengths and weaknesses.  Stand back, if you will, and try to see the forest rather than the trees.  If you give your story an “old in and out” review of your own, you may find that it pays dividends. 

One last note: I joined the Storytellers community in June 2006, so this begins my third year as a member.  I’ve enjoyed it immensely, and look forward to our future! 

by John B. Rosenman

No, no, I’m not talking about the sensational movie starring Daniel Day-Lewis in his first Oscar-winning role. I’m talking about my left foot, which until six weeks ago was strictly dependable, except for a weak ankle that necessitated wearing an ankle brace if I engaged in physical exercise. One day I noticed that my left foot hurt. Then it hurt a lot more. Then it got better and lulled me into a false sense of security, because just when it had almost returned to normal, it started to hurt again. The swelling returned, and each day the painful areas shifted. Now it was my toes, now it was the top of my foot, and now the bottom.

Finally, after two weeks of fluctuating discomfort, I went to a clinic. They X-rayed it and the doctor prescribed a pain killer. His best guess: gout, something that had occurred to me. He referred me to a podiatrist, and I went.

About this time, you’re probably wondering if I’m blogging on the wrong site. What does any of this have to do with writing or creativity? To which I say . . . patience.

I hobbled to the podiatrist’s office, had my foot X-rayed, and was led to a room with a padded chair where I waited, my throbbing foot extended like an offering to some sadistic god. After a few minutes, I heard someone in the hall and moments later, footsteps approached. I sighed, expecting a stereotype in a white coat – that is, a middle-aged podiatrist in a rumpled white coat who looked like Edward G. Robinson.

I was wrong.

Beautifully wrong.

Into the room walked a Vision of Loveliness, a Goddess Who Must Be Obeyed. Let me be plain here: to say that MY podiatrist was attractive is like saying Venus is photogenic. Folks, we’re talking Drop-Dead Gorgeous. I swear that within the first few seconds, I actually started to salivate, like Pavlov’s dog.

Then my writer’s brain kicked in. Mixed with my heterosexual proclivities, the result was bizarre or unusual, as it often is with writers, who have a tendency sometimes to see trivial experiences as dramatic or fictional events in which they are the main character or leading actor. Examining my X-rays, my doctor informed me I had Hammer-toe, not gout, and that a dislocated joint explained why one toe was partly looped over the other. She also said that she had received an operation just five days before for that same condition. Here she showed me a delectable bandaged LEFT foot as proof.

Gazing at her exquisite instep, I realized that I’d had a foot fetish all my life and had never known it. What’s more, the fact that she and I shared the same affliction on the same foot, created an instant we-are-made-for-each-other soulmates aura I could not ignore. Never mind that it was completely one-sided and unreciprocated. When, after all, has any writer worth his or her salt let reality derail a satisfying romantic fantasy? When she advised me that my condition would only become worse with time and that I needed to have it fixed, I promptly said, without thinking, “Well, why don’t we do it right now?”

Turns out, a patient had cancelled his procedure and she could work me right in. I lurched up, limped to a phone at the front desk and called my wife, telling her to bring lunch (it was two o’clock and I hadn’t eaten), and to give me a ride home.

I then limped to a back room and climbed onto a padded couch. A nurse told me the only “real” pain I’d feel would be when she numbed my foot. She asked me if I was ready.

I gave her a John Wayne grin and said you betcha.

She sprayed some icy solution on my left foot and then gave it four needles. And let me tell you, those needles came from all directions and went in deep. Then my goddess materialized with an angelic smile. She suggested I might want to avert my eyes and perhaps contemplate the ceiling, but there was no way I was going to remove my gaze from her. Besides, I felt that a potentially heroic, semi-preposterous scene was imminent, and part of me wanted to play my creative part so I could dramatize it to others later.

SHE asked me if I was ready.

Repressing the urge to ask for a shot of bourbon and a hunk of rawhide to clench between my teeth, I gave her a fearless look and nodded.

She smiled and then broke the second largest toe on my left foot. I watched her proceed to the smaller toe adjacent to it and crack the knuckle out of that one. She then sliced my toes open, gutting and filleting them like little fish. I gazed down at the bloody ruins of my toes and thought, “Wait’ll I tell folks about this.” Next came the black stitches and a two-inch long pin, which she inserted horizontally to the hilt in the broken toe. In the month since this operation, I’ve had some pain and a little pleasure from this wicked pin, making up all kinds of inane jokes which probably amuse me only. You know, how the pin has improved my TV reception remarkably, and its only drawbacks are that I sometimes get stopped at the airport or pick up a cheap porn station from Seattle.

Well, I won’t belabor this chapter in my life any more, except to say that just after the slice and dice was completed, Jane arrived with a cup of chili (with cheese) from Wendy’s. In tales I tell of this saga, I usually mention the chili as a humorous example of my courage while they bandaged me up and gave me a prescription for enough Oxycodone to stop a charging rhino in his tracks.

Since the operation, I’ve gone back once more to have the stitches out, and I’m frankly ambivalent about my next and possibly last visit, when the divine doctor pulls the pin on our relationship and I can wear a regulation shoe on my left foot. But part of me foresees a continuation of this cosmic drama, with the toesies on my right foot misbehaving. Again and again I go back to her, but after she has cracked and repaired all my toes, what possible excuse will I have left to see her? Hmm, damned if I can’t think of some truly sick and morbid possibilities.

At any rate, like the ham I am, I continue to narrate and dramatize this experience. Sometimes I tell colleagues I was so enraptured by this celestial creature that if she had said, “I’m sorry, sir, but I’m afraid we have no other choice but to amputate your left leg,” that I would have given her a he-man shrug and said, “Well, Doc, if you really think it’s necessary . . .”

Okay, here’s the point of the whole thing, and the question(s) I want to ask those reading this blog. Are we creative types more likely to see even trivial experiences in our lives as momentous events in which we play a vital role – sometimes as an action hero, other times, as a watered down protagonist or Everyman? Is there a detached writer or editor sitting on our shoulders, weighing the possibilities? Do we dramatize our lives and ourselves more than others? I really want to know. Seems to me I’ve heard this discussed before and the general consensus is yes. But surely ordinary people do it too. There’s Thurber’s Walter Mitty, for example, who spiced up his humdrum life with heroic fantasies. But then, what was Mitty but a writer who hadn’t found himself? I’m also reminded of The Truman Show. Are we more likely to imagine we’re the star of a lifelong sitcom or dramatic series with smash ratings? Are we so narcissistic and vain, so enraptured by the image in our psychic mirrors, that we suspect that everyone we pass is an adoring fan?

Please tell me what you think. Am I nuts, or perversely normal? Really, I can take it.

In the meantime, I’m getting ready for a trip to the Dentist next week. Though he’s in his fifties and does look like Edward G. Robinson, I feel my muse stirring. After all, his assistant’s from Sweden and she’s one hell of a looker. . . .

by John B. Rosenman

In the spirit of public service to writers everywhere, especially beginners, this is the first in a series of fearless exposes of GREAT WRITER MYTHS. Illusions may be nice and comforting, but they have a downside: they can blind you to reality and prevent you from coping with it. For a writer this can be particularly deadly and pernicious. Thinking that stuffed, DOA turkey you wrote is actually a living, champion thoroughbred about to win the Triple Crown will never enable you to develop as a writer and achieve your potential, which is possible only if you try something which you do have some talent for and were meant to do, like collect stamps, be a serial killer, or run for high public office.

This month’s myth came up a few months ago on one of the loops I frequent. Someone was saying that even negative criticism from an editor or publisher was good because it showed he had noticed you and that you had made an impression. In return I wrote, “This is often, perhaps usually true, but not always. I have received personalized rejections savaging my stories and ripping them apart.”

Folks, I thought I had made my case. However, the bloke at the other end wrote: “If you get personalized rejections, YOU HAVE ACHIEVED A CERTAIN LEVEL.” He added, “I was in a writers group . . . and whenever someone received a response, it was cause for celebration because we usually just got form rejections . . . If someone takes the time to send you a personal note, it’s because they think you have potential and believe you should keep writing.” In fact, you should consider personalized rejections as a encouragement from “the publishing world” that “You’ve come a long way, and are almost there.”

Okay, I remember that for years when I started writing, all I received were form rejection slips. I’m sure most on this site have had a similar experience. You might even get to the point where you’d be happy just to see a scrawled “Thanks” or “Up Yours” on one of those forms. Under the circumstances, we can understand why a writer, especially a desperate, beginning one, would look forward to and treasure even the most casual response or recognition of his existence from an editor, why he would embrace even the most tenuous sign that a real live human being existed out there who had actually taken a few minutes to read his words and respond. But folks, while a reply, even a negative one, OFTEN implies something positive, and suggests that you may have climbed out of the great unwashed multitude of writers and achieved some small degree of distinction, it does not necessarily mean that. To think otherwise is to embrace a delusion and an illusion about the submission process, and friends, my conscience would not rest if I did not put this mischievous myth in the crapper where it belongs. Call me a mean-spirited killjoy if you like, but thinking a slap in the face is actually a flirtatious come-on will only prove a liability. Ultimately, it will weaken rather than strengthen you.

I can already here someone say, “But why deny a writer what encouragement he sees? Why take away what hope he has?” To which I would respond, “Didn’t you read the previous paragraph?” Getting published and achieving success as a writer is difficult enough; when you form a habit of grossly misinterpreting editors’ words and signals, it becomes immeasurably harder. Reading the situation for something else than it really is will only handicap you because it separates you from reality and makes it impossible for you to learn from what editors actually mean and improve your writing on the basis of it.

To be honest, I don’t know how much a problem this Pollyanna attitude toward negative feedback is. Perhaps I’m making a big deal out of a small one, and clutching at editorial straws is a tendency that afflicts only the terminally desperate. Assuming it’s a genuine problem, though, here are five things that such writers should remember.

1. These days, more and more editors/publishers are commenting on writers’ work anyway. This is largely due to the fact that magazines and publishers are paperless and do their thing increasingly online. Everything’s cheaper: space, layout, and TIME. When all you have to do is type a few words and click Send, you’re far more likely to comment on that story you hated. The sanguine writer I mentioned earlier wrote that editors “are basically business people and have no time” to send comments they don’t mean. Well, when a response is just a key tap or a mouse click away, they often do.

2. If the editor’s review is relentlessly negative and/or vicious without any mitigating features, such as an invitation to send more of your work, then you can probably bet he’s not interested in a second date. In other words, don’t assume he’s aroused and wants to play bump and tickle just because he responded.

 3. Some editors are mean, negative, overly critical. It’s their nature to see warts on everything and to praise almost nothing.

4. By the same token, some editors are kind-hearted and positive like Paula Abdul and  praise too much. They don’t want to hurt your feelings but may unintentionally do something even worse: lead you astray by sending the wrong impression. I mean, what part of the word REJECTION don’t you understand?

5. Finally, lest I’ve created the wrong impression here, often editorial feedback is indeed a positive sign that you have registered on the editor’s radar. Especially if it’s a prozine with a good reputation or a respectable, advance-paying publishing house, the reader may be justified in feeling encouraged. And if the editor/publisher invites you to send more, then yes, the rejection might be a golden opportunity. On such occasions, NO might imply a possible future YES.

At any rate, I know that all readers’ comments on this essay, whether pro or con, will be an affirmation not only of my insight, genius, and writing abilities, but of my humanitarian concern for writers everywhere. Even if you appear to be negative and rip my opinion and words to shreds, I will know your true sentiments. And if you happen to edit a decent magazine – well, my story is already in the mail.

That’s it for this month, friends. Tune back in May, when I will expose and explore GREAT WRITER MYTHS # 2: Writing for Storytellers Unplugged is Not Only a Fast Track to Fame and Glory, but Will Ensure That You Always Have a Hot Date on Saturday Night.

John B. Rosenman

By the way, check out my interview which will be posted early this morning at the following site:

http://www.apenandfire.com/?p=466

[This is a paper that I read at a conference on Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror several years ago at Norfolk State University.]

Science fiction, fantasy, and horror are like love and good sex. Most of us assume we know what these terms mean, but when we try to formulate mutually acceptable definitions and reach a shared understanding, we are likely to find ourselves hopelessly divided. Many authorities in these fields even argue that there are no completely acceptable definitions, and that even the best ones will be somewhat inaccurate or misleading.

Within literature and the arts, such a situation is fairly common. For example, there are scholars who contend that even the best definitions of Romanticism and Classicism will be somewhat wrong. Closer home, we may not even be able to agree on a label for a work that most of us love. Consider the movie The Wizard of Oz, in which a girl is knocked unconscious and transported in a dream to a wondrous land in which a scarecrow longs for a brain and a tin man pines for a heart. Most of us might classify this classic as escapist fantasy, but think again. If we consider Dorothy’s nightmarish encounters with a wicked witch, flying monkeys, and all those imaginary “lions and tigers and bears,” can’t a case be made that the movie is actually dark fantasy or horror, at least when seen through a child’s eyes? Or what if Dorothy boarded a spaceship and flew to Oz (located on a planet beyond the Milky Way) and returned the same way? Would the movie then be science fiction or a mixture such as science-fantasy?

What I am suggesting is that some of the art we love may be hybrids, as heterogeneous and ultimately unclassifiable as the complex people we know. Still, human beings crave the comfort, even illusory, of consensus, and they insist on defining their terms. In that spirit, I will try to define briefly what science fiction, fantasy, and horror are, as long as it’s understood that any definition, even the best, will be somewhat deficient.

To do so, I will talk about the ignition switch on my car. For months, it’s been giving me fits, for it has been difficult and at times even impossible to turn it off. I’ve taken the damned thing into the shop half a dozen times and spent a small fortune getting it repaired. Yet after driving home today, I still had to spend five minutes turning it off, and it appears that more costly trips to the shop await me.

Now, if I were to write about this problem as a mainstream, “traditional” writer would, my treatment of the subject would reflect a realistic world we all recognize. Perhaps a thingamajig or a #9 widget in the steering column caused the problem, or the man who sold me the car in the first place knew my car was a lemon, and simply didn’t tell me. Whatever the case, there would be a prosaic, everyday explanation for my woes, one very much in keeping with what we know and accept as reality.

But let’s look at my ignition switch from the standpoint of fantasy, which is perhaps the oldest art form there is. Long ago, when cavemen looked up at the dark, thunderous sky, they probably imagined fearsome giants warring against each other. Such an explanation for the unknown fits in well with The American Heritage Dictionary’s definition of literary fantasy as “Fiction characterized by fanciful or supernatural elements.” Fearsome, warring giants are certainly fanciful or supernatural, and if my explanation for my ignition problems was fantastic in nature, I might invent all sorts of fanciful or supernatural causes. Perhaps my ignition didn’t turn because of those ubiquitous gremlins we always hear about. Or some wizard or sorcerer cast a spell on my machinery. Who knows, if I’m paranoid or deranged enough, perhaps I’ll conclude that my car is alive and simply doesn’t like me or misses its former owner. Either way, my explanation won’t be a “realistic” one, though it had better have a realistic consistency and internal logic of its own. For example, if I say the ignition switch acts the way it does because it doesn’t like me, I can’t suddenly show it being nice to me and working well without a valid reason.

Next, let’s look at my ignition sorrows from the viewpoint of horror. But first, a warning: strictly speaking, horror may not even be a genre, for it is primarily an emotion that one finds universally in everything from Hamlet to “Hansel and Gretel.” Our friend, the dictionary, doesn’t even provide a literary definition of it. For practical purposes, let us define horror as art whose major effect is to frighten and terrify, using everything from subtle, creepy mood and atmosphere to gore, vomit, and assorted gross-out effects. In keeping with this definition, I may sense an eerie, intangible presence in the front seat that interferes with the ignition switch’s proper function. Perhaps that presence slowly grows in haunting, ghostlike fashion and one night, I even feel phantom fingers lightly brush the back of my neck. Or, if I want to describe my ignition switch in such a way as to fill you with gut-wrenching horror, I might have blood or a long, slimy tongue ooze out of it, just before I insert the key.

On the other hand, I could approach this situation from the standpoint of psychological horror – that is, horror that reveals, in Poe-like fashion, my psychic sickness, the deranged and demented recesses of my diseased mind. If so, I might conclude that my ignition switch was tampered with by one of my colleagues because he – or she – has always hated me and delighted in causing me trouble. Indeed, perhaps that very colleague now occupies this same stage with me at this very moment, and I know who it is. The only question is, should I seek my revenge with poison, an axe, or through some more diabolical means?

Here’s one last horrific possibility: it’s late at night and I’m stranded on a back road way out in the boondocks because, for a change, my ignition switch won’t turn on. Perhaps the situation makes me feel like Pip in Moby-Dick. Like him, I feel all alone in the universe, which is completely indifferent to my fate. As the wind howls, I realize I could die and rot out here and never be discovered. The world itself would proceed just as before and wouldn’t even miss me. Certainly that is scary, isn’t it? Certainly that is horror. Now imagine I receive a visitor, one of the “Old Ones” from H.P. Lovecraft’s Chthulu mythos. The creature is from another planet, and it belongs to a mysterious race far older and more intelligent than our own, and with far greater powers. What’s more, it is so strange and hideous in appearance as to have a Medusa-like effect upon the beholder. Merely to look at it, is to be driven absolutely and irrevocably insane.

We’d all agree, I believe, that this last situation certainly qualifies as horror. But note that I described the creature who comes to keep me company on that lonely road as being “from another planet.” Doesn’t his extraterrestrial nature and origin make the scene belong more to science-fiction, or, to mention a new hybrid, to science-fiction horror? Again, if I give that creature a more supernatural, fantastic twist, perhaps we should opt for the label of “dark fantasy.” As I mentioned before, sometimes these terms can be slippery. Who knows? If the creature’s funny or humorous, the whole thing might even be comic fantasy or comic horror, along the lines of Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.

Last, let’s consider my faulty ignition switch from the standpoint of science fiction, which the dictionary defines as “A literary or cinematic genre in which the plot is typically based on speculative scientific discoveries, environmental changes, space travel, or life on other planets.” Instead of Lovecraftian Old Ones from another realm, perhaps my ignition switch is recalcitrant because a nearby wrecked (but undiscovered) spaceship from a distant galaxy is trying to contact me on the car radio, which I have yet to turn on because I don’t like either news or music. Another possibility is that the malfunction is caused by local environmental changes that are caused in turn by global warming that presages a worldwide catastrophe, and my defective ignition switch is simply the very first symptom of humanity’s looming fate.

Here I would like to make a statement that may sound extreme but that I think is important. Because science fiction is so “speculative,” so concerned with infinite possibilities and alternate realities, it possesses a conceptual richness or potential that transcends what we find in all other literature, including that which has been traditionally taught in classrooms. The scope of science fiction is so vast and limitless that it embraces not only this world and universe but others; not just this time period but the distant past and the remote future; not just outer space but the inner space of the human body or a drop of water, which may be inhabited by microscopic beings much like ourselves. There is African science fiction, Jewish science fiction, feminist science fiction, humorous science fiction, and science fiction for juveniles and children. Moreover, science fiction may be “soft” and so non-technical that anyone can read it. Or it may be what’s called “hard” and based so much on current science and scientific extrapolation that you almost have to be a scientist to understand it.

Indeed, science fiction embraces so much, that I might not even have an ignition problem at all. The switch I’ve been complaining about may actually belong not to me but to another John B. Rosenman on a parallel or alternate Earth. Back here, in this Norfolk, Virginia, my car works fine and has never required even one repair.

Oh well, it doesn’t hurt to dream.

In closing, I hope I have helped to clarify what science fiction, fantasy, and horror are, and shown how they sometimes intermarry and have very interesting children. Considered together, these three art forms offer endless possibilities for the creative imagination, which I believe will be amply demonstrated at this conference, sometimes in unorthodox ways.