What do I like to read?

As a part of The Twelve Trials of Triskelion, the program is coming to an end, but we on Ad Astra are looking to keep it up. As a result, we’re looking to expand blogging. And now there’s a new book club, called Boldly Reading, with its own blog!

So – the first prompt is – what do you like to read? what fanfic story type/era/character and heck even name an author here you gush over do you like to read?

And so I’m thinking.

Challenges

While I love the Star Trek Enterprise and The Original Series eras, that doesn’t necessarily define what I read. More often, I go looking for a good story, and then whether it fits into my own personal era preference doesn’t truly factor into it. Good stories are good stories.

I also have great respect for people who put themselves out there for the challenges, in particular, the monthly challenges. For newer authors in particular, it has got to be daunting. It presents the old what if they don’t like me? fear that I suspect all authors have inside us.

Once I’ve read a challenger (even if they don’t win, and even if I didn’t love their story), I try to look at more of their works. Sometimes people are just off, and one story didn’t hit its marks but that doesn’t mean that others won’t. But if I have disappointment enough times, I’m done. That is, unless it’s for a monthly challenge. And I can’t honestly say exactly when that moment occurs, but I know it when I see it. Then I’ll read all of the entries because I don’t think I can vote in good conscience without reading all of that month’s entries.

But that doesn’t mean I’m going to love the author who has disappointed me. Unfairly or not, that person now has more of a hurdle to climb over in order to get my love. But it’s not an impossible hurdle.

Characterizations

For authors not involved in monthly challenges, I am looking for good characters. I love action sequences, but the truth is, they’re hard to write. Sometimes what you’re thinking of just does not translate well to pixels. But characters can. Someone who is not a Mary Sue. And someone who doesn’t just get a description in some huge data dump. It’s as if the author were picking the character out from a police lineup. Someone who I can hate or love or be repulsed by or laugh with or at or want to hug or kick. Someone who stays with me.

Give it up for Templar Sora!

One author whose works I have loved pretty much from the beginning has been Templar Sora.

Star Trek Online (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Two of his characters I have particularly enjoyed are Jessica St. Peter and Seymour Sonia. Jess is an unlikely leader. She’s a person thrust into the role when everyone around her falls down on the job. Or they are too scared or damaged or inexperienced to step in. And, as a young leader, she deals with something that a lot of young leaders in fan fiction never seem to have to deal with – insubordination by people who think she should not have her place.

Enter Seymour Sonia, the consummate jerk. Everything from hitting on Jess (before she gets a command) to openly being hostile to her, he’s a fun character to despise. The beauty of this character is his passive-aggressive nature. I have found that often jerk characters are written as utterly one-dimensional, as authors might feel they have to stack their decks. After all, who could possibly hate a Starfleeter?

Try me.

Upshot

I love a lot of what I’m reading. But to really hit the stratosphere, give me a character where all I want to do when I see him in a scene is yell, “Bite me!”

Jun

2013

Whither Trek? And whither me? AKA where am I going, and why am I in this handbasket?

Whither Trek? And whither me?

Whither Trek?

Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

Gaguin – Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

Gaguin – Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

When I set out to first write this little trilogy of blog posts about Star Trek fan fiction, I thought about this particular painting quite a bit. I have told you who I am, and where I (and, to some extent, Trek) come from. But where are we going?

The Cloudy Crystal Ball

Of course I have little to no idea of what’s going to happen next.

Cloudy crystal ball

And that has never, ever stopped me from speculating.

After all, Star Trek itself is dreams and visions of the future. Some, like communicators and desktop computers, have been scarily accurate.

Others, like tricorders and bio beds, are close to accurate, or are within reach.

And then others, like warp drive, the Third World War, the Augments, etc.?

Not so much. So, whither Trek?

What’s Next?

For Star Trek, there is likely to be a third film in the JJ Abrams universe, and it will likely come on or around 2016 as that is the 50th anniversary of the TV series. Abrams will not be directing it. It will be interesting to see who gets it. For me, the JJ Abrams universe means more Eriecho.

As for a new series, I imagine there will be one, and it will likely be in the post-Nemesis future, but closer to the JJ Abrams style. It will depend on budgets and audience tastes. Enterprise was given a fairly large budget, but it was still difficult to get across everything that needs to be done and shown within financial restrictions. At the time, their ratings were not considered to be good. Now, they would be perfectly acceptable.

Whither Trek on TV?

Any future television series will likely have an even bigger budget than ENT did, and will likely depend more upon green screen technology in order to cut some special effects corners. What is troubling about that is that large budgets mean that ever larger audiences are needed in order for a show to make money. But television audiences are becoming more and more splintered all the time.

Whither Trek? Unless this speculative future show has a lot of network brass (and money) backing it, it could very well be set up for failure, much as it seems happened with ENT. Science fiction on TV these days is generally not big, beautiful ships. Even Firefly (which is a decade old, by the way) had a lot of set pieces that took place on the ground. It saves money.

So I would expect to see, and would actually hope to see, a series more character-driven and more plot-driven. A series where makeup and costumes and sets matter. It would be a series where acting and writing are top-notch. This would be not only because they are beloved and respected and say something meaningful and win awards but also because, for real, they save network money. A series where the effects exist but don’t overpower the story line and are not the engines that drive character and plot arc decisions.

Whither Trek?

Discovery, of course!

A girl can dream, can’t she?

Jun

2013

Where Did it all Begin?

Begin – The ’60s

I could lie and tell you I was engaging in free love, protesting the Vietnam War and marching in Selma.

Or I could tell you the truth, that I was born in late 1962 and don’t really have a clear memory of any current events until about 1967 or 1968 or so as I rather vividly recall hearing on a radio that a heart transplant had been successfully performed. I also remember the Moon landing. We had horrible reception, so it was fuzzy and strange, and that made it all the more mysterious.

MTV on the Moon

Seriously, I first saw a clear image of the Moon landing when MTV initially started broadcasting.

I also remember seeing the Vietnam War on TV, often during dinner. I don’t remember the specifics of it so much, and maybe I was shielded from them and certainly the worst of it wasn’t broadcast, anyway. But I do remember it, out there, naked, for all to see, and wonder about.

Star Trek in the ’60s

I remember watching TOS. Some of it was first-run, and some was in what were likely the first rounds of reruns. I was also watching Lost in Space at the time, and The Outer Limits (I recall having nightmares about one episode). I don’t think The Twilight Zone was in reruns at the time, in southeastern Pennsylvania, which is where my family lived then.

One rather big difference I noticed between Lost in Space and TOS was that the women on Lost in Space did laundry and cooked. There seemed to be an unending supply of space laundry. Will Robinson got to do cool stuff and have adventures (and get into trouble), and Penny did, too. But, in the end, Will got to tinker on the ship or talk to the robot. Penny did the dishes.

Things were not like that on the NCC-1701. And while Uhuru was, in many ways, a glorified receptionist, and Rand was a glorified secretary (and Chapel the RN was in another traditionally female role), at least they did things. I’m still not so sure how they did their space laundry, but none of them seemed to be in a hot hurry to take care of it at the end of a day. And they generally did not cook for, or serve, the captain or Mr. Spock, etc.

It surprised me to see Uhuru working under a console and fiddling with wires that sparked. She was doing repair work, and Spock even said she was the best person for the job! What the hell?

The times, as they say, they were a-changin’.

The ’70s

This was the era of the rerun. We moved to New York at the start of the decade, and TOS competed for my attention with such offerings as an afternoon movie. The Planet of the Apes films would be shown, one after another, all week during a typical week. They were cut to fit a two-hour window and I would watch from 4 to 6 PM, folding laundry or starting dinner or otherwise helping with chores during the commercials. My brother and I were latchkey kids, so someone had to do the rather down to earth wash.

Our mother, of course, wasn’t the only woman in the workforce. I had more and more friends whose mothers worked, at least part-time. I had friends with divorced parents. And I was in the last class year in my junior high where the girls had to take Home Economics while the boys had to take Shop.

At the end of the decade, I took Advanced Placement English and the teacher required a creative writing assignment that she would read to the rest of the class. I did it, and was pleasantly shocked that I did not actually die from embarrassment.

Star Trek in the ’70s

I got to know this old friend even better. When I attended a wilderness summer camp, a fellow camper brought a cassette tape recording of an episode – it might have been The Trouble With Tribbles. I’m not sure. I recall commenting on the use of so many sound effects. I suppose I was beginning to understand, a little bit, about how the whole thing worked as a production.

The ’80s

My life changed quite a bit during this decade. I spent the first few years in college and then Law School, and I devoted the mid part to finishing Law School, and the end to practicing law, which I hated. However, during Law School, a boyfriend suggested to me – I bet you could write something if you put your mind to it.

And so I did.

The stories (there were a few) were not great. They were murder mysteries taking place in Boston. My Miss Marple-type character was a Midwestern Philosophy student at my alma mater. While she was not a Mary Sue type of character, I can honestly say now that she was mainly not too terribly believable. But I did come up with two character names that I have grabbed for my fan fiction – Thomas Grant and Shelby Pike.

At the end of the decade, I met my husband, who has always been there for me, for writing and everything else.

Star Trek in the ’80s

I recall, in 1991, going with my family and then-fiancé to see Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. It was not planned, and I cannot remember what we were supposed to be watching instead. Perhaps the competing film was sold out. I do remember liking it very much and just thinking, yeah, I like this stuff.

But when The Next Generation began to be aired, I didn’t watch it, and it all kind of fell off my radar. Some of this was due to the show not starting off too well, some was due to so many changes happening in my life.

The ’90s

In 1990, I up and quit practicing law. I had been miserable for far too long. But it was hard to find other work, so I instead concentrated on planning the wedding. In 1994, we moved to Providence, and then in 1995 we moved to Boston, and into our house in the middle of that year. I took a job auditing and traveled around the country, and was away for a good 200 – 250 days every year. I had little time for anything, let alone Star Trek. The center obviously could not hold, and I transferred to different work and finally left that role at the end of the decade, for more lucrative pastures as a data analyst.

Star Trek in the ’90s

For me, it was nearly nonexistent. While others were watching TNG, and then Deep Space Nine and Voyager, I was, well, working. A lot. One show we watched, pretty religiously, was Quantum Leap. And we did see Star Trek: First Contact in a theater. And then in ’97, we got a computer with Internet access.

The ’00s

We were settled in a happy home life when 9/11 happened and the bottom dropped out of, well, everything. The financial services market collapsed, and took with it my job. My parents had a neighbor who died in the Twin Towers. It was personal, and it was scary.

A ray of hope was knowing that there was going to be new Star Trek. My husband and I vowed to watch it.

Star Trek in the ’00s

From the first scene of a young Jonathan Archer playing with a model starship, to the three starships signing off at the end of the series finale, we were hooked. It was must-see television, so far as we were concerned, and I even joined the campaign to save Enterprise.

And then, on February 26th, 2005, I wrote and posted my first fan fiction – More, More, More!, also called the disco Trek story.

I had a few bursts of creativity that year and then shelved everything for five years, returning to it on October 21st, 2010, with Reversal, a story that I spun out as I was posting it, with no plans whatsoever.

What about now?

That, gentle reader, is for the next meta blog installment. Stay tuned.

Jan

2012

Welcome, or, In Praise of Fan Fiction

Welcome! Come on in, and sit down.

Welcome to My Worlds

I’ve got a lot to say.

Jespah 2012

This blog is going to be about fan fiction, of the Star Trek kind, mostly Enterprise although I do branch out into the other series’ and the films’ universes on occasion. But my main focus is ENT.

If you don’t like fanfiction, you might want to turn back now. But if you aren’t sure, or if you think it’s just for those who can’t be creative, I urge you to consider a few things.

Adaptations

Fan fiction, in essence, is like an “adapted by” or “based on” credit in the movies or on television. Sure, it’s not 100%, absolutely, completely, utterly, blisteringly, breathtakingly original. But that “adapted by” credit? Let’s see where else it is, or where it should be, shall we?

How about West Side Story, for starters? And they didn’t even credit the original author! Instead, playwright Jerome Robbins and writers Ernest Lehman and Arthur Laurents are shown. Funny how William Shakespeare isn’t listed, eh? Well, I guess the Bard didn’t have a very good agent. Take a look here if you don’t believe me.

Or what about Ten Things I Hate About You? Oh, there’s another one with no credit for poor ole Will. Instead, Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith get the nod. Check ‘em out here.

Willie the Shake isn’t the only writer who gets short shrift with adaptations. What about Clueless? Amy Heckerling is the only writer with a credit. If I were Jane Austen, I’d be a little upset, seeing as its basis is Emma. Don’t believe me? Take a gander here.

There are countless vampire film and television adaptations, copies and suggestions – they don’t all mention Bram Stoker. Twilight certainly doesn’t mention the father of the vampire genre, although it does give credit to Melissa Rosenberg and Stephenie Meyer. Check it out.

At least Charles Dickens gets a “suggestion” credit for Scrooged, but the real billing is left for Mitch Glazer and Michael O’Donoghue. See the list of Scrooged writers.

Adaptations Outside of English

Of course English writers are not the only ones out there who are hit up for adaptations, suggestions and the like, and English language films aren’t the only adapters, but at least Shakespeare gets a mention in Ran, along with Akira Kurosawa, Hideo Oguni and Masato Ide. Perhaps it’s the Eastern cultural imperative to respect one’s ancestors at work here.

Here’s a film based on a Spanish poem – El Cid. And, you may have guessed it, no credit for the original author, believed to be Per Abbad, but plenty of credit for Fredric M. Frank, Philip Yordan and Ben Barzman. Take a look at the list of El Cid writers.

The Point?

And then there’s The Wind Done Gone and other parallel novels, which use other books’ scenarios as their own. See Wikipedia for a list.

What’s the point of all of this research?

The bottom line is that fan fiction isn’t significantly different. It’s a cousin, if you will, to adapted screenplays, suggested stories and parallel novelizations. Plenty of perfectly wonderful and respected works of art, from the play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead to the book Grendel are all, truly, based on someone else’s universe.

Do you accept those other works? Do you eagerly stand in line for tickets to Wicked, or watch the Clueless TV program in reruns, or read Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea? Then, my friend, you are a consumer of art that is quite similar to fan fiction. Why embrace one and find fault with the other?

Come with me, and explore, what it means to be human – or Vulcan, or Denobulan or even an original species like Daranaean, or Calafan or Witannen or others – in a vast, unfamiliar place, where death can haunt every light-year or love and friendship might just be around the next bend in the corridor or a lift or transport ride away. Come and explore the outer, the other and the new and strange, but also the familiar and homelike part we all have in us.

Writing is not an activity solely the province of those who are paid any more than imagination solely belongs to those who create for a living. Come and see what I made, and where I am taking things and, frankly, where characters and planets and storylines and events are taking me.

I welcome and open my door to you, and am turning on the light, for you to see into my worlds.

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