Cognitive Blindness, Cultural Bias, Cultural Differences, Newsletter, Pipsqueak Articles

Fog of War

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Faces of war

Once again, we find ourselves bearing witness to yet another war with a non-stop spectrum of horrific stories and images that make our souls shudder and our hearts break. It is easy to get drawn into a narrative of good guys versus bad guys. It is easy to find ourselves in a heated screaming fight over why one side or the other are the evil ones. But wars at ground level are not really about good versus evil; they are about survival. Regular people get swept up in evil and find themselves doing things that they never would have thought possible. War turns normal people into monsters. Robert Sapolsky wrote: “We judge ourselves by our internal motives, but others by their external actions. … When Thems do something wrong, it’s because they’re simply rotten. When Us-es do it, it’s because of an extenuating circumstance”. Imagine the great harm you might inflict on another to protect a child you love. Because our motives are “pure” they mitigate our actions — allowing ourselves not to think of ourselves as monsters — even when we do objectively terrible things. We are all good at rationalizing our own behavior. To overcome our natural instincts…

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Book, book promotion, Newsletter, Pipsqueak Articles

The Self Published Science Fiction Competition 2023

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2023 SPSFC books Collage

So it is the end of another summer, and that means it is the start of another writing competition — SPSFC or The Self Published Science Fiction Competition. This is 3rd year this competition is being held and it is my third year participating (with 3 different books). I got to quarter finals the first year, but last year, my story was completely overlooked. I think it makes sense — I don’t write easy to characterize books. My books defy genres. They are strange, twisted, and hard to pin down. What book shelf does one assign to a story about environmental collapse that uses demons as personification of nature? If a judge is expecting a space opera, they are in for a disappointment. That said, there are really amazing stories that are submitted into this competition, stories that deserve a wide readership and because of the label “self published” don’t get it. So consider reading a few and always leave a review for those that you liked. A kind word is what indie authors live for (it’s certainly not the money). Here is this year’s book covers in all their glory! See if you can spot mine… And if you…

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Background Knowledge Errors, Errors, Language, Newsletter, Pipsqueak Articles

Neanderthal in The Back Yard

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Neanderthal

I was around ten when I had a recurrent dream. Back then, I was good at lucid dreaming — I could make myself dream the same story for weeks on end and remember all of it. It was similar to writing in that it was like watching a story unfold in my imagination. I dreamt many stories this way; although most are lost, there was one that stuck with me about a Neanderthal buried in the permafrost next to the mini merry-go-round in our apartment building’s back yard. We lived in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It was cold and snowy in the winter even if there was no actual permafrost in the courtyard. I must have read something about the marvelous preservation of mammoths, and that gave me the idea. I figured that if those ancient pachyderms could be found in permafrost, so too could early humans. In my dream, I dig under the snow, in the bushes located a few feet from the merry-go-round, and discover a bit of old animal skin. Brushing away a few more layers of snow and dirt, I find what looks like a mummified arm, dressed in clothing made of fur. I know right away…

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Cultural Bias, Newsletter, Pipsqueak Articles

The Eliminati

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Secret Society

We live in a society where people acquire vast amounts of stuff and then run out of space to store it all. Some respond by adopting minimalism; true believers embrace the clean aesthetics of clear floors, empty shelves, and bare closets. Of course, in our disposable consumer culture, these same people can buy replacements for what they have discarded. The zen state of declutter is but a momentary illusion. Marie Kondo, apostle The Gospel of Decluttering and an advocate for minimalism, built her career encouraging people to discard items that failed to “spark joy.” Upon having her third child, however, she came to the conclusion that minimalism and kids were not compatible and confesses to now having a messy home. Apostate! The urge to acquire stuff is probably pre-programmed into us by evolution, just like the extra layers of fat we accumulate when food is plenty. Because good times don’t last, humans hoard resources for a rainy day; those with a cushion fare better during a downturn. But, as with many traits driven by evolution, the accumulation of stuff can become pathological. Hoarding can be a detriment to survival, and the line between prepping and hoarding is thin. Some manage…

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Newsletter, Pipsqueak Articles

Different Kinds of Stories

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The Orchard Window by Daniel Garber, oil on canvas 1918

I believe we can distill the plethora of story types into two main categories: feverish cliff hangers that compel their readers to read on through the night, and the more tranquil tales that follow a structure of “this happened, and then this, and then this.” Of course, many stories offer a fusion of both types. Thrillers often drive the narrative to the very last word, while other stories might resemble meandering rivers that gently float the reader to their conclusion. I appreciate both, but I find the more mellow stories can be more compatible with a busy schedule. Kids, for example, don’t care if a novel is impossible to put down when demanding attention. The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom, a new game released just before Mother’s Day, is a case in point. My son predicted that on its release date, people would take the day off to indulge in the game. He was right, resulting in what could be called a national Zelda fever day. We saw a similar scenario during the release of the Star Wars sequels, with fans playing hooky to go see the movies. The only literary equivalent that comes to mind is the…

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Book, Conceptual Design, Interaction Design, Interface Design, Newsletter, Pipsqueak Articles, Product Design Strategy, Reference

Developing a Story

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Vars signs books

How does one choose a story? Or does a story choose its teller? For me, random triggers in my subconscious coalesce and spark inspiration that is not yet a story but rather the embryo of one. That seed, with time, might ripen enough to be worth planting. But the seed of a story doesn’t contain a compelling narrative that grabs and doesn’t let go until the very last word and beyond. A good story stays with its reader long after the last word is seen or heard. It rises unbidden in the middle of the night to infiltrate the reader’s dreams and deliver something new — a melding of what the author was trying to tell and what the reader took away. What does it take to develop a good story? A spark of imagination is one. Persistence is another — it takes time and perseverance to get words down on a page. But there’s more. I believe that good stories, like all good products, are constructed following a design process. There are always constraints on how the story needs to be told for a specific audience. There are industry demands on authors. There is a ton of background research.…

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