Fantastika – Page 28 – Wis[s]e Words

On a Red Station, Drifting — Aliette de Bodard

Published on October 19, 2014Leave a comment

Cover of On a Red Station, Drifting

On a Red Station, Drifting
Aliette de Bodard
116 pages
published in 2013

I wasn’t too impressed with the first story of Aliette de Bodard I read, when it was linked from Metafilter. I found the story, set in a Vietnamese or Vietnam inspired far future “too laboured, too trying to be interesting, but in the end it’s just another Orientalist allegory”. Which is somewhat ironic, as De Bodard is actually of Vietnamese descent… Can a writer be Orientalist if she’s actually writing from her own cultural background? That’s a question we’re going to come back to in discussing On a Red Station, Drifting as it’s at the heart of the problems I’ve had reading this book.

The reason I bought On a Red Station, Drifting, after that rough start I had with de Bodard was because she was nominated for the novelette Hugo and I discovered that her nominated story, The Waiting Stars, was “an excellent slice of Banksian space opera, a story of love, family and two incompatible views of the world”. On a Red Station, Drifting promised to be more of the same. It’s set in the same universe as The Waiting Stars, where the Dai Viet Empire ruling the stars makes a welcome retrieve from the usual Roman Empire model. At the time of this novel however it’s in trouble, with a weak emperor on the throne and rebel warlords springing up and taking over star systems.

Does a Bee care?

Published on October 16, 20141 Comment

Requires Hate is an abrasive blogger from Thailand who made her name pointing out and critiqueing the racism, sexism and orientalism found in science fiction and fantasy, often going after supposedly liberal writers. In the best of circumstances being accused of these things can lead to a defensive response and Requires Hate could be rather aggressive in her criticism. Case in point: her review of Tricia Sullivan’s Double Vision:

It’s a white woman who, through a fictional black woman as her mouthpiece, is describing Japanese men as “little robotic bulls” (the idea of East Asians being robotic itself echoing offensive stereotypes) and “like little Nazis”: not necessarily the comparison that’d first leap to mind when you are describing people who move like robots or even like soldiers at a drill. Later on, after hearing about the sexual assault (perhaps in an attempt to make light of things and make the survivor feel better), Cookie’s friend Gloria idly asks whether it’s true what they say about Asian men’s penis sizes.

And this was for a writer she actually liked at the time. With writers she didn’t, she could be far more biting, if not downright nasty, as with her posts on Cindy Pon’s novels. Furthermore, under her Livejournal persona, Winterfox, she was also accused of bullying and harassment. In short, she made a lot of enemies before she disappeared late last year as it seemed she’d lost the will to blog.

Benjanun Sriduangkaew is a science fiction writer from Thailand who started getting published in 2012, got a fair few excellent short stories published, enough to get her nominated the John W. Campbell Award for best new writer this year. Like any other new writer, she’s active online, on twitter and her blog, which is light and happy and nice and more than a bit twee. You can understand why the moment she got any attention, rumours started that she and Requires Hate were the same person. These rumours apparantly started to intensify around the Worlcon, though the first time I became aware of them was early September, when it was mentioned in the comments at James Nicoll’s blog. Glad I didn’t comment back then so I look smart now, as I was sure it was just stupid to think two people could be the same just because they were from the same neck of the woods and active in sf/fantasy.

Because it turned out to be true this time, as Nick Mamatas officially revealed that yes, Sriduankaew had been blogging as Requires Hate/Winterfox:

Anyway, Benjanun Sriduangkaew used to blog under the name Requires Only That You Hate. I like Bees’s writing, I liked the RotyH blog, and I’ve known (without exact confirmation, but Bees had a contracted story in PHANTASM JAPAN) for quite a while. I suppose I am most interested in the reactions of the people who were yelling that to even suggest that Bees and RH were the same person was racist, which should be hilarious.

All of which would only be mildly interesting if not for the enemies RH/Winterfox had made as a blogger. Because allegedly some of those had been waging a whisper campaign against her, revealing her true identity to her editors and other influential people to try and derail her career. Mostly it’s been done behind the scenes, but at least one author publically called on her readers to write to Sriduankaew’s editors. This sort of doxxing, revealing of real life identities, is one of the worst crimes you think of in many online communities, if only because it’s so often used against people with good reason to be anonymous or pseudonymous. I may have the privilege not to have to worry about keeping my online and offline lives separate, many people don’t.

On the other hand, as has been argued forcefully in James Nicoll’s thread on the news, what’s so wrong in making people aware that sweet butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth Sriduankaew is actually a notorious online bully and abuser? Somebody who’s been careful to not reveal her past, who in fact has been busy memoryholing it?

Which is the biggest problem in getting to the truth of this. So much of what happened has now devolved into he said/she said territory, what with the deletion of posts and comments as well as the general entropy of the internet. None of the people claiming to know the truth are impartial and what’s abuse to one party are just forcefully expressed opinions to the other. What’s more, there are good people on both sides; this isn’t a GamersGate situation or a Vox Day inspired witch hunt. Some of these people genuinely believe that RH was fighting the good fight against racism and orientalism, perhaps a bit abrasive in how she went out it, while others believe that she just used this as a shield to attack women of colour she disliked. The point is, it’s almost impossible for an outsider to find out the truth and at this point it really doesn’t like much like there are any high minded motives behind this fight anymore.

No, this is a good old fashioned fannish feud, where the original cause for the feud are not so much forgotten as irrelevant at this point. People have been hurt and upset on both sides and have caused hurt and upset themselves. Neither side is innocent.

For me personally, I’m going to try and stay out of this fight because I’m far from sure it would solve anything to come down on one side or the other. I like Sriduankaew’s writing, but I also think it would credit herif she was to break her silence and make it official that yes, she was Requires Hate, to be honest about her history. It would credit her enemies to stop trying to ruin her career, or, at the very least be open about believing she’s a toxic influence on science fiction. Don’t keep it festering in the shadows.

Ancillary Sword — Ann Leckie

Published on October 12, 2014Leave a comment

Cover of Ancillary Sword

Ancillary Sword
Ann Leckie
356 pages
published in 2014

Ann Leckie’s debut novel, Ancillary Justice, won about every major science fiction award going: the BSFA, the Clarke, The Nebula and the Hugo, the first time any author won the four most important awards in the field with the same book, let alone with their debut novel. Anticipation has therefore been high for the sequel, not least on my part. Would Leckie been able to keep up the high standard of her debut? Would Ancillary Sword build up on it or be more of the same? Is Ann Leckie really the major new sf talent she seems to be or just a flash in the pan?

The main reason for Ancillary Justice‘s impact was Leckie’s use of gender. The Radchaai culture she created uses female pronouns exclusively, making no distinction between male and female in their language. but it goes further than just mere language. Leckie’s protagonist, Breq, struggles with establishing gender, has to consciously evaluate gender clues even when she does speak a gendered language. Possibly this is because she’s an ancillary — one of the meat puppet extensions of a ship AI — because from what we saw in the first novel other Radchaai had no such difficulties. Breq is also the last surviving part of her ship AI because her ship, The Justice of Toren was killed by the immortal ruler of the Radch, Anaander Mianaai, at war with herself.

Judgement on Janus — Andre Norton

Published on October 8, 2014Leave a comment

Cover of Judgement on Janus

Judgement on Janus
Andre Norton
188 pages
published in 1963

It’s a miracle: I actually managed to start an Andre Norton series in the right order: Judgement on Janus is the first of a duology, together with Victory on Janus. Another minor miracle is the fact that my copy lasted long enough for me to read it as the cover was flaking off something fierce. Normally Ace paperbacks hold up better. This is actually one of the first Norton novels I’d bought, years ago, but had never read so far.

Naill Renfro is a young man who, caught up in the slums of the Dipple, sells himself as indentured labour (just like Charis Nordholm) in order to have enough money to give his mother a dignified death. He ends up on the planet Janus, where dour religious fanatics fight a never ending battle against the primeval forests covering the planet. These forests they consider a source of evil, as they do many things, especially the alien relics or treasures occassionally found. These are supposed to be reported and destroyed immediately. Those who don’t report it and try to keep them for themselves are punished by god with the green sick and left in the forest to die. Three guesses what happens to Naill.

Exiles of the Stars — Andre Norton

Published on October 7, 2014Leave a comment

Cover of Exiles of the Stars

Exiles of the Stars
Andre Norton
249 pages
published in 1971

It was clear from the first page that Exiles to the Stars was a sequel and a quick trip to Librarything confirmed that this was a sequel to Moon of Three Rings, which I’ve never read. It’s neither the first nor likely the last time I’ll read a sequel before the original novel and in Norts on’s case, since she wrote before the rise of the epic fantasy series, her novels always tell complete stories, with anything you need to know from earlier books neatly explained. In Exiles of the Stars the things that need explaining are the protagonists, Krip Vorlund and his companion Maelen. Both are not what they seem. Krip outwardly looks like a Thassa, a humanoid alien race, but his midn is human, having taken over the thassa body when his original was destroyed. The same thing happened to Maelen, now inhabiting the form of a glasssa, a small four footed hunting animal where she once had been a woman and priestess on a planet where the priesthood was adept at body switching. All this of course the result of the action from the previous novel.

Their prediciment shows up the important role psi powers and mind control play in Norton’s space opera, as it does here. Many of her heroes either encounter ESP or discover their own talents during their adventures. It can feel a bit old fashioned, on a par with the navigation tapes used to steer the spaceships. But in this case it also shows how large and strange Norton’s universe is, where her heroes are lucky to survive, let alone thriumph. Occasionally in the wrong body.