Category Archives: Amusing Timewasters
That Escalated Fast. Like, Really FAST.
Ask me a question and I'll answer it on ROCKET TALK this week. ANY QUESTION.
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire In a world where dinosaurs are ridden and cars don't exist, what form does Eisenhower's interstate highway act take?
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire Firstly, dinosaur shit would be one-stop shopping to fertilize farmers' fields.
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire Secondly, I'm sure enterprising ranchers would have pens of cows at certain locations to feed dinos. Tax the cow stations.
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@BrennanML And are pterodactyls in this calculus or are we talking land bound dinosaurs only?
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire OF COURSE Pterodactyls are in this calculus! I mean, be reasonable! They are this world's airplanes! (except smoking is OK)
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@BrennanML @jdiddyesquire What happens when a dinosaur rampages out of control? Where's the liability? Can you rent a dino?
— Stephen Blackmoore (@sblackmoore) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @BrennanML I suppose so. At age 25. Is dino insurance required? What's a collision policy look like? Strict liability?
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @sblackmoore Combination of auto insurance and pet liability. After all, what if my raptor, Mindy, savages someone's ride?
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@BrennanML What if said ride was totally provoking Mindy? This is a complicated legal quandry. @sblackmoore
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@BrennanML @sblackmoore Shared world anthology incoming?
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @BrennanML Traffic court would be complicated. So would getting your license at the Department of Dinosaur Vehicles.
— Stephen Blackmoore (@sblackmoore) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @sblackmoore You'd also have to stay current on its shots. And it's a brave vet indeed who would de-worm Mindy.
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @jdiddyesquire That would be crazy fun, wouldn't it? We would so ruin Dinotopia.
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @BrennanML Imagine the cost. You think gasoline's expensive, dino feed, housing, waste management. That shit racks up.
— Stephen Blackmoore (@sblackmoore) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @sblackmoore When vets become auto mechanics — my god, the opportunities for overpaying are endless!
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@BrennanML @sblackmoore "She really needs a new air filter. I mean just look at the crud on her current one."
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @jdiddyesquire Raptors are small and fuel-efficient commuter vehicles. No, they'd go after the Humvees — brachiosaurus.
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @sblackmoore @BrennanML The experts disagree. Dino Riders would know best.
http://t.co/Myzza6YYm5
— Wesley Chu (@wes_chu) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @sblackmoore "Jeff just bought a red T-Rex. Now he just tools it around the street."
"Ugh, such a mid-life crisis."
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @BrennanML The new Toyota family Brachiosaurus, bred special to get your kids where they need to go.
— Stephen Blackmoore (@sblackmoore) August 12, 2014
@BrennanML @jdiddyesquire Now I want to write a 1950's greaser story about a dino road race for pink slips.
— Stephen Blackmoore (@sblackmoore) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @jdiddyesquire "How could you lose Mindy to that band of greasers!!?"
"It's okay, I have a plan to get her back!"
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @BrennanML Yeah, this is clearly the opening story in the anthology. Period piece. Drag racing. OH MAN YOU RAN 97 SECONDS!
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @jdiddyesquire Also, everyone knows that herbivores are the safest family vehicle.
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @BrennanML There's also definitely a racketeering enterprise of flying dinosaurs wranglers with a monopoly on air travel.
— Justin (@jdiddyesquire) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @sblackmoore "Honey, I know that the raptor has the best fuel economy, but this hadrosaurid is just so affectionate!"
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @jdiddyesquire "Security systems on majungasaurus got high rankings this year. Most who try to dino-jack them were eaten."
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@sblackmoore @jdiddyesquire They show up with a copy of the key and a big steak. "Easy there, girl. Eaaaaaaaaasy…."
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
@jdiddyesquire @sblackmoore Now the French will eat dinos, but that's really controversial here in the US.
— ML Brennan (@BrennanML) August 12, 2014
It’s possible that Stephen Blackmoore and I are bad influences on each other. Poor Justin.
When April Fool’s Day Pranks Partially Deploy
When I was at Vericon two weeks ago, I had the delight of meeting a number of great writers – Greer Gilman made me laugh so hard on a panel that I was covering my face with a program; Max Gladstone taught a group of us Small World, and Saladin Ahmed promptly kicked everyone’s ass; and I got to have lunch with Elizabeth Bear, Scott Lynch, Saladin Ahmed, and Max Gladstone. Plus very fun panels to be on, and even better ones to attend, and I’m not even starting in on the delight of a first-night dinner that included Luke Scull and his delightful wife Yesica (both terrorized by what we New Englanders call “spring,” which they were inadequately coated for), plus Pat Rothfuss. Good times!
A few days after the con was over, Max Gladstone posted a fun piece of futuristic dystopian John Deere flash fiction (really, why isn’t this a Hugo category?) on his website. I read it, enjoyed it, and posted it around, as you do. Then I went along with my day, which included teaching my short story class. The class is in one of my favorite sections of the course (the “Professor Brennan has been working hard teaching Nathaniel Hawthorne, Tolstoy, Conrad, and the Bloomsbury group for two months, and deserves a one-week treat goddamnit” section, if you will) – on the previous class we’d discussed Ursula K. Le Guin’s classic “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” along with Kurt Vonnegut’s “Harrison Bergeron.” And in the class I was prepping for we were going to get to discuss Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” and Ray Bradbury’s “August 2026: There Will Come Soft Rains” – really, top-notch, great stuff.
Then I remembered that April Fool’s Day was not only coming up, but this class was scheduled to meet on that day.
Then I thought about Max Gladstone’s flash story again.
Then I got a very, very bad idea.
When I went into class that afternoon, here is what I handed out to my thirty-three students:
April Fool’s Day Extra Assignment
Due: April 1, 2014, before midnight
Biographical Background
Max Gladstone’s first novel, THREE PARTS DEAD, was named a Massachusetts Must Read Book of 2012. He was shortlisted for the 2013 John W. Campbell Best New Writer Award, and longlisted for the 2008 Writers of the Future award. TWO SERPENTS RISE, the second book in the series, was published in October 2013, and a third, FULL FATHOM FIVE, is forthcoming in July 2014.
Max graduated from Yale, where he majored in East Asian Studies with a special focus on Chan poetry and late Ming dynasty fantasy; he lived and taught for two years in rural Anhui province, and has traveled throughout Asia and Europe. He’s been a researcher for the Berkman Center for Internet and Policy Law, a tour guide for the Swiss Embassy, a go-between for a suspicious Chinese auto magazine, a translator for visiting Chinese schoolteachers, a Chinese philosophy TA, a tech industry analyst, and an editor. He has wrecked a bicycle in Angkor Wat and been thrown from a horse in Mongolia.
Max is also the personal friend of the professor. HIS MISTAKE.
Your Mission, Should You Choose To Accept It
In addition to his excellent, genre-bending novels, Gladstone recently wrote an excellent piece of dystopian flash-fiction, “Sam Ogilvy’s Lament,” and posted it to his website at http://www.maxgladstone.com. This story fits in very nicely with the work we’ve been reading in class by Le Guin, Vonnegut, Jackson, and (particularly) Bradbury.
If you choose to participate (which is absolutely voluntary) the guidelines are as follows:
• At any time from 12:01am to 11:59pm on April 1st, you will go to the entry on Max Gladstone’s website that features “Sam Ogilvy’s Lament” (“The Tractor Story from ICFA. Also, Vericon fun!”) and post a literary analysis of the story.
• The analysis is a minimum of one paragraph in length, and should follow formal rules.
• The direction you take is up to you. You may draw parallels between Gladstone’s work and the stories that we have been reading in class. You may analyze the symbolism in the story (the emphasis on the tractor being “apple candy green”). You may analyze the moral implications of Sam Ogilvy’s decision at the conclusion of the story. You may follow whatever path your heart desires.
If you choose to participate, please make certain that there is some identifying mark on your reply text. First name and last initial are fine. If you can make it clear that Max Gladstone’s story is the subject of a class assignment – all the better.
• Those who participate will have their lowest quiz grade dropped.
We also read through Max’s flash fiction in class and discussed it a little.
April 1 rolled around yesterday, and I eagerly awaited the beginning of the swarm on Max’s website.
And waited.
And waited.
By 6pm, one student had posted an analysis. Clearly I had not properly calibrated the heart-breaking lethargy of students. There was a brief flurry of activity late at night, as their natural active hours appeared, and their ingrained last-minute assignment completion instincts kicked in. All told, seven participated, and I’d say that they do a good job with it – there are thoughtful comments, but it’s also clear that they’re having fun with it.
Max did eventually realize that something was going on, and he posted this tweet at 4:50pm –
@maxgladstone
A few folks are academically engaging with my tractor romance flash fiction in the comments section of my blog. How delightful.
That was a bit before the minor swarm began – really, I am pleased with the students who participated (they’ll be getting a bit of extra extra credit), but let’s all just take a moment and imagine the awesomeness of the prank that could’ve been – thirty-three students suddenly inundating Max’s website.
sigh
I guess there’s always next year.
Whippets In Spaaaace, Week 3

The puppies continue to grow. With their mother as a convenient size reference, observe their terrifying growth rate. There’s starting to be a concern that these puppies are the whippet versions of Babe the Blue Ox. And we all know how that ended – in tragedy and a year’s worth of steak.

Asaro disagrees with Tepper, because Asaro prefers space sagas, ship battles, and quantum physics. It is hard to argue with those points, Asaro.

If they don’t get attention from humans, they’ve also discovered that crying can get them what they want. This is especially practiced by Scalzi, who, according to my mother, is the biggest crier of them all.
And that’s pretty much it for this week of whippet development! In non-puppy news, there’s a giveaway for three copies of Iron Night, so you can enter to win one of those. I’ll also be signing the copies, so that’s kind of fun. Iron Night was also reviewed recently at Fantasy Book Café and All Things Urban Fantasy, and there’s also a fantastic review of Generation V over at Bibliotropic that I strongly recommend checking out. Finally, for those puppy-philes in the Rhode Island area – I’ll be doing a signing and reception at Books On The Square on February 28th. Since I’ve been told very specifically that they are “taking a chance on [me]”, spread the word if you live in Rhode Island and let’s see if we can change this bookstore’s mind about out-of-state speculative fiction authors!
Whippets In Spaaaaace, Week 2

Here are the puppies pictured with their mother for size reference. Quite a difference from a week ago!
Back at the end of January, my mother’s whippet, Jessie, had her litter of puppies. Mom made the fatal error of letting me name the puppies, resulting in a litter named after some of my favorite living sci-fi authors. Since whippets usually have large litters, and Jessie’s first litter consisted of eight puppies, I had originally expected to honor (if you call having a puppy named after you an honor – which, really, shouldn’t you?) several more authors. Bad luck, to Alastair Reynolds, who didn’t make the cut. (honestly thought there was one more puppy in that womb – oh, well. a whippet’s uterus is apparently a harsh mistress)
I also learned from that blog post that apparently adorable puppies + the names of famous sci-fi authors is blog hit gold. Who knew? (okay, apparently everyone knew except me) So here is an update!

This is Asaro. Her coloring is a bit lighter than Tepper’s. She’s easy to pick out when you’re looking at the litter from above, since she has a white diamond on her butt.
Since the litter is half the size of a usual whippet whelping (say that ten times fast), the puppies don’t have to fight too hard for their meals, so they seem to be growing like a science experiment gone awry. I first saw them when they were two days old, and at that time they could lie in one hand. Now they are about the size of guinea pigs, and they require two hands to cuddle, due to all the puppy fat. Seriously, these puppies are so fat that they can barely lift themselves up. The only one who can maneuver with any kind of real agility (and even that is really being graded on a curve) is Scalzi, because Scalzi is the smallest puppy right now. By smallest I mostly mean “least fat.”

Brin has the darkest fur pattern — it’s a dark brown brindle. Here he is attempting jump the side of the tub. (unsuccessfully — no Uplift for you, puppy!)
Seriously, these puppies are pretty much fat bellies, superfluous legs, and mouths.

That’s Tepper sitting on Asaro – the puppies are starting to play a little bit in those rare moments between eating or sleeping. Mostly this involves sitting on each other, but hey, everyone has to start somewhere. You can get a partial view of Asaro’s butt diamond in this picture.
They have also matured a little from when they were a week old, and existed solely for the purpose of eating, then napping to get the energy to eat some more. They’re still very focused on eating, but after they fill their bellies there will be about a five second period where they will look around inquisitively before taking a nap. Their eyes are open now, and they seem to recognize people. If they see a person and their mother isn’t around, they will now start making little puppy whimpers until you pick them up and cuddle them – I think this is a heat thing, though my mother has the heat in her house pretty cranked right now, and their little tub is full of blankets and a few heating pads. Once you pick the whimpering puppy up, they kind of snuggle against you for a second, then begin exploring any exposed skin for the possibility of a nipple. You know, just checking about dinner.
Every time my mother or I walk into the room, their poor mother hops out of the tub (it’s one of those plastic swimmy tubs – it helps contain both wiggly puppies and their urine) and runs into the corner where her big fluffy cushion is. She’ll give the most hysterical, “Oh, thank god you’re here. YOU deal with them for a while,” expression.
Whippets…… In Spaaaaaaaaace!
Congratulations to my mother’s dog Jessie Bell, who over the course of a very long day has had four puppies! (we’re not entirely sure if she’s done — there might be one still left in there, but since Jessie is now taking a break to eat dinner, it’s kind of a Shrodinger’s Puppy kind of situation)
My mother has agreed to let me name them (always the first mistake), so I have chosen to name these puppies in honor of some of the best living writers of sci-fi. (how did I choose this genre? well, in the interests of not being a total puppy naming hog, I chose the speculative genre that my brother and I both have the most overlap of interest in)
At the far left, and the first puppy born (and the one who looks most like Jessie in her coat pattern) is Asaro (named of course for Catherine Asaro, physicist and author of the amazing Saga of the Skolian Empire series). At the far right with the really funny spot pattern is Scalzi (named for John Scalzi, whose Old Man’s War series my brother and I both really love).
In the middle are Tepper (named for the amazing and prolific Sheri S. Tepper, whose books I discovered in graduate school and which utterly blew my mind) and Brin (named for Davin Brin, whose Uplift fantasy series is so beloved by my brother that he very seriously tried to get me to shlep all the books in the series down to WorldCon to get them signed). All puppy genders match their namesakes.
If there does end up being a Puppy #5, then it will be named (regardless of gender!) Reynolds — not for Mal of Firefly, but for Alastair Reynolds, because in my brother’s words about his book Pushing Ice, “Long journeys are the best journeys.” Let’s hope so, Possible Puppy #5! (I had the pleasure of being on a panel with Alastair Reynolds at Worldcon, and he is such an amazingly nice guy that I really hope he will not be INCREDIBLY CREEPED OUT by having Possible Puppy #5 named in his honor. I feel like Scalzi can accept this canine naming tribute in the spirit to which it is offered, and I have no basis to make a guess regarding Asaro, Tepper, and Brin, so I’m going to figure that what they won’t know certainly won’t hurt them).
There will be more photos to come over the next few weeks, but I hope that everyone enjoyed meeting Whippets…… in Spaaaaaace!
January 22 Update: Potential Puppy #5 turns out to be… not. Sorry, Alastair Reynolds! If she ever has another litter, you’ll be Definite Puppy #1!
Here’s a picture of Jessie and her 1-day-old puppies!

Scalzi is having breakfast, Asaro is snuggled in Jessie’s front paws, and I’m honestly still having trouble telling Tepper and Brin apart, but they’re the puppies bookending everything.
Whippets…… in spaaaaaace!
The Mako Mori Test
There was a lot of discussion today over social media about the article from The Daily Dot about how a lot of people have problems with the limitations of the Bechdel test based on the fact that a film like Pacific Rim, with its incredible female character Mako Mori, fails it. Due to this, there are a lot of voices now calling for the creation of what has been dubbed “The Mako Mori Test.”
As a bit of background for anyone who didn’t read the article:
The Bechdel test is rather elegant. In this test, your movie must have:
1) Two named female characters
2) who talk to each other
3) about something other than a man.
If it doesn’t have all three items, then it fails. A shocking number of films fail this test, including Pacific Rim.
The Mako Mori Test was proposed by Twitter user @chaila, and is this:
The Mako Mori test is passed if the movie has: a) at least one female character; b) who gets her own narrative arc; c) that is not about supporting a man’s story. I think this is about as indicative of “feminism” (that is, minimally indicative, a pretty low bar) as the Bechdel test. It is a pretty basic test for the representation of women, as is the Bechdel test. It does not make a movie automatically feminist.
Now, as @chaila (as reported by The Daily Dot) has proposed the test, it seems like a useful idea to be used in conjunction with the Bechdel test. Where my concern comes in is the way I felt a lot of people were talking about this on social media, which was essentially that The Mako Mori test could be a *replacement* for the Bechdel test. And that’s where I think things get pretty problematic.
For what it’s worth, I thought Pacific Rim was hugely fun, I’ve recommended it to a lot of people, and I freaking *loved* the strong representations of POC.
*However* — I think the Bechdel test remains a valid tool. Does Pacific Rim failing the Bechdel test mean that I’m not going to watch it? No. But it raises valid points, and ones that I don’t think we should start trying to argue away with the specific creation of a new test that the movie can pass.
Why? Look at that number at the beginning of the article — 56 actors in the end credits. 3 of them women.
Was one of them an awesome woman of color who kicked ten types of ass? Absolutely. Does that offer a complete pass to the fact that 94.6% of the cast was male? Fuck no.
Here’s why — you can keep the same casting for Yancy, Stacker Pentecost, Mako Mori, and even that father-son Jaeger team. There’s your primary cast, and you don’t have to make any changes.
Why not make that duo of scientists female? Why not make a few of those politicians who cut the funding for the Jaeger project female? Why not have a few of the technicians with speaking roles female? Instead of having the pilots of Crimson Typhoon be a set of male triplets, why not a set of female triplets? Or instead of having the Russians be husband and wife, why not have them be sisters? When the scientist ends up in the smugglers den, why weren’t some of those smugglers female? Why not have the smuggler kingpin be a woman? You know that scene where Yancy is totally kicking the ass of everyone in that long line of possible co-pilots? They’re all men. Why wasn’t it a mixed-gender selection of possible co-pilots? In that entire scene of the possible co-pilots, there is only one woman in the room — Mako Mori.
When you look at Pacific Rim, you see a world of men, with only the barest sprinkling of women. Look at the crowd scenes in this movie — the only time I saw an even mix of men and women was in the public shelter (where speaking female actor #3 appears, by the way). In every other part of this movie, it’s men.
Mako Mori is a fantastic character. But by being unusual by the fact of her gender, it also perpetuates the underlying suggestion that a woman being a part of this world is unusual, that somehow she is special — not just because of her abilities as a pilot or her ambitions to avenge her family or her relationship with her adoptive father — but because she has *overcome* her gender and is now under consideration to be a pilot. It perpetuates that notion that if there are places for women, they are few and tokenish, so women need to fight as hard as they can so that they’ll be considered for those one or two spots.
Also, I’m just going to say it — we see a grand total of two female Jaeger pilots. One is the wife of another Jaeger pilot (the Russians), and the other is the adoptive daughter of the guy who is in charge of the whole damn program. I’m just going to go out on a limb here and say that the film doesn’t seem to just be saying that the male-female pilot ratio here is insanely off-kilter, but also that it’s going to take a big fucking bag of nepotism to make this thing happen.
The Avengers is another movie that I love, and it fails the Bechdel test. But I don’t think its fail is as absolute as Pacific Rim’s. Watch the scenes on the SHIELD airship bridge and count the number of female background actors who make up the crew. Now compare that to similar “bridge” scenes in the Jaeger headquarters.
Here’s a comic movie that passes the Bechdel test — Thor. Jane Foster talks with her assistant Darcy throughout the film, and Siv has a brief chat with Freya. Instead of talking about how the Bechdel test is useless and should be thrown away, maybe we should be asking why a test with such simple requirements was failed so utterly epicly by Pacific Rim when it would’ve been so extremely easy to pass it?
So what do you think about the Bechdel test, the Mako Mori test, or about Pacific Rim in general?
**NOTE: A chunk of this post was originally posted on Facebook, in response to Abhinav Jain’s posting of the Daily Dot article.
Ten Authors Who You Should Read

Sometimes you see something and you’re like, “HOW did I not know about this thing before?” I hope that this list (like whatever the hell this critter is) shows you something that you hadn’t known was out there, or hadn’t tried yet.
On Tuesday, one of my favorite bloggers, Danielle over at Coffee and Characters posted a Top Ten Tuesday slot on the topic of ten authors who deserve more recognition. This is a fun idea, because it’s not just asking the usual impossible question, which is “Who Are Your Top Ten Favorite Authors,” or, worse, “Who Are The Top Ten SF/F Authors.” I can’t imagine writing those lists without defaulting to who is huge and established in speculative fiction. I think this prompt is fun because it spurs you to think of either who you’ve just been exposed to (even if they only have one book out) or who just doesn’t get the kind of credit and monstrous fame that they deserve. So here are my picks!
1. Django Wexler – The Thousand Names is an amazing debut – I think the trend toward flintlock fantasy is a really fun one (but I’m a history nerd, so I would), but I really think that Wexler’s is the standout among the recent releases.
2. Will McIntosh – Love Minus Eighty was so wonderful and beautiful, I read it in a day. Incredible exploration of the intersection between technology and humanity, but also amazing characterization.
3. Sheri S. Tepper – Amazing, amazing ecofeminist sci-fi. Start with either Singer From The Sea, Gibbon’s Decline and Fall, or Grass. She’s written many incredible books, but I still often run into SF enthusiasts who have never even heard of her.
4. Teresa Frohock – Have you read her book Miserere: An Autumn Tale? YOU MUST READ IT NOW. It’s okay, I’ll wait.
5. Cassie Alexander – Her third Edie Spence book just came out — this is great urban fantasy about a human nurse who gets sucked into a shadowy underworld of supernaturals.
6. Nick Sagan – His Idlewild series completely blew my mind. The first book is just okay, but it’s necessary set-up for the following two, which are such a fascinating examination of character and human nature. Also, I’ve never seen a *less* idealized presentation of teenagers.
7. M. J. Scott – The trilogy starts with Shadow Kin, which I liked, but right now my very favorite is Blood Kin — fantastic romantic fantasy.
8. Margaret Killjoy – What Lies Beneath The Clock Tower is an extremely fun variation on those old Choose Your Own Adventure books. He also works on Steampunk Magazine.
9. Emma Bull – War For The Oaks was the first urban fantasy I ever read, and it has very fundamentally set the way I view the genre. It’s amazing, everyone should read it.
10. Sharon Shinn – Okay, so she’s crazy well-established, but I really love her stuff. I’m in love with her new Elemental Blessings series, and I just read an older book of hers called Jenna Starborn that was the BEST Jane Eyre remaster I’ve ever seen. She really focused on the themes, rather than just surface plating.
So that’s my list — who are some other good authors who YOU think should be getting more attention?