Category Archives: Cool Things

Cool enough to be a category and a tag.

Cool Things: Index (x2!)

Posted by natechen on

Indexing is a new serial by Seanan McGuire, available from Amazon.com through the Kindle store. I discovered it because I made the mistake of reading one of those periodic e-mails Amazon sends out, you know the ones where they recommend things for you. They’re dangerous, dangerous things and my wallet doesn’t like them very much. In fact, they’re one of the prime reasons that I don’t let Amazon show me pictures in their e-mails.

But the name caught my eye. I’ve already mentioned one of McGuire’s works in this spot before, the very high quality October Daye novels. Indexing plays around in very different headspace, running with themes of self-generating narrative similar to Mercedes Lackey’s 500 Kingdoms series. This is weird, very metanarrative stuff. As far as I know the idea first started with Terry Pratchett but has become more popular over time (or maybe just speaks to the breadth of Pratchett’s influence on modern fantasy). It may only appeal to the literary minded.

The basic idea of a self-generating narrative (or SGN from here on out) is that there are stories out there, and some unknown force causes them to play out over and over again, frequently bending or breaking the laws of nature to create the necessary circumstances. There’s problems with the concept of SGNs and the implications that most authors give to them that the more logically minded might question. But the whole point is not to think too logically and just enjoy the ride.

In short, SGNs offer a chance for fractured fairytales on a grand scale, giving the author license to mix, match, avert and otherwise put their own spin on classic tales. Indexing looks to be no exception. It focuses on members of a special government task force who’s job is to deal with SGNs before they get out of hand. However, since Ive only read the first few installments of the series, gauging it’s exact tone and the level of the story behind the stories, so to speak, is a pretty iffy game. Still, if you like the idea of story on top of stories, McGuire looks to be bringing a pretty good one to the table.

What’s really cool about this, at least to my mind, is the fact that Indexing is really taking advantage of changing technologies to bring readers a good experience. The serial will update every two weeks with a new installment, but you only have to pay for the book once. After that, each installment is synced to your Kindle (or iPad/desktop app) as soon as it comes out and you can pick up reading right where you left off. Neat! Plus, it looks like while it’s running as a serial you get a considerable discount on the final price. It’s worth talking a look at.

——–

Totally unrelated to the above: Indexed is a sort of webcomic, published on Tumblr by Jessica Hagy. It uses simple line graphs and Venn diagrams, and occasionally something a little more complicated, drawn on the back of index cards, to make humorous and sometimes insightful points. It updates most every weekday and is a lot of fun to read. Check it out!

Cool Things: Project Milkweed

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Ian Tregillis‘ Milkweed Triptych is a saga of alternate history, superpowers and Nazis. It focuses on that defining era of the previous century, World War Two, and it weaves a convoluted tale of politics, ambition and the human penchant for evil. If you enjoy any of the the above you might enjoy the series, but if you like them all it’s required reading.

A quick definition: Alternate history is an exercise in world building where you take the established time line and change one thing, be it major or minor, and then wonder how that would make a difference in the resulting historical events. Most alternate history looks at what would have changed immediately after the break with established history is made but sometimes changes are made in the far past but the alternate history narrative still looks at the society that would result in the ‘modern’ era, which is to say at whatever time period the author was living in.

Milkweed belongs to the first category, and it begins with the idea that the Nazis had real, working übermensch with psychic powers at their disposal starting about the time of the Spanish civil war. While these psychics are still highly experimental, they’re dangerous enough that Great Britain becomes concerned when word of their existence leaks out.

In their attempts to learn how the psychics work British Intelligence winds up consulting one of the last English warlocks in existence. A rather foppish young man and good friend of one Raybould Marsh, spy, Lord William was taught the language and dangers of negotiating with Eidolons by his grandfather. Since negotiating with powerful beings of alien nature with cosmically horrific overtones drove Will’s grandfather to becoming an awful drunk, Will himself has ignored the art for many years. There’s also the little fact that the Eidolons are bent on the extinction of humanity and tend to demand payment for their favors in the form of violence and murder.

Never the less, Marsh and his superiors quickly decide that, if Britain is going to stop the German supermen, Eidolons are the only option available. What results is a horrifying series of atrocities on both sides of the conflict. The first book in the series, Bitter Seeds, lives up to its title as men rack up the lives of other men as counting chips. Coldest War brings the butcher’s bill due, and Marsh and William have to face what their earlier actions have wrought.

But anyone could write a series of devastating failures and ideologically motivated missteps. What makes Project Milkweed really shine is the third book, Necessary Evil. After all the wrongs done, Raybould Marsh is given a chance to make things right. And he does it, not by taking the price from others without their consent but by freely sacrificing many of the things he had been willing to murder for. In the end, it will take more than cleverness or power to carry the day. It will take strength of character. Marsh finds it, although he pays a horrible cost.

While I highly recommend Project Milkweed be warned that, since it focuses on a very dark period of history, some of the things that happen in it are dark as well. In particular, a lot of time is spent in the Nazi’s human augmentation research program. While what is described there pales in comparison to some of the real experiments that the Nazi’s ran in concentration camps, and the books never go into gruesome details, it may not be your cup of tea. Also, the use of human lives as fuel for arcane rites is more than a little disturbing.

If you don’t want to hear about those things, then avoid Project Milkweed. But if you’re okay with reading about how sometimes it’s darkest before dawn, then that alone may mean Milkweed is right for you.

Cool Things: 20th Century Boys

Posted by natechen on

Manga – those comics which we Americans, being unable to produce many visual narratives outside of the comics pages and the superhero genre, import from Japan to help fill out our graphic novel shelves. Whether you love it or hate it, manga is a phenomenon in America today. But if all you’re familiar with is the mainstream stuff you may wonder what the big deal is. If so, I suggest you look into 20th Century Boys. It may broaden your horizons a little.

Naoki Urasawa is a manga-ka, or manga artist, of some fame in Japan. He’s tackled a wide variety of genres and consistently delivered a high quality of art and story, when he was the author of the story (even when he wasn’t, he collaborated with people who knew what they were about.)

20th Century Boys may be one of his most impressive in scope and themes. It is nothing more or less than a tribute to the days when it was possible to save the world.

For Endo Kenji, living in 1969 meant rock and roll, moon landings and a new age for humanity. For a handful of young boys, it was an exciting era. It was a time to dream of growing into successful and impossibly cool adults and, when the turn of the century came in thirty years, it would undoubtedly mean a coming apocalypse that could only be averted by the actions of brave men like they will undoubtedly be by then. Kenji and his friends spent the summer daydreaming about what could be, and writing down their future adventures in crudely drawn and lettered books, buried away to be excavated by their future selves when the time was right. Among them, a story of how the world would end, and how they would prevent it.

For Endo Kenji, living in 1997 meant struggling to keep the family store open, looking after the niece his sister hand unexpectedly left with them before disappearing a few years before and trying to keep in touch with just one or two of his old friends. There’s no time for daydreams. With three people to keep fed and a corporate manager to appease, there’s time for little else. No rock and roll, very little technology and absolutely no heroics.

That is, until one of the family’s long standing customers turns up missing. When Kenji goes to retrieve the last delivery he had made, he spots a symbol that takes him thirty years back. A symbol of friendship between young boys. A symbol that says, ‘we are friends’.

But that’s not what it means anymore. One of Kenji’s old friends never quite grew up. Never put the toys behind him. He’s set out to bring their predictions of the end of the world to life, even if he has to play the villain himself. He’s charismatic and he’s rounded up a cult of followers, calling himself ‘Friend’ and quietly maneuvering himself into a position to wreak havoc. Kenji and his friends, as the only people who know the doomsday plan in it’s entirety and will take the danger it poses seriously, have to figure out who Friend is and stop his plans.

Kenji isn’t the supercool adult he planned to be. He’s not prepared or equipped to fight or persuade. But the world needs a hero, even if his only qualification is convenience store clerk.

The themes that run through 20th Century Boys are at once simple and deep. A typical shonen, or boy’s comic in Japan focuses on themes of friendship, hard work towards goals and eventual victory. Urasawa takes these themes and makes them his own by adding one more: the passing of time.

His story grapples with friendships not just as they are formed but as they grow, falter and sometimes lapse. By covering a span of over fifty years (the manga eventually looks forward into the 21st century) Urasawa gives his characters incredible richness as we watch them age from naïve young boys to struggling and disillusioned men and into grim but purposeful middle age. In spite of the disagreements and distance that often comes between them their deep and heartfelt friendship endures over time, a stark contrast to the superficial charm of their nemesis.

By the same token, the goal Kenji sets with his friends, to save the world, is almost ludicrous in scope. But at the same time, we see what happens to these people when they give in and accept that their ludicrous goals have to be set aside so that they can ‘get by’ in the world. They diminish. They are demeaned. They learn few truly useful lessons and they struggle through day by day, slowly loosing touch with themselves and the people in their lives. Only when their worthy cause is returned to them do they revive, grow and become the men they wanted to be.

It’s tempting to dismiss comics as just frivolity, a few pretty pictures, with no real depth or power to them. And if you transfer them from one culture to another, surely they must loose even more of what little meaning they had. But in 20th Century Boys, Urasawa has written a powerful critique of leaving the big goals behind in exchange for the day to day and remindeds us that friendships are what we make of them. Read it, and it may change your perspective for good.

Cool Things: The Philadelphia Story

Posted by natechen on

I mentioned a while ago that I do love me some black and white movies. I’ve mentioned Casablanca before, and I figured that I might as well take advantage of this spot to mention a few others that you may not have heard of.

The Philadelphia Story stars Cary Grant, Katherine Hepburn and Jimmy Stewart, names you’ve hopefully heard of (and if you haven’t, this ain’t a half bad film to watch as a beginner’s primer to their work.) In modern times this movie would probably be considered a romantic comedy, but it has very little in common with the films put under that heading today. A brief synopsis of the story runs something like this:

C.K. Dexter Haven (Grant) and Tracy Samantha Lord (Hepburn), decidedly upper crust Americans with significant privacy issues, get married (not shown) and quickly get divorced again. Fast forward a bit.

Tracy is planning on getting married again, this time to George Kittredge (John Howard). The editor of a major tabloidesque magazine dispatches a reporter, Macaulay “Mike” Conner (Stewart), and photographer, Liz Imbrie (Ruth Hussey), to cover the wedding, armed with some juicy blackmail to get the family to play along. Dexter goes along, officially to provide an introduction to the family but unofficially with the hope of winning his ex-wife back. What results is a train wreck of conflicting objectives and personalities.

The Philadelphia Story is great for a plethora of reasons. It’s funny. Really funny, the kind of funny that is timeless in the way it relies on strong, believable and openly conflicting personalities. All of the stars, and the supporting cast, nail their parts, giving performances of a quality that many modern day stars seem to only manage once every four or five movies. But most importantly, the story manages to tackle issues without being in your face about it and without sacrificing the story.

Mike is a solid, proud working man. But at his heart he’s an artist. While he spends most of his time pounding out meaningless social drivel for a second rate gossip rag he once wrote a series of short stories that he published – and sold abysmally. (My sympathies, Mike.) Even so, he views himself as a member of the proletariat, solidly against the bourgeois in all forms. Problems arise when he finds himself attracted to Tracy Lord, very much not a member of the proletariat.

Tracy is a strong, confident woman with little patience for people who can’t match her own level of foresight and character – or so she seems to tell herself. In truth, she’s stand-offish and harsh. She has tossed Dexter for his drinking habit, which disgusted her, and she finds Mike’s insight and sharp wit a match for her own standards.

Dexter stands in the middle of the whirlwind. He still loves Tracy, despite her shrewish behavior towards him, and he hopes that some day she will learn that with high standards must come mercy, or she will wind up cutting herself off from humanity and end very, very alone. He never makes excuses for his bad behavior, but he’s dried out since his drinking days and can’t quite understand why he is still being punished for them. So, with grace and humor he has to gently rebuke Tracy’s excessive zeal, finagle some way to get the Lords out from under the blackmail threats with Mike’s help and hopefully walk away with the girl and a few new friends in the end.

The Philadelphia Story is a great story, well told, but more than anything it’s great for the way it shows the ways in which romance continues after a visit to the wedding alter. Thankfully not all relationships are as rocky as Dexter and Tracy’s. But, with this story in mind, it’s a little easier to believe that, with a little grace and a lot of dedication, even the rockiest can turn out fine in the end.

Cool Things: Metropolys

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Okay, board gamers! This one’s for you. Metropolys is a board game that serves as a strange blend of real estate management and creative bluffing. Each player takes the role of an urban developer and takes turns bidding on properties, attempting to acquire districts to build in that correspond to the goals they are given at the beginning of the game.

Of course, some districts have value in and of themselves and developing a large number of some types of districts carries bonuses as well. Since each player has two objectives that can score them points, figuring out who is doing what, and why is more than a little tricky. The game ends when one player has placed all of their buildings.

Metropolys can appeal to your gamersense in a couple of different ways. It has a strong psychological aspect in that it challenges you to figure out what your opponent is up to. The bidding plays into that, since each player has a limited number of high bids and using them early can leave you powerless to stop other players from snatching up properties in the later game.

I have also found few modern board games that encourage long term planning as well as Metropolys. Most games have a fair element of randomness to them, since that helps inexperienced players keep up and enjoy the game along with the skilled players. In Metropolys, that randomness comes from not knowing exactly what the other player needs to do to win and how they’ll respond to a given situation. But, by the same token, you know exactly what you need to do to win and with a little contingency planning it’s possible to plan and execute several rounds of intense bidding that leave you considerably ahead of other players, which gives great satisfaction and makes you feel something like a supervillain in the midst of a masterful heist. (But why would anyone want to feel like that, right?)

Visually Metropolys can seem kind of busy – the colors aren’t quite as distinct as they could have been, especially as regards lakes (which are an important part of some modes of gameplay) and rivers (which aren’t), and the little tokens that mark the values of some districts pose some logistical problems and add to setup time (but since they also add to gameplay value I’m not going  to complain too much). In short, there’s nothing special about the finishwork of the game. But don’t let that discourage you. Metropolys is a fun and fast game and, since the concept and gameplay is simple, it serves as a good game for families as well as parties. If board games are your thing it’s worth the time to check out.

Cool Things: Inspector Lewis

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For whatever reason, there are few people who can do a murder mystery like the British. (Yes, yes, everyone knows Edgar Allen Poe invented the mystery story. The British do them better.) They’ve produced smashing successes in print and TV, and I would presume in film and over radio waves. In fact, the quintessential reasoning detective is Sherlock Holmes, a British detective created by a British author. And let’s not get started on Dame Agatha. Given my love of mysteries and Great Britain’s outstanding presence in the field and it’s no surprise that many of my favorite detectives are British. I’ve already mentioned Peter Grant. Today’s specimen is a little more ordinary than PC Grant, though.

Detective Inspector (DI) Robert Lewis, former Sergeant to DI Endeavor Morse. Like many police detectives, and unlike many private detectives who tend to move around, the kinds of mayhem and death that make up a large part of DI Lewis’ day to day are defined by the place he lives. For Lewis, that means Oxford.

To us American rubes, Oxford is synonymous with higher education and the University of Oxford. There’s more to the city than that – for starters Oxford University is not the only institution of higher learning in town – but when Robbie Lewis gets called out you can be almost certain some kind of brainy, professorial type involved, if only so they can drive him nuts. It also serves the dual purpose of driving home one of the prime messages of the series: Education does not make you a better person. It just means you know things.

People in Oxford can do a lot of damage to themselves and others with the things they know.

The worst part is most of these brainy types are equipped with large amounts of esoteric knowledge and a passion for advertising it, even (especially) when committing murder. So, when it comes time to interview yet another suspect who knows too much about not enough, DI Lewis drags out his own Sergeant, DS James Hathaway, who attended university in that other place (Cambridge) and is more than willing to digest all the scholastic details of the case into something his boss can handle. His career path, from scholar pursuing a career in the clergy to Sergeant who gets little respect from the same kinds of academics who once praised his work, is a stark contrast to Lewis’ long career and clear satisfaction with his job.

In addition to being an excellent foil to Lewis, Hathaway serves to ask the philosophical questions. Does finding and punishing murderers really make anything better? Is it worthwhile? And when then pieces are all in place and the investigation is complete, who picks up the pieces of the lives that have been ruined?

While mystery series are about finding who’s done it, you won’t want to tune in week after week, or pick up title after title from the library or book store, unless you love the people who are solving them. Alone, Lewis’ brusque manner and direct approach to problems could make him a little too abrasive to be truly likable. Alone, Hathaway’s intellectualism and philosophizing could make him a little to cold or wishy-washy to assure us of his commitment. Together, they make a perfect team.

As for the mysteries themselves, Lewis is a police procedural, not to be confused with a detective story. While both of those categories will probably have their day in the Genrely Speaking segment, for now suffice it to say that the emphasis is on watching Lewis and Hathaway tromp around gathering miscellaneous testimony, expert opinion and trace evidence than overly convoluted murder scenarios or brilliant leaps of logic. Rarely will our heroes put all the pieces together before we do. In fact, the scripts are usually designed to have viewer and detective arrive at the solution at once. The entertainment is less about the puzzle and more about the fun in watching it solved.

And since the puzzles are put together by people from Oxford, you’ll even gain a greater appreciation for culture thrown in! Unless you’re like Inspector Lewis, in which case you can just shake your head and wonder how anyone managed to build Western Civilization when they had scholars like this around. It’s a mystery in and of itself, isn’t it?

Of course, we already know the answer to that. After all, where would we be without men like Lewis?

Cool Things: The Beams Are Creaking

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In keeping with tradition, I come with news of the season’s fourth and final all for One Productions play, The Beams Are Creaking.

First, a quick disclaimer: I’m not in this production. So if that’s been keeping you away please consider coming to this show!

Wait, you want to know what the show is about? Well, to put it simply it’s about the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Lutheran pastor who lived in the first half of the twentieth century. He opposed the Nazi party and their takeover of the German churches and worked with Abwehr (a German Intelligence organization) as a part of the many attempts on the life of Adolf Hitler during the Second World War.

The Beams Are Creaking is a play about a hard time, when choosing to live well was not easy. Then again, living right is never easy and there’s much we can learn from people who have given their all in pursuing that end. Hopefully this production will have lessons for us all.

Shows are May 3rd – 5th and 10th – 13th, and will be at the Main branch of the Allen County Public Library. Ticket information can be found on afO’s blog.

Cool Things: Clockwork Century

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Our last episode of Steampunk Month (a spontaneously generated phenomenon now coming soon to headspace near you) is dedicated to Cherie Priest’s Clockwork Century series of novels. Like all steampunk novels, Priest’s story is set in a world with rather Victorian sensibilities and retro-futuristic technology. Like Whitechapel Gods, last week’s steampunk offering, the Clockwork Century takes place in a world that is pretty much like our own.

Unlike, Whitechapel Gods, the Clockwork Century focuses on events in North America. In the 1890s of this strange, parallel world the American Civil War (or War Between the States, or What Have You) continues to rage off and on through a series of armistices, truces and perpetual ill-will. Like all good sci-fi/fantasy authors, Priest doesn’t spend a whole lot of time trying to explain where the South is getting manpower from, or how a mostly agrarian economy managed to match an industrial powerhouse longer than a handful of years. I mean look, the British allied with the South, supplies, mercenaries, time to develop new technologies, Progress! Huzzah!

Not that the dynamics of a rapidly industrializing society at war are really what Clockwork Century is about. No, most of the action in the fist five novels or so (give or take the road trip aspects of Clementine and Dreadnaught and the jaunt to New Orleans in Ganymede) is centered on the west coast. Sure, the stories range far and wide, but everything actually hinges on the abandoned city of Seattle, in the territory of Washington (which, with the war still on back in the states, hasn’t had much luck in getting admitted to the Union.) There, way on the northern end of the West Coast, the aftereffects of Dr. Leviticus Blue’s Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine are shaping up to redefine life as we know it. In a strange, subtle, very weird kind of way. You see, while I love a good steampunk story the Clockwork Century has one thing I really hate.

Zombies.

Or, if you’re a resident of Seattle or the surrounding area, rotters. Rotters is the name for people exposed to a strange gas that started leaking out of the ground after Dr. Blue’s test drive of the Boneshaker, who died and who haven’t quite stopped walking around yet. For reasons unknown, they bite people. Okay, honestly they bite people because that’s what zombies do, but if you think about it that only makes sense when we’re dealing with corpses animated by a malevolent force bent on killing, maiming and terrifying people. Rotters are not those kinds of zombies (that we know of.)

So normally I wouldn’t recommend a zombie story to you, just like I wouldn’t normally recommend Lovecraftian fiction to you. The Clockwork Century stands apart, however, because it gives its zombie narratives context and handles its characters with style.

The blight gas that creates rotters is the focus of much scrutiny to the scientists of the Clockwork Century. Deranged people with little sense and less restraint, known as chemists to most of the world, have discovered a way to distill blight gas into an addictive drug and are selling it for pleasure or as an alternative painkiller. It also turns you into a zombie if you take enough of it but, like all addictive drugs, that goes without saying. There is the interesting little problem of these particular zombies being able to reproduce by biting people.

And the fact that that makes no sense does not bug me. At all. >_<

BUT. By constraining the rotters to Seattle and a few other places where blight gas (or it’s distilled form) has been around more than is healthy Priest manages to avoid many of the annoying cliches of the zombie genre. There are still people in this world. Civilization carries on. In fact the old city of Seattle has sealed tunnels full of people (and empty of blight gas and rotters) working quietly to figure out what they’re going to do about their private little end of the world.

And the people in the North, the South, and the independent Republic of Texas (which apparently scrounged up enough good sense not to get involved in the war in this time line)? Well, they carry on, too. They just have to dodge the occasional zombie outbreak while they’re doing it. While an argument could be made that the Clockwork Century does not have the transportation infrastructure or population density to make a zombie apocalypse the danger it is to a modern world, I would tell people arguing such a thing to read at least up to Dreadnaught before making that judgement.

And now I’m going to stop talking about the zombie part of this series, because, while zombies are just a horrible train wreck of crap that has been foisted onto fiction to the detriment of us all, and while Priest does a halfway decent job managing not to make her zombies much more than set pieces and keeping the action focused elsewhere, the real charm of this series is not in the zombies or even the steampunkness, it’s in the way Priest handles the world as a whole.

When I talked about keeping the story in mind I mentioned Priest as a great example of juggling characters. Truly, the way she does it is a wonder. I can’t say too much about it, as the nature of some characters are spoilers, but suffice it to say that just because a character walks off the screen in one book and isn’t seen again in that title doesn’t mean they’re gone. In fact, minor characters frequently go on to sprout entire books of their own. Case in point: Book 5, The Inexplicables. Or, to give an even better example, the many trials and tribulations of Jeremiah Swakhammer. (Yes, he’s as awesome as the name implies.)

The sense you get is that the world itself is alive and growing, with a lot of small, mundane things happening off the screen that stack up and surprise us when the narrative takes us back to people we haven’t seen in a while. Sure, some of the things that are alive and growing their ranks are actually, technically undead but hey, that’s just the price you pay.

All in all, the Clockwork Century series is well titled. It doesn’t rest on the back of a character, it doesn’t focus on a particular conflict. It’s much more an adventure through a wild, unpredictable frontier. An Old West you’ve never seen before. A war that’s not in any history book. And yes, possibly the end of the world in slow, shambling motion. If you love world building or character driven fiction, it’s probably worth your time to check out.

A short story entitled Tanglefoot, set after Boneshaker, the first novel in the series, but containing no spoilers for that book or any other stories in the Clockwork Century, is available for free by following this link.

Cool Things: Whitechapel Gods

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Steampunk runs a wide gamut of themes, usually drawing inspiration from the likes of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells along with the pulp fiction that was famous for it’s prolific nature and low quality in the Victorian era. In many ways it is a retro genre, as much about evoking the feel of those days than about trying to tell a particular brand of story. So steampunk has a tendency to wander far afield. Where fantasy, mystery and science fiction are usually thought of as mostly separate genres, steampunk has a tendency to mix all three liberally.

But there’s one other genre that frequently, but not always makes its way into steampunk stories: Horror.

Not just any horror, either, but horror based on the madness-exploring works of H.P. Lovecraft. One such book is S.M. Peters Whitechapel Gods.

Before we dive into that, a brief explanation of Lovecraftian fiction, also known as cosmic horror. Cosmic horror is designed to induce fear through the idea that humanity is in the grips of uncaring and impersonal forces beyond the ability of men to understand or have any lasting effect on. These forces are usually personified as old and powerful aliens from the depths of space (hence the term ‘cosmic’), the most well-known being Cthulhu. Any attempt to come to grips with these forces, and in many cases even just seeing them, drives people mad. They leave readers with the impression that, with the exception of a few well trained experts who can hold insanity at bay, if only for a time, humanity has no choice but to accept eventual destruction. Their only choice is whether they will approach it in ignorance or insanity.

Cosmic horror tends to be popular among geeks (but not this one) and scientists (they’re not the same thing), but doesn’t enjoy much acceptance in the mainstream, which already has newspapers and MSNBC presenting much the same themes.

So wait, if I don’t enjoy cosmic horror much, why am I recommending Whitechapel Gods to you?

Well, mostly because it manages to dodge most of the failings of the cosmic genre while reveling in the trappings. For those of you that have never heard of it, Whitechapel is a part of London (which means that, unlike the other two steampunk stories I’ve mentioned, this Victorian era fantasy actually takes place in Victorian London!) However, unlike the real Whitechapel, the Whitechapel created by Peters is totally cut off from the rest of London, and England as a whole. Within its walls, Baron Atlas Hume rules with the aid of his steam powered robotic enforces, the Boiler Men and his majordomo, John Scared.

In addition to being the ruler, Baron Hume is the high priest of a dark cult that worships the horrific cosmic beings Mama Engine and Grandfather Clock, and assists them in the Great Work that will ultimately Destroy The Earth (okay, that last part is never actually said anywhere, but it’s implied.) Each of these strange, mechanical “gods” claims a priesthood from among the general populace, known as Black Cloaks (for Mama Engine) and Gold Cloaks (for Grandfather Clock).

Oh, and there might be some normal people running around trying to overthrow the Baron and his gods and restore Whitechapel to London proper.

What sets Whitechapel Gods apart from most of cosmic fiction is that it makes humanity an active participant in the story and avoids sidelining its villains. One of the biggest problems of cosmic horror is the way it tries to present epic threats to the safety of humanity while the majority of humanity remains in ignorance of the threat. Cosmic horror implies that this makes humanity ignorant chumps, with the exception of the chosen handful who have the strength of will to look extinction in the face and realize they’re doomed.

On the other hand, in Whitechapel Gods humanity actively participates in either advancing or preventing the outcome of the story. First and foremost is Baron Hume, who lays the foundation for the altered Whitechapel of his own free will. Following in his footsteps come the armies of Cloaks who read his words and trust his gods. Behind them all lurks John Scared, who pursues his own twisted ends and opposing them is the very Crown of England and its agents, plus many of the common people of Whitechapel itself.

Since the typical Lovecraftian horror drives men insane just by being around, it’s really very hard to describe them in the pages of a book. Any title that tries and succeeds is likely to have a hard time finding a publisher. As a result, we tend to hear people talking about these things an awful lot, but they never do anything of note (except possibly being seen by one of the characters and thus driving them insane). There’s a whole lot of build up without a lot of payoff and the villains of cosmic horror wind up being not the entities the stories are about, but the humans who destroy themselves trying to understand them.

Whitechapel Gods presents us with entities that are much more active and thus, much more sinister. Just the presence of Mama Engine and Grandfather Clock causes a disease known as the clacks, a disease that slowly morphs parts of the victim’s body into machinery. Grandfather Clock can see through the faces of clocks and watches, and spies on the people of Whitechapel to keep them in line. Mama Engine will not let her priests die, no matter what happens to them. While not present in the way the other characters are, the cosmic horrors of Whitechapel Gods are just as present and just as horrible as the human villains of the book, putting them several steps ahead of most other Lovecraftian creatures.

Now if all there was to Whitechapel Gods were a great story of creepy aliens plotting to destroy the world from the heart of Victorian London I’m not sure the book would be worth recommending. But with the addition of a solidly written hero’s journey and a slew of surprising and well rendered human protagonists, Peters does an excellent job of giving you people to root for as well. With subtle questions about what it takes to be a leader in hard times woven throughout, the tale offers food for thought as well.

Many books show you humanity at its best. But if you like fiction that takes a stab at showing how humanity can show its best even in the face of things that should be beyond it, Whitechapel Gods is a title worth checking out.

Cool Things: Girl Genius

Posted by natechen on

And we’re back here with Steampunk month on Cool Things, bringing you another week of coal-fired goodness. This week’s theme: Steampunk Illustrated!

I can only be talking about Phil and Kaja Foglio’s amazing steampunk comic Girl Genius. Unlike many of the things I’ve been geeking about on this blog, Girl Genius is a genuine web-based property, meaning that by following the link I’ve provided you’ll be able to read the entire saga of Agatha Clay as she traverses Europa in a saga of adventure, romance and mad science.

Of course, your time is precious and you may not want to invest the kind of time necessary to get current on a story that has been updating regularly, three times a week, for over a decade. So what is it that sets Agatha’s tale apart from the rest?

For starters, there’s the sense of humor. Steampunk, being mostly rooted in the culture and moors of Victorian England, is not exactly known for it’s laugh-a-minute soundtrack. But Girl Genius spices up it’s Victorian setting and themes with excellent, vaudevillean banter, well timed comeuppances and hilarious sight gags that, odd as it may seem to say about a static medium, are executed with expert timing. The expressions of the characters alone is worth the price of admission, or at least the time invested.

The world of Girl Genius is exceptional too. Europa is very much a parallel to Europe of the past, but rather than being ruled by nations the continent is ruled by sparks, people with the touch of madness that makes them phenomenal mad scientists, among other things. Baron Klaus Wolfenbach is one of the most powerful sparks around, and he collects lesser sparks and channels their studies into avenues that are less likely than most to result in disaster or discomfort for the common man. The eponymous Girl Genius is Agatha Clay, one such spark who has to find her way in the increasingly treacherous world of the Baron and his son without loosing her life or her sanity. The inventions of the sparks are funny and original, and are beautifully illustrated in ways that are both impressive and whimsical.

But most endearing are the characters, from the somewhat shy Agatha to her dim but enthusiastic Jaeger sidekicks, the brooding Baron and his brash son, even Agatha’s small, clockwork robots show more personality than you will find in many titles from DC or Marvel. Whether you’re looking for someone to root for or root against, Girl Genius has what you want.

And on top of all that you can add:

Check it out. You might find you like it.