Downbelow Station by C.J. Cherryh, Winner of the Hugo Award for Best Novel, 1982
There was a time when I made a point of reading Hugo Award winners as soon as a given year’s WorldCon results were announced. (Assuming I hadn’t already read that book – which was a rare thing.) That’s a habit I’ve lost over the past twenty or so years, and with a very few exceptions, I haven’t really been keeping up. But in the late 1970s, and all through the 1980s, I picked up copies of Hugo winners as soon as I could after the awards were made.
Award-winning novels did not, of course, make up the bulk of my sci-fi and fantasy reading. I was also, in that time period, beginning to pick up on authors I would follow through the years to come. This was facilitated by a relocation from a small town, with no bookstores in easy reach, to a major metropolitan area that held many such establishments. And so I was better able to indulge my appetite for fiction. Of the authors I discovered as a result of this easier access, few have provided me with as many enjoyable reads as C.J. Cherryh. I read Gate of Ivrel the year DAW Books published it, and in quick succession read Well of Shiuan,Fires of Azeroth, and The Faded Sun Trilogy. The author’s writing style and detailed depictions of exotic civilizations and their peoples had a very strong appeal, and so I was willing to take a chance on a new and longer work by this author when it became available. That’s how I came to read Downbelow Station before it won its Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1982.
Downbelow Station raised my interest in C.J. Cherryh’s work to a new level. The prologue that sets the stage reads like an excellent bit of narrative history – a genre of nonfiction that has always appealed to me. The story launches from those pages with an immediacy that drops the reader straight into the tension-filled plot while introducing the main characters as they each deal with a sudden, and then rapidly worsening, situation. The war between the Earth Company and the colonial worlds and stations of Union – which has raged for many decades – is coming to an end. The fleet of warships loyal to the Earth Company are too few in number to win, and Union is poised for victory. Star stations belonging to the Company are falling to Union, generating a flood of refugees for whom Pell Station (orbiting Pell’s World) is a final, if desperate, last stop. The station, overburdened by this sudden increase in population, is pushed to its limits. To make matters worse, the Company ship that led the refugees in warns of more to come. Each major character is introduced during this massive surge of refugees, their roles and respective subplots established, and the story expands from the event of arrival and the unrest it immediately creates.
The multiple subplots never lose sight of each other, and the pacing is carefully balanced between rapid action and introspection. The characters are believable, and their actions and reactions drive the braid of subplots that combine to create the overall tale. Complications increase as the overall plot pushes the characters into ever more dire situations, creating a conflict that appears irresolvable. And yet, there is a resolution, one that not only makes sense but lays the groundwork for the many novels that have since been set in the Alliance-Union universe for which this author is so well known.
More than most of the Hugo winners I’ve discussed here, rereading this book really took me back to that time when science fiction was more than just escapism for me. It was more of a way of life, and had become the keystone of my social life, associated as I was with fannish groups in the Phoenix metro area. I was even involved, in a small way, with the running of a local sci-fi convention. In 1981, I found myself volunteering to be overnight security for the dealer’s room of this “con.” This involved spending the night in the room housing the various tables and their wares, a task that appealed because I couldn’t afford a room at the hotel. I first read Downbelow Station – almost all of it in the two nights I was needed as a guardian – instead of sleeping on the row of chairs that I was instructed to put in a line just inside the door to block entry. It was assumed that I’d stretch out and sleep there, or at least doze. It was, as I recall, the only way in or out of the room, so any thief would need to fall over me to get in. Sleep? I wasn’t even comfortable enough to doze very often. So I left a light on and read. The book with me was Downbelow Station.
When the event was over, the first thing I did was finish reading that book. Afterward, I recommended it so often I drove a few friends to distraction. (The tables were turned, a couple of years later, when one of these friends discovered Startide Rising by David Brin, and just would not stop talking about it.) Only a few months passed before I read it again, when in 1982, it won the Hugo Award for best novel. I was enormously pleased to see that a book that had hooked me so solidly took top honors that year.
In the decades since, the period during which I was so active as a fan has become a source of (mostly) pleasant memories. Except for participation as an author guest at local Tucson and Phoenix conventions, and a WesterCon held in Tempe a few years ago, I’ve left that part of my life behind. Rereading this particular Hugo Winner brought that time back to life for me, even as I enjoyed rediscovering the book that turned an interest in an author’s work into something more like admiration. Science fiction has seen few authors who have been as prolific, or produced such consistently fine work. And fewer still that I follow to the extent of buying and reading every book, as soon as it’s available. Downbelow Station found in me a reader, and turned me into a fan.
There is a meme commonly posted in the social media, on Facebook in particular, meant to offer support or comfort to those facing life’s slings and arrows. The messages range from heartfelt to sickly saccharine, but the intentions are always good. The nature of the message varies with the problem being addressed, but they always start with the phrase, “I don’t know who needs to hear this…”
It’s easy to flip past such posts and scroll on. To be honest, I usually do – they are so frequently repeated that they become part of the landscape, in a manner of speaking. And I can see how some people might be tempted to give these harmless messages of general support a cynical roll of the eyes. But if you’re dealing with one of the topics discussed in this sort of post, you might have a different reaction. Those posts dealing with depression usually get a nod from me. It does sometimes help to know you aren’t the only one in the world with one foot on that slippery slope.
Which is why I’m writing this entry for my weblog. A form of depression has been a fact of my life for as long as I can remember, although I was in my early thirties before I knew for certain the nature of the beast. That’s when I became acquainted with a condition known as Seasonal Affective Disorder, or SAD. (An apt acronym if ever there was one.)
Every year, as the Autumnal Equinox approaches, I unpack a bright light – technically called a “light box” – and rearrange my morning schedule to accommodate Bright Light Therapy (BLT, and yes, that one’s been done to death, believe me.) I do this to counteract, to some degree at least, the effect of ever shorter days on my mood and motivation levels. The BLT sessions last three quarters of an hour, and I pass the time reading and sipping the day’s first cup of coffee. As treatments for mental health problems go, it’s not bad. It certainly beats the Valium they stuffed into my late father when he hit rock bottom, many years ago. And it’s quite effective. Most years, I am largely untroubled by serious symptoms, which in my case manifest as anxiety and depression.
Most years. But not this year. Autumn of 2023 bushwhacked me.
SAD varies in severity from year to year, and I can’t always correlate severity with an external trigger. Oh, when I was working the day job (whichever one you want to point to over the last forty years or so), stress could certainly reduce the effectiveness of BLT. But I live the writing life these days, something long desired. While life has its ups and downs, this form of semi-retirement hasn’t actually challenged me in a big way. And yet a few weeks after the days began to shorten noticeably this year, and I’d settled into the seasonal serving of BLT (couldn’t resist after all), an all-too-familiar sense of anxiety struck me. It came on strong, taking me by surprise, and derailing mood and motivation. There was nothing really to be anxious about, but there it was, that deeply unsettling sense of something being wrong, and threatening to get worse. It was especially noticeable as the afternoons wore on and the shadows stretched across the world. (Cloudy weather can seriously aggravate my condition, especially when light levels fluctuate.) That anxiety becomes a sense of impending doom that has no rational justification, and yet cannot be denied. At its worst, it’s nothing less than debilitating. Motivation dies as I find myself just hunkering down and hanging on, waiting for the awkward episode to pass. The length of time it persists varies from day to day. In the morning, with BLT, hot coffee, and a world gradually brightening outside, I can catch my breath. I can do things. But then the afternoon comes, as it always does. Sunset can be an awkward time of day, and has been for a few weeks.
The current episode of deep anxiety seems to be settling down (not lowering my guard just yet), but cloudy days and sunsets are still not my favorite things right now. I’ll probably never really know what upset the balance this year.
In a conversation with an online acquaintance, I was reminded that I’m not alone in coping with this disorder. As I said before, for some reason knowing this does help. Which is why I don’t roll my eyes at certain memes when they pop up in the newsfeed. Many of us dealing with SAD have sympathetic family and friends. I’m blessed with a wife who understands what’s happening, and why, and knows better than to take at face value some of the things I say when I’m down. She was there when I figured out what was wrong with me – it was a joint discovery. But not everyone is so fortunate; not everyone has the support they need. And so I’m writing for whoever needs to hear this.
If winter gets you down it might not be, as some would say, mere holiday stress or – worse – giving in to a personal failing. You may be dealing with a very real condition, one amenable to treatment. While I’ve managed without seeking much professional help, I know people who have needed a therapist’s assistance to cope. Either way, you can control this condition and keep your head above the high water mark until spring. Ignore anyone who tells you this is pop psychology. It’s a legitimate diagnosis, as you’ll learn officially if you do need to seek professional help.
How can you tell if you need help? Only you can decide, but if there’s even a tiny bit of doubt, talk to a doctor. There are very few physicians out there, these days, who think this is some sort of popular self-diagnosis. A timely referral to a mental health care professional might make all the difference.
In the meantime, if you suspect you have this seasonal problem – and many people do to one degree or another – consider the following up-to-date resource before making any decisions.
Defeating SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder): A Guide to Health and Happiness Through All Seasons by Norman E. Rosenthal M.D.
You should be able to obtain a copy from just about any local bookstore. You can also get it by following the links below, if you prefer.
This book covers symptoms and treatments, discusses the latest research on the condition and its variable nature, and provides guidance on coping with SAD, including the selection of lamps for the application of BLT.
The anxiety and depression caused by short days in autumn and winter are not figments of your imagination. The condition is real, and can cause all manner of problems as it interferes with day-to-day living. But you aren’t alone in this, and SAD can be treated, and treated effectively. Just thought I’d throw this out there, for anyone who needs to hear.
And I will, on Sunday morning at TusCon 50. 10am, Nov. 12th. Selections from my novel The Gryphon Stone, and a short story or two, depending on how timing works out. Bring something I can sign, if you wish. Or just come to listen and talk a bit.
TusCon 50, November 10, 11, 12, 2023. Tucson, Arizona.
Friday, Nov. 10th
I will, indeed, be a participant in this year’s TusCon event. Below you will find my official schedule. In between these times, to quote the wizard, expect me when you see me.
No official functions on day one. I’ll be here and there, attending the odd panel discussion (the odder they are the more likely you’ll find me there). Also likely to be in the vicinity of the Dealer’s Room, where Mostly Books will have some of my books available for sale.
Unfortunately, the one thing I’m not doing this year is setting up a telescope. There’s apparently no place to do so at this location.
Saturday, Nov. 11th
Autograph Session #1
11:00 am to 12:00 pm at the designated Autograph Area, in the company of fellow participants Curt Booth, J.L. Doty, Mona Ventress, William Herr, and Robert Kurtzman. I’ll sign books, program guides, and the free stuff I’ll have with me. Almost anything that will take the ink from a ball point pen. I draw the line at body parts that require public disrobing. Don’t go there.
Kill your darlings. How do you keep character death meaningful?
In the Ballroom from 3:00 pm to 4:00 pm. “There are good ways to kill your characters. And there are bad ways to kill your characters. Come learn some of the best ways to kill your characters.” That’s how the program guide describes this one. So come and learn how writers kill, and why. In a fictional sense, I mean. Don’t be afraid, we won’t hurt anyone. Promise. Sharing this panel with Diana Terrill Clark, Marsheila Rockwell, Yvonne Navarro, Frankie Robertson, and Cynthia Ward.
Getting to Know your Characters.
In Panel Room #1 from 8:00 pm to 9:00 pm. From the program guide, “Who is your hero really? Does he vibe at all with the person you think he’s going to hook up with in the 3rd act? And why is he opposing your villain? And speaking of your villain…” Some insights into how we create the characters that populate our fiction. How we make these imaginary people seem real? And why do we need that resemblance is coincidental caveat at the beginnings of our books? In the company of Catherine Wells, Jay Smith, and William Herr.
Sunday, Nov. 12th
Thomas Watson Reading
In Panel Room #2 from 10:00 am to 11:00 am. No, you will not be sitting in a room watching me read. That would be weird. I’ll be reading something out loud. Something I wrote, of course. Could be almost anything, really. After more than ten years of writing and publishing fiction, there’s certainly plenty to choose from. And that’s a thought that makes this author smile.
Peter looked up and through the expanding cloud of debris around him. Through it he could see advancing ranks of multi-limbed machines, lit dully by the distant sun of Godsend, marching down the outer hull, casting vague shadows. There were too many of them. As he watched, the Redemption’s slugfests picked off the hull walkers farthest from him, tearing out chunks of the station’s outer hull in the process. Peter couldn’t recall how many hull walkers had been built for the station proper, but he had a sense that it would be a depressingly large number if he remembered it. And then the rest were just suddenly there, launching themselves into space.
“The damned things are flying!” Peter said. “I know the originals weren’t designed for that.”
Fuumbral and Peter arranged themselves to fight back-to-back. The weapons built into Peter’s suit, and fire from the ship, saved them from being immediately overwhelmed. Debris rebounded from the hulls of the ship and the station, and they dodged as often as they fired. The hull walkers came on, some scuttling down the outer hull, others flying. Just when it seemed they would hold their own, a shout of warning came over the comm from Lt. Engler. At the same moment, Peter saw a section of the hull explode, and from the hole created by the blast emerged a swarm of hull walkers, all of which raced to the access containing the all-important link to the Redemption’s systems.
Peter couldn’t track the flying mechs and this new threat at the same time. “Redemption, priority targets are the flying mechs. Keep them off our backs.”
“They’re too close to your position for safe…”
“Just do it!” Peter was firing all the while, frantically trying to keep hull walkers from reopening the panel concealing Fuumbral’s link.
Light flashed and flared, much too close for comfort, but the spaceborne threat was dealt with; enemy icons in his HUD flickered out by the dozen, leaving him free to target the increasing number of walkers appearing from within the torus. This is more than we built. A lot more. Debris sailed past him, the smoothness of its flight belying its speed, and therefore its kinetic potential. There was so much debris, too much to dodge in the mere seconds they had before it was right on top of them, that collisions were inevitable. A broken walker leg hit Fuumbral straight on. The Hroom’s suit remained intact, firing thrusters in frantic bursts to stabilize Fuumbral, who did not reply when Peter shouted its name.
Distracted, he didn’t react in time when his suit flashed a proximity alert. Something crashed into him from behind. All the readouts in his helmet blinked off and then back on, awash with orange warning lights. He heard Rebecca shout his name, and the fear in her voice turned his blood cold. What had she seen? What had happened to him? He couldn’t feel any pain, and he could breathe, but it must have been bad because he was graying out. Peter pointed his rifle at the hull walkers nearest the location of the link to the ship. Or tried to; for some reason, his arms and fingers weren’t working. He couldn’t remember what he was supposed to do with them in any case.
Strangely, the hull walkers still attached to the station seemed to have paused to watch what was going on. One launched into space toward Fuumbral, who drifted, apparently helpless. Peter tried to shout a warning, but wasn’t sure anyone heard it over the ringing in his ears. It seemed odd to Peter that no one aboard Redemption reacted to what was happening. Not that he would ever really know what was happening, he realized, as a mech appeared in his fading vision, claws extended and moving straight for him.
The Godsend star system was lost to the rest of the galaxy at the end of the Faceless War, its link to other systems severed when the Faceless disrupted space and time to make its final assault on Humanity. Within that star system may be clues to how the Faceless came to wield its awesome and destructive powers.
When the way to Godsend is finally open, twenty years later, two expeditions are sent to investigate. One seeks to understand their defeated enemy, the other to exploit what the Faceless left behind.
Nol’ez Jaxi and her friends grew up together studying anything and everything to do with the Faceless. They seek an understanding of the enemy that took so much from them as children, while seeking a resolution to the fragile relationship they have with each other.
Peter Harrans and Ander Handy once called Godsend home – before the Faceless appeared. Each man is plagued by demons from his past. Both are seeking closure – and redemption.
Not all of them will find what they seek. All will be lucky to leave Godsend alive.
It’s one of the oldest of all philosophical questions, one that has prompted countless hours of self-examination by every generation of human beings. A question that can only be answered from within, and sometimes only with considerable difficulty.
It can’t be answered by someone else, looking in from the outside. Such an attempt often results in baseless assumptions being made, or if they seem to be otherwise, are based on false impressions. Misunderstandings arise as a result. Some are addressed and clarified in a rational, adult fashion. Some are not.
I’ve read many accounts of authors running afoul of unintended false impressions raised by the fiction they publish. People read the work, it affects them emotionally, and they decide they’ve learned something about that author through the feelings the story evoked. While for some authors this may be an accurate perception, I believe that far more often than not the opposite is true. After almost twelve years published, I find that I can now offer myself as a case in point.
Some of you may have read my short novel Toby, the story of a man for whom life has taken a serious turn for the worse, leaving him questioning the value of just about everything and everyone. Taking to the road to clear his head and reorient himself, he encounters a lost dog in a campground, and resolves to return this poor beast to its family. The catch: he finds the pooch in New Mexico, after the heartbroken family was forced to return to their home in Illinois without their lost dog. But he accepts the challenge, hits the road, and adventures ensue.
The eponymous dog is a major character; he is, after all, a turning point in this man’s life. I did my best to make Toby the dog and Paul the man equally believable characters, and from the responses I’ve seen, I did a pretty good job. Not being a dog owner, or in any sense a dog person, I did plenty of research on dogs and their behavior, then ran this story by a friend who has dogs that he and his wife train for agility competitions. This research added up to the dog not only becoming a believable character, but an eminently lovable fictional canine. So lovable and relatable, that some people think the book is about the dog, not the man.
I can easily see where a dog person would come to that conclusion, and don’t really mind at all that this happens. Toby is supposed to capture the heart of the reader as he helps Paul rediscover that the best approach to life is to say “yes” to it – whatever it may bring. The story is actually a sort of hero’s journey, in the Campbellian sense. That was my intention, along with wanting to write something with an unashamedly happy ending.
I have been amazed and delighted by the way the book has touched the lives of those who’ve read it. Very few have reacted in a negative way, all but one of them reacting to an unfortunate and unfair prejudice against Toby’s breed. That exception is the case in point noted earlier. One reader made an assumption about me, based on reading a copy of Toby. While not an unreasonable assumption, it was unfortunately incorrect. This reader contacted me about a behavioral problem that developed in their dog, a fairly serious matter as I understood it. While I sympathized, I had to respond, in all honesty, that I was entirely unqualified to provide such advice. What I know about dogs is second-hand, based largely on research, with some feedback from friends who are dog-owners.
Toby is an idealized representation of the canine species, created for a specific fictional purpose. He is not based on a real dog, nor is he derived from a lifetime of dog-raising experience on my part. I like dogs well enough, and have enjoyed the company of well-behaved dogs owned by friends on any number of occasions. But I’ve never raised one of my own – and really have no desire to do so. I explained this to the reader, pointing out that merely writing a book that includes a canine character didn’t qualify me to offer the advice being sought. I suggested seeking the help of a veterinarian or a specialist in dog behavior.
This was not the expected answer, and the reader was most displeased. For this reader the book created the unfortunate and false impression that I had significant expertise in dog care and behavior. How could I have created such a realistic canine character otherwise? The disconnect created by my reply prompted a harsh (putting it mildly) reaction. I’d misled this reader, and the concept that I might have done so without intending any such thing never entered the argument.
Okay, it does happen that someone reads a book I’ve published and decides that my work just doesn’t satisfy. But this is the first time anyone ever read a book of mine, expressed great affection for it, but ended up deciding I’m some sort of lying bastard unfit to walk on the same planet. How dare I write a book “about a dog” without being an expert in the care and feeding of the canine tribe?
Probably the same way I dare to write about people traveling between the stars, flying on gryphons, or meeting a harpy moonlighting as a Muse – just a few of things I’ve written about but never experienced. All in a day’s work, as a teller of tales.
Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised by this reader’s assumptions, and the false impression of me engendered by the story in Toby. After all, I went to great lengths to make Toby a thoroughly believable dog. But that’s what I’m supposed to do. It’s part of my job. If I fail at it, I fail as a storyteller, so I always go all out when creating a character of any species. And yet here I sit, surprised by the realization that, this time, I may have succeeded just a little too well.
In an effort to increase the availability of my books in eBook format, I have now made most of them available through Google Play. Because their website does not effectively segregate my work from another author of the same name – an English preacher who has been dead for 337 years – searching for my books by author name is an effort in futility. You can search by each title, but it would be more convenient to have all the links available in one place. So, if you’re in the habit of reading on your phone and buy books through Google Play, allow me relieve you of the need to search for mine at all. A list of links follows.
History is a pageant of changes, recorded both in the events that create and drive those changes, and in the lives of the people caught up in them. Some of the changes are cyclic, and some are one and done; some of those can break the cycles. I’m a sometime student of history, and one of my favorite nonfiction genres is narrative history. A good narrative history details the events recorded and the changes that come in their wake, but goes further by depicting in detail the lives of those associated with the events. These are stories of people who are in equal measure caught up in and driving the events that we call history. I find such narratives compelling.
This interest in the cycles of history may explain why The Snow Queen by Joan D. Vinge held my attention as strongly as it did. A novel, and definitely not a future narrative history, it still detailed a story of changes, both cyclic and a one-off event destined to alter that cycle. Strongly character-driven, the tale is centered on the people coping with changes, some of them devastating, in a world as clearly realized as any depiction of our own world you might find in a narrative history. In much the same way as a well-told narrative history, I found this novel to be a compelling read. Of the Hugo Award winners I’ve read so far, this one really stands out.
Set on a world called Tiamat, a world with more ocean than land (the name is that of a sea goddess from Babylonian mythology), the story is of a cyclic change that occurs every century and a half. Other worlds have access to Tiamat through a stargate created by a black hole. When Tiamat’s star system is positioned just right, the gate works, and this access exists for 150 years. Following this period is one of equal length during which the world is lost to the rest of interstellar civilization. Two human cultures exist on Tiamat: the technology-dependent Winters, who control things when the planet is open to the off-world visitors who provide the technology, and the low-tech Summers, who according to tradition take over when access is cut off. To maintain control of Tiamat and its resources when that world is next open to them, the off-worlders have rigged the tech tools they provide to essentially self-destruct during the time the Summers rule. The change from Winter to Summer rule involves an ancient ritual, involving the sacrifice of the Winter queen to the sea when her Summer counterpart ascends.
The current queen intends to change this cycle, seeking a way to keep the technological tools running and herself on the throne – and among the living. That plan becomes ensnared in schemes involving interstellar smugglers, a belief system among Summers regarding their goddess, people called sybils who are flesh-and-blood data delivery systems, and a native species that is harvested for its blood. A drug is refined from the bodily fluids of these creatures that can extend a human’s life almost indefinitely. The drug is at the heart of all the character motivations, one way or another. Few things are as they seem, and if they are, they don’t stay that way for long. And just when you think things couldn’t get worse for the protagonists, they do. I was guessing at where this was all going down to the last handful of chapters, and when I had it figured out, I wasn’t quite right.
The Snow Queen is a wonderful example of what, in science fiction and fantasy writing, we call world building. As measured in terms of depth and detail, it’s right there with Frank Herbert’s Dune. There is a large cast of characters from a variety of cultures and backgrounds, with both characters and cultures clearly developed and believable. The ocean-dominated world of Tiamat, much like the world-encompassing deserts of Arrakis, is very much a character in its own right.
Like the world they inhabit, the characters in the story have depth and complexity that make them believable, however extraordinary their circumstances. There are no clear stereotypes. The heroes are ordinary mortals, flawed without always being actually dysfunctional. And the chief villain isn’t exactly a truly evil person, incapable of love or compassion, but someone caught between the contradictory motives of preserving her culture and saving her own life. The combination of pacing, world building, and character-driven plot makes this a story that deserves to be a classic of the genre. The ending satisfies, even if it puts a chill up your spine at times. And while there are enough questions unresolved at the end to justify the sequel Vinge wrote, I didn’t feel as if the ending dangled there, awaiting a true resolution.
It all adds up to a story that I will pick up and reread someday, after I’ve read its sequels. I’ve read Hugo winners that had me wondering “What were they thinking, voting for this one?” But not this time. Had I been given a vote to cast in 1981, I would quite likely have cast it for this book. I can say that in all honesty, having read the other nominees for that year. All were very good. The Snow Queen was extraordinary.
Let’s get something clear right from the start. This thing they call Artificial Intelligence, currently being discussed and promoted in a big way? It’s a misapplication of the term. These systems are not conscious entities, certainly not in the HAL 9000 or SkyNet science fictional sense. To the best of my understanding these are machine learning algorithms, designed to respond to requests in ways that mimic human interactions. They search the vast online resources out there, do so in an astonishingly short amount of time, and come up with a response that meets the criteria set by the user. That response is given in a way that reads (or sounds) like something almost human. AI systems get better at this the more often they’re used, and in that sense, at least, they do learn.
They respond according to their programming which, to be honest, is almost mind-boggling in its sophistication and ability. But Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a term that has been appropriated by those who see “gold in them thar hills.” It serves them well as a marketing buzzword. These systems are not intelligent in the sense of being capable of independent thought, which would make it possible for them to be creative. (Not yet, anyway.) They don’t think. They don’t create. They harvest, organize, and present information in what seems a personable manner. They are computer tools to be used – or misused.
And misused they will be. Nothing special about AI as far as this goes. It’s a short list that contains only technologies that have never lent themselves to abuse. It always comes around to whether or not the risks inherent in deliberate misuse of technology outweigh the benefits. With AI this remains to be seen, although there certainly are signs of trouble ahead. One example, relevant to what I do, is the application of so-called AI to the world of writing.
While I believe that a time will come when true AI “wakes up” and develops its own sort of awareness and creativity, I don’t see it happening in the immediate future. The idea that a machine of any sort will be able to do what I do, and do it well enough to compete effectively with flesh-and-blood writers, while not entirely far-fetched, doesn’t worry me. These systems, when asked to start a story or write an essay, sift the virtual world and cobble together things found out there to fit the request. They create nothing new in the process. I don’t see the novelist or short story writer being replaced any time soon by such systems.
What I do see happening, with ever increasing frequency, is the use of so-called AI to “aid” the writing process. I’ve heard of writers who, for various reasons, have turned to these augmented search engines for story ideas, opening paragraphs (and even chapters), and for evaluation of stylistic elements in their writing. All of this is done to make the process easier or more efficient, or to save money by eliminating editorial expenses. Such use is frequently described as being on par with the employment of grammar programs. Some of those experimenting with AI seem to be looking for a way to jump-start a writing career that has faltered, for whom motivation has been undermined by a lack of success as defined by book sales. Such a measure of success is an expectation too many aspiring writers carry into their effort right from the beginning. Lack of fulfillment of this expectation is understandably frustrating, and that frustration can suppress the motivation to write.
For some, this use of AI might turn out to be just what they need to regain their motivation and start writing again. Having your personal well of inspiration cease to generate story ideas must be a horrible feeling. If AI helps someone to bounce back from such a dry spell, it could be considered an example of proper use of the technology, and it would be hard to hold that use against them. But to my mind, the current application of AI to get the actual work of writing done amounts to a steep and slippery slope. For no matter what “tools” you employ to make writing seem easier, the problem of finding and cultivating readers will not change. And it is this problem, more than anything else, that interferes with commercial success. Finding an “easier” way to write fiction will surely create a temptation in some to let the machine do ever more of the writer’s work, possibly increasing their productivity, but with a decline in quality. This is already happening; as a result, a few short fiction and poetry periodicals are now closed to unsolicited work because they are being inundated by lackluster, machine-generated material. If this trend continues, the independent book-publishing world risks being swamped as well, as increasing numbers of frustrated writers release books they have “written” using AI. Books that are, to an ever-increasing degree, the work of machine learning systems that become more adept at imitating human expression with each iteration – books with stories lacking the spark of true creativity that gives good fiction its emotional power.
Even if human readers of fiction recognize the soullessness of such material, there’s nothing to stop it from being published and promoted. The market is already seriously over-saturated as it is, and piling more – possibly substandard – books into the mix will help no one, writers or readers. This, more than the possibility that a machine might replace me, gives me nightmares.
For my own part, I won’t be using these so-called AI tools in my writing. This isn’t a purely ethical decision on my part. I won’t be tempted to try the AI writing tricks I see ever more people embracing because I don’t find them useful. Coming up with ideas or story starts? Seriously, I’ll die of old age before I run out of story ideas. As for reducing the “grunt work” involved with writing (whatever it is people really mean by the phrase), I enjoy the actual process of writing too much for that to have any appeal. And I don’t believe for a moment that AI can edit a book for me as effectively as a human being. So, when you read a story or a book by me (or even a weblog essay), you can be assured it was produced by 100% organic methods.
You’ve decided to try your hand at writing fiction, and have committed words to paper – or to a computer file. But after weeks or months of work, you’re getting absolutely nowhere. The material you’ve produced doesn’t inspire confidence, and as a result, it’s hard to stay motivated. What’s going on here? Why isn’t it working? It certainly didn’t look this hard, to judge from the books you’ve read.
You seek advice from other writers, such as the ideas I presented here. None of it works, and your frustration grows while the story sits there, untouched. Writing a story sounded like a thing worth doing, and you do know how to write, but it just isn’t working according to expectations. Why?
Maybe it’s time to examine what motivated you to write that novel or short story. What made this seem a good idea in the first place?
When I ask this question of people I meet, in and out of the virtual realm, the answers fall into two general categories: a love of reading fiction inspired the idea of telling a tale; or it sounded like an easy side hustle – definitely better than driving for Uber or Lyft. Whichever I hear, there’s a common mistaken assumption, that writing fiction is a relatively easy thing to do. That it might be anything but easy comes as a shock to many would-be writers.
Although telling stories is a thing that comes naturally to most people, no one is born a writer. We all tell stories of one kind or another. You spend a day at work, or at school, and then come home to tell your family about the events of your day. You share memories of past events with friends. That’s basic storytelling. For some of us, however, the itch to be creative wakes up the imagination, and stories come into being that are not of day-to-day events in real life. Fiction, in other words. That creative impulse can amplify this very human thing called storytelling (I’m tempted to say hijack it), and with enough such amplification, the urge to tell that story takes hold. And there you sit, a literate human being who has done plenty of reading, deciding to write this one down and see how it flies.
That bit about writing it down is the hard part. Writing readable fiction takes time and practice. For most of us, it takes a lot of time and practice. There are exceptions to this rule, but it’s those exceptions that define the rule, after all. That exceptions exist is no guarantee you will be one of them. And so it’s more than likely that the first attempt feels awkward, or just outright botched. When you find yourself floundering, you have two choices. You can keep at it, and practice the art until you are good enough to publish your work with some confidence. If you can accept the reality that the only way to become adept at writing fiction is to first write some lousy fiction, there’s hope for you. Go on and give it another try.
The second choice is, of course, to quit. You can give it up and be content with reading fiction. I’ll come back to that choice a little later.
But what about those seeking a side hustle?
To be blunt, if you started stringing words together because you thought it might be an easy way to make money, you’ve embarked upon a fool’s errand. The chances of making even a modest living by writing are very slim. The fact that a few people do so, and in fewer cases make a lot of money, comes back to exceptions defining the rule. And the rule is that making a living as a writer is incredibly difficult. I’ve never managed it, and I’m doing better than many indie authors. In my case, the sales of my existing books easily cover the expenses involved with the publication of new books: editing, cover art, promotion, etc. I consider this a success – but it’s a success more than a decade in the making. I’m comfortable with this. I’m a storyteller, not an entrepreneur wannabe. But if I had to pay the bills from that income, well…
So, if you’re into this for the money, make sure you have a day job that provides a good financial fallback. Unless you turn out to be one of those rare exceptions (best of luck with that) you’re probably going to need it.
However, it does seem to me that most people who try their hand at writing fiction these days are those who have always wondered if they could make it work. They’ve been inspired by the fiction they love to read. “I wonder if I can?” is a good reason to give anything an honest attempt. But perhaps your inability to finish that story is the answer to the question. It just may be that you can’t. That you are not, by your nature, creative in the literary sense. You are a reader and not a writer, not a teller of fanciful tales after all. It may not be a desirable answer, but it may be the truth.
How can you be sure, one way or the other? One way to make that call involves answering the question with another question. Can you stop? Now that you’ve had at least a little experience in trying to write fiction, and have let your imagination come out to play, can you give that up? If you realize you haven’t at least tried to get any writing done for a month or more, and you shrug this off without a qualm, it may be time to reconsider the idea of writing. If letting it go turns out to be easier said than done, if you find yourself being distracted by thoughts of that unfinished tale – or by new ideas for stories – you need to keep trying. There’s a good chance you really are a writer. So do a little each day, even if all you manage is an idea scribbled down or a new paragraph that helps a story inch forward. Keep at it. It will all add up, in the end, even if the increments are small.
The learning curve can be steep, but the view from the top is worth the climb. Work it bit-by-bit, if necessary, until you’ve finally told a tale to the end. Don’t worry along the way about whether or not it’s good enough to publish. It probably won’t be – yet. That’s what the revision process is all about. That rough draft might take some time, and your first efforts may be flat-out embarrassing. (Mine certainly were.) Be patient with yourself; you can only learn to write fiction by writing fiction. You may be stuck fast today, but if you persist, where might you be tomorrow?
Under Desert Stars 