Maturing

I wrote the four relatively short books that make up the Donzalo’s Destiny series over something like fifteen months time yet I can, rereading them, see that my style very much matured — improved, I would be inclined to say — during the course of their creation. It became something much closer to what I would call ‘my’ voice. I’m not about to go back and rewrite them or anything of that sort. They’re perfectly acceptable as-are. These were my very first fantasy novels and mark the creation of the entire Izan mythos. It has certainly grown since, and the somewhat murky magic system introduced in Donzalo has become downright scientific in its explanations.

They are also the only novels in which I have used a semi-omniscient point of view. Ultimately, it’s more a matter of multiple POVs but the narrator does occasionally intrude. Not enough to hurt anything; it’s still pretty much the way the characters see things. For the most part, I managed to avoid head-hopping, though in fiction since I have largely restricted myself to one point of view per scene — and, generally, per book.

Design and So On

From time to time, I have posted bits here (or at the Arachis Press blog) about typography, book design, and that sort of thing. It's probably not the ideal place for it but then this is supposed to be my 'everything' blog.

Well, maybe not quite everything. That's why I've fired up a dedicated blog for my design interests, The Far League Ranger. Yes, the Far League Rangers has been my catch-all name for back-up bands and studio musicians over the years but I think I can use it for this as well (and keep hold of the name for other purposes, if desired). I may drop stuff about typography and rest here occasionally but TFLR will be the main place for that now.

Bitumen

I’ve been doing some light research into the use of naturally occurring bitumen, all the way back into prehistory. It’s something of which I knew very little but could certainly be useful knowledge for my writing. A mention in a book I’m reading about the ancient Indus Valley Civilization got me interested.

It seems it was used all the back into the Paleolithic for all the sorts of things other tars might — adhesives, sealants. Hand axes have shown traces of the substance, mixed with clays or other materials, on their broad ends, supposedly to serve as a sort of pad or grip when wielding the stone tools. I had always thought they must have been uncomfortable to hold and use, and apparently our Neanderthals felt the same.

It can be mixed with oils and/or heated to make it more pliable, and spread on baskets or pottery to water-proof. It can be used, obviously, on boats of all sorts (including Native American canoes). In the Indus world, it was even used to line fairly large pools. One can imagine all sorts of uses and I intend to do just that in future fiction. I may just drop some references to it into the next Mora novel. Those Kohari must calk their sewn-together boats with something.

And, to be sure, it would have been an object of trade, a resource to be discovered, exploited, protected. The original black gold? Well, maybe not quite that valuable but a ready source would still be worth something.

Speculative Fiction

Samuel Delaney has stated that when the term ‘speculative fiction’ appeared in the Sixties, it was applied loosely to experimental fiction, often with imagery derived from science fiction and fantasy. Perhaps we’d label that ‘literary science fiction’ these days. But speculative fiction, as a name, varied some in its implications over the years (and pretty much disappeared for a while) before finding its current definition as the broad swath of genres stretching from science fiction to fantasy.

I do see it as such a spectrum. What all the genre and sub-genre within speculative fiction share is a self-standing alternate world, with its own internal rules and logic. That differentiates it from realistic fiction, which follows the rules of our own world, and the surrealistic, which bends those rules of the real world — with little regard for logic — to jar the reader’s perceptions.

‘Magic realism’ is, of course, a form of surrealism (by these definitions) rather than speculative fiction.

Rarely do I refer to any of my work as speculative fiction, though I legitimately could. It can sound pretentious, can’t it? My science fiction is readily identified as such. The fantasy — despite most having rather strict science fiction-like underlying rules — would be regarded as fantasy by most. Those terms are good enough for me.

By the way, horror is sometimes included as a sort of speculative fiction but I don’t consider it a genre at all. I would call it a theme, that can be applied to almost any genre. Monsters are everywhere!

Sundries

 

The picture is of the O.U. Sundry Store in Athens in the late Fifties, before Jim Fry (the protagonist of 'These Remembered Hills') attended Ohio University. In 1960, Campus Sundry Store opened at a new address. He would definitely know and probably shop there when he began classes in ’62. It is entirely likely to show up in a future novel.

Generations of Ohio University students shopped there, before it closed relatively recently. Anything they needed!

This is the last post I'm bringing over from the Hocking Hills blog. But I shall, of course, write more about the area here. 

 

Bobcats

another post brought over from my soon-to-be-defunct These Remembered Hills blog:

Ohio University, in the city of Athens, plays a somewhat central role in ‘These Remembered Hills’ and will continue to do so in any sequels. Athens is some twenty miles down the road from Logan and should be about thirty miles from the Fry Farm. That would depend on the route one chose to drive, though most come to a fairly similar figure.

Jim Fry, who already has completed a couple years of college at Ohio State plus a four year hitch in the navy, chooses to enroll at Ohio University both because it is conveniently close and because of the reputation of its art program. Art is what he has decided to study after leaving the service. Also, an old friend of Jim — or of his late sister — is an instructor there.

The university is spread on relatively low land near the Hocking River and is — or was — known to flood with some regularity. This is alluded to in the novel but we have yet to experience it. That is a definite possibility in a future story.

The art building is at a bit of a remove from the rest of the campus and I have noted this in the novel. Much of the rest of the geography of the university and Athens in general I have fudged a bit — the businesses and such, in particular. It’s fiction, after all. I haven’t been strict about any of the other locales in the novel either, but in general it is all close enough. No blatant rearranging of the scenery!

I might mention that Ohio University has also popped up in other novels in another series, written under a different name. That would be the Women in the Sun books (‘One Summer in the Sun,’ ‘One Christmas in the Sun’) which appeared under the Sienna Santerre pen name. A young athlete, a friend of the protagonists, chooses to attend the college. The university itself, however, does not actually appear as a location in the stories.

So we can expect the university to appear in any sequel to ‘These Remembered Hills’. Maybe the Bobcats football team, too. Jim will definitely be driving to classes in Athens come Fall. He might even take his bike to ride around campus.

Each Awry, a poem

Each Awry

A succession of mirrors, each a tad awry 
from the next, throw their reflections into me.
Memory mixes poorly with passion; love becomes
some stock image we painted on the past, assuring
its existence, telling ourselves its truth once danced
here, along these roads of tomorrow. Have you followed?

Ah, our roads. They find themselves in morning fogs
and fogged mirrors where we seek our faces, forgotten
overnight. I wipe the obscure image away,
hoping to find one more pleasing to the world.
Which do you remember? It will be as true
and as false as all the others, each awry.

Stephen Brooke ©2025