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#fiction

333 posts209 participants25 posts today
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Reading Recluse

📘 "Look to Windward" by Iain M. Banks

My seventh Culture series novel. They can all be read out of order, but I don't recommend reading this one before "Consider Phlebas", and I don't recommend reading that one before any other one. If you're considering getting into this fantastic sci-fi world, I'd suggest starting at "Player of Games".

This space opera focuses on the aftermath of war: the trauma, the guilt, the blame, the desire for revenge, the hopefully even bigger desire for peace that will finally last for everyone. Like every Culture novel, it's dense, but worth the focused read. For me it's a perfect mix between a contemplative slow pace and sitting on the edge of your seat until you're pushed off by a twist you didn't see coming.

If you've read any other Culture books, you've experienced the high highs of the Culture: a utopic intergalactic society in which people can live without any scarcity, do as they please, travel anywhere, become who they want to be and live as long as they wish to. This text shows the downsides to the Culture's craving for positive change through forced involvement with other species. I want to defend the Culture at every turn, but like its citizens, this book made me feel embarrassed to do so.

There's intrigue, action, multiple points of view, ethical questions that keep you up at night, great characters, endless lore... If you have any interest in sci-fi, give this series a go. I feel like it's still a bit niche, a bit difficult to get into, its fans unfortunately a bit too dudebro male (blegh), but if you love it you will love it deeply.

Book cover of 'look to windward'. It's a picture of a yellow atmosphere with some brown/yellow ground visible, possibly a planet or a plate. The author name is in bold black lettering at the top, the title is below it. The top right corner says 'a culture novel'.
#AmReading#SpecFic#SciFi
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RS, Author, Novelist, Prosaist

#PennedPossibilities 613 — How do you feel about the world or universe you’ve created within your WIP? Are you satisfied with it thus far?

Remember. You asked...

How do I feel about the world itself? Like I stepped in cesspool up to my knees!

Most nations are theocracies, with oligarchs ascendant fighting one another. It's a full extrapolation of post Jan 20th 2025, stabilized with the needle at religio-fascist, by those who preferred stable to bat-shit, and taken 50 to 150 years into the future. (I haven't decided the timeline, yet.) The initials E.M. in EM Mars Colonizations Corp stand for what you think it does, complete with very cute silvery Heinlein spaceships misnomered as Starships. The main character is shanghaied to Mars as a colonist (one added to a population of 10,000) on the last ship making the passage as EM goes bankrupt. All her life, May Ri struggled not to be completely nothing, destined by her gender to barely have agency, valued mostly because she could bare sons. Now she must master living on Mars, with its corporate frontier rules.

There's a reason Mars Needed Women (the title), but the story I'm telling has "Need" in the past tense. Men die disproportionately more often than the women in Mars Space, and when the corporate power structure begins to crumble, May Ri has to fight harder for survival. She, however, isn't interested in keeping the status quo. Neither is all her sister colonists, nor all the first generation (nisei) Martians who have all been raised by only their mothers.

I'm really satisfied with how the story I'm writing works within this universe. It's feminist to the core. It questions gender roles. It tars patriarchy as ruining the lives of women AND men.

It's coming together, gonzo pantser style. Just wrote the 14th installment of 31. I've 8 of the remaining 17 planned. The reader should be starting to see that May Ri is as ruthless as those in power (the men, of course), but with a female twist. She hates being used, but she likes men (finds them fun) and wishes they'd quit with the power-dominance-shit. She hates seeing other women being hurt, and she's the type of person, given the chance, ceases opportunities and makes solutions. When she has four daughters to protect against the Earthers, it becomes very real.

I'm posting all installments on Mastodon thru the month of March. To keep up with the story, follow this hashtag: #RSMarsNeededWomen.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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Continued thread
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2503.10 — Exploit (Ch/March 13) #Writever #Mars #SpaceOpera CW: Fictional violence, women fighting back

Angry to the point of trembling, May Ri gathered in the auditorium with the other women with "non-essential tasks," as ordered over the loud speakers. She, Randy, Reina, and Rod had been waiting for the Deimosbase Decath minister to call to marry them when an emergency in a far off colony separated the men from them. A man past 50—with a gold braid patch on his helmet-less form-fitting Mars-green pressure suit— marched in trailed by his all male goons as May Ri characterized them.

She knew she was right when he said, "You are Mars' improperly exploited resource. Today we are redistributing that labor." That caused a massive cringe amongst the women amidst a growing roar of desent.

He yelled, "Quiet!" shutting them down.

When a selection criteria was, "Are you married?" a bristling May Ri found herself backing the teenager into a wall, trying to hide her.

"You!" the man motioned Reina to the exit.

May Ri put her arms out. "Not happening!" She glared into blue eyes.

The man—who turned out to be the Head EM Director and an original colonist—backhanded her.

In Mars gravity, she flew against the wall and slumped, seeing stars. He bent over Reina—May Ri's fall had knocked her over—offering a hand. When May Ri's eyesight quit swimming, face burning and tasting blood, she launched herself head-first at his gut. She still had Earth muscle. He deflected her, but her leg hit the big man's hip and they tumbled together. She landed no punches before he wrenched her upright, arms locked behind her.

Chuckling, he said, "I like determination—"

She jerked, stomping at his foot. He shoved her cheek and nose into the wall, pinned her arms, and pushed a hand into small of her back, preventing anything but sputtering.

"Fights back. I value that. Sexy. Are you married?"

"You interrupted our ceremony."

"Ah." He chuckled more. "About Reina—?"

"You know her name!"

"I won't pick the Onēsanue if you calmly come with me."

May Ri found herself swearing and cursing in her head. She spat blood, which dripped down the wall, noticing the other prey had slunk away from the predators. His goons watched silently at a distance. Reina looked pale, shaking, sitting limbs akimbo, hands on the floor. Red hair flew as she shook her head vigorously.

May Ri shouted, "Did you hear that promise?"

Women's murmurs proved they did. Heart ricocheting off her sternum, she said, "Fine."

Minutes later, the man dragged her by her wrist with a long stride she could barely match. Spring doors guarded all the domes against vacuum breach, but the créchè had windows, as did the farms. Women worked in each, some men in the farms. Nobody in the halls. She thought about crying for help, but thought of Reina whilst palpating her bruising face.

Was he simply redistributing her labor to another job?

Equating the, "are you married," question with Decath purity standards, she whispered, probing, "I've been with other men."

"Experience makes you more qualified," he returned.

Could her stomach knot up worse?

Best to seem docile, she thought, to hope for weapons. He was an EM Corp manager, bound by the charter. Theoretically. Was she over-reacting? The corporation had run out of money; all Earth transits with supplies and people, cancelled. The term corporate reorganization came to mind. Was the Martian board of directors reorganizing?

She recognized the docks as she let his pace slide her into a doorframe. She saw the circular glass corridor that surrounded a Martain "tarmac." Rovers and motels, with flatbeds, were parked to the right—three orange dust-coated helios, with multiple stacked blades and lots of hyper-nacelles, sat at priority. Jetways connected to two passenger cargoons and one long distance pinnace. He shoved her through the spring door of the latter, following. It jostled like the flex tube it was, with his massive form clumping behind—bouncing her, she thought, to intentionally panic her.

Rushing, she grabbed the spring door. Stuck! It didn't even rattle.

He plowed into her, flattening her against it. With a snigger, he unlocked it. When it opened, still smooshed, she stumbled flat onto the deck. The spring door snapped back with a bang as he clamored over her. Vac-safe cargo boxes littered the inside. With no preamble, he unzipped his pressure suit.

She sucked in her breath, scrambling bruisingly into a bulkhead.

He had a jumpsuit underneath. Scoffing, he said simply, "Remember Reina. See that bench? Toss the boxes down the cargo chute." He stomped to the loo, shutting it behind himself.

Sweating, heart racing, she thought, Now what?

(Continued) #RSMarsNeededWomen 13

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2503.13 — Are you mindful of your readers’ expectations? How so?

How flapping timely! Analyzing when I run into a hitch in my writing pace—like today, again—it is this. EXACTLY. So, listen carefully to what I'm going to say to myself...

I am not telepathic.

Repeat that. I am not telepathic.

Louder: I AM NOT TELEPATHIC!

I DON'T know what the reader is going to expect.

I DON'T know if the current scene is going frighten, trigger, or be too explicit for my audience...

Because I DON'T have anyone looking over my shoulder click there tongue and say, "Tch, tch, tch!"

I am going to take a deeeeeeep breath, now,
clear my mind,
and write the flapping scene—full stop.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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#ScribesAndMakers 2503.13 — Shameless Self-Promotion Day. Let's boost away.

Here's the newly minted cover art† for Mars Need Women. Check it out!

It's a web-novel, described in the blurb below. I have been posting it in a single free-to-read Mastodon thread. The link is below.

“A hopeful deeply-dystopian feminist SF story, with thinly veiled jabs at our current world's bad actors making for a bad future. Please note the past tense in the title: Mars Needed Women. The story's women are going to work to bring down the system, at least that part that's oppressing them, in a massive unscheduled disassembly.”

So far I've posted 12 chapters of 31, which I will do more or less daily through the end of this month. The first installment is an inside jacket blurb. The main story starts with a clang in the second installment. Chapter 11 may leave you in tears. #RSMarsNeededWomen

More in the #altText

#BoostingIsSharing

eldritch.cafe/@sfwrtr/11408894

=-=-=-=
† I designed and created the cover, wrote the blurbs, and did the titles. The images are courtesy of ESA and NASA. The spine is a strip of a Mariner 7 image. This is becoming a hobby of mine, and I am open to requests.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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The cover art for Mars Needed Women. The background is of the Mars surface with rover tracks, big rocks, sand, and a greenish sky. There is a triskelion image of Mars, which is a tattoo in the story. The back cover reads as follows: Shanghaied May Ri struggled when the EM goon clamped an aromatic wet rag over her nose and mouth... Waking weightless and nauseated—stuffy head pounding, being floated somewhere—despite grogginess, she eyes-closed punched someone, spinning away to bounce off a wall. The click of cartilage, the thump off a bulkhead, the blare of a warning horn, and "Rig for ring spin!" rang in her ears. A tech clapped a bag over her mouth before she vomited up her last putrified meal, while enduring the blonde's glare as blood beaded around her nose. May Ri glowered back. Sitting on the wall, dragged on her butt, her inner ear then her innards soon informed her the wall was becoming the floor. From the author: “A hopeful deeply-dystopian feminist SF story, with thinly veiled jabs at our current world's bad actors making for a bad future. Please note the past tense in the title: Mars Needed Women. The story's women are going to work to bring down the system, at least that part that's oppressing them, in a massive unscheduled disassembly.”
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Christina Anne Hawthorne

#ScribesAndMakers 13
Self-Promotion

Kovenlore Chronicles is a 7-novel #adventure #romantasy series, Riparia Dellbane the unlikely heroine pulled into helping save dystopian Carrdia. There’s elaborate worldbuilding & a diverse cast.

All 7 novels (plus 2 novellas) are already written.

The 1st book in the series, Trust in the Forgotten, is published, the sequel coming in late spring. Currently on Amazon, it’ll eventually go wide.

The image is a color map of the continent of Tremjara on the world of Ontyre. The continent is roughly oval with notable exceptions, the oval tilted southwest to northeast. In the far north are the Frozen Lands, but otherwise the continent is surrounded by three oceans, the Para-Equa in the west, Terminus in the south, and Titania to the east. A long, slim peninsula, along with multiple islands, exists in the northwest. In the west and south are multiple, large islands. The southeastern peninsula is a barren wasteland with some volcanic islands off its coast. There are scattered islands up the eastern coast, most notably Pannulus, a roughly circular archipelago. The continent is roughly divided in half by mountain chains, some more extensive than others. Mountains also exist in other locations, especially the southwest. The west is heavily forested, the east a mix of forests and grasslands. The south desert. Some notable locations follow. Mythwyll in the southwest was the elfin homeland. In the west, Forstava is still the ora’ean homeland. In the east, Emprensa was once the home province of an empire. In the northeast, Draskrith is the realm of the shadow lords. Below that, and as noted, is Pannulus. At the continent’s center is nation of Carrdia. It’s surrounded by mountains, except in the west along its border with Forstava, and in the northeast. The continent’s biggest lake is located there, as is the mighty Key River.
On the right is the book’s cover, the negative image a golden, hand drawn map showing mountains and rivers. On top of that is the title, Trust in the Forgotten, written in a stylish text that’s turquoise with black outlining. Between the first three words and the last below them are eyes that are the same color. Below that, in the same font and color, but without shadowing, it reads Book 1 of the Kovenlore Chronicles. Near the bottom, and written in a more plain text, the color a dark yellow with a black outline, is the author’s name, Christina Anne Hawthorne. The left, beside the cover, is the following text: On the world of Ontyre… Riparia Dellbane, a reclusive Keeper courier with a fractured past, blends into Carrdia’s dystopian landscape, yet dreams of a better future. It’s about vision. Then, over one grim night, routine becomes ruin as opposing fractions seek to exploit or capture her. To survive, she must discover why. She must also discover why the handsome seer reawakening her heart is aiding her. Is he leading her to safety or to those wanting her life? Is she brave enough to untangle the conspiracy wanting to consume, not just her, but an entire nation? As a child, tragedy stole her trust. Now, her heart is begging her to trust again.
#AmWriting#WritingCommunity#Fantasy
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#ScribesAndMakers 2503.12 — Do you play games? If so, do they influence your creativity?

I love playing video games but I never ever have time. Last few days I've spent over 8 hours writing to get my web-novel chapters published mostly daily. Regular schedule has plenty of distractions beyond gaming

How does it influence my creativity? A couple decades ago, I played a role playing game called MERP. I invented an amazing character and I've wrote a few chapters, but didn't complete the story. I did write a trans story in that universe, got it accepted, but the publisher went under so I never got paid.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2503.12 — Happy Plant a Flower Day! What rôle does nature take in your stories?

How would you describe a ruined world from the 1st person POV of people who live have always lived in said world and find it normal? In the Reluctance series, nature is a very important background character who words don't always match up with the reader's understanding of how their world works.

[Author retains copyright (c)2025 R.S.]

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