Category Archives: Worlds Beyond

Comics, books, games, conventions and more!

Flesh and Steel

I am currently reading Flesh and Steel by Guy Haley. It is a #WarHammer40k book which finally deals with the gruesome creation of servitors, the systemic inequalities which degrade & oppress the ordinary citizens of the Empire.

The set up is well done, an investigator who has an augmented arm replacement, has to work with a tech-priest as body is found & the case over laps their jurisdictions. It’s an interesting mystery & delves into parts of the #WH40k universe I’ve not read before.
https://www.blacklibrary.com/all-products/flesh-and-steel-ebook-2020.html

The RedLine Book Festival.

It was a wonderful evening, I got there early, meet Mr Hamilton, gave him a packet of his fav biscuits, did our prep work and then it was on with the show.

It was a fun and wide ranging conversation about his work, how he works, what works for him and how everyone has to find what works for them, to how science fiction books ideally are to make people think and consider questions they may not otherwise.

He was lovely in person, very much a gent and after the event we popped over to Eddie Rockets for a burger and kept talking away.

Thank you so much to https://www.redlinebookfestival.ie/ for the opportunity.

Salvation is out now and it is the start of a new trilogy.

https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/peter-f-hamilton/salvation/9781447281313

 

 

SFF and Diversity

This post is brought to you after I read this on facebook https://www.facebook.com/joch.mcarthur/posts/10103074134267273

The diversity in SFF (Science Fiction & Fantasy), what ever the medium comics, film, Tv, books and video games is why I am a fan. I have had people wonder how my feminism, parses with my interest in SSF, what I have read, watched, played and loved as frankly fed my feminism.

Helped me dream of the world being a better place and of people dealing with each other with compassion. Helped me figure out what I would do in horrid situations, let me explore possibilities.

SFF has never been prefect, it won’t ever be, it is created by flawed humans, but it has never been the preserve of cis white hetro men not from the very beginning.

Yes as it has become mainstream and those looking to target the biggest section of the market for profit have started to present it as being of and for cis white hetro men, but that is spin.

SSF has always been diverse, women and girls have always created, organised, wrote, drawn, been the back bone of fandoms.
Yes Fandom and conventions are not perfect either, but they are a hell of a lot better then they were 20 years ago in my experience.

Which is why I am proud of the conventions I have been involved with, Shamrokon and Octocon and the work done to try and reflect that diversity and the joy SSF brings.

Hope to see many of you this weekend in the Camden Court Hotel for Octocon.

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Octocon2015

I will be in the wonderful geeky bubble which is www.octocon.com all weekend.
Mind yourselves while I am off event running and getting to be on so many panels which are so inter sectional it has made me squee.

Panels on bodily autonomy in young adult fiction, on bisexual representation in fiction, on sex workers in fiction, on genderqueerness in fiction, on mental health & neuro diversity in fiction and fandom community and magic & pagan ism in fiction.

This is my schedule for the weekend, you can have a look at the rest of line up here

http://app.octocon.com/#

 

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Scifi/fantasy fandom has this rep of being all older cis white hetro men. It’s not. Both guests of honor this weekend are amazing and also women. Many of out guest authors joining us are women I admire, and I know I will also be surrounded by lovely feminist men.

I will be tweeting from @Octocon over the weekend if you want to see what I am up to.

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Worlds Beyond Podcast Ep 01 interview with Paul Anthony Shortt

Yes once again I am bitten by the podcasting bug. Worlds Beyond will be an irish podcast about all things Geek, Gamer and Genre Fiction related.

 

The 1st episode is with Paul Anthony Shortt who’s book Red Skies the second in the Lady Raven series was published this week. His is an Author, Gamer, Father and self confessed feminist. We talked about his books, ghost busters, why stories matter and how he will be at Octocon 2015.

 

redskies

Red Skies is available to down load now from amazon as a kindle release.

You can find Paul Anthony Shortt online in the following places

Website: http://paulanthonyshortt.blogspot.ie/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/PAShortt

GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6476977.Paul_Anthony_Shortt

 

 

 

 

 

Arcadecon 2015

Arcadecon is on this weekend 3rd to the 5th of August in the Crown Plaza Hotel, beside the Blanchardstown shopping center.

 

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It’s one of the few conventions I’ve not yet attended and I am looking forward it for a range of reasons. Most conventions I attend are usually focused on one aspect of fandom or geek pursuits, but this looks like a real all rounder.  I am looking forward to hearing Paul Bolger talk about , hopefully meeting Professor Elemental, attending the Kapow Burlesque, meeting members of the USS Cuchulain.

So much to see and do, I have images of the current time table below so people can have a look at what to expect over the weekend. As ever a time table is only every finalised after an event has finished.

Friday

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Saturday

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Sunday

 

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If anyone wants to talk to me about Octocon please do come find me, I may also have some Dublin2019 flyers with me.

Writers are my rock stars (Neil Gaiman is coming to Dublin)

I have written before bout how Writers are my rock stars (also known as go go plan crazy, travelling to Galway to hear Warren Eills speak)  and how they open worlds to me, their words delighting, haunting and staying with me.

There are a few who’s craft is so beguiling I will try and make the effort to see them talk in person. So far I have been lucky that many of them come here to Ireland.

I don’t go crazy for autographs or photos with, but just like to listen to them talk about their work. I have found they are usually inspiring people.

Last summer due to my involvement with Shamrokon I got to meet Carrie Vaugh, Charles Stross, Ruth Long Michael Carroll and do the Guest of Honour interview with Seanan McGuire.

So I was delighted when I saw this

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(photo by @ClaireNolan)

So I will be out in UCD next Wednesday as Neil Gaiman will be receiving the James Joyce Award. I did come to his writing via Good Omens and then Sandman, and have read just about everything else he’s written over the last 25 years. I got so see Terry Pratchett a few years back when he attended the Unseen University Challenge in TCD and it will be nice to finally have seen them both in person.

 

Purple Monkey Dishwasher

Ever play Chinese whispers? That game when you get a group of people and a sentence gets whispered from one person to another. This of course distorts the message, some times it is completely different, other times parts remains or it’s important context is lost.

Sometimes the internet is like the most complex game of Chinese whispers. Often primary sources can’t be found, esp in the fast moving world of internet blogs, forums and of course twitter.

The sheer amount of stuff which can get written by thousands of people on various platforms around the globe in one 24 hour period can be staggering. So it’s not surprising that it can be at times impossible to get a grasp on certain topics like Gamer Gate.

What I have found startling is that the same arguments which get put to me about why I should not say I am a feminist are being used to tell people why should not say they are supporters of gamergate. Should radical or extremist elements be let take over an idea or a movement?

I can understand why the reasonable and moderate people who id themselves as part of not wanting games to be censored and who think that there needs to be better ethics & standards in game reviews and games journalism won’t walk away from gamergate. There are actual issues which do need to be talked about.

Where ever a person stands on how they think the games industry & culture needs to evolve, the abuse and threats to people need to stop. I would dearly like to see those who have made such threats feel the full force of the law, but that mean justice depts have to start taking online abuse seriously.

Yep Z.Q. is being punished for being an outspoken woman, I know what is like, thankfully never as extreme as what she has had to endure. There were those who were out to get her before her ex trashed her in that blog and it was the excuse they felt they were waiting for, all of which is unacceptable. Funny the journalist whom she has been accused of trying to bribe isn’t being hounded, a reporter who let themselves be compromised would be the person I would be pissed off with.

How ever I do know there are some who won’t want games to be sanitised and I get that and know people have not acted in a reprehensible manner. I really worry that those who have behaved as vile scum will tarnish the term gamer for ever and cause a regression in how people think of games. It feeds in to the whole manchild myth about games and gamers, how it is to be ever taken seriously as an art form with this crap happening around it.

I honestly think it is the generation who grew up playing Halo on consoles who created a community out of foul mouth teens who have dominated gaming culture to a point. There were awesome online gaming communities before them but that for me was the tipping point of one which grew up with out much adult interaction and it’s spread across online gaming, unfortunately.

I don’t agree with at least 40% of the critique in FemFeq, esp as there seems to be an element of eroticphobia to A.S. feminism. I think that the series of videos should have been the kicking off point for a heap of much needed discussion about games as an art form and how they can reflect society and culture. Don’t agree with what someone says and their conclusions, then refute them, tear down the position and the argument.

If you can’t do that and your only recourse is to attack the person rather then the position or the argument, then you’ve lost, you are not going to be taken seriously or have any credibility. All that has been done by those going to extremes to shut up women like Z.Q. A.S. and D.W. is to poison the well and make Jack Thompson seem right to people who don’t game and don’t know the joy it brings.

Seriously my kids who have been brought up as gamers would rather people they are ‘filthy casuals’ then have their peers link them to the hatred and misogyny gamer gate has become associated with. They both have had run in with asshats online, they both try and model good gaming manners, not quiet to Starcraft levels but still the last few weeks has had them distancing themselves, which I understand, but it still saddens me.

I have tried to keep up with what has been going on but until no I have not written about it, I have instead when ever I felt the urge to get into discussions, I’ve gone and played games instead. Mostly Assassins Creed Liberation, which has a protagonist who is a woman a person of colour and  the game is nuanced, smart, full of tangential learning about class, gender and the world as it was in the time period of the game. And I get to kill people, what more could I want in my games.

Well bar some day Steam allowing games like Leisure Suit Larry and Lula The Sexy Empire on the Market place. Why is it I can kill people in so many ways, but not get people off in games? But that is a topic for another blog post.

 

 

Shamrokon: what I did last weekend….

I had been feeling the guilts that I was not at the marches on Saturday http://www.abortionrightscampaign.ie/  or Sunday, http://www.marriagequality.ie/ as I was involved with running a large scifi convention.
But as problematic as Scifi/fantasy fandom can be, nothing at the convention needed smashing, which given that it was the european scifi convention it had 1,300 people from 33 countries and we had 130 program items and 113 participants, is mind boggling.

Often at these events cis white men can dominate the panels, that wasn’t the case, in fact we did have a gender disparity as we had too many women on panels. Also we had more women moderating then men, I was delighted that Cheryl Morgan who is a trans right activist as well as  is an Hugo award-winning British science fiction critic and publisher. took part on panels over the weekend and as I was moderating the Boycott panel and we talked about TERFS.

We had equal numbers of men and women displaying in the Art Show , non of the cos players were harassed, we had panels on women in 2000AD, women writers, Gender boxes in Game of thrones and real life, why women have had to use pseudonym to get published, the Hawkeye initiative, Missing Medieval Women, discussions on why fiction women write had been seen as lesser.

I let it be known that I was queer and a feminist and made sure our code of conduct included making the convention a respectful place including respecting pro nouns and the photograph policy. I had people tell me they felt safe. Our youngest and oldest panel participants were women and the youngest at 14 is the youngest ever for a Eurocon. We had 4 workshops and all of them were run by women. including Lora O’Brien. It was refreshing and awesome and all off the convention was accessible.

There were even scholar ship tickets for fans of colour and those who may not be in the financial position to afford to go http://con-or-bust.livejournal.com/. 2/5 of the guests of honor were women, Seanan McGuire andYlva Spångberg.  Seanan McGuire was wonderful to interview and referenced the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media and was able to cite figures from the studies, and one of the others was Jim Fitzpatrick who  was one of the public signatories on the Anti Amendment statement opposing the pro life amendment in 1983, he is also a human rights activist.

 Shamrokon got it as right as a scifi convention can be and I am proud of what we accomplished and the people on the committee and the staff who all had social justice awareness before we started.