The WAL

I had intended for this post to be something political or cultural, both of which I’ve been giving a lot of thought to lately.  Other easy topics might be that I finally finished “Heroes Inc” today, to a grand total of 61,106 words or something about Halloween and my children, but I’m not going to write or rant about any of these things.

My neighbours have a Pug, an energetic, lovable little meatball of a dog my children adored, with the unlikely name of Mr. Plug.  Whenever he slipped his harness, he’d usually find his way into our back yard looking for my kids.  My daughters played with him regularly after school, fed him sticks, gave him treats that he would only take from them, chased him around and let him chase them.  On our big vacation this summer, they found a stuffed Pug they had to have, and named it after him.  My son occasionally took Mr. Plug for walks, with the blessing of his owners and they ran more than walked, great exercise for both.  They’re all very fond of him.

Yesterday, as Mr. Plug’s owner was snapping the leash to his harness for a walk, he spied another dog he knew and slipped free.  That other dog was on the far side of the street a car hit Mr. Plug before he got half way across.  I live in a 40 km/h zone where the only people who do 40 seem to be the ones who live here.  Everyone else goes too fast, but for a Pug, there’s only one winner with a car moving almost any speed.

I should have said, my neighbours had a Pug.  The kids are taking it hard.  My girls spent large parts of yesterday afternoon and evening crying and my son tried his best not to.  Today was a little better, but there have still been a few tears.  Tomorrow, they’re planning to make a card for Mr. Plug’s owners.  I don’t know that it could be worse for them if Mr. Plug had been our dog, and it’s hard not to join in when you’re children are grieving so openly., but you need to help them see through the tears.

I delayed going to work this morning to stop in at the house and talk for a few minutes.  My neighbour seemed almost on the edge of tears.  Their children are grown, and they’d had the little guy since he was a puppy, only two years.  I have to admit to being fond of him, too, in a more distant way, mostly for the joy he brought to my children.  He didn’t really pay much attention to me, anyway – they were the ones with the treats or who took him for a walk while I just scratched his back once in a while.

It’s funny, though, how a pet can become such an important part of your life, even indirectly, even when it’s not your own.  Small lives can make a big impact on our supposedly larger ones.

Farewell, Mr. Plug.  If there is a dog heaven, I hope it comes with all the sticks you can eat.

Okay, so it’s been a busy time the last little while.  That’s not going to change for the next few weeks between regular life, an upcoming interview, Halloween, Remembrance Day, and plenty of other stuff.  But I’m still getting my writing time in, mostly on breaks at work.

Heroes Inc Progress
58,516 / 50,000
(117.0%)

I have exactly one scene to write and Heroes Inc will be finished.  Under a thousand words and I might even be able to find enough time to finish it tomorrow, thus making the Halloween deadline I set for myself.  For anyone keeping track, this will be the third novel I’ve started and finished since Christmas Day last year.  Not too shabby, even if they’re all only first drafts.

But I’ve done it at almost the complete expense of my short fiction.  Of the 291k new words I’ve written in calendar 2008 so far (yes, I keep track and this number doesn’t include editing, revising, or plotting), 235k of those have been on the novels.  So, for the remainder of the year, it’s a short fiction blitz.

There are two stories that need to go back into the wild.  Yes, I got another rejection this week.  Strange Horizons took a pass on ‘The Last Eclipse’.  I’m okay with that and remain confident I can find a home for this story.  ‘Failing Hope’ also needs to go out again and this morning I finished the (theoretically) final revision of my submission to the Tesseracts 13 anthology to come out next year from Edge Press.  ‘Waiting for Spring’ is a dark fantasy story, if anyone’s wondering.  Throw in two other stories finished their final revisions and a lot of stuff I need to get edited, or in some cases written and, well, my word count is probably going to drop off a lot for the next two months but a first draft does not a story make, so I’ll be spending just as much time on my writing.

Updates to follow more regularly, I hope.

So for my first post in a week, I’m not going to write about the disappointing election result or the pathetic voter turnout or the or anything political at all.  I’m still contemplating, though I’ll happily discuss anything political if anyone wants to drop me a line.  And if I owe you a message, I’m going to plead life and not having been connected much in the last week.  It’s on the way.

No, this post is another dreaded writing update for today is a special occasion!  I received my first rejection letter today, though letter stretches the point a bit.  Heard back from the editor of “The World Is Dead”, the anthology I submitted my first ever zombie story to at the end of August.  I’m honestly not that surprised by the rejection (never expect to get published) because while I do think it’s a good story (I wrote it after all), I don’t know that it’s really horrific enough for a horror anthology.  My first readers really enjoyed it, but one of them made the observation that it was kind of twilight-zoney, sort of.  A definite compliment, but it means I should look for somewhere else to send it, and I will.

Still two stories waiting for responses with two waiting on market research and two more waiting for commentary from first readers.  A couple of anthology deadlines coming up, too.  As for the novel, well, I have managed some progress there.

Yes, I’ve exceeded the 50k goal and with 8 and a bit scenes left to write, I’m tracking at 59-60k.  The Halloween goal doesn’t look as realistic as it once did, but I’m okay with that.  After Heroes Inc is done, I’m going to take a break on the novels for a bit.  Yes, I know I’ve said that I intend to do some heavy editing on one of them before Christmas, but I’ve got twenty-ish stories that have at least a first draft complete (plus one in progress and four more plotted) and I want to get more of those into the wild.  I am working on plotting a new fantasy novel – I think I mentioned that a while back – but the story already feels too big to be contained in one book.  Might have the word trilogy associated with it and that scares me a little.  It’s tough enough to hold a narrative across a short 60k novel.  Across three books?  Serious continuity policing will be involved.

It’s always nice to receive a comment of any kind since it means someone’s actually reading what I write.  Thought I’d take this comment and make a post out of my response instead of just commenting back.  It made me think a little but not change my mind at all.

“As for strategic voting, it assumes that an individuals concerns and vote count for nothing. By voting strategically you are taking away funds from the smaller parties and are ensuring that only the old-boy parties are left to run again in the next elections. It destroys democracy as much as this first past the post wins everything system does. Ah well. It’s the new fad. Long live hairy women and bell bottoms. Written by: Anonymous”

Wish you’d left a name.  Maybe next time?

I think I have to disagree with the assumption that the individual vote means nothing in strategic voting.  But I do think that each vote means less than it did in days of yore when our two-party election system only had two parties.  You’d had enough of one, you voted for the other.  In a four or five party system, it’s dysfunctional.

The Liberals came up with a majority government in 1993, 1997, and 2000 with never more then 41.3% of the popular vote, and that 41.3% gave them a strong majority.  Is this right?  Should a government have solid majority power in this country when 6 in 10 people didn’t vote for it?

With the amount of vote splitting on the left at this point, strategic voting fills a valid need.  Say in the current election, you’re an NDP supporter (for example) and you really don’t want the Conservatives in power again, you’d normally vote NDP.  But what if the NDP doesn’t even have a snowflake’s chance and it’s a close race with the Liberal candidate, or vice versa?  You still don’t want the Con in, but with no hope of getting who you really want, your best hope of turfing your nemesis is to vote Liberal, much as it might hurt.

Strategic voting is hardly a perfect tool and it does nothing to address the huge gaping wounds in the system we’ve got.  I’d far rather vote for something than against something, but it gives us a partial balance.  And if, like me, you don’t live in a riding with a tight race, you vote your conscience.

Destroys democracy?  No.  Distorts?  Maybe, but perception isn’t reality, no matter how often you hear someone say it.  Strategy is important in any blood sport, and it makes sense to turn your vote into the biggest hammer you can.

I think a bigger issue is apathy.  Not even 65% voter turn out in the last election.  The Cons got 36.3% of 64.7%, so 23.5% of eligible voters put the government in power that currently runs things and wants to keep doing it.  That’s scary.

I’ve become a fan of strategic voting in our broken electoral system.  Broken, you ask?  Of course it’s broken.  It’s designed for a two party system and we’ve not got four significant players in English-speaking Canada, five in Québec.  Theoretically, you can win a seat in Ontario with 25% + 1 vote.  Majority governments have been won with less than forty percent of the popular vote.  Of course the system is broken, but what’s the incentive for a party in power to fix it?  The Ontario Liberals made it look like they were trying to a few years back by picking a system that few people understood and no one liked then letting us have a referendum on it without any clear communication on how it worked, but hey that’s better than no effort at all, right?  (Hope your sarcasm detectors didn’t overload there.)

So, strategic voting.  Rough translation:  vote for the politician in second place, regardless of your preference, to keep the one in first place out of office.  Rather than voting for something, you’re voting against something, but this is often the way it works anyway.  You’ve got a lot of choices of how to cast your vote when punishing a party you’re unhappy with.  Strategic voting helps focus the anti vote.

In the current election, if you’re not interested in the Conservatives keeping power (and who is, really), and you’re in a riding that’s a tight race, vote for the non-Conservative candidate who has the best chance of winning.  Yes, this may mean voting for a Liberal when you want to go NDP or Green.  Or some other combination.  In Québec, you might have to vote for a separatist to get rid of the Tory (that would be a hard bone to swallow for me, considering how I feel about separatists).

I’ve finally found a tool to assist.  Don’t let the name of the website fool you, Vote For Environment is all about not electing the Conservatives.  The site’s focus is due to the lack of environment policy and leadership the Harperites have shown, but I’ve got plenty of other reasons to not vote Conservative (economic stupidity, broken promises, lies, and on and on).  Punch in your postal code to get the details on your riding, but if you’re really interested in the numbers behind the numbers, and I am, click on the Advanced Prediction Model link on the front page.  They’ve got drill down data to show projections based on the latest polls.  Polls are never a guarantee, as honest polsters will admit, but they’re all we’ve got to work with until the actual election results come in.

And if you live in a riding that’s not a close race?  Well, then you vote your conscience.  In my riding the Conservative incumbent won last election with 51% of the vote.  Based on the numbers I’m seeing from VFE, the polls project 47% this time, so I live in a Conservative stronghold and get to vote for whoever I want.  I don’t have the ability to vote strategically, but I am telling everyone who’s interested to think about the shape of the Canada they want.  Every little bit helps.

So my short, 50k word Superhero novel is on track to finish the first draft at 57-60k.  Not surprising, I suppose.  The good news is that this afternoon, I was two scenes from being caught up to where I’d plotted to with only a nebulous idea of how to reach the planned ending from there.  Built about half the bridge and I think I can flesh out the rest tomorrow without too much difficulty.

On other fronts, no word yet on any of the stories out looking for homes.  I’ve got a couple of stories with first readers looking for issues, but nothing quite ready to go.  Two others with a third draft in progress and still other things in the pipe.  Starting to wonder if this is taking too much of my time, but I’ve got too many stories I need to get out of my skull and can’t really slow down.  The goal is fifteen submissions by the end of the year.  Wish me luck.

I’m not a fan of Stephanie Meyer or of her Twilight Saga, but I recognize that there are thousands of people who are and that vampires are hip and cool right now.  Miss Meyer is understandably upset at the moment.  According to an article on the Guardian UK website, which I learned about through the Adventures in Scifi Publishing podcast, she has a right to be.  But she’s not the only one.  Look around and you’ll find there’s a lot of angry buzz attached to her name.

Apparently, someone leaked the full (but not yet nearly complete) manuscript of the final volume in the series onto the internet.  Upset is probably missing the mark by several orders of magnitude.  She’s so upset that she can’t possibly finish the book.

Ex-squeeze me? A-baking powder?

Really.  ‘In any case, I feel too sad about what has happened to continue working on Midnight Sun, and so it is on hold indefinitely.’  That’s a direct quote from the guardian article.  She feels… sad.

I have three points of view on this.

First, as a reader, WTF?  One person whom you trusted betrayed that trust, so you’re going to punish legions of readers by not finishing the story.  They’ve given you their trust, their belief, and their money and you’re going to throw that back in their faces because someone hurt your feelings and you’re sad?  Had I been a fan, I wouldn’t be any more.

Second, as a writer (and yes, not one with a bestselling series of books, only a single published story, which, oddly enough, also involved vampires, but this is all beside the point):  again, WTF?  Your fans have bought 5.3 million copies of your first three books, with a fourth released this past summer, and there’s a movie coming out adapting the first one.  (And how do you think the movie studio might feel about this?)  How can you possibly show them this level of disrespect and think any of them might ever look at something you write again?  Way to thumb your nose at the people who made you a success.

Third, as a parent, this is obviously the act of a spoiled, petulant child who needs to be sent to her room for a decades-long time out.  Suck it up, princess.  The universe does not revolve around you.  Five million copies and a movie?  Your fans have made you rich, probably rich enough that you don’t need to care what they think any more.  And obviously you don’t.

You do have a way out.  Bitch slap the person who released the manuscript until they’re sorry and you feel better, take a month off to relax, recuperate, and grow up, then come back to the keyboard and get to work.  But first, apologize profusely in a hugely public way to your fans and keep apologizing until you get it right.

Having watched the four-on-one Leaders debate in English, highlights of the French debate, I’ve come to a few conclusions.  Don’t take these as gospel or infer how I’m going to vote.  I honestly haven’t decided yet except that it won’t be Conservative.  Punditry and commentary over the last couple of days has mostly served to reinforce my opinion that it’s all about spin in the media.

Stephen Harper the robot is back.  No emotion, no caring about what other people think or say, no reaction to almost everything.  He spent his time attacking Dion without presenting anything resembling a platform or plan on any issue and only brought up bits and pieces of his governments “record” when something actually roused him enough to defend himself.  Mostly he sat back and let people hit him.

Stephane Dion showed passion and determination whenever someone managed to piss him off.  In those moments, he became someone you could actually listen to make a point.  His handlers should be giving serious thought to how they can keep him pissed off at all times.

Jack Layton spoke very effectively, using his media training to good advantage.  Come out with a quick jab to Harper’s chin, give a quick sound byte on the relevant piece of NDP doctrine, take another swing if there’s time.  In the open discussion, he got the most hits in, mostly on the PM and occasionally on Dion, and all the best ones.  “Where’s your platform? Under your sweater?”

Elizabeth May was a valid voice at the table, had certainly done her homework, and was no less reasonable than anyone else present.  She seemed to delight in pointing out bits of past Conservative idiocy, broken promises, and outright lies.  I’m certainly glad the consortium backpedaled enough to invite her and wonder if she performed well enough to get elected.

Gilles Duceppe.  I have to say that I honestly don’t understand why he’s invited to the English language debate.  I understand why he comes – it’s a free hit, or as many as he can get, against the government as well as everyone else – but I don’t think he should be there.  He’s not running for PM (he said so openly) and the French-Supremist routine doesn’t play at all outside of Québec (not nearly as well in it lately, either), no matter how subtle, other than to make people’s eyes roll.  A regional, separatist party doesn’t belong at the national debate.

The round table format was interesting instead of the traditional podiums, but what I’d really like to see are some one on one debates.  Layton against Harper, Layton against Dion, Dion against Harper.  They wouldn’t need to be two hours long, but they’d certainly be more informative and give us more to work with on deciding who should have the job of running the company.

Eleven days and counting.

Because I haven’t posted one for a little while.

Progressing well, but I need to do some more detailed plotting.  The rough plot is only going to get me through to the 3/4 mark.  The last quarter of the book is only worked out to a “major event” per scene level.

I’ve also got one more story in need of a home.  “The Prince of Mediocrity” is a short piece, under 1400 words that might be classified as humorous sociological SF.  “Dragon Gold” had its final polish, but I want to give it one more read before I think about sending it to anyone.  And I’ve got a Christmas SF piece midway through its final edit and in need of a new title.

Something more after I’ve had some sleep, maybe.

As entertaining a tool as they are, polls are actually pretty useless.  I say this not to slander or annoy the people who make their living from them, but because it’s true.  They’re nice to identify trends and they give the pundits something to talk about every single campaign day, but they’re always wrong.  Aside from the ridiculous error bars (Exactly what does +/- 2.9% 19 times out of 20 mean, anyway?  That twentieth time is completely meaningless?  I know the math must bear things out, but come one guys, it’s like you’re admitting that you have no idea what you’re talking about.), they’re not accurate enough.

And what do I mean by that?  Well, you need to read the fine print.  The numbers usually add up to something in the vicinity of 100% which means that everyone they talked to actually thinks they know who they’re going to vote for.  So any given poll needs to be read as “XX% of decided voters intend to vote for party ABC”.  The undecided voters, by some accounts, can be as much as 40% of the total electorate (or the fraction of it that actually goes out to vote).  That’s an awfully big swing vote, don’t you think?

One more thing that bothers me about the math: can you really get an accurate picture of the way things are (even with a 3% error 19 times out of 20), by taking a sample of 1000 or so out of a population of millions of voters?  Seems to be an awfully small fraction to me, if there are, say,  10 million voters (this is very low – almost 15 million people voted in the 2006 election) and you ask a random 1000 of them what they think, you’re only getting one hundredth of a percent of the possible opinions at that moment.  The math may work, but people are more complicated than math.

Lastly, and this almost ignores my previous arguments, none of the polls are detailed enough.  A national picture is nice, but it’s not the whole story.  It’s lovely to be able to estimate seat totals if we all voted today, but it’s not the whole story.  Even going to the provincial level won’t do.  Something that really matters to me is how my riding is shaping up.  Is it a close enough race that I should vote strategically to not get the idiot I don’t want?  Or should I truly vote my conscience because there’s already a clear winner?  Yes, perhaps I should truly vote my conscience regardless of the front runner, but if it really is a tight race, then a little strategic voting could make a huge difference in my riding and the shape of the government across the country.

So my advice of the poling companies is this:  more detail, more clarity, more people surveyed.  I’ll answer a political survey every day if someone calls.  Not a marketing one, though – they can bugger off.