Breakfast with Pandora

The Mirror and the Mage

I'm thrilled to announce the release of my latest novel, The Mirror and the Mage: A novel of ancient Rome, which is available as a paperback or a Kindle e-book.

It's my first YA (a "young YA" for ten- to thirteen-year olds) and the first book that combines my love for the Latin language with my passion for storytelling.

The Mirror and the Mage follows 14-year old Lucius Junius Brutus, who will one day becoming the liberator of Rome and the founder of the Roman Republic.

On the cusp of adulthood, Lucius longs to follow his brother into the army of King Tarquin the Proud, but his father sends him to the remote shrine of Numa Pompilius to be a priest. Lucius thinks he will spend his life guarding dusty sacred scrolls, but he soon finds out that the scrolls have power-- and powerful enemies. To save the city, Lucius must become a priest and a warrior.

If you like Latin language, you may be interested in the game being developed from the book, which is in beta form here.

And if you want to be kept abreast of all the news and receive special offers for the book, email teenage underscore heroes atsign yahoo dot com and ask to be put on the mailing list. Or simply click on the "Join Our Mailing List" button at the side of this post.

Valete, omnes! Take care, everyone!

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and read this perspective of a person who's been both a rocket scientist and a teacher.

He hits the nail on the head.

Thanksgiving Twitter tempest a fake?

Curiouser and curiouser.

Elan Gale, reality TV producer who was the subject of my last post, has now confessed that the incident he tweeted out to thousands of followers over Thanksgiving weekend was a fake.

Here is the place to see the details, including tweets from Gale confirming the hoax.

Now we can begin the speculation that it was actually a real incident, and that Elan is trying to milk more publicity out of the stunt, and/or he's so embarrassed by the reaction of some that he wants it to go away.

I was taken in, I will confess-- most of all, by the following:

That's a pretty good fake note, in my opinion. Different stationery, completely different handwriting. Did Elan do that, or did he get someone else?

I always wondered where the airlines were in all of this-- why they didn't say anything, why there was no confirmation from them that this actually happened.

It made sense that "Diane" would say nothing, because she was the one who looked bad.

But if an airline passenger is actually making up an incident that reflects badly on a certain airline, you'd think they would have said something.

It reminds me of another post I wrote about a hoax concerning a boy flying in a balloon. Remember this one?

This is why I stick to fiction.

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Twain's take on river more current than ever

During the school year, if someone asks what I am reading, I am likely to respond, "Student papers." But once summer starts, there is time for pleasure reading.

Case in point: The beloved brought into our marriage a set of "classics," which is to say hardcover reprints of authors like Thomas Hardy and Daniel Defoe.

On a recent peruse of that shelf I found Mark Twain's "Life on the Mississippi," which I had never read. Mark Twain wrote "Life" as a travelogue of his journey by steamboat from St. Louis to New Orleans and from there up to Minneapolis-St. Paul. Twain took this trip in 1883, a fascinating time for us in the 21st century. Technology was accelerating at a dizzying pace at this time: electricity was transforming life as the Internet has for us today.

The romance with which Twain refers to steamboats feels like my nostalgia for railroads. He laments the bygone days when the paddlewheelers were the queens of the river. And he reserves special venom for... the railroads, which he considers a blight on the land. Here's one choice Twainian snarkism:

We reached St. Paul, at the head of navigation of the Mississippi, and there our voyage of two thousand miles from New Orleans ended. It is about a ten-day trip by steamer. It can probably be done quicker by rail. I judge so because I know that one may go by rail from St. Louis to Hannibal-- a distance of at least a hundred and twenty miles--in seven hours. This is better than walking; unless one is in a hurry.

Twain also spends some time bashing newspapers in a hilarious tour-de-force that's too long to quote in full:

The season being far advanced when we were in New Orleans, the rose and magnolia blossoms were falling; but here in St. Paul it was the snow... The newspaper thinks [this variation in weather] isn't a natural thing; and once a year, in February , it remarks, with ill-concealed exclamation points, that while we, away up here, are fighting snow and ice, folks are having new strawberries and peas down South... An act of Congress-- no, Congress could not prohibit the [yearly] strawberry [story] without questionably stretching its powers. An amendment to the Constitution might fix the thing... Under authority of such an amendment, Congress could then pass an act inflicting imprisonment for life for the first offense, and some sort of lingering death for subsequent ones; and this, no doubt, would give us rest.

Whereas in our day and age, we lament the decline of traditional journalism, and decry the inferior blog-and flog Internet with its lack of civility and rampant gossip.

Which goes to show that the more things change, the more they stay the same, and it's a lesson for us in the scribbling business. People will make money off transportation as long as there are people who want to go places.

The same is true about books and news. For a while there, we were thinking that the Internet was going to make all written content free of charge. But in the past year or two, there has been a big rise in paid subscriptions for premium content on websites. Journalism is going to crop up again pretty soon, in a different form. And someday future Samuel Clemenses will lament the passing of that, too.

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The changing face of Facebook

The changing face of Facebook

In 2009 I wrote a blog post about what I considered to be a new or newish phenomenon: Facebook. 

Etwart says: hashtag cultural studies

I predicted that all other entertainment media would suffer from Facebook's appeal: that everyone's ability to tell their own stories with instant publication to their online community would mean we would turn into a society of micromythologists.

We would, in other words, all be famous for 2 or 3 seconds, as long as it took for our friends to read our posts.

That turned out to be not true at all.

Facebook, or my Facebook feed, anyway, has turned into the equivalent, not of a smorgasbord of personal stories, but mainly into a "shopper": the old-time term for a free extra edition of the newspaper, with a few editorials and features, but mostly advertisements.

It's not that no one is telling their story anymore. Just that nearly everything else has crowded that out.

I'm a culprit. Those of us selling our own books are energetically plugging them on Facebook.

I also have musician friends advertising their gigs; artist friends plugging their pieces and shows; and there are plenty of fundraisers out there as well. 

Not to mention the "Suggested Posts" and the pages I've "Liked." Much of that has to do with spending money. Except maybe for that Steampunk thing I Liked, which started flooding my feed with pictures of leather corsets.

And of course, the nonstop political stuff.

Very few friends simply share their lives: two exceptions are Linda and Cathy, who have challenging home and family situations. They use Facebook as a place to vent, to ask opinions, to seek help and support, to laugh, and to celebrate good news. 

Linda and Cathy are the features and editorials in the old-time shopper that Facebook has become for me.

I love newspapers and will read them "cover to cover" given time. Even a shopper can be entertaining.

But you get tired of being pitched to all the time. That's why I've stopped advertising my book on Facebook. I just don't see giving the same 150 friends the same opportunity to buy something they've already passed on. 

So here is the light bulb, which you may already have been screaming at your computer screen: instead of adding to the Facebook ad noise, why don't I share stories from MY life? 

Goodness gracious. What a concept. I might just have to try that.

Or stop complaining.

A literary (?) interview

Craig Nova, a writerly colleague of mine, just got interviewed about his new book, The Constant Heart.

Beyond the discussion of the book, about the son of an astronomer, I found the following section especially revealing of something: the interviewer's bent, or the lingering culture of American letters currently, or just something off-putting generally:

[Interviewer] You explore these questions with many of the techniques of what we might call “genre fiction.” Your work, I think, blends “literary” qualities with elements of noir fiction, offering the reader the pleasure of both experiences. (I’m putting these terms in quotes because I’m not sure how reliable they are.) What attracts you to this kind of storytelling? What are its strengths and limitations?

What is literary fiction, anyway? What is genre fiction? In the past it's been used to separate, most often under rubrics of what is considered good (literary) and what is considered bad (genre) writing. Or that which concerns universal truths (literary) with that which only seeks to entertain or titillate (genre).

I find these distinctions unhelpful, if only because I have read a fair amount of literary fiction that can only be considered an imitation of what people think is literary, and which is not good at all. And I have read genre fiction that is quite universally true (e.g. Exposure by Therese Fowler, a novel of women's fiction with a well-considered whiff of Romeo and Juliet).

I consider Skater in a Strange Land fantasy, but it is not just about a story or entertainment. If someone would like to interview me about the book, I could reveal all the intricacies of its universality.

More good and true writing here by a writer who defies literary and genre distinctions.

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New year's Resolution revisited

This year I resolved to do 50 blog posts, or about one a week. Counting this one and those from Skater in a Strange Land, I've done 42 so far.

Which means I'm behind.

So expect more from this space or the Skater blog before the New Year. I'm in sight of my goal. I'm going to make it!

Grumpy Old Bookman back in the saddle

Way back in 2005, AKA the Dark Ages, I was a regular reader of a book blog called Grumpy Old Bookman. It was written by a curmudgeonly, quite cynical, idealistic, seasoned-with-age man who wrote, reviewed and thought about books in a profound and enlightening way. The GOB, as he was sometimes acronymed, had a large readership and was one of the most popular book blogs on the Web. I would say he is a representative of the First Golden Age of Internet Blogging.

One of the more significant things he wrote was that all financial success in the book writing business is a result of sheer luck. Disturbing on the hand, but motivating on the other for those of who think perfection is what drives book sales.

The GOB kept writing-- faithfully and frequently-- up until November 25, 2007, when he said he was taking a sabbatical.

Well, the GOB is now back, taking up where he left off with book news and observations. I hope he will be talking about his nearly five-year hiatus, and how he feels the world of books has changed since he took his break. It's a bit of Rip Van Winkle story, though I'm sure the GOB has not been asleep the entire time.

BTW, I found out about the resumption of posts as I was cleaning up the old Internet bookmarks on my computer. Kudos to the GOB for retaining his old URL.

*

In other news about folk I have followed in the past, Gary Vaynerchuk, erstwhile wine blogger and would-be mega consultant on all things Internet marketing, recently posted a curious video about his desire to become the owner of the New York Jets football team.

According to business books, this is called the Big Hairy Audacious Goal, an accomplishment that seems impossible to achieve but by its very audaciousness and desirability motivates a person or a business to work hard every day towards it.

Gary is a communicator and a person who likes to stir the pot. In this video, he says that the day he succeeds in buying the Jets football team will be the worst of his life, because he thrives on struggle, work and process rather than results.

Fair enough. But I was more interested in a comment to the video, which I quote here:

Even the pursuit of goals, in which you are finding joy, is a chasing after the wind. One thing is true of us all, in 50 to 75 years it's unlikely that anyone will even remember our names or who we were. There is more to all of this than the chase or achievements. Remember 1 thing, it's not our story, we are not the stars but supporting actors in the bigger story. Are you sure you are playing the role you've been asked to? Don't waste it.

This person is referencing the opening chapters of the book of Ecclesiastes, the narrative of a man who has done it all and realizes it's not worth it. True wisdom is knowing and fearing God. 

Gary has made it clear his motivation for working hard is personal fulfillment and family. In 50-75 years he hopes his grandchildren will see him on the videos he's made, and be proud and inspired to love and work for their own families. Good for him.

For me, meaning is everything. I'm with the commenter. I wish I could see the big picture and know the exact role I'm supposed to play in the cosmic drama. And despite imperfect views, I continue on in that spirit.

My Big Hairy Audacious Goal is to someday Know God. Impossible, yes, but motivational for sure.

Kickstarting mythology

Got an email from a team of two authors who want to start a Magic Tree House-type series of books for 4-8 year olds, with world mythology as the main content delivered.

You know Magic Tree House-- 2 spunky kids find a magic tree house, are transported back in time to various literary and historical locales, where they participate in famous narratives and events. One of the Greek-oriented titles is "Hour of the Olympics".

Authors Rudi Liden and Rachel Hill would like to capitalize on the big success of MTH with a series of their own, and two spunky kids of their own, Penny and Bobby, but in order to do so, they need start-up funds. That's why they have a kickstarter.com page. They don't have much time left to make their goal, so I agreed to spread the word a bit. They have a nice video with engaging art, and their first book is about the Midas touch.

Midas was a king of Phrygia, now part of the nation of Turkey, who famously was granted a favor of the god Dionysus after saving one of the god's followers. He wanted everything he touched to turn to gold.

This story is not strictly Greek mythology, but a kind of ancient fan fiction, where authors in late antiquity took an original figure from Greek history and endowed him with a story.

Liden and Hill would like to use this opportunity to tell young readers about the pitfalls of desire. I personally would like to see how this comes out, though I've told the authors I think it's very tricky to do foreign cultures well for 4-8 year olds. Most of the time you end up just reinforcing American values and the foreign is lost.

Yeah, but it's a lot more edifying than Ben 10, Liden counters.

Click over and see what you think.

How popular is your favorite Greek divinity?

Greek mythology is popular. But how popular? And who is more popular than whom?

Breakfast with Pandora is here to tell you.

While working on my project on the Myers-Briggs personality system and Greek divinities, I googled Poseidon and noticed he had 33.6 million hits. I thought, well, that has to be among the most. Only Zeus would have more. Actually, not.

Herewith find a list of the 15 "official" Olympian divinities and their Google hits as of today. The results may surprise you.

I searched for the name alone. The numbers are in millions of hits.

Apollo                       209
Hermes                     200
Athena                        134
Ares                             112
Zeus                             82.7
Artemis                        47
Hera                             34.2
Poseidon                     33.6
Hades                           32.5
Aphrodite                   30.4
Demeter                       15.3
Hephaestus                12.3
Persephone                9.2
Dionysus                       5.1
Hestia                            1.25

I thought for sure Zeus would be #1, but I didn't take into account that Apollo and Hermes are very recognizable brand names now.

If you put "greek god" or "greek goddess" after the names, the hits go down considerably (again listed in millions of hits):

Zeus                             2.35
Apollo                        1.830
Athena                       1.030
Aphrodite                   0.966
Artemis                        0.853
Hera                             0.605
Hermes                       0.570
Hades                          0.555
Ares                             0.538
Demeter                       0.453
Hephaestus                0.261
Dionysus                     0.355
Persephone                0.231
Poseidon                     0.217
Hestia                            0.187

And, as I thought, the more traditional names go to the top, with Zeus comfortably at #1.