sci-fi

Making Up New Words to Go with your New Worlds

beccakinla gadget, how to write, naming, new words, sci-fi, writing process Leave a comment

I just finished a sci-fi novel entitled The Empress of Mars. There were many things I liked about it, and one of the things that the author, Kage Baker, managed particularly well was naming all those imaginary new technologies that appear in the story.

Almost all sci-fi stories describe hi-tech gadgets, and if those gadgets are new to your imaginary realm, you have to name them. One of the challenges is naming them in a way that evokes the item’s function, but doesn’t sound too similar to either real-world objects and those that inhabit other author’s books. And you’d better not trample on anyone’s trademark, either. Sometimes you read a book, and you’re lost by the new vocabulary, or it’s clunky and sounds artificial. Ms. Baker did an excellent job of naming things in ways made sense, yet seemed exotic enough to flesh out a new planet, many years in the future.
I have always been the type that makes up words. Long before Frindle, I would spout strange new words that never appeared in a dictionary or thesaurus, but which better described items or behaviors than any word that does. My specialty is turning nouns into verbs, and vice versa. However, my newest invention is “shadebathing.” It is intended to describe the behavior of one of my children, who on a hot day will run into a bit of shade, plotz, and stretch out to cool off, no matter how inconvenient the time or place.
I’m blessed that one of my children has followed in my footsteps. For example, he thinks that the phrase “crime-ridden” should be replaced by the descriptor “crimey.” I voiced the objection that this is too close to the word “criminy,” but he remains unconcerned. “No one knows that word anymore, Ima. Or if they do, they sure don’t use it.”
Naming characters and locations has always been relatively easy for me. I can just make up anything, no rules. However, when you name your fictional gadget, as I mentioned above, you need to balance familiarity with novelty. I find this much tougher. In the novel I’m writing now, I keep picking names for things, then feeling the need to relabel them.
Thank G-d for “Find and Replace!” I seem to be employing it a lot lately.

more jewish sci-fi contemplation

beccakinla deus ex mechina, fantasy, Hereville, sci-fi 1 Comment

I’ve finally read Hereville!

I found it at the Beverly Hills Library at last, plus the author will be at the Association of Jewish Libraries West Coast Conference that’s coming up soon, so I figured the time had come. The beginning starts off like it’s going to buy into nasty stereotypes about women’s roles in Orthodox Judaism and terrible stepmothers. My heart sank, and I almost didn’t continue. B”H, I read on, because the author totally turns both these notions on their heads by the end. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and recommend it highly. I can’t wait to post a glowing review on Amazon!

The upcoming conference, by the way, is on the topic of graphic novels for Jewish kids. A comic book about the founding of the state of Israel won the Sydney Taylor prize last year or the year before, I think, and Hereville won this year. Of course the first in the genre that is well-know was Maus about 15 or 20 years ago, but only now is this genre gaining momentum.

I’ve been reading more and more “Jewish” sci fi and fantasy (some of what is classified as such is anything but Jewish, if you ask me) and writing more pieces, too. I’m realizing from some of the comments I’ve gotten back from friends that a big hurdle in the genre is the idea of deus ex mechina. As an Orthodox Jew, I strongly believe that Hashem runs the world…and that everything will be “right” in the end. The sci-fi genre, in particular, has a big undercurrent of rugged individualism, and fantasy often depends on the threat that things could work out very badly indeed, with evil at odds with good and totally independent of it. These tendencies tend to conflict. I’m trying to resolve it in my writing.

fantasy, sci-fi and the Jewish reader

beccakinla Ami, books, children, fantasy, frum, Hereville, kids, literature, Orthodox, sci-fi, Torah 1 Comment
Thanks to my brother-in-law Joshua, I just heard about a wonderful new graphic novel called Hereville. The subject: an 11 y o Orthodox girl fights trolls. With a little research, I discovered that this is currently the #1 Jewish book for kids being sold on Amazon. This doesn’t surprise me in this least. There is a dearth of fantasy and sci-fi books for Jewish kids out there, but there is certainly demand.

Look at the popularity of Harry Potter novels, Percy Jackson adventures, The Dragonriders of Pern, the Circle of Magic series (by Tamora Pierce), The Blue Sword and other books by Robin McKinley, and all those early Heinleins (in his pre-Stranger in a Strange Land days when he still wrote “appropriate” material). Frankly, kids crave these types of books. Why? 1) Kids and teens want to be experience more than their everyday lives. This is escapism from the discomforts of childhood–bullying, homework, parental rule, etc. 2) Kids and teens are still learning to be comfortable with themselves. They have yet to learn many of their personal strengths and often feel inadequate. Many of them hope their hidden talents will “magically” come out and prove them to be special (maybe they’ll even save the world!), a common theme in many of these books.

Jewish kids are no different in these psychological needs. Some frum parents let their kids read secular sci-fi books, but there are a lot of problems with unrestricted access to them. Many fantasy books incorporate pantheism, animism, and avodah zara. Some (His Dark Materials series by Phillip Pullman, for example) are outright anti-religion. Others describe magic as an appealing alternative religion (many Tamora Pierce books).

Sci-fi books also frequently espouse atheism or portray Science as religion. Moreover, many frum people are uncomfortable with idea of life on other planets, though it is not clear that this opinion has a sound basis in our tradition. Another big barrier in portraying the future is that Moshiach must come, and most rabbeim hold He’ll arrive by the year 6000 on our calendar. Finally, the rigors of space travel introduce unwieldy elements into narratives about Jewish characters: halachic times, Shabbos, kashrus, etc. all must be dealt with.

I think we’re slowing coming to grips with these issues. I’ve seen some fantasy and sci-fi in the fiction department on Chabad.org. A few years ago, there was a fun adult novel of speculative fiction by David Shapiro called The Promise of G-d, and an anthology called Wandering Stars which is Jewish, though certainly not Orthodox. On the juvenile literature front, time travel has become an acceptable subgenre somehow–there’s The Devil’s Apprentice and Trekking Through Time. In 2009, a blogger described the 2009 Jewish Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators Conference at the 92nd Street Y. There, participants were told that among the “in demand” topics was time travel, and that one lecture was about writing Jewish books for the “Twilight Generation”.

There was a piece in HaModia for You set in space last year, and currently the Aim tween supplement to Ami Magazine has a serial with a sci-fi mystery called “To the Edge of the Galaxy.” (disclaimer: I co-author it with Beth Firestone). Ami specifically wanted a sci-fi spin on the serial.

And now there’s Hereville. The reviews I’ve seen are great, and the readers aren’t just religious or even just Jews. Maybe the time for authentically Jewish sci-fi and fantasy books has come. It would be my fantasy come true!



great news!

beccakinla Aim, Ami, children, firestone, Jewish, kids, klempner, magazines, Mishpacha Junior, Orthodox, sci-fi Leave a comment

I haven’t been active on my page for a while, but I wanted to share good news with anyone who drops by.

I’ve been publishing articles on the website www.metroimma.com about parenting small children and connection between real-life and classic children’s books.
The new Jewish magazine, Ami, is now available by subscription at http://www.amimagazine.org/ and on the newsstands in NYC and Chicago…hopefully, it’ll be available in all major Jewish markets soon. I’m co-authoring one of the weekly serials contained in the Aim tween supplement (my co-author is Beth Firestone, known for her novel Candles in my Window). It’s entitled “To the Edge of the Galaxy”. The story follows the adventures of an Orthodox family chosen to colonize a distant planet. I’m hoping all you readers up there will pick up a copy of Ami and try it out!

Additionally, Mishpacha Junior magazine published a story of mine a couple of months ago and expects to publish another soon. I’m really enjoying writing for periodicals and will continue to list my ongoing projects.