Another Space in Time

Okay- so you have your first ever completed fiction book. You are not alone, another thousand have been written today. So, how are you going to add enough to your great story to turn it into something that readers will think is great? A good idea is to sit down with the 'Elements of Active Prose' for an hour, before you start your first personal edit. Ten more private edits, then read again. You will hopefully find that you have absorbed at least a little from that hour of advice. Of course, you could read Newland's guide first. But most of us won't, I wouldn't, I was born knowing how to write. Few of you will be quite as arrogant as I tend to be, but I'm sure you get the picture. There isn't a wrong way to write, but there is often a better way. Do I follow all the rules? Not a chance. Will you? I don't know, that's not the point. The point is to learn to sit outside your work looking in, seeing where you could do things just slightly better...

These short stories are like snapshots in time, the way things were in passing, not stories that conclude, but rather flashes of action that are left to run on in our own imaginations. There is a good diversity of main characters each with their own stories, stories painted with good supporting casts. There is a partial end point to a couple of the stories that strongly determines direction, but basically the reader is left with a great deal of adventure. These glimpses into other's lives are set in French, English and Spanish speaking environments. I'm sure that they reflect by degrees not only Rogers observations and also his own experiences across the world. As with all collected works, some will interest any individual reader more than they will another. All though are enjoyable and encouraging of thought long after the book reading device has dropped into stand-by mode. This is a short book, quality rather than quantity, and well worth the little it costs. I only...

The title is very appropriate- a good place to start and a connection that is often missing. The future here isn't one I would be eager for, one in which a super species, computer intelligence, and manipulated humans/androids, seem to subvert the very laws of nature and even of physics. This is about progress defeating culture, science defeating religion, and I sense a final hopelessness for the rebel 'Orphanage' in a following book. The 'Mother against invention' may not get another outing, as the script does stand alone, but I expect one. The style is very much telling, reporting, by characters. There is no omnipresent voice. This is a difficult style to pull off. We read a series of reports from different characters, different angles and shifting time. I was happy with that, but felt I needed to be taking my own notes. I'm sure I missed some significant points, which is always easier to do when the story is driven by detail about events rather that events ...