Heroes and Villains for a New Reality...

http://www.lillibridgepress.com/genre/science-fiction

My science fiction novelette "Meeting" depicts a future in which reality is  constructed out of technology and artificial intelligence; countless bits of data that can be selectively re-shuffled to create new realities at will.  Science fiction in general has long warned us of advancing surveillance and data manipulation technology encroaching on our basic freedoms.

Once again, reality is catching up with sci-fi.  In this new age of on-line communication and increasingly wide-spread governmental data surveillance, a new kind of anti-hero has emerged:  cyberhackers.  Call them what you will.  Heroes or Villains.  Anarchists or whistle blowers.  Champions of freedom, or traitors.  They are an inevitable by-product of an age in which even democratic governments such as ours are amassing unimaginably vast databases that contain all our personal communications, presenting an enormous potential for oppression and invasion of personal privacy.

Edward Snowden is the most recent in a series of hackers who leak classified information to the public.  Some would praise him and some would bury him.  Some see him as a new kind of heroic American revolutionary who, instead of throwing tea into Boston Harbor to protest taxation without representation, breaks down the allegedly unconstitutional walls of government-classified information and adds a sorely needed degree of transparency to a dangerously opaque and increasingly secretive state of cyber-surveillance.  Others see him as a strutting egoist, a product of a narcissist generation which lives in their own artificial cyber reality, believing themselves above the law and seeing real life as being boundless as the Internet.

Whether you see Snowden as hero or villain, there is no denying that he and others like him have opened a badly needed national debate on the appropriate boundaries of governmental snooping and personal privacy.  Advocates of nation-wide governmental data collection on our private communications argue that such surveillance can be obtained only with the review and approval of the FISA court.  And, what is that?  It's a secret court for secret business.  It's a shadow court; a shadow cabinet that functions as an arm of the executive branch of government and is guided not by constitutional law, but rather functions like an unelected legislative body that weighs the pros and cons of whether to surveil or not.  It was set up to handle the monitoring of international communications for the purpose of national security.  If the NSA or FBI comes to them with a request for surveillance on a "U.S. person" (the definition of which is becoming increasingly vague) the FISA court's answer is supposed to be "no."

But, for how much longer?  In an age where we've seen our government illegally kidnap, detain and torture people in the name of national security, and even kill American citizens with predator drones... when national security can justify the Executive circumventing both Congress and Constitution in deciding what rights of privacy (or, even life itself) the rest of us have... Where then is the system of checks and balances between our three branches of government that is supposedly one of the cornerstones of our way of life?

Naturally, debates over the reach of the executive branch and the military pre-date the cyber age.  We've all heard of the unconstitutional mass-internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, and of the excesses of the Nixon administration, exposed by the Watergate scandal.  But, cyber spying brings an old national debate into a whole new arena.  And, of course, the promises and dangers of the cyber age are not limited to the U.S.  We've all seen how the power of the Internet helped launch social uprising in the Middle East (the "Arab Spring") and how the Red Chinese government has tried (with only limited success) to control the Internet as an instrument of social dissent.   An organized campaign of cyber-espionage and cyber-virus warfare is being launched out of Red China against the U.S.  Cyber space, it seems will be the next battlefield, both for international conflict and internal social dissent.

As has always been the case when dealing with the Internet, few rules apply in establishing intellectual property.  The private sector has had to deal with this, and now the government must.  Rules have to be set, but they should be decided upon in open Congressional debate under the watch of an informed public.  The fate of our fundamental rights should not be decided in secret, in a shadow reality over which our democratic process has no control.  Our country has, after all, survived for over two centuries and prevailed against a succession of powerful enemies  without having to sacrifice our fundamental rights of privacy or freedom of peaceful assembly and communication.

The Internet promises to give the human race an unprecedented degree of connectedness and freedom.  Deciding how to deal with that wider realm of activity and knowledge presents a new challenge for our democracy.  People like Snowden believe knowledge should be free and unfettered for all.  Whatever else you may think of him, or what you think should be done to him, it is hard to resist that sentiment.  After all... knowledge is power.  And, human nature being what it is ... when the select few control that much knowledge ... Can freedom survive?

Are we still in Kansas?

http://www.lillibridgepress.com   (Science Fiction)


Venus Loop is a purely fictional story of a planet destroyed by its own pollution.

But, once again, reality is inching closer to the horrors of science fiction.  Our darkest fantasies seem to creep closer every year.  Wildfires.  Droughts.  Coastal flooding.  Now, tornadoes tearing their way across the plain states.  Storms breaking hundred year records coming one upon the other in just a few days.   (Where's the great and powerful Oz when you need him?)

Yes, Virginia:  It's global warming.  Complicated in its details, yes, but basically simple.  Rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) resulting from the burning of fossil fuels trap the sun's heat, causing the world to grow warmer, decade by decade.  As the temperature rises, glaciers melt, the sea level rises.  Which means more moisture and warmer air over the sea.  The result, of course, is more powerful storms in greater frequency.

I've been blogging about global warming for what seems like forever.  I've attended countless science lectures and demonstrations.  Here in Boston, the global warming awareness group 350 (Too late: 350, the scientifically calculated maximum ratio of CO2 in our atmosphere before we pass the point of no return has expired; we've reached 400) has held numerous rallies -- fun events in Christopher Columbus Park, with people wearing wet suits and swim gear, symbolizing the day Boston will be swallowed by rising sea levels.  The other day, I attended a 350 demo at Revere Beach.  Like all such demos, it had a catchy name:  Hands Across the Sand.  Less than a dozen people showed up.

Remember when the public was actually aware of the threat of global warming?  A failing economy and escalating culture war seems to have diverted our attention, even as our towns and cities flood, burn or sail off into the storm clouds.  What does it take to wake the public up again?  If a twister a mile wide tearing across Oklahoma doesn't do it, what will?  A major flood in Boston or New York?  The scenes of devastation in the storm's wake brought tears to the eyes of a TV reporter.  It made the bombing of Oklahoma City seem almost insignificant by comparison.  This time, there's no terrorist to execute; we can't reclaim control of our lives so easily this time.  (We could try a few more executions as sacrifices to the storm gods--the way our culture's going, I wouldn't put it past us.  I doubt it would help, though.)  Switching to clean, renewable energy sources and redesigning our cities to weather the existing damage might.  If there's time.

Time's running short, folks.  How many more wake-up calls do we need?

Snakebite Horror reviews "Desert Flower"

Vampire fiction fans...

Nate D. Burleigh, Author of "Sustenance" reviews my vampire novelette "Desert Flower":

"Tom Olbert's Novella “Desert Flower” brings two worlds together in an epic supernatural tale of lost virtue, friendship, love, and blood."

To read more:

http://snakebitehorror.weebly.com/5/post/2013/02/desert-flower-by-tom-olbert-rating.html

African American characters in science fiction

FLAGS - a science fiction novelette by Tom Olbert, published by Lillibridge Press

"In this dark and dangerous view of humanity's future, mankind appears hopelessly splintered into religious, racial, and cultural factions. In the middle of all this violence and chaos, two men meet as enemies: Jamal, a seasoned military veteran, and Matthew, a young idealist. Soon they are forced into an unlikely alliance when their two embattled societies are attacked by an alliance intent on their mutual destruction.

Jamal lives, his inner strength sustaining him and his faith. Even though Matthew survives, he appears hopelessly lost. Together, they struggle to conquer both their enemies and themselves. With war on all fronts, how can they stand united under flags?"

http://www.lillibridgepress.com/genre/science-fiction

In "Flags", I presented a grim picture of a future in which interstellar travel and extra-terrestrial colonization, in placing greater physical distances between people, succeeds in taking racial and cultural segregation to the ultimate degree:  genocidal interstellar war.  The story demonstrates how enemies can become allies, later even friends when faced with a common foe.  How racial identity can bring former enemies together.  And, how racial hatred can become an infectious evil, corrupting the soul and ultimately destroying the very fabric of human decency.  It holds out hope (though only a slim one) that something higher in Man can rise above the dehumanizing effect of racism.

Excerpt:

“The name of that world is New Bethlehem,” Matthew cried out, his voice cracking, his throat still sore from the gas as he strained against the two grunts holding him.  “I’m sorry to say I wasn’t there, no.  But, I wish to God I had been, if only to send more of you stinking Muslims to a just end!”  The fat man kneed him in the stomach, hard.  He doubled over in pain, falling to his knees, spit dribbling to the floor.  The fat man grabbed him by the hair and yanked his head back, his wide, angry dark face staring into his.

            “I lost both my sisters in the first raid, you murdering piece of...”

            “Mohammed!” the captain barked, standing up behind the desk.  “Touch that prisoner again, and you will face court martial!”

            “But, sir...Jamal...” the man said with pain in his voice, turning to face his commanding officer.  “He killed those three men in the gunnery room and destroyed two of our landers.  Thirty-three men in all, dead because of this stinking...”

            “Fair kills.” the Captain said quietly through tight lips as he stiffly re-seated himself.  He stared at Matthew and gently shook his head.  “So much for the renowned Christian spirit of forgiveness,” he muttered sarcastically, drumming his long fingers together.  Laying his hands flat on the desk top, he spoke in the clear, hard tone of an officer.  “On your feet, corporal.”  The two grunts roughly stood Matthew up.  “Your homeworld, all other member states of the Black Christian Alliance and all galactic territories formerly under their sphere of influence are now protectorates of the Black Muslim Brotherhood.  You, corporal, are a prisoner of war and will be held here pending transport to our homeworld, Mecca IV where a military tribunal will determine your fate.  Take him to the stockade and book him on the next star transport out.”

            Matthew defiantly spat at the man’s desk as he was led away by the two soldiers.  A security alarm sounded, harsh and shrill.  The enemy captain swore under his breath and opened a com channel to his troops in the field.  The holo cube glowed and the terrified face of a Muslim ground force commander appeared, floating on the air, gray ripples of static passing through the man’s features.  “Lieutenant Achmed, Sector 5 reporting.”

            “What is it, Achmed?” the captain asked in an irritated tone, as if he had more important things on his mind.

            “Sir, we’re under attack!  All strategic sectors!  Landers and A.P.C.’s...we’re outnumbered and taking heavy fire!”  The sounds of artillery rumbled through the radio speaker, white flashes distorting the holo transmission.  Matthew’s heart soared with elation.  It wasn’t over!

            “Hold your positions, Lieutenant!” the captain ordered, his voice tense and angry.  “We’ll send for reinforcements from homeworld.”

            “Sir...” the static was getting worse.  “We’ve received offworld distress calls from our star squadrons.  Our home systems have fallen under heavy attack as well.”

            “What?!” the captain roared, rearing up behind his desk.  Matthew laughed out loud.  “That’s impossible.  The B.C.A. has no squadrons left!”

            “Its not the B.C.A., sir.  They’re bombing the Christian cities to hell!  And, ours as well!”  Matthew suddenly felt himself turning to stone.

            “Who the hell is?!”

            “See for yourself, Captain.”  The Lieutenant’s eyes looked down and the holographic scene changed to a ground level live-transmit image of invading troops disembarking from armored personnel carriers.  The words SECTOR 5 appeared in the lower left corner of the image.  The A.P.C.’s were marked with an emblem Matthew had never seen outside holotexts before:  An upraised white fist against the back-drop of a planet, a spaceship circling.  The emblem of the Darwinist Consortium.  Matthew stared in disbelief.  It couldn’t be.  As the armored shock troopers leaving the A.P.C.’s approached the transmitting holo camera, Matthew could make out their faces under their helmets.  Angry, screaming faces, pasty-pink in color.  There was no longer any doubt.  “Whites,” Matthew whispered in shock.

            The hologram scene changed again, the words SECTOR 12 appearing.  More invading white troops, more A.P.C.’s, but with a different emblem displayed on their flanks.  A bearded white head with a horned helmet, like the Vikings of ancient Earth.  The Odinist Empire, Matthew realized.  Was he dreaming?  The hologram changed again.  SECTOR 19 this time.  Same pattern of attack by white soldiers.  This time, the A.P.C.’s were marked with a white cross against a red background.  The White Christian Confederation.  How could this be, Matthew thought desperately.  Those three white nations had been mortal enemies for decades.  Why were they suddenly fighting under one command with a common objective?  Unless...Matthew’s blood froze.

            “Take the cuffs off that man,” the captain said, pulling on body armor and loading a plasma rifle.  “And, release those Christians in the stockade.  Issue them whatever guns we can spare.”

            His sergeant...the one named Mohammed...looked as though he couldn’t believe his ears.  “Sir...they’re the enemy.”

            “That is the enemy, moron!” the captain screamed, pointing at the holo projection as he ran towards the door.

            Matthew was too numb to think as they took the restraining cuffs off him and shoved a rifle into his hands.  All he could do was follow his enemy through the same door through which he had, a few short hours ago, followed the men that enemy had killed.  What now, Sweet Jesus?

**********   

As we enter Black History Month, let's reflect on how African American characters have been featured in science fiction over the preceding decades.  In the pulp sci-fi of the 30's and 40's and in the only slightly more contemplative SF of the 50's, hardly at all.  While science fiction was in its early days in many respects a trail-blazing genre, it was still, like any other marketed commodity, an avatar of a still segregated and bigoted society.  We could dream of bright, fantastic future adventures in interstellar space, but not of racial equality.  The imaginary heroes conquering the galaxy were as WASP-ish as they could be.

As society changed, SF reflected the changes.  STAR TREK broke daring new ground by introducing a weekly multi-ethnic, multi-racial cast to present the idealistic image of a completely integrated and diverse United Earth of the future.  The lead character, of course, the heroic order-barking Captain Kirk, was still as purely Anglo-Saxon as could be imagined.  The show's only regular African character was Lt. Uhura "whose name means 'Freedom'."  Memorable for her striking beauty and often outspoken independence, she did help to inspire a generation.  (Whoopi Goldberg, who decades later played the insightful space-traveling Guinan on Star Trek: The Next Generation said she was inspired by Uhura, since she was the only positive African role model she got to see on T.V. as a kid.)  But, when all is said and done, Uhura was allowed to be little more than a glorified telephone operator, and even Guinan little more than a bartender, though both characters had considerably more potential.  The Next-Gen character Geordi Laforge (played by Levar Burton of "Roots" fame) did break new ground both as an African American character and as a blind character.  But alas, not as a lead character.

Science fiction is what lets the next generation dream.  And, the historic absence of black faces among the pioneering heroes of popular science fiction is one more reflection of an evolving society that still has a long way to go.  Case in point, in the 70's, the parade of lilly-white faces in STAR WARS -- the blonde, boyish Luke Skywalker, the cowboy-like Han Solo, the venerable, bearded Obi-Wan Kenobi or the moral purity envisioned in the Caucasian looks of Princess Leia.  The dashing presence of Billy Dee Williams as Lando Calrissian was, at best, a distraction.

In the 90's, the first African American Star Fleet commander in the STAR TREK franchise was Benjamin Sisko of Deep Space Nine.  A powerful and memorable figure, his character was introduced in bitter tragedy, in the aftermath of his wife's death.  Still grieving and unable to move on, Sisko is thrust involuntarily into the role of religious messiah on an alien world still recovering from its own great tragedy.  Watching the Sisko character evolve through the years of the show was interesting and unique.  In addition to being the first African American lead character on STAR TREK, he was also the first to raise a child on the show and undergo a religious conversion.  Though a very strong character, Sisko's potential was somewhat overshadowed by the fact that the show had more of an ensemble chemistry than other Trek ventures.  (Sisko did not make full captain until late in the series.)  Avery Brooks, the actor who portrayed Sisko once commented about the show, in context with African American history, citing the bitter irony of the racial discrimination his father had suffered "all so I can climb through holes and fight monsters."  (Progress of a sort, I suppose.)

And today, as we enter the second term of our nation's first African-American president, and science fiction is slowly making its way back into popularity after a long post-9/11 low, how do African American characters fare in the genre?  Will Smith has become a familiar face in the SF genre, both as one of the farcical "Men in Black" and as the brave, wise-cracking Air Force fighter pilot in the high-budget corn-ball War of the Worlds rip-off known as "Independence Day."  His strongest and most serious SF role to date was "Legend" the remake of the now-classic post-apocalyptic "last man on Earth" tale which has been remade again and again over the years.  This was the first time we allowed ourselves to see a black man as the last hope of humanity, and Will Smith gave a strong performance; a welcome departure from the smart-mouthed clowning for which he was previously well-known.  Mr. Smith's latest project in the genre is an offbeat-looking far-future action film known as "After Earth," in which he plays a father struggling to keep his young son alive in a hostile environment.  Again, it's one man against the universe, and the brave face of humanity is African.

Perhaps African SF is the current frontier of the genre that dares to look to the future.  But, I'm sure it won't be the last frontier.

Review of "Desert Flower"

http://www.horrorpalace.com/2013/01/16/desert-flower-book-review/

Lovers of vampire fiction and creatures of the night --

Check out the latest review of my vampire novelette "Desert Flower" at the delightfully horrific site:  The Horror Palace:

http://www.horrorpalace.com/2013/01/16/desert-flower-book-review/

Death's Door, devil's gate...

And, here we are again.  In the wake of America's latest (and sadly, probably not last) senseless mass shooting.

The pattern is familiar:  The prime-time close-ups of trembling, teary-eyed faces, hugs, candles, ribbons, photos and road-side monuments and shrines.  The parade of mourning relatives, the brief national unification in grief, anger and dismay.

And then, of course, the politics.  Throughout the preceding tragedies, the NRA has held firmly to its position on gun access:  "From our cold, dead hands."  And, apparently, over the cold, dead bodies of a growing roster of innocent victims.  Same old argument:  Guns don't kill, people kill.  (Primarily, people with guns, but somehow they always seem to miss the connection.)

Some say it's different this time, that the American people have finally had enough of this madness and are finally ready to follow the example of other countries (Scotland, New Zealand, etc.) who, in the wake of their similar tragedies have imposed stricter gun laws which have significantly reduced violence.  Some say the tide is finally turning towards sanity, and that it is no longer political suicide to stand up for gun control.  Amen.

But, even before the bodies were cold, we were already hearing the familiar voices of the gun crowd through their mock tears.  If the teachers had been armed, they argue, they could have killed the gunman before he killed any children.  I remember when I went to Kindergarten and grade school, they wouldn't even let us play guns in class.  Now, we're supposed to have teachers with holsters on their belts and ammo belts draped across their chests as they write on the blackboard.  Brilliant.  Arm everybody.  Ah, for the days of the old west.  The pearl-handled six-guns glinting in the sun as two men face each other on a dusty street.  Nowadays, substitute Uzi's, assault rifles or laser-scope slide-action automatics for Colt 45's, but same idea.  Every second bar-room scuffle and lunch room argument over sexual territory ending in gunfire.  We're not really that far gone, are we?  Let's hope this tragedy is as much as it takes to bring us out of the Clint Eastwood fantasy world we've been living in and get our leaders to institute effective and lasting gun control.

But, it could just as easily go the other way.  With all the talk this latest tragedy has generated about mental health, we may end up keeping the guns, but instituting Orwellian methods of social mind control.  With our kids already medicated half out of their minds, what's next?  Mandatory mind-altering medication, intensive isolation or shock treatments for every kid who even looks too sad or too quiet for comfort?  (Sound far-fetched?  They used to do that with kids suspected of being homosexual, you know.)

When death comes in a form as horrific as this, it can shake a people off their present course.  Which path they take from there depends on many factors, none simple.  We puzzle and agonize about what kind of dark journey leads a lonely, angry young man to mass destruction.  We should take note of our own dark journey as a society along the way.  How we love our guns.  How we lick our lips and salivate when going to war in some land across the sea most of our kids can't find on a map.  When mass slaughter hits us close to home, whether from foreign would-be martyrs in the sky or suicidal loner nihilists entering class rooms or work places with legally obtained firearms, we are stunned.  We're not used to being hit at home.  Lifetimes separated Pearl harbor and 9/11.  We've grown safe and spoiled with an ocean between us and the old world.  Mass destruction is something we inflict on others; not the reverse.  So many flowers and candles and photos.  But, not one for the thousands of innocents killed by our predator drones.  So many lonely ones among us waiting to channel demons we usually export.

In death's wake, we pause to stop and reflect.  We've been isolated too long as a people, perhaps.  Maybe if we stopped romanticizing violence as a simple way to solve every problem, we wouldn't be tasting explosions of violence among ourselves, erupting like cancerous boils, inflicting harm no external enemy could.

Dina Rae's Halo of the Damned

Read my review of Dina Rae's supernatural thriller "Halo of the Damned" at:

http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/468525009