Cyberpunk and the City – the view from AussieCon4

Commentary with great validity from the 2010 WorldCon echoed many traditional science fiction themes. A panel discussion with Marianne de Pierres, Charles Stross, Russell Blackford and Gord Sellar looked at genres and modern examples.

Nylon Angel by Marianne de Pierres`

Although influenced by cyberpunk but suggesting they may not be cyberpunk writers, both Charles and Gord agreed with Marianne on a basic point of view – we are living in a world that is exhibiting phobias brought on by future shock. Examples from the panel and the floor included the seeking of power and the resulting repression and “police security” culture in some countries, and even some states or regions within countries.

Clarkesworld by Gord Sellar

The “city as a character” was examined, including Gotham and the writing of Dickens, while it was also suggested cities have not achieved their full promise yet. The city need not necessarily be dystopian or bleak although the rise of China and Japan offered potential storylines of cities with vast populations and the impacts on the citizens.

Saturn's Children by Charles Stross

The panel also suggested sub-genres, for example biopunk, and books like Shockwave Rider were essentially concerned with people in extreme future shock. The discussion included examples of post-cyberpunk – which has changed organically – but the overview suggested the underlying aesthetic from William Gibson still exists. The themes of fundamentalism, whether political, cultural or religious, inform many steampunk novels, short stories and the related sub-genres.

One stream of discussion wondered if William Gibson and other early writers of cyberpunk were using a personna building methodology and so “punk” is about the writers rather than an integral element of their stories.

 

Pitching The Novel – advice from AussieCon4

An important stream of panels at the 2010 WorldCon concentrated on the publishing issues facing authors and artists, including John Berlyne, Simon Spanton, Rowena Cory Daniels and Ginjer Buchanan speaking on how to approach agents and publishers.

The blogs of agents and publishers – plus the Twitter feeds from agents, authors, publishers and editors – are full of advice for new and established writers. Nonetheless the panel gathered together most of the important issues and techniques that now assist authors in their quest for publication.

Rowena Cory Daniels

Rowena is an author and also runs workshops on pitching. Her advice summarised many key requirements of how to approach getting a novel published:

• define the genre you’re working in
• create a brief “elevator pitch” and polish it til it shines
• develop a powerful synopsis
• determine the market strengths of your work
• undertake extensive research into agents and publishers

Simon is deputy publishing director at Orion and Gollancz and added some pointers:

• the novel must be finished
• never under-value the research into agents and publishers
• don’t rely solely on pitching
• use the web or workshops to get your name and work known

John from Zeno literary agency added:

• the quality of the writer is exhibited in the pitch although that may not accurately reflect the quality of the novel
• the quality of submission needs to be professional rather than clever

Ginjer Buchanan

Ginger is editor in chief at Ace, alongside many other key responsibilities in the publishing empire she inhabits. The advice from the other panelists was underlined repeatedly by Ginjer with a number of humorous anecdotes from her experience.

Ginjer added that pitching to an editor is the same protocol as pitching to an agent, and please desist with bold, underlined, red, green and/or blue “emphasis” (or indeed any other “tricks”) in your pitch documents. While mildly amusing for a moment, such devices do not create a professional impression and may ruin the publication hopes of a well-written novel.

 

The Steampunk Playground Within Speculative Fiction

The issues of “what is” and “where is” could be more important to steampunk than the conventional “what if” of science fiction themes, according to Richard Harland, John Berlyne and Jay Lake.

John Berlyne

In fact, Jay considers steampunk is fantasy rather than science fiction, while Richard pondered whether steampunk is a style rather than a literary movement in itself. Nonetheless the panel said style can continue as a standard and separated steampunk from being just “a fashion” which could be seen as a date-related fad.

Richard Harland

The panel considered steampunk today is historical and Victorian to a large extent, whereas Wells and Verne were writing contemporaneously so, in a sense, not steampunk although their themes and concerns inform the genre today. The panel also viewed medieval and Dickens and gothic within the style, while suggesting Dune as an archetypal steampunk movie.

Although the writing style exists in its own right, games, costumes, movies and art probably return more revenue than books.

Steampunk requires strength in the characters and in the storylines so it appeals to the eccentric and the non-sterile mindset, and John added that it has a link to raw invention, making it pre-technology to an extent.