Categories
Books

James Tiptree, Jr.: The double life of Alice B. Sheldon

(by Julie Phillips) The book was extremely interesting and held my attention throughout. I’ve never been a big fan of biographies before, but this was either exceptionally well written, hit my interests spot on, or I’ve come to enjoy the complexities of a full life.

Alli’s life was full and complex. She grew up half smothered under parental love, but was also dragged along on long journeys from the time she was six. He parents were famous and a part of the society scene, and her mom in specific was highly respected. Alli tired early on of being told, “if you grow up to be half the woman your mother is…”

Alli seems bright, but very prone to the trap of originality. Throughout her life she struggled with big issues [the relations of male and female, the role of artists], but seemed determined to intuit her way to solutions rather than learning from others. Part of her problem stemmed from a lack of good woman role model in art and the other fields that interested her.

Her life wasn’t a string of successes, though the support of her family meant that her failures could be weathered in some comfort. She was impulsive– she married her first husband four days after meeting him. It didn’t work out very well– they were both rebellious and felt it was their duty to shock and provoke society. Alcohol and drugs made their marriage a difficult one to endure. It was stormy, with lots of shouting, threats, and temporary separations. They soon moved on to a full divorce.

At loose ends, she joined the army auxiliaries in the 1940s, survived the absorption of the auxiliaries into the full army, learned the tricks of analyzing surveillance photos, and found her husband “Ting”. They had a shaky marriage as the war wound down and they transitioned to civilian life, and soon decided to move to a farm and breed chickens. That lasted for almost five years before they drifted back into city life and joined the new CIA. Her husband did very well in the CIA, but Alli bounced from assignment to assignment and wasn’t looking forward to a career well behind her husband. Her introversion surfaced strongly and reacted badly to the stress and long hours of CIA life– she could project a cheerful front, but it wiped her out. (This entire time was trying to their marriage; she disappeared for months and they considered divorce, but they negotiated a very non-standard arrangement. They soon came to really love each other and twined deep into each other.)

She retired from the CIA and went into research. She enjoyed research and learning, but was terrible at getting along with her department, didn’t want to go through applying for grants, and picked a great singular topic for research– a fascinating study about novelty. But it wasn’t really structured to lead to a stream of research on the topic and she soon after defending her thesis, she left the life of research behind.

Throughout her life, Alli had a strained relationship with her mom, but now her mom was suffering more severely from aging. Alli also struggled with depression throughout her life, and particularly after her stint in the CIA, amphetamine addiction.

She was in her fifties by now and kind of at loose ends. She submitted some quickly written short stories and was amazed when they were accepted. She sent them in under the name James Tiptree, Jr.– whimsically selected from a jar of jam and joking with her husband.

Her pen name allowed her a whole new world of relationships with editors, fans, and fellow authors. Her life’s experiences were well suited to a man’s history, allowing her to write without much separation from herself. She kept her real identity hidden for almost a decade despite increasing curiosity from the whole science fiction community. During this time she established several strong relationships with other authors– including Ursula LeGuin, who she nicknamed Starbear. After his mother’s death Tiptree’s identity fell apart, robbing her of the solace the alter ego had provided. [Particularly interesting to me was the strength of her connection to LeGuin– she was the first person Alli wrote when she was warned that her secret was unraveling.]

Thereafter she wrote fewer stories, as age struck her husband and herself. Their yearly vacations to the lodge, Canada, and Mexico became more complicated (due to health issues) and finally had to be set aside. Eventually she killed Ting and herself at home.

There’s a lot of very interesting stuff that I skimmed right by– her sexuality and her lifelong questions about it, her early career as a painter, and a lot of interesting depth about all of her relations. It made for fascinating reading, and is a book I highly recommend.

Categories
Books

Out of the Everywhere by James Tiptree Jr. (and Raccoona Sheldon)

Out of the Everywhere and Other Extraordinary Visions (1981) is a solid short story collection by Alice Sheldon. (The two names in the title are the pseudonyms she wrote these stories under). This is a solid collection of mostly good stories. As she later wrote, the weaker stories are typically written by Raccoona, but they’re all interesting.

One interesting short story is Raccoona’s The Screwfly Solution, which turns men into monsters. The final two stories in the collection are also interesting. Out of the Everywhere is a strange mix of viewpoints, including a cosmic wisp drifting among the stars and several humans who are all linked. The last story was very strong– With Delicate Mad Hands— a strange longing for the stars, a tale of repression and bullying, and a first contact story all rolled up together.

Categories
Books

Meet Me at Infinity by James Tiptree, Jr.

This is a great book to read if you’ve read everything else by/about James Tiptree, Jr./Alice Sheldon. I made the mistake of reading it first and it was just… okay. The book consists of rarely and never published fiction (some from before her writing career took off, some published once in a zine or small collection, and so on), and non-fiction contributions to fanzines. The stories are generally weak but fun– it’s not hard to see why they weren’t submitted or weren’t accepted at the time, but they’re still interesting for a breezy read.

The fanzine non-fiction contributions and relationship with Jeffrey Smith, the small-circulation fanzine editor who later became literary executor of her will, are the core of the book. She is insightful about her vacation spots, with great snippets of place and people. I particularly liked the contributions to the Women in Science Fiction circular– I think I’d like to read the whole thing and get the context.

Again, if you already love Tiptree, you’ll probably love this book. If you’re just getting started on her works, save this for last.

Categories
Books

Lavinia by Ursula K. LeGuin

A wonderful book, set in a the world of the Aeneid. (I’ve never read it, but I have read many references to the Aeneid before.) LeGuin takes her character from the margins of the poem and delves deep into her life. It reads as historical fiction, which was amplified by some of the choices she made [and explained in the afterword].

Lavinia’s life is regimented and “poor” for a princess– the kingdoms of coastal Italy aren’t huge and lack the impressive tax base that comes later. Religion and faith are constant and soothing– and smaller scale. It’s the gods of the hearth, not Olympian gods striding the battlefields.

The lives of the simple kingdom are turned upside down by Lavinia’s actions and the interference of “the poet”. The presence of the poet was mixed to me– in many ways I appreciated his presence and tie to the poem, but it doesn’t mesh well with the detailed life that we see and experience. If they were missing, I’d have enjoyed it as pure historical fiction… but there’s a constant umbilical that keeps this from drifting back into pure fiction.

Lavinia’s role is circumscribed by society– you’ll be disappointed if you’re looking for a warrior woman wielding a bloody blade. There’s a lot of action and struggle and the world changes, which was plenty for me.

I enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone who would appreciate a story of powers viewed on edge. This is the story of moving and shaking, but subtly.

Categories
Books

Dead to Me by Anton Trout

The first book in a series lent to me by Stacy. Thanks!

It’s an appealing story about Simon Canderous, who can read the history of objects with a touch. It doesn’t always take intent, which kicks the book off with a bang. As the book goes on, we learn about his employer (the Department of Extraordinary Affairs) and we’re introduced to a few other vivid people.

The plot moves along, and poor Simon gets drug through alleys, slopped in slime, encounters a compelling ghost, raids an upscale cult headquarters, and more. His love life is horrible* [in a book sense: certainly active and compelling from my POV, but anyway…], but things turn around as it goes.

It’s similar to other “White Wolfesque” books– similar to the Dresden Files, and could easily be in the same universe. There are a lot of people who are in on the secret world– an entire Bureau in New York alone. It seems likely to spill out into public knowledge with so many people in the know… but that’s true with just about the entire genre.

In the end, it was a fun book in a sub-genre I typically like– and the power was handled interestingly enough that it didn’t trip my “been there, done that” fatigue.

Categories
Books

WWW:Wake by Robert J. Sawyer

This book was a very quick read; easy to keep track of even with distractions. I polished it off in a couple of days and enjoyed it. The book seems very tidy–each of the seemingly unrelated threads advances at a good pace and signals ties for later.

The book examines intelligence and self awareness from several angles, including an AI coming into its own and a bright ape that masters representation and communication, questioning exactly what level of intelligence has rights…

The threads are bright and obvious and lack the subtlety of LeGuin in Powers. Despite that, it’s a fine read, clearly the beginning of a series; I’ll keep my eye out for the next.

Categories
Books

Powers by Ursula K. LeGuin

By far my favorite of the Annals of the Western Shore, this book is a great continuation of an interesting world. More important– this book is about Gavir, a house slave in the city of Etra. It is very well written, empathy for Gavir is immediate and strong.

Gavir provides a great viewpoint of the world. His house, the city, and the world are all positively revealed through his eyes. As the book goes on, Gavir learns, but his core nature remains unchanged. His relationships involve a huge mix of relative power and authority. His book knowledge is widely respected and makes him popular in many ways, but it alters the way he’s seen consistently.

I’ll have to reread the first two books in the series [though there’s no direct connection, not even characters]. The theme running throughout this book (about trust and power) is strong, so if you dislike coincidence in service to a theme and it gets your hackles up, this might trip your radar. Otherwise, I hope you enjoy the book as much as I did.

Categories
Books

Beka Cooper: Terrier by Tamora Pierce

I really enjoyed this novel. While it has a very YA feel (kids get things done that adults can’t), there are good explanations for Beka’s gifts and drive.

Throughout, Beka feels like a real character. Her navigation of the path between shadowy friends and learning to be a good “Dog” is interesting and tense. There are a lot of stories within stories at the fringes of Beka’s story, which really makes the world feel full of vibrantly developed characters.

All in all, I enjoyed it and look forward to checking out its sequel, Beka Cooper: Bloodhound.

Categories
Books

Perdido Street Station by China Mieville

After hearing about this book for so long, I was glad to finally dig in and try it out. It’s a solid book, with a lot of fantastic elements and near-steampunk technology. The main characters are very well drawn, and his non-humans do a good job of being truly alien. That’s aided by their non-conventional forms– no dwarves and elves, he uses birdmen and ant-headed people instead.

I enjoyed the book and look forward to reading more by China Mieville. The book didn’t encourage swiftly reading it and setting it aside, but instead encouraged lingering and inhabiting the world.

Categories
Books

The Postman by David Brin

A very quick book– I gobbled it up in a few long stretches over the weekend. It has an interesting protagonist– a college student when the war broke out sixteen years ago. It’s an interesting world– several times the narrator mentions that it wasn’t the war that broke the world, it was the crazies that took advantage of the situation.

I noticed myself comparing it to Warday as I read it, noting the differing devastation from each world’s limited war. One big question missing from the Postman was “what about the rest of the world”? At least in Oregon (and the rest of his travels), no other has nation swooped in to pluck the carcass. It looks like devastation was more evenly distributed in Postman world. [Some of the biological warfare is specifically mentioned as targeting East Asia, etc., so it makes sense.]

I liked the characters and the narrow focus of the world. In some ways it seems like “the Postman” has it too easy… but it’s clear that there is a strong interest in the rest of the nation that was just lying untapped. The sci-fi element of the super soldiers was a quirky twist– not really necessary to the book, but it doesn’t detract either. In the end, I enjoyed it– it was another good David Brin novel.