M. Darusha Wehm

Science fiction and mainstream books by award-winning author M. Darusha Wehm

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Recipes of Arkadia: Betsy Rhys-Jones’s Spicy Vegetable Stew

Food — growing it, preparing it, eating it — is a central part of life in the Arkadia space colony. Over the next few weeks I’m sharing recipes for some of the food mentioned in the book.

Betsy isn’t one to build a community hall or tend to crops, but she isn’t content to just sit by the riverside. She loves to cook, but cooking for one is a pain. So why not share with everyone?

Recipes of Arkadia: Betsy Rhys-Jones's Spicy Vegetable Stew
Print Recipe
Servings Prep Time
2 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
1 hour
Servings Prep Time
2 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
1 hour
Recipes of Arkadia: Betsy Rhys-Jones's Spicy Vegetable Stew
Print Recipe
Servings Prep Time
2 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
1 hour
Servings Prep Time
2 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
1 hour
Ingredients
Servings: servings
Instructions
  1. Sauté the onion in the oil, with salt, pepper and other spices. (Note - spice amounts are approximate. Adjust to taste/smell).
  2. When the onions are translucent, add the stock and beans. Cover and simmer until the beans are just tender but not quite done.
  3. Add chopped potato and yam. If necessary, add stock/water to cover. Simmer about 10 minutes.
  4. Add the green beans or other vegetables. Simmer until potatoes are soft. Serve with rice or fresh bread.
Recipe Notes

The cook and prep time is highly dependent on what (or if) dried beans are used. Lentils and pre-soaked chick peas cook in about half an hour, other pre-soaked beans can take up to an hour and a half. But you can let the stew just simmer on the stove while you do other things, making the house smell wonderful. Or use canned beans. That works, too.

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Notes

Notes
￪1 diced
￪2, ￪3 small
￪4 or other pre-soaked beans
￪5 or other chopped vegetables

3-2-1 Book Launch!

At the New Zealand National Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention on Easter weekend, I was lucky to be able to pre-launch Children of Arkadia along with several other awesome local authors.

Gail Carriger
Gail Carriger

We were welcomed by local Rotorua bookshop Atlantis Books, and after a great Q and A with the con’s Guests of Honour Gail Carriger, Phillippa Ballantine and Tee Morris, we read a little from our books for the generous crowd.

First up was Debbie Cowens, with her Sherlock Holmes/Jane Austen mashup, Murder & Matchmaking.

Then Darian Smith read from his debut novel, Currents of Change.

Up next, I read the first chapter of Children of Arkadia, then the Australian FFANZ delegate to the convention, David McDonald read from his story “Her Face Like Lightning” from the anthology Insert Title Here.

Last but not least, CY Smith read from her new collection, The Chasm.

It was a great evening and I’m especially grateful to the folks at Atlantis Books for being so welcoming and genuinely excited about all our books. They were awesome! If you’re ever in Rotorua, go check them out. It’s a beautiful shop!

 

All photos by Matt Cowens

Thoughts on Awards

This post is about the Hugo fracas, but it’s also about awards in general.

If you don’t know about the current brouhaha regarding this year’s Hugo Award nominees, I’d recommend that for your own sanity you don’t read the rest of this post and go do something more fun. Like read a book, for example.

If you still want to know what’s what, you could do worse than read George R.R. Martin’s well-reasoned explanation and opinion. Of course, it’s long, written in many parts and not finished yet. But still —go do that. I’ll wait. The first part is here and it continues with subsequent posts.

So. Awards. I strongly dislike popular vote awards. They inherently reward campaigning, slates and bloc voting. And, not to put too fine a point on it, popular works already enjoy the natural rewards of popularity: eyeballs, pageviews, buzz and sales. I frankly don’t get the point of having an award for popularity. It’s double-dipping, But, they exist and like everything else in the universe that isn’t my personal ideal, my options are to participate and try to change things for the better if possible, or just opt out.

The Hugos are part of my community, part of my business. I might not like the way they are structured, but they are what they are. If I participated in the past (which I have done) I can’t opt out now just because some if their inherent flaws have been made obvious.

However, some people have argued that even participating in this year’s Hugos validates the use of slates and breaks the Hugos.

Bullshit.

Any system that requires adherence to unwritten rules in order to function properly is broken from inception. All straight popular vote awards open themselves to slates and bloc voting, it’s just a matter of people deciding they want to make it happen.

I’ll be giving everything in the Hugo packet a shot, even if that means I stop reading immediately after I see the author or publisher’s name. I’ll vote for what I think is award worthy and vote No Award before anything that isn’t, just like every year.

I personally hope that this debacle forces a rewrite of the actual Hugo rules to reflect the way voting is intended to occur. Regardless of the intentions of the slate-makers (and I personally deplore everything about “Rabid Puppies”) I just can’t sympathize too strongly with an organization losing its shit over people following their rules.

The nominees, on the other hand, have all my sympathy, congratulations and good wishes.

Recipes of Arkadia: Chen Wu’s Seed Loaf

Food — growing it, preparing it, eating it — is a central part of life in the Arkadia space colony. Over the next few weeks I’m sharing recipes for some of the food mentioned in the book.

Chen Wu, one of Arkadia’s volunteer bakers, doesn’t think of himself as lazy — he’s efficient. He makes a lot of bread, so he does it the easy way: by letting time do the work. 

Recipes of Arkadia: Chen Wu's Seed Loaf
Print Recipe
Servings Prep Time
1 loaf 10 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
50 minutes 18 hours
Servings Prep Time
1 loaf 10 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
50 minutes 18 hours
Recipes of Arkadia: Chen Wu's Seed Loaf
Print Recipe
Servings Prep Time
1 loaf 10 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
50 minutes 18 hours
Servings Prep Time
1 loaf 10 minutes
Cook Time Passive Time
50 minutes 18 hours
Ingredients
Servings: loaf
Instructions
  1. Add all the dry ingredients to a large bowl and stir them up.
  2. Add 2 cups of warm water, mix until you get a damp, doughy ball. You can do this all with a wooden spoon, there’s no need to knead! Cover with a cloth and let it sit overnight.
  3. The next day, pour the dough into a loaf pan and bake at 220C/425F for 40-60 minutes.
Recipe Notes

This seed loaf is my real-life everyday bread, using 3 cups of white flour, 1 cup of whole wheat and flax seed or meal. I’ve let the dough sit for more than 24 hours and as little as 8 hours. Longer is better, but the bread has always turned out.

You can use more or fewer seeds; I wouldn't go with more than a cup, though.

This recipe is based on Jim Lahey’s No-Work Bread, from How To Cook Everything.

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Notes

Notes
￪1 flax, sunflower, chia, sesame, whatever

Happy (sneaky) Book Day!

tl;dr You can get the ebook of Children of Arkadia NOW

I knew I was having a sneaky digital launch of Children of Arkadia at the New Zealand National SFF Convention Reconnaissance this weekend (come say hi if you’re there!), but my publisher Bundoran Press has given the okay for everyone to be a Kiwi for a day (or four).

So the DRM-free ebooks are available now to buy from the publisher’s website as a zipped epub/mobi combo. Good for all ereaders!

Yay! Happy ebook Day!

 

Recipes of Arkadia: Vyacheslav Haereoa’s Easy Creamy Veggie Soup

Food — growing it, preparing it, eating it — is a central part of life in the Arkadia space colony. Over the next few weeks I’m sharing recipes for some of the food mentioned in the book.

Arkadia isn’t large enough to be able to sustain all crops year round, so its chefs need to be able to improvise based on what is available. This basic soup recipe can be modified nearly endlessly to use different ingredients and create highly varied options.

When Slava Haereoa decided to open a soup cafe, this was the first thing he made. It’s really easy to make, but don’t tell his regular patrons!

Recipes of Arkadia: Vyacheslav Haereoa's Easy Creamy Veggie Soup
Print Recipe
Servings Prep Time
4 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
40 minutes
Servings Prep Time
4 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
40 minutes
Recipes of Arkadia: Vyacheslav Haereoa's Easy Creamy Veggie Soup
Print Recipe
Servings Prep Time
4 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
40 minutes
Servings Prep Time
4 servings 20 minutes
Cook Time
40 minutes
Ingredients
Servings: servings
Instructions
  1. Sauté the onion in the oil with salt & pepper, add the garlic.
  2. Add the potatoes, vegetables and stock. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer.
  3. Let it cook until the everything is soft. With a potato masher or stick blender, puree everything until it is creamy.
  4. Add herbs or spices to taste. You can add milk or cream if you want a richer soup.
Recipe Notes

Some good combinations:

  • basil with zucchini (pictured)
  • chiles, coriander and cumin with pumpkin/carrots
  • thyme with broccoli
  • nutmeg with cauliflower
  • mint with peas
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Notes

Notes
￪1 diced
￪2 crushed
￪3 scrubbed and diced

Interview with J.S. Bangs, author of Storm Bride

I chatted recently with J.S. Bangs, author of the fantasy novel Storm Bride.

When Saotse rode across the treacherous ocean on an orca at the bidding of Oarsa, Power of the Sea, the blind maiden believed she had been chosen for a great destiny. But she hasn’t heard Oarsa’s voice in decades. Aged now, she has found her place among a peaceful, long-lived people, though her adoptive sister, Uya, still blossoms with youth. Then, pregnant Uya is kidnapped, and the rest of her family is slaughtered when an army of mounted warriors strikes the defenseless capital, leaving Saotse grief stricken and alone.

After Saotse finds refuge with strangers in a distant village, a new Power makes contact. Saotse embraces the opportunity to bury her bloodthirsty enemies in vengeance, but wielding the Power’s bitter magic could cost her everything she is.

As war escalates and allies flock to her side, Saotse believes she finally understands Oarsa’s purpose for her. But the Powers may have set events in motion that even they cannot control, and the fates of gods and men alike hang in the balance.

J.S. writes short fiction as well, and is particularly interested in linguistics and languages, of both the human and computer varieties.

Me: Can you describe your writing for someone who is unfamiliar with it?

J.S.: I like to write epic fantasy in unusual settings. “Unusual” means that I eschew the traditional fake!Europe settings, elves-and-dwarves, as well as the most straightforward quest plotlines. When I do draw inspiration from real-world cultures, I tend to use non-European cultures, or else I’ll just make something up entire. That said, I still love epic fantasy, so you’ll find plenty of gods, kings, magic, and heroes. Among contemporary authors, I would compare my style to N.K. Jemison or C.J. Cherryh.

Me: Would you want to live in the world of your book? Why or why not?

J.S.: I’d love to live there…. but not during the events of the story. The main setting for this book is the city of Prasa, which seems like a really pleasant place to live when it’s not being plundered by barbarians. They have beautiful pebble beaches, a mild climate, and excellent views over the bay and the mountains.

Me: Why did you write this story? What is compelling about it for you?

J.S.: My story ideas always involve the random collision between multiple ideas in my head. On a personal level, this book was written in the period around when my second child was born, and I was very caught up in the process of becoming a parent again. That came through pretty strongly in the character themes of the novel. I had also recently read a wave of Warrior Princess stories, and I was getting a little annoyed with the notion that a “strong female character” meant a girl picking up a sword and killing people. I wanted to write some strong female characters who were resolutely feminine, and who could impact the world without ever holding a weapon.

At the level of plot and setting, I was intrigued by a recurring cycle in the history of Europe and Asia where the “civilized” people living at the edges of the Eurasian continent get overrun by barbarian nomads from the inland steppes, and then the barbarians settle down and become civilized, and then the whole cycle repeats again a few hundred years later. I was also struck by something I learned about the Plains Indians, which is that some of the most iconic “plains” tribes, such as the Dakota, were actually descended from groups who originally lived much further east. But the arrival of European settlers on the Eastern seaboard created a ripple effect of westward movement.  Both of these motifs are present in the history and backstory of the setting.

Me: What surprised you while writing it?

J.S.: How gratifying it was. This was my second attempt at writing this story, after my first one ran aground and died on the rocks at 40,000 words. I was nervous about attempting this one again, but I was tremendously relieved to find out that the plot problems which had wrecked the first attempt were fixable, and I fixed them. (They key turned out to be eliminating a major character. Lesson: Don’t be afraid to eliminate whole characters and plot arcs if you need to.)

Me: How will reading it make people feel?

J.S.: By turns intrigued, horrified, anxious, relieved, disappointed, revolted, panicked, and vindicated.

Me: Was there anything you did deliberately while crafting this novel (pacing, language, symbolism…)? Why?

J.S.: I usually create a language for my books, and this book was no exception. For the less linguistically inclined, on this book I especially challenged myself to expand my use of imagery and descriptive language, and it was mostly a success. However, my line editor was a huge help in this regard, because there were a lot of places where she said, “Yes, that’s a very creative metaphor, but it makes no sense.” Good on her :).

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JS Bangs - Headshot

J.S. Bangs lives in the American Midwest with his family of four. When not writing, he works as a computer programmer, and he can occasionally be found gardening, biking, making cheese, or playing Magic: the Gathering.
His short fiction has appeared in Daily Science Fiction, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show, Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, and other venues. You can read his blog at http://jsbangs.com, or follow him on Twitter as @jsbpax.

Even more tech from my novels coming true

Sort of.

In my Dex novels, the virtual world Marionette City lets you do just about anything you can do in the physical world: have a job, have sex, have a meal. I always thought of the latter as being the height of virtual cool.

I’m not the only one, obviously, as this article in Wired profiles a few different teams taking on the problem of simulating food. I kind of love this idea:

experimenting with tongue-based interfaces that can simulate sweet, salty, and savory flavors by sending an electrical current into taste buds.

Mmm… tasty electricity.

* Image from Project Nourished

Interview with Alex Shvartsman, Author of Explaining Cthulhu to Grandma and Other Stories

I recently had a chat with author Alex Shvartsman, whose book, Explaining Cthulhu to Grandma and Other Stories, just came out.

Alex is a prolific short story writer, who is also the editor of the Unidentified Funny Objects annual anthology series of humorous SF/F. He knows a thing or two about games, as well.

Me: This is a collection of short stories. Is there any theme or similarity between them?

Alex: My body of work isn’t yet at the point where I can produce a themed collection. Instead, I included what I consider to be my best tales. The title story of the collection won an award and also came in second in the 2013 IGMS Reader Poll. A number of others made Tangent Online Recommended Reading Lists, or were reprinted, translated, and podcasted in various venues. So I’m going for overall quality rather than a singular theme, other than the fact that all the stories are science fiction or fantasy.

Me: Can you describe your writing for someone who is unfamiliar with it?

Alex: I’m proud to be known for writing humorous SF/F, because it’s such a difficult thing to pull off. However, not all stories in this collection are humorous. Some are rather dark (though I wouldn’t describe any as outright horror.) Overall, I try to write fun, plot-driven stories rather than character studies or works that are overly literary. Although I’m certainly not implying a parallel in quality, I strive to write the sort of fiction produced by Mike Resnick, Bob Silverberg, Jim Butcher or Simon R. Green.

Me: Would you want to live in the world of any of your stories (or definitely not want to)? Which one and why?

Alex: Oh, what a fun question! I think I’d enjoy living in the world of Conrad Brent. There are two stories about him in the book, and they take place in our regular world, in the borough of Brooklyn where I live, except magic and supernatural creatures are real, but only one in every 30,000 people can perceive them. There are wizards, and druids, and an enormous troll living under the Verrazano Bridge.

Me: Hmm… I don’t know about that troll. How do you think reading this collection will make people feel? Any ideas it might make readers consider?

Alex: If I do my job right, the reader will experience a rollercoaster ride. There is a mix of humor, adventure, darkness and introspection, and I hope that every reader can find a few favorites. Overall, I’m an optimist and I think my idea stories (especially flash pieces like “Notes on the Game in Progress, Played Almost to a Draw”) really show that. One of my own favorites is the story that concludes the collection: “Fate and Other Variables”. It’s about a hacker and a kabbalist teaming up to break into the Book of Fate and change their futures, and in addition to being a fun story has all sorts of intellectually stimulating ideas about free will.

Me: Finally, should we give this book to our grandmas?

If your grandma is anything like the one in the title story, she’d secretly enjoy the book! (Though she would never admit it, or let it show. She’s a tough old thing.) I strongly urge each of you to buy a copy and read it, that way you’ll be able to form your own opinions as to what the grandmas might think!

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Alex

Alex Shvartsman is a writer, translator and game designer from Brooklyn, NY. Over 70 of his short stories have appeared in InterGalactic Medicine Show, Nature, Galaxy’s Edge, Daily Science Fiction, and many other magazines and anthologies. He won the 2014 WSFA Small Press Award for Short Fiction. He is the editor of the Unidentified Funny Objects annual anthology series of humorous SF/F. His collection, Explaining Cthulhu to Grandma and Other Stories released on February 1, 2015. His website is www.alexshvartsman.com