Joe Vasicek

Goodbye DC

So I have some crazy, unbelievable news to share: I got fired from my internship, under disputed circumstances. That’s right: fired from my unpaid internship four weeks before it was scheduled to end.

The exact reasons for the termination were never made completely clear to me, but I suspect politics played a significant role and that’s all I’m going to say about it here. If you want to know more, please contact me privately.

Fortunately, the Washington Seminar people have agreed to let me get credit for my academic work–which means that I’ll be able to graduate. I’ve been sent home early, but I can still pass the class with a C/C-.

Oh well. In some ways, this kind of sucks, but in other ways, it’s a blessing in disguise. I learned everything that I needed to learn from my internship: that I don’t want to pursue a career in government or policy making.

Government work is long, hard, and very intensive. It also involves office politics, sitting behind a desk, and fighting entrenched bureaucracies. It’s not the kind of career that allows time for family, let alone writing. And the payoff? The common refrain I heard was that the work was “interesting.” Not “meaningful,” “life-changing,” “personally enriching,” or any of that–just “interesting.”

Nope. Not for me.

I also learned that the kind of people who are attracted to Washington DC are not the kind of people I feel very comfortable around. Generally speaking, Washington DC tends to attract people who are ambitious, self-absorbed, arrogant, loud, poor listeners, opinionated, and oblivious of the people around them. This certainly wasn’t true of everyone, both at the institute and at the Barlow center, but I found they were the exceptions to the rule.

I will say a few positive things, though. DC has some excellent museums and monuments–the best of any I’ve seen anywhere else. In particular, I found the FDR memorial, the Portrait Gallery, and the science and innovation exhibit at the American History Museum particularly moving.

In terms of people, ironically, the ones that struck me as most sincere and genuine were all politicians. In particular, I was struck by Congressman Matheson and Senator Bennett. I’m not sure if I would vote for either of them–it depends on their stance on the issues–but they both struck me as intelligent, well meaning, good people.

I will also say that my respect for the military went up significantly. After hearing so many people spout of so much self-important hot air about this or that political issue, it was remarkably refreshing to see people who were willing to put their lives on the line for their country. To any servicemen reading this, thank you for all you do. I have nothing but the deepest respect and admiration for you.

My experience in the Barlow center was generally quite positive. I had an excellent roommate and made quite a few friends. I’m sorry if I seemed kind of aloof most of the time–it’s probably because I was miserable for other reasons and didn’t realize it. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone again back in Provo.

So, what’s the plan now? Finish the academic side of things ASAP, then head back to Utah. I’ve got a lot of old friends I want to catch up with before the summer, not to mention the last couple English 318 classes. That’s one thing I sorely missed this semester–English 318. Beyond that, I don’t quite know–a lot of things are still in the air. I’m confident, however, that whatever happens, it will be for the best.

Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

“I’ve watched through his eyes, I’ve listened through his ears, and I tell you he’s the one. Or at least as close as we’re goign to get.

“That’s what you said about the brother.”

“The brother tested out impossible. For other reasons. Nothing to do with his ability.”

“Same with the sister. And there are doubts about him. He’s too malleable. Too willing to submerge himself in someone else’s will.”

“Not if the other person is his enemy.”

“So what do we do? Surround him with enemies all the time?”

“If we have to.”

“I thought you said you liked this kid.”

“If the buggers get him, they’ll make me look like his favorite uncle.”

“All right. We’re saving the world, after all. Take him.”

Thus begins one of the greatest SF classics of all time, Ender’s Game. With such a spectacular beginning, it only keeps getting better.

I decided to reread Ender’s Game because a friend of mine in Washington was reading it. I read this book back in high school in only two sittings–the first twenty pages in the library, and the rest back home, where I finished it wide-eyed at three in the morning. I didn’t regret a single moment of it, then or now.

One of the most fascinating things to me about this book is the way that Orson Scott Card breaks almost all of the rules of writing. On every page, he “tells” much more than he “shows”–some of the battles he glosses over in only a couple of paragraphs. He gives only minimal setting details, and very few of these are visceral or concrete–it’s very hard to “get into” the world of Ender’s Game the way you would with a fantasy novel. Most of the characterization consists of “navel gazing”–Ender thinking to himself about how bad things are, rather than taking action.

Breaking these rules, however, is exactly the thing that makes this a good book. The story isn’t in the setting, or in the nitty gritty of the battles–it’s in Ender’s mind, how he reacts to the forces around him, and how those forces change him. “Telling” rather than “showing” allows him to keep the pace at a breakneck, thrilling speed while cutting out unnecessary details, and the “navel gazing” allows us to get an intimate picture of Ender’s mind.

It goes to show that good writing isn’t just about knowing the rules, but knowing how to break them. And when it comes to plot, character, pacing, foreshadowing, thematic elements, and the hero cycle, Orson Scott Card proves his masterful brilliance in this work beyond a doubt.

One of the most fascinating things about this book is that it hits all eight points of the Campbellian monomyth. This excellent article (originally published in Leading Edge) explains how. The most incredible thing to me is that the year after Ender’s Game came out, Orson Scott Card did it all again–wrote a blockbuster book hitting all eight points of the monomyth–with Speaker for the Dead, which I think is a superior book.

Ender’s Game is a true classic of the science fiction genre. Not only is it a highly entertaining story, it is deeply meaningful and insightful as well. It’s one of those books you can reread multiple times, and it only keeps getting better. Whether or not you’re a fan of science fiction, this is a book you will deeply benefit from reading.

With the Lightnings by David Drake

Daniel Leary, Lieutenant in the Republic of Cinnabar Navy, dreams of commanding a military starship one day. Unfortunately, as the estranged son of a corrupt senator, and with almost no money to his name, he has virtually no chance of ever seeing it happen.

While serving in an assignment on Kostrama, a neutral trade world between Cinnabar and her mortal enemies, the Alliance, he meets Adele Mundy, chief librarian of the Kostraman capitol. The title is virtual meaningless, however, as the uncultured Kostramans would give the position to anyone–even a political exile from Cinnibar such as Adele. Her whole family was assassinated by Leary’s father, and she has sworn to take revenge.

Little do they both know, the Alliance has other plans.

Ever since I met David Drake at World Fantasy 2009 in San Jose, I’ve been meaning to read one of his books. I must say, I picked a good one. With the Lightnings is the first book in his RCN Series, which is basically David Drake’s take on Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin novels. Think Napoleon-era naval battles and political intrigue…in space.

Does it sound good already? Yeah, I thought so.

I was a little surprised at first, because the first chapter started with a bunch of info dumps. It took until about the halfway mark for the action to really start, but when it did, it was awesome. A bunch of navy guys marooned on a hostile planet behind enemy lines, trying to survive a planetwide coup and blowing all kinds of stuff up along the way–yeah, it was cool.

The thing I enjoyed most about this book, however, was the insight into the minds of the officers and the way the officers and soldiers interacted. You can tell that David Drake has experience in the military–lots of experience.

It was evident in the little things the main character noticed–the colors and patterns of soldiers’ uniforms, competency among his own men and incompetency in men not under his command, leadership style and how he dealt with crises–stuff like that. The language was colorful, but when the soldiers swore, their language had a bite to it that went beyond the actual words. The people felt gritty, but very real.

At World Fantasy, I mentioned to David Drake that I’d read some of Joe Haldeman’s works, and knew they were both Vietnam vets. He remarked that Haldeman’s works are very much different than his own: Haldeman’s characters are constantly stabbing each other in the back, whereas in Drake’s works, there is always a sense of teamwork and unity, even when the going gets messy.

I could definitely see that in With the Lightnings–it’s one of the things that made the book so fun to read. Yes, things get pretty tough and a lot of people die, but there’s always a sense of loyalty within the platoon (or whatever the unit is called).

With the Lightnings is a great space opera action/adventure story. After reading it, I really want to read more books in the RCN series. If you want a good, fun military sf adventure story, this is a great one to pick up.

Dinner with friends

I had dinner tonight with one of my classmates from English 318 last year, who is a frequent commenter on this blog. He and his wife were kind enough to invite me over to their apartment, where we ate, talked, hung out, and had a general good time.

It was great to see an old friend from Sanderson’s class! We talked a lot about writing, and that was way cool–I haven’t been around people who can talk writing since I left Provo (not counting the IM conversations I have with Chuck every other day). At one point, his wife had to stop and say “wait, let’s put this conversation on pause and let me get to know this guy”!

He showed me this interesting online compendium of Wheel of Time characters, which blew me away; I haven’t read the Wheel of Time series yet, but just looking at how many characters are in the books, I have no idea how anyone could write something like that. I guess that’s the direction Fantasy is going in–enormous worlds, long books, dozens and even hundreds of characters.

We talked about all kinds of other things, too–school and work, career decisions, future plans, social pressures, life in general, etc. It was great being with interesting people who are genuinely interested in what you have to say. I tend to be a little self-conscious about the fact that I talk too much, but they got me to talk a lot–about how I decided to be a writer, how I wrote Genesis Earth from story idea to the latest draft, my future goals as a writer, etc etc. It was a lot of fun.

We also talked about my current project (working title: Bringing Stella Home), and I shared the 30 second story blurb. I then asked them what they think the title should be, and together we came up with an interesting title idea: Saving Ben and Stella.

What do you think of it? I kindof think it has a nice ring to it. Mentions Ben and Stella, which shows that Ben’s storyline is important as well as Stella’s. Then again, it’s not much of a change from the previous one.

In any case, I had an awesome time with Stephen and his wife. It’s great to have friends wherever you travel, and meet up with old classmates after graduating from college. Thanks guys!

Need new title

I need a new title for Bringing Stella Home. As you can probably tell, the current one just isn’t quite good enough. Got any suggestions?

I was thinking of something that combines the words “fire” and “salvation,” but I haven’t come up with anything cool yet.

If you’ve got any better ideas, please let me know.

Chomping at the bit

It’s 1:30 am where I am, and I just finished reading through the second draft of Bringing Stella Home and all of my first readers’ comments. I don’t know how to describe what I’m feeling right now, but I am so ready to make this story shine!

First of all, the story itself is incredibly powerful, at least to me. True, the current draft is full of problems (some of them so embarrassing I cringe just to think that I allowed other people to read it) but at its core, there is definitely something poignant and moving. One of my first readers is on active duty right now in Afghanistan, and it actually inspired him to write a poem.

Of course, a reader can be “moved” in bad ways as well as good, and some of the feedback on the current draft’s problems brought out a side of my friends that I didn’t know even existed (yes, Kindal, I’m talking about you). Seriously, reading those comments was like getting gutted and filleted with a rusty fishing knife. If I’d had problems with my self esteem, I probably would have cried.

Oh well. At least it wasn’t boring. 🙂

But harsh or not, the comments were all useful–surprisingly useful, actually. In a story this big, it’s easy to miss things (even big things like character motivations), but after reading through all my reader comments, I feel confident that I’ve got a solid outline for the revision.

Some of the suggestions were pretty dang good, too. Usually, I only adopt about half (or less) of the proscriptive comments my readers give me, but this time, I’ll probably end up taking quite a few more. I don’t know if it’s because I was an idiot when I wrote the first draft or because my readers were getting into the story a lot more than usual, but the advice this time opened me up to all kinds of new ideas.

I probably can’t say much more without spoiling my own story, and I definitely don’t want to do that. Let me just finish by saying that I believe this story may be the one that breaks me into publishing. I hope this doesn’t sound conceited or arrogant, because I don’t mean it that way at all. I just think that this story has some serious potential, and that if I treat it right, it will end up in print someday.

Inshallah, someday soon!

In the meantime, I’m going to put everything into revising this next draft–that is, everything short of secluding myself in a white room and starving myself (or graduating and not looking for a job, which is a more realistic possibility). This story is calling to me–it needs to be told. It needs to be fixed. It needs to be polished and shared with other readers.

It needs a lot of work. But now it’s 2:00 pm, and I’d better get to bed. Another exciting day of photocopying newspaper clippings and compiling spreadsheets of data on press freedom in Turkey awaits me. Excuse me if I sound too excited.

Go to Tor.com and read this.

Brandon Sanderson’s story of how he decided to become a writer is very interest. It goes back to elementary school, when he hated books and reading in general. A wise teacher put a copy of Barbara Hambly’s Dragonsbane in his hand, and it started a chain reaction that led to him becoming a bestselling writer.

As one of Brandon’s students, I’ve heard the story several times. However, I had no idea how significant a role that Michael Whelan, the illustrator of that book, played in it all. Tor commissioned Michael Whelan to do the cover for Brandon’s next book, The Way of Kings. In response, Brandon wrote a blog post at Tor.com explaining how significant it is to him that Mr. Whelan was chosen to do the cover art for The Way of Kings.

It’s an awesome and moving blog post. You should check it out.

In unrelated news, I am 110 pages into outlining Bringing Stella Home 3.0 and enjoying the process immensely. I’ve got some awesome first readers. Even with all the honest criticism, I’d much rather be writing than doing office work at my internship. Ah, well, April 15th will be here before we know it.

As for graduating and finding myself in the real world…not quite as thrilled about that. More like scared s***less.

Major project shift

I’ve got this goal to finish my current work-in-progress, To Search the Starry Sea, by May 1st 2010. However, the deeper I get into the story, the more I realize how many problems it has–how much it sucks, in other words.

Normally, this wouldn’t keep me from dropping the project or putting it on hold. It happens with every rough draft (or second or third draft, for that matter); midway through every project, I start to get all angsty and worry that the project sucks, that it’s beyond saving, that I’m wasting my time, etc.

However, this time it’s different for a number of reasons.

First of all, the story itself doesn’t suck. However, it does have a weak beginning and a poor setup, which makes it very difficult to develop the middle section. With better conflict foreshadowing and character introductions, I could tear right through this section, but without that, I’m floundering more and more.

A couple months ago, I started to realize this, so I started a set of revision notes for the next draft. My thought was “if I know the story needs changes, rather than going back and changing them, I can just make a note of them and move on.”

However, that approach isn’t working because the unwritten changes aren’t impacting the story as fully and completely as they would if I’d write them out. If the changes were minor, I could let them go–but when they have to do with something fundamental, like setting up a romantic subplot, or turning a minor character into a major character into a major viewpoint character, I can’ t just make a note of the change and move on–I need to write the thing to see what it changes.

In other words, I need to restart this project from the beginning. But if I do that while I’m still angsty about it, it’s going to end up like crap. I’ve got to let it sit for a while.

It’s frustrating, because I really want to finish a straight draft from start to finish. For both Genesis Earth and Bringing Stella Home, I only finished the rough draft after dropping the project for a while and restarting it at the beginning. If it works, I guess it works, but it would be nice if the creative process were more linear. Blegh.

All is not lost, however. Most of my first readers for Bringing Stella Home have gotten back with their feedback, and it’s been extremely helpful. I’ve got a clear direction and lots of ideas for where I want to take that story, and now that I’ve spent some time away from it, I can honestly say that it doesn’t suck all that bad. In fact, after a lot of work, it might actually be decently good.

There are several reasons why it makes sense to work on Bringing Stella Home right now. For example,

I’m excited about it. Better to capitalize on that now than wait until after the enthusiasm has died.
I’ve got lots of ideas flowing to me now. I could try to write them all down for later, but why not try them out now, while they’re still fresh?
I’m sending Genesis Earth out to a bunch of places, and the rejections are starting to come in. If I can respond to a rejection by sending out a second book in a timely way, I will look much more like a professional, and the agents/editors will take me more seriously.

My goal was to have To Search the Starry Sea done by May 1st. Let’s see if I can do Bringing Stella Home 3.0 (and yes, the title will change) by that day instead. And if that proves too difficult, what with graduation, internship, looking for work, and figuring out life, at least I can reach the halfway mark by then.

So that’s my new goal: Finish Bringing Stella Home 3.0 by May 1st, 2010 (or at least be halfway finished). To do that, I’ll have to read through all the comments by the end of this week and have the revision notes all figured out.

Better get started!

I’m published!

That’s right–my first published story just came out in issue 58 of The Leading Edge. I am happy to say that after three years of formally pursuing my career as a writer, I am now a published author!

The story is titled Decision LZ1527, and it’s about a guy asking a girl out on a date–as told from the point of view of the little men inside his head piloting his body like a starship. I really like the tagline in the table of contents: “A man, a woman, and a whole crew of matchmakers.”

Full disclosure: I submitted this story after I joined the staff as a volunteer slushpile reader. Most of the editors for this issue are pretty good friends of mine (including the Production Director, who’s one of my most trusted alpha readers). I submitted it under a pseudonym, however, so most of the staff didn’t know it was mine until after they’d accepted it.

The Leading Edge is known for the excellent quality of its illustrations, and I’m happy to say that I lucked out with with the artist the editors picked for my story! Josh McGill is a graphic designer and aspiring children’s book illustrator. He’s done art for issues 53 and 55 of The Leading Edge. The picture on the right is the one he did for the front page of my story. I must say, I’m impressed!

The Leading Edge is a semi-professional small press science fiction and fantasy magazine affiliated with BYU. It’s been in publication since the early 80s, when Marion K. “Doc” Smith’s famous “class that wouldn’t die” got together and started it, along with Quark and LTUE. If you would like to support the magazine (and read my story!) you can purchase a copy of issue 58 at the following link:

Issue 58: “Redemption Songs”

Lot’s of people dream about getting published, but it takes a lot of hard work and rejection to actually make it happen. As writers, though, we tend to be harder on ourselves than we ought to be. It took almost four years for Decision LZ1527 to find its way into print, but it did. That’s enough to make the rest of the process worth it.

Let’s hope it’s the first of many!

Writing the synopsis

Ugh. It’s so hard to write synopses. I spent all my free time tonight writing one, so it doesn’t look like I’m going to get more than a couple hundred words (if that) in To Search the Starry Sea.

It’s a necessary evil, though–so many agents and editors require it. Now that I’ve got a one-page synopsis down for Genesis Earth, I can start submitting more liberally. I’m sure, though, that it needs tweaking before it’s ready to send out.

For that reason, I’m uploading it to this blog, so you guys can take a look. I’ve got to warn you, though, there are SPOILERS in this document–so please, don’t read it unless you were one of my first readers! You all know who you are. Here it is:

10-3 march one-page synopsis 4.0.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments. And thanks!