Parts of Speaking Publishing

 I think I would be picking at the Plur1bus post every day if I let myself, so I'll leave it alone at this point. I want to move on to Severance as my second example of Speculative Fiction that I have been immersing myself in, with several provisos or caveats mentioned up front.  I call it speculative fiction but it's a how, not prose on a page. Same with  Plur1bus.  I do read other speculative fiction, just not as often. I read Til We Have Faces and   The Memory Police in  the last year or so and plan to read them again. In the last five years I have read Ursula LeGuin and Dune and Hyperion and Wool (Silo). Overall, I tend to read literary fiction that is set "in the real world."  Both of these shows touch or "Venn Diagram" into typical space and technology science fiction but are definitely more about the psychological matters involved.  Most people know the premise of Severance. A huge multinational corporation, apparently providing hea...

 These are my responses to this show. I began watching it in October. I do not remember if it was recommended on a podcast I listen to or if it just caught my attention on Amazon Prime (it is an Apple TV show). I think what drew me in is that the main character is a writer, a very successful one, far more successful than is believable. She lives in a house in Albuquerque that would be over $500,000 or $600,000 here in Northwest Georgia. That's a really lucrative career. So, yep, it's science fiction.  In the first episode, and I will confess I have not rewatched any episodes, two major things happen: The planet is infected with a virus, and we meet Carol Sturka. Let's start with the first.  Over a period of a year or more, astronomers receive signals from Kepler 22b, which is, according to Google AI (and I apologize for using it): Kepler-22b  is  a significant exoplanet discovered by NASA's Kepler mission, notable as the first confirmed planet in the habitable z...

 This may be a three-parter. I am fascinated by speculative fiction of a certain type. I would call it Twilight Zone-based. I love the Twilight Zone when I was a child and it imprinted on me. I have not watched many of the episodes now on YouTube, but I remember many of them. The basic aesthetic of a normal person all of the sudden caught in a nightmare world has a lot of possibilities. I have written some short fiction of that ilk myself. One day I need to collect them and self-publish them. I do not want to send stories to contests (costs) or to magazines. People can read them if they want. Perhaps I will start to post them here.  Anyway, "speculative fiction," according to the all-knowing Wikipedia, citing the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature, is an  umbrella   genre  of  fiction  that encompasses all the  subgenres  that depart from  realism , or strictly imitating everyday  reality , instead presenting  fantastic...

 Yesterday we celebrated the second birthday of my grandchild. I do not post anything, especially photos, of my grandchild on social media or the Internet. Her mother does, but I will not do that.  Things I'm thinking about today.  Will there be another revolution in Iran? I hope so, except that is easy for me to say. Revolution means people die and there is a risk factor--very large--about who will take over. I definitely would not want Donald Trump to! The Iranian people are suffering from oppression and from economic default.  My prayer is that they regain their human rights, first, then their resource-rich land can be used properly for their benefit, and third, the gospel can flourish there. I want the same for Turkey, which is nowhere in the position of Iran but could use new leadership. The Turkish people did not strike me as happy, but somewhat scared, definitely unfulfilled.  From sources I read, the Ayatollah has a ticket to ride, probably to Moscow, wh...

He posted this on Facebook, so I figure it's fair game to post here. This writer is Billy Graham's ex-son-in-law, and as he mentions here, also committed adultery, which he owns. I appreciate his words, but I still find the hypocrisy of Yancey speaking and writing while being in the affair to be . . . I can't say unforgivable, but disqualifying. Why didn't he believe what he wrote? Did he write to convince himself, or just to make money? I'm a cynic, I suppose. I've seen too much of this in my life. Addendum: I am glad to see Tchividjian being called out for this post. Others perceive it to be "too soft on sin," especially the comment we are all three days away from an affair. Ed Stetzer's editorial is better--it gives godly advice on preventing sinful patterns. TT's comments seem to say we don't know ourselves well enough and that's why we judge PY. This is very close to an "everyone is doing it" argument or "everyone is...

1. Still mad; maybe a tad more merciful and understanding, but still mad at him and the system that does not hold celebrity voices in the church accountable. However, Yancey would probably say he was a journalist and not a theologian or preacher/pastor. No matter; he purported to interpret the Bible and the faith for readers.  2. I recall that his last book was about his mother, brother, father's death, and hard upbringing in the fundamentalist subculture. It was heartfelt. Many of us can relate to such stories, such truths. I have struggled to shake off those fundamentalist teachings and really, those burdens. They hang like scales on our eyes, affecting our sight; they stay like a parasitic voice that says "judge first; look for sin; blame yourself because you must be wrong; don't stop working; all that matters is ministry, gospel, the Bible, service, church." They tell us to love but only parts of people, not their wholeness. It cuts us off from humanity.  3. But w...