Historical romance novels are full of families concerned about dowries, but you hear much less about bridewealth and dower (not the same thing as dowry) in the West. Any way you slice it, though, getting married has often required a lot of financial planning. Read the latest New Worlds Patreon post at Book View Cafe, and comment over there!
I don’t have a novel coming out this spring, but I’ll be at Borderlands Books tomorrow anyway, at 3 p.m., as part of a group reading with Nancy Jane Moore, Dave Smeds, and Deborah J. Ross. We’ll be reading from the Book View Cafe anthology Nevertheless, She Persisted, with a Q&A and signing. I hope to see some of you there!
Onward through the topic of marriage! Now it’s time for the New Worlds Patreon to talk about monogamy vs. polygyny vs. polyandry vs. things like line marriage, and the social effects these different structures have. Comment over there!
Marriage is one of those enormous topics I’m not getting through in a single post. I could probably fill all of this February and next February just discussing it and its ancillary subjects. But we’re starting off with the question of why people get married and who’s allowed to do it, as our first installment of the New Worlds Patreon this month. Comment over there!
I have two posts up at BVC today. The first is an expansion of my post in response to the passing of Ursula Le Guin; with the benefit of a little more distance, I have additional things to say about the effect she’s had on my life and career.
The other, of course, is my New Worlds post for this week. Completing our tour through certain features of the natural world, I discuss deserts: not always hot, not always filled with sand, but very interesting for stories.
Our jaunt through the physical landscape of your invented world continues with a discussion of mountains and how people relate to them: as resources, mythical loci, places of danger, boundaries, and more. Comment over there!
This week on New Worlds: plate tectonics! And also mountains, volcanoes, earthquakes, and other things that go along with the fact that our world is a big ball of rock plates floating on a sea of molten lava. Comment over there!
The dust is settling at Patreon, with the planned changes to their fees taken off the table (hallelujah!). And so I continue with the New Worlds series, with the latest post covering fictive kinship — the ways someone can be family without being related by blood. Comment over there!
Over on the New Worlds Patreon, my theme for December is going to be kinship — the anthropological term for “family,” and a favorite subject in the field. We start with lineage, including a discussion of how people often misunderstand what matrilineality means. Comment over there!
Have you ever given much thought to your kitchen, and how you would keep yourself fed without one?
Whether the answer is yes or no, come along to the latest New Worlds Patreon post and read all about kitchens!
This week on the New Worlds Patreon, I delve into things like the Columbian Exchange and how thyme used to be exotic to American cooks with a discussion of local and imported food. Comment over there!
The general theme for this month has been stages of life, and we close that out with rites of passage. Next week, because the Patreon passed one of its funding goals a while ago, will be a fifth (bonus) essay, on the more theory-side aspects of worldbuilding!
Comment over there.
My Patreon is trucking along, but I haven’t been good about linking to it here. So have a list of recent posts!
This week’s post (sneak preview!) will be on rites of passage, followed by a bonus post on the theory of worldbuilding, since that’s one of the funding goals we’ve reached. Remember, this is all funded by my lovely, lovely patrons — and if you join their ranks, you get weekly photos, plus (at higher levels) opportunities to request post topics or get feedback on your own worldbuilding!
Follow the map to another world . . .
Two cities joined by their reflections. A realm of feathered serpents and jaguar-men. A desert where a former goddess seeks the ultimate truth. In this collection, award-winning author Marie Brennan takes you to ten different fantastical lands, including the world of her famed scholar-heroine Lady Trent. Journey with her to places rich and strange: here there be more than just dragons.
The pre-order wait is over! Maps to Nowhere is now on sale at all the following fine retailers:
Yesterday saw the release of Nevertheless, She Persisted. There are many things with that title these days, but this one is mine — well, mine and that of eighteen other authors from Book View Cafe. It is, as you might expect, a collection themed around female persistence in the face of adversity. If you feel like you need that sort of encouragement right now, or you know someone who might, or you want to support the general idea, or you just think that sounds like something you would like to read, you can get the ebook directly from Book View Cafe, or from Amazon, Nook, iTunes, Kobo, or Amazon UK; if you want a print edition, those are available too, from Amazon US or UK.
My contribution to the anthology is “Daughter of Necessity”, which is one of the stories I’m proudest of having written. It was inspired by an essay of Diana Wynne Jones’, and of course she herself is the woman whose work inspired me to become a writer in the first place.
It’s been six months since Elizabeth Warren was silenced on the floor of the Senate. Keep on speaking out. Persist. We will stand strong.
I should have posted this yesterday, but appropriately enough, I was too busy prepping for the game I ran last night. 🙂
Dice Tales: Essays on Roleplaying Games and Storytelling is out now! If you play RPGs and have an interest in them from the narrative side of things — the ways we use them to tell stories, and what GMs and players can do to make them work better in that regard — you may find it of interest. Follow the link to buy it from Book View Cafe, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Google Play, iTunes, Kobo, or (in a first for me) DriveThruRPG. And if any parts of it wind up working their way into the games you play or run, let me know!
Also, the New Worlds Patreon has headed off into the wilds of rudeness, with two posts on “Gestures of Contempt” and “Insults.” The theme will continue through the end of this month before turning in a new direction for August. Remember that patrons at the $5 level and above can request topics, so if there’s something you’d like to see me discuss, you can make that happen!
The most recent New Worlds post is on sumptuary laws, i.e. the ways in which societies try to regulate the outward signifiers of class and rank.
Looking back at my previous blog series of BVC — Dice Tales is now set to be an ebook! You can currently pre-order it from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Google Play, iTunes, and Kobo; or you can wait for the on-sale date of July 18th and get it from DriveThruRPG or direct from the publisher, Book View Cafe. This is edited and expanded from the original blog series, with more than half a dozen new essays.
And — as a teaser — while it is my first foray into game-related publishing, it may not be my last . . .
I’ve been very remiss in linking to my New Worlds posts over on the Book View Cafe blog (brought to you by my lovely Patreon backers). Here’s the full lineup to date:
If that stuff looks good to you, please consider becoming a backer!
And, for a bonus: I’ve been neglecting the Dice Tales community on Imzy, but I put up a new post today ranting about how combat-oriented rules can screw over plot.
Month two of the New Worlds Patreon kicks off with a look behind the scenes at my super-easy approach to making languages look real. Comment over there!
It’s the fifth Friday of the month and I only promised four New Worlds essays per, but since the first post was mostly just an introduction, you get five this month. For future months, I’ve added a funding goal to cover those months where there ought to be five. In the meanwhile — and on the topic of weeks and months — let’s talk about measuring time!
