8FOLD: Mighty Medley # 21, September 2015, by Brenton, McClure, Perron, Russell, and Russell

[Andrew Perron]

On 9/10/2015 11:47 PM, Adrian J. McClure wrote:
<snip>
 > My ideas tend to be pretty big and expansive, and compressing them is an
 > useful and interesting challenge.

I know the feeling - and it hit me pretty hard, this issue.

 > So this piece--it was inspired by a bunch of things. There was an actual
 > visit I did over this summer, for one thing, and the surreal experience of
 > taking a long trip on a Greyhound bus.

:D

 > (I don't own a car. I wish to God the USA had an actual functioning system of
 > public transport.)

Indeeeeeeed. x.x

 > I love writing in the kind of reflective elegaic mode that Bradbury did so
 > well, but I often don't get a chance to in my big and plotty recent LNH
 > stories.

Ahhhhhh, yes. Good stuff - you're very good at setting a mood and an atmosphere. <3

 > I really love the ideas and approach behind this piece. It also makes a
 > really interesting counterpoint to my piece, since both are about people
 > being at a point where they have to rethink their course in life.

It's true!

 > And it's also a response to Gamergate, and I ended my story with a reference
 > to the previous 8fold response to Gamergate. Tom's story was about calling
 > attention to the ugliness, and--as with similar things in Gillen and
 > McKelvie's Wicked and the Divine from what I've heard--I thought it was good
 > and necessary, but it's easy to just get fixated on that, and get in a trap
 > where that kind harrassment and ugliness and misogyny seems overwhelming and
 > inevitable. And that plays into narratives where women are eternally and
 > inevitably victims. It's also important to think about how to change things
 > for the better and move forward.

YEAH. I kind of see that as my role in the overall storytelling arc of the culture.

Watchmen pointed out why the superhero genre as it was was flawed, but didn't 
really point out a way to fix it. Which is okay in isolation, but no one else 
did either - which meant people dug into Watchmen, pulled out Rorschach, and 
said, "Ah, here's what we were looking for!" My job is absolutely to bring out 
the possibilities of the way forward - sort of like a reverse Atropos, where the 
next step is new life instead of death. It's something we especially need right 
now, as so many of the old assumptions and ways of doing things are fraying 
apart at the seams.

 > As someone who studies medieval literature, I enjoyed the digression into
 > Anglo-Saxon history. I gotta say, though, this story has been going on long
 > enough I sometime forget who's who and what they're doing. Maybe a recap
 > would help?

Hm, indeed.

 > Interesting how there are two stories called "Beyond The" in this issue, and
 > they're both about the memetics of fascist movements.

...oh, nice, I didn't even think about that.

 > This story was super adorable and had a lot of great details. The fact that
 > 8fold's Superman equivalent is a cat is one of my absolute favorite things
 > about that universe.

YES. <3 I gotta write a Docrates story someday, or maybe just a Mammal Militia one.

 > Oh, and the title is perfect.

Andrew "NO .SIG MAN" "Juan" Perron, love her titles.