Should SF be fun? (from: EP390: Cerbo un Vitra ujo)

[chemistryguy]

I agree that asking if SF should be fun is a silly question. Actually the comment that sparked this was asking "should SF run on Escape Pod be fun."

After all, that was the stated mission that started the whole thing. Of course, we are now several editors later and yet it seems that the "fun factor" is still at least one part of the equation when stories are chosen. Personally, I expect that in any given month we will hear some "fun" SF stories, but that there might also be some thought-provoking, introspective, or even slightly disturbing stories as well. And I wouldn't have it any other way, because only having "fun" stories would be awfully limiting.

That is a different matter, although I'm glad EP editors have chosen not to limit their choices to lighter fare.

For my money the most horrifying horror story I have read was NON-fiction, Preston's The Hot Zone.

Afterwards, I considered how wrong I was not to have included non-fiction as a  potential source of horror.

[DKT]

Should Escape Pod be fun?

I suspect that's up to the editor, and I seriously doubt any of the editors chosen to sit in the EP captain's chair don't get that Escape Pod should "Have Fun."

That said, I agree with Scattercat that fun is incredibly subjective. I'm perfectly fine with EP not presenting light fare every week, and I think running darker stuff occasionally will make the lighter stuff stand out. Mind the warnings at the beginning, if the darker stuff bothers you - that's why they're there .

Running darker stuff at EP is also not a new thing. Steve did it back in the day (the Neal Asher story is the first to jump to mind, but I'm sure there were others if I went and looked), and every other editor since has as well.

[matweller]

Mind the warnings at the beginning, if the darker stuff bothers you - that's why they're there .

Indeed. We are not inclined to run warnings at all. So if they are there, even if they are veiled in light comedy, they are very real. And in this particular case, it was very serious and not done by the usual voice so it should have stood out even more.

[Devoted135]

Mind the warnings at the beginning, if the darker stuff bothers you - that's why they're there .

Indeed. We are not inclined to run warnings at all. So if they are there, even if they are veiled in light comedy, they are very real. And in this particular case, it was very serious and not done by the usual voice so it should have stood out even more.

It absolutely did stand out. Especially coming from Norm, I took it very seriously. As I said in the other thread, I really appreciated it, and thank you for including it!

[childoftyranny]

I would say that Devour was one of the best episodes I've heard on EP, and that was far from lighthearted. I tend to think that one type of fun is the story that provokes you to think about something new or in a different way, sometimes that requires what I'd call "mental violence," which the times when sci-fi and horror directly mix often occurs!

[matweller]

I would have to say that 70-80% of my favorite EP episodes have been either morose or dark or at least darkly sarcastic. Pretty much every episode involving a robot assistant leaves me in tears and I love it. I can't think of Steve Eley without thinking of that early story abut the reverend (or some church official) and the robot and that's a near Braveheart-level tearjerker.

[SF.Fangirl]

I apologize. I've been getting overwhelmed by some common themes I've been seeing in most/all of these story threads for the past year and more, and I need to back off again for a while.

I'm someone who pretty much immerses completely to a story's universe and am willing to accept that there isn't time to explain every detail, and that some things, while distasteful, are also beautiful. So when I walk out of the mental theater into a gathering of my fellow "viewers" and find out nobody had the same experience, it makes me sad.

It's funny, but critiques about the technical aspects that I control don't bother me, but when the validity of the art (for which I am really just another audience member) is called into question on a completely subjective basis, I get itchy.

  I try to comment on every story - often late to party as I am since I often get a weeks behind on my listening.  My comment is along the lines of I liked it" or "I didn't like" and I try to explain why.  It seems other commentors spend a lot of time giving detailed critiques really try to delve into the technique of story telling that I just can't get into.  I'm not a writer, though, so I'm not coming to this from a peer review perspective.

[chemistryguy]

  I'm not a writer, though, so I'm not coming to this from a peer review perspective.

So I'm not the only one?  Yay!

[Icky]

I think Sci-Fi should be extremely thought provoking (and based upon the observable universe... and all the mysteries that exist based upon our current understanding).  Believe me, there's PLENTY of stuff that can fall into that category.

[Fenrix]

I think Sci-Fi should be extremely thought provoking (and based upon the observable universe... and all the mysteries that exist based upon our current understanding). 

Does it stop being science fiction if our understanding of a "mystery of the known world" moves past what is presented in the story?

[InfiniteMonkey]

I think Sci-Fi should be extremely thought provoking (and based upon the observable universe... and all the mysteries that exist based upon our current understanding). 

Does it stop being science fiction if our understanding of a "mystery of the known world" moves past what is presented in the story?

Example?

[Scattercat]

Like science fiction from Verne's day in which people flew to the moon and found an atmosphere and thriving life.

[Scumpup]

I think Sci-Fi should be extremely thought provoking (and based upon the observable universe... and all the mysteries that exist based upon our current understanding). 

Does it stop being science fiction if our understanding of a "mystery of the known world" moves past what is presented in the story?

It becomes outdated science fiction, but it still remains fun IMPO.  The bulk of what I read falls into that category.  There's a vast mountain of free ebooks out there for the downloading and another equally vast mountain of free audiobooks.  I enjoyed stuff like "Tumithak of the Corridors" when I was a kid and I still do.

[InfiniteMonkey]

Oh, if that's what you're talking about, then it just becomes dated. That has little to do with "fun" unless it's (IMHO) really, REALLY stupid.

Example: Our bookclub recently read the reprinted omnibus edition of the Sector General series by James White (the first three are reprinted in "Beginning Operations"). Now, in one of the stories, White describes all the scientific information for a Brontosaurus - current as of 1962 or so. Ok. He was accurate for the science *of the time*, and completely inaccurate for 2012, but that didn't make the story any less fun.

(small) Counterexample - social change that has outstripped the writing - the most harmless example I can think of are the ubiquitous (female) secretaries for police detectives in the future of "Do Androids Dream of the Electric Sheep?" Ok, that's not a science thing, and it's not that much of a thing in the story, but it's an example of how that sort of dating can make things Not Fun.

[Kaa]

An even better counterexample (IMHO), also from Philip K. Dick, is A Scanner Darkly, in which the entire future is an extrapolation of the drug culture of the early 70s. For me, at least, this makes it an extremely difficult read, not at all fun, and frankly just annoying on a lot of levels.

[Devoted135]

I personally find it useful to think about how the characters view their world and let them determine how I view it. Do they consider their world to be one driven by science or magic? Therefore, if Verne's characters think they are using science to achieve spaceflight, then it is still science fiction in my book. Likewise, if the narrator of Wells' The Time Machine believes that the time machine uses technology (as opposed to magic) to travel through time, then I say The Time Machine is science fiction.

[Windup]

It becomes outdated science fiction, but it still remains fun IMPO.  The bulk of what I read falls into that category.  There's a vast mountain of free ebooks out there for the downloading and another equally vast mountain of free audiobooks.  I enjoyed stuff like "Tumithak of the Corridors" when I was a kid and I still do.

Out of curiosity, how would you react to someone doing a story today, but setting it in the universe as it was understood in an earlier era? 

Specifically, I'm wondering how you would react to a new story set in the "consensus SF solar system" of the late 40's and early 50's, before the start of the planetary program -- Venus as a planet-wide swamp, Mars as the ancient remains of a dead or dying civilization, tidally-locked Mercury, warm and earth-like Jovian moons (albiet with lower gravity), etc.  Somewhat like Steampunk stories that have the Victorian cosmology turn out to the true.  Or are the 50's too close in time?

[Scumpup]

It becomes outdated science fiction, but it still remains fun IMPO.  The bulk of what I read falls into that category.  There's a vast mountain of free ebooks out there for the downloading and another equally vast mountain of free audiobooks.  I enjoyed stuff like "Tumithak of the Corridors" when I was a kid and I still do.

Out of curiosity, how would you react to someone doing a story today, but setting it in the universe as it was understood in an earlier era? 

Specifically, I'm wondering how you would react to a new story set in the "consensus SF solar system" of the late 40's and early 50's, before the start of the planetary program -- Venus as a planet-wide swamp, Mars as the ancient remains of a dead or dying civilization, tidally-locked Mercury, warm and earth-like Jovian moons (albiet with lower gravity), etc.  Somewhat like Steampunk stories that have the Victorian cosmology turn out to the true.  Or are the 50's too close in time?

I've never read anything matching that description.  The closest thing I have experienced is playing the Fallout games with their retro-future SCIENCE! theme.  I love the games but they have an entirely different vibe than actual vintage science fiction.  It would take a skillful author to avoid a nodding-and-winking tone.

[Bdoomed]

I've never read anything matching that description.  The closest thing I have experienced is playing the Fallout games with their retro-future SCIENCE! theme.  I love the games but they have an entirely different vibe than actual vintage science fiction.  It would take a skillful author to avoid a nodding-and-winking tone.

I think it would take an even more skillful author to not avoid the nodding and winking tone, yet work it in, in such a way that it makes the story that much more fun.  I picture it as a task for Vonnegut or Adams. 

I would also desperately love to read that story.

[DKT]

They're not quite as rare as you may think they are

Here's one from Escape Pod - one of my all time faves: Hesperia and Glory, by Ann Leckie.

Cat Valente has done a couple of them as well.

[olivaw]

Have a look for Atomic Tales, a radio series which is all about capturing that 1950s essence.
Not quite Adamsian, but good fun.

[Icky]

There's no doubt that a story being scientifically accurate "for it's time" qualifies it as Sci-Fi (in my book)...  it just means it isn't the 'best' Sci-Fi.   Still, some of those books are just great.   But when there's NO scientific basis for what's going on, I don't know why the word 'Science' is used at all when describing a story. 

BTW....   

A REALLY FANTASTIC SHORT READ:   THE FUTUROLOGICAL CONGRESS by Stanislav Lem.    Holy Crap!   This book was written in Polish, and, for our purposes, translated into English.  Now, one might think something would be lost in translation (and probably something is... But, WOW!  What a translation it is.  So very clever. 

[DKT]

I've never read anything matching that description.  The closest thing I have experienced is playing the Fallout games with their retro-future SCIENCE! theme.  I love the games but they have an entirely different vibe than actual vintage science fiction.  It would take a skillful author to avoid a nodding-and-winking tone.

I think it would take an even more skillful author to not avoid the nodding and winking tone, yet work it in, in such a way that it makes the story that much more fun.  I picture it as a task for Vonnegut or Adams. 

I would also desperately love to read that story.

Oh, um. I feel like an idiot for not mentioning this story earlier - Barsoom in June.

I recorded it with Graeme Dunlop for Cast of Wonders and it was a blast. Fun and funny and short.

[InfiniteMonkey]

Oh, um. I feel like an idiot for not mentioning this story earlier - Barsoom in June.

I recorded it with Graeme Dunlop for Cast of Wonders and it was a blast. Fun and funny and short.

Gee, Dave, what could have POSSIBLY taken up your attention ahead of this? 

[DKT]

 

Martians, probably. And sexy Venusians, no doubt! Lots of sexy - bzzzzzzt!

I mean...I'm fine. And it wasn't the Martians or Venusians, because there aren't any such thing!