Tag: science fiction

The End – Keepers

We’ve all had phases in our lives that have had to come to an end. That’s how our lives work. We grow, we move on. Besides the lessons I’ve learned in those life phases, the most valuable thing to come out of those endings, are the people I’ve picked up along the way. Friendship is a bit like fishing. Some people we catch and we keep. Other times, it’s catch and release. When a phase in your life ends, it can mean saying good-bye to some friends and letting them go. This isn’t always easy, but usually in hindsight, we…

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The End – The Unexpected Gift

I remember exactly where I was when I got the news my older brother Doug had died. It was the Monday of Labor Day weekend, 2011. I was at my home, a 28-acre forested property in Mulmur Township, southeast of Collingwood. The telephone rang, and I answered. It was my eldest brother Peter calling to tell me Doug had passed away earlier that morning. The news both did, and did not, come as a shock. After having a stroke-like memory loss one August day in 2010, Doug spent some time in the hospital before being diagnosed with an aggressive form…

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The Truth Inside the Lie – Nathan Elberg

The World is a Wild Place People are different. Not just in appearance, or restaurant preference. Not just in intelligence, but how they apprehend the world. You might say there’s a pencil on a table. A Pacific Islander would say that the table lumps. You might say there are a few pencils on the table. The Islander would say the table lumps severally. You might say that your father’s brother’s children are your cousins, while your male siblings are your brothers. In many societies though, your father’s brother’s children might be just as much your brothers as your male siblings. You might believe in fundamentals, like honesty,…

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The Truth Inside the Lie – Matthew Hughes

What Would Winston Churchill Say? I spent most of my adult life as a freelance speechwriter, writing mainly for CEOs (they don’t mind spending extravagant amounts on themselves) and the occasional politician.  I didn’t know I was a born speechwriter until I wrote my first speech, while working as assistant to a Member of Parliament.  I discovered I had the rare knack of being able to hear a speaker’s voice and speech patterns in my head, then write the text so that the words sounded natural. Mostly, I wrote bread-and-butter jobs, an endless succession of Chamber of Commerce luncheons and…

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The Truth Inside the Lie – Nina Munteanu

The Battle of Grunwald and the Fate of the Teutonic Knights My part in this piece of history really started sometime in 2008 with the vision of an incredible image by Croatian artist Tomislav Tikulin. It was the image of a magnificent knight, standing in a war-littered mire and gazing up, questioning, at the vaulted ceiling of a drowned cathedral. A great light shone upon the knight in streams of white gold. It sent my imagination soaring with thoughts of chivalry, adventure and intrigue. Who was this knight? With that image imprinted inside me, the next nexus moment came when…

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Women of Character – Leslie MacKeen, Cultural Theorist With a Heart

In Warpworld, Cultural Theorists travel across the dimensions to explore new worlds and blend in with Outer civilizations. It’s a dangerous job and only a handful of People are smart enough, or tough enough, to do it. On our world, travel to some parts of the globe is still considered exotic, glamorous, and, yes, sometimes dangerous. Leslie MacKeen, has traveled to many of those places, not to steal vita but to lend a helping hand. Fittingly, I met Leslie in 2003, in Costa Rica, while she was backpacking from the tip of South America to her home in the United…

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Women of Character – Skyrider Bobbi Powers

Where do fictional strong women come from? Well, they are partly imagined, but they are also inspired by lots of real life women of character. At the end of Warpworld, readers meet Rider Pilot Shan Welkin, who is also known as a skyrider. Today, I’d like you to meet real life skyrider Bobbi Powers. I met Bobbi on my first trek to Baja California Sur, Mexico, in 1998.  She was a pilot and a flight instructor, equal parts gutsy and sweet, and I liked her immediately. Since then, I’ve had the pleasure of sailing, flying, hiking, and back-roading with Bobbi…

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Women of Character – My Han Solos

“I don’t want to be Princess Leia!” If you had been among the small group of neighbourhood boys with whom I played Star Wars, back in 1977, you would have heard this phrase a lot. We were, like most kids who were eight-years-old when Lucas’s opus came out, obsessed with Star Wars. For me, our re-creation of the world of Luke Skywalker was not just play, it was a portal to another dimension, a chance to become a swashbuckling space hero. The only setback to playing Star Wars was that, as the group’s only female, I was always cast as…

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Ho Hum, Just a Photo of Warpworld on Everest…

OK, so I happen to be friends with mountain gurus/legends Tim and Becky Rippel. This spring marks Tim’s cajillionth season guiding climbers to the top of the world and his and Becky’s adventures over the years definitely rival Seg and Ama’s. My apologies to the Sherpa who had to lug Warpworld all the way to base camp! You can follow Peak Freaks Expeditions up Everest (and beyond) on their blog: Here! Oh, and Tim, since you’ve now taken up scuba diving, I expect a photo of you reading Wasteland Renegades from the bottom of the world. ~Kristene

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