Chris A. Jackson's Blog

Several writers, and Hollywood screenwriters, have tried to depict what an alien language might be like. Here we discuss the possibilities.

Alien Languages.

Most SFF novels focus on heroes. What does it mean to be a hero? Here we discuss what heroes are and how we can make them fresh and original.

Where are the Heroes?

Here the panel talks about the upside and downside of cyber-enhancements, and what kind of future it might bring.

Where’s My Brainjack?

You actually do judge a book by its cover, whether you realize it or not. We talk about what makes a good cover, and a not-so-good cover.

Cover Art

In which we rant about all the mistakes movies and TV (and some writers) make about medicine, injuries, etc.  Esteemed panel of writers, scientists, physicians, etc!

Literary Malpractice

Elves, Dwarves, and Unicorns are familiar and cool, but sometimes you really need a Kaiju!

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Please ignore the noise after the applause… The recording runs long.

The publishing world is changing constantly in interesting ways. Listen to me (hybrid published author) publisher Michael R. Underwood from Angry Robot, and agent Joshua Bilmes from the JABberwocky Agency talk about our experiences.

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My second panel discussion at Balticon was about science…real science. Biology! SF is a tech-heavy genre, but Biology is often neglected or done poorly. We had a great time and had a diverse group of panelists.

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One of the best panel discussions I’ve ever done, and I finally figured out how to record! Yay!  Give a listen… How worldbuilding for RPG’s differs from that for novelists. Some great insight!

Audio file

This is something we’ve all seen clearly, the waving of hands by a magician to direct our eye away from the hand palming the card or coin. It’s simple, but surprisingly effective. Writers do this, too. We throw red herrings at the reader, drop misleading clues, even create unreliable characters whose perceptions are skewed to keep the truth hidden.

This is nothing new.

In politics, it’s also the norm. So and so is a liar! Oh, but so and so is just as bad! So and so cheats people! Oh, but so a...