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Geeking Science: Baen Book Teacher Guides

Erin Penn

Image courtesy of imagerymajestic at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

One of the cool things about living in North Carolina is Baen Books headquarters is here, not New York. Yes, that Baen Books with David Weber, Margaret Ball, Eric Flint, Sharon Lee, etc. So a writing convention in these parts will have at least one Baen representative, maybe even the big lady herself, Toni Weisskopf. At one of the conventions I attended Ms. Weisskopf told us about a thing. Baen Books offers teachers’ guides FOR FREE to some of its young adult (YA) oriented materials – guides good for the classroom or homeschooling.

I know last month’s geeking science was on “The Sell”, and make no mistake Baen Books is not doing this exclusively out of their hearts. The teachers’ guides are free, the books themselves – sometimes – are not. On the other hand this particular sell dovetails well into their core business while also having beneficial results. The teachers’ guides not only support reading (and every publisher supports reading), but also encourages students to use the science fiction as a jumping point to learn history and science. Where someone might go “who care how prize money was awarded by England during the wars?”, reading about the prize money collected by the Manticore Navy in Basilisk Station by David Weber raises an interest – then the rabbit hole shows a student what money meant (economics), how money was divided (math), which wars had the most money given (history) and a dozen other interests. By the way, Basilisk Station is a free book just like the teachers’ guide.

Is this “The Sell” or a publishing company giving back to their customers? The creation of the teachers’ guides did cost money – proofing, adding to the website, etc. Having met Ms. Weisskopf and Mr. Weber and the other authors participating in this program, I know its a bunch of people geeking out about how to get people involved in education by using the carrot instead of the stick. These are people who pour over research to get the covers right – did that uniform in 1637 have four or five pockets? Information and words are their life!

And they want to pass on that passion.

The Young Adult list at Baen Books ( http://www.baen.com/bookdata/ya ) contains a vetted list by Ms. Weisskopf. The ones with little books beside them contain teachers’ guides. Over twenty are available.

(9/15/2020 update – looks like the list has been removed for now. You can search on teacher guides here: https://www.baen.com/allbooks?q=teacher+guides)

Teaching through science fiction – man, I wish this was around when I was a kid.

WRITING EXERCISE: Create a small guide for a reading group based on your work in-progress (WIP). Put together at least six questions.

READING EXERCISE: Pick one of the teachers’ guides and work your way through it. Which book did you pick and what did you learn from the guide?

Editing Rant: Choose the Moment

Erin Penn

Wrong place, wrong time

Acquired from the Internet Hive Mind

There is a Time and Place for Everything

Use of adverbs to describe timing was covered in the last Editing Rant. 

This Rant is on WHEN things happen in a plot. I’m talking about Content Editing/Macro issues, instead of my normal Line Editing issues. Why do writers put inappropriate actions during a ticking clock scenario? I’ve run into this predicament multiple times in eroticas and romances.

 

Example one: Family member has been injected with (a silver) poison and has less than a day left. The shape-shifting couple doesn’t even know where the person who has the antidote lives. What happens next? You would think internet searches, contacting friends, getting the police involved, taking the family member to the hospital? Nope, sex which results in an argument and the couple, after a physical battle since werewolf’s emotions often result in physical battles, end up in totally different parts of town after she throws him through the window and runs off. Half a day later they make up and THEN they start looking for the person who has the antidote.

Facepalm

Acquired from the Internet Hive Mind

Example two: Trained military personnel, crossing jungle terrain to attack a compound, get separated from the main group during an ambush. While catching up with the others, the couple gets overwhelmed with thinking this may be “the last time” and stop to have sex. During a military operation, after they have fallen behind their group, on a rescue of civilians, with a ticking clock of sunset. Best of the best military, hand-picked for their professionalism and abilities.

Acquired from the Internet Hive Mind

Example three: A superhero story (the one I am dealing with now). Repeat and rise – Ugh! One does not stop to have sex delaying rescue of loved ones WHO ARE BEING TORTURED TO DEATH and you know because the supervillain is broadcasting the pain via ESPer abilities. Maybe if the sex scene was moved directly in front of the discovery of family members needing rescue, but not after … even if the main character thinks this may be the last chance with the hottest babe/bod in existence. Anyone who is that selfish is not someone I can identify with or want to be around. I am guessing other readers might feel the same way as me, but how do I, as a line editor, tell the author this? I don’t. I can’t. It’s too late to change anything on the content level when it hits my desk.

Acquired from the Internet Hive Mind

Yes, eroticas and romances are about when couples get together and get it on, but they are also about how the couple stays apart. Romantic tension can go hand-in-hand with Thriller tension. It’s a personal favorite genre mix of mine; in fact, I love it more than the typical romantic tension builder of a spat between lovers driving them apart. Circumstance within the thriller can provide double duty of the ticking clock tension and “cock-blocking” tension. If a wedge needs to be driven between the couple to cool the sexual action while building the emotional connection, the action-ride of the thriller works wonders.

I think eroticas and romances are the worse offenders of killing a ticking clock with inappropriate actions, but I have seen other examples in mysteries and horror.

WRITING EXERCISE: Come up with a ticking clock scenario (hostages, parent dying in hospital, dinner burning in oven, etc.) for a character, then put him/her in a situation where they will be highly tempted to go off-track. Why or why don’t they act on the temptation? If they go off-track, should the ticking clock explode?

READING EXERCISE: Think of a book which ignores a ticking clock situation to have an inappropriate action. Did it bother you? Why or why not?

Flash: Up the Steps

Erin Penn

Rating: Mature

I could not believe my luck when I ran into Bret on the stairs while moving into my new apartment. Maneuvering the full size mattress from my pickup into the building had taken far too long and the narrow stairwell made me want to cry defeated. Then Bret bounded down the steps on his way out and voluntarily stopped to help. Between the two of us we managed to drag the dead weight up two flights. Delights of delights, I find out he has the door across from mine. Together we have the top floor alone.

After getting the box spring up and tipping the mattress we had left leaning against the wall on top, Bret collapsed on the makeshift bed. “Please tell me the frame is lighter.”

I shake my head. “Don’t have a frame. In fact, that is pretty much it except for the bag of clothes in my front seat and about two dishes.” I find myself focusing on his abs and try to drag my eyes upwards to his kind face, but instead they drift down . He shouldn’t look so right on my bed.

(189 words – originally appearing at Sunday Fun on Breathless Press 10/21/12 – The original photo of a hunky guy on a bare mattress on the floor was of unknown copyright so did not put on my site – published on old blog 11/11/2012; republished in new blog format on 2/12/2017)

Book Review: Cellar

Erin Penn

Amazon Cover - Cellar

Book Cover from Amazon

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON

Cellar by Karen E. Taylor

Something’s not quite right about the neighborhood of Woodland Heights. Five years ago six children disappeared in this suburban heaven. When Laura Wagner moves into a house that had been vacant for most of those five years, this something comes alive.

Laura Wagner, divorced mother of two, addicted to alcohol and Valium, sees nothing wrong with her life; she sees nothing much at all. She gets by as well as she can, aided by the solace of her drugs and whiskey, until the day she backs into a police car in the parking lot of her favorite bar and is sentenced to involuntary rehabilitation treatments.

Returning home clean and sober is an eye-opening experience. The spirit dwelling in her house reveals its true, evil nature and begins to prey upon her, her friends, even her children, avid to spread its message of death and despair.

Laura must learn to control her inner demons before she can subdue these outside forces threatening to break free. She must learn how to distinguish hallucinations from reality, learn how to stop the spirit that requires her death and the deaths of her loved ones.

Author’s Note:
CELLAR is a re-issue of my previous published book (Twelve Steps from Darkness, Copyright © 2007 Karen E. Taylor.) The story, while essentially the same, has been edited and expanded upon in certain areas, resulting in several new scenes and an epilogue.

 

MY REVIEW

I finished reading Cellar by Karen Taylor at midnight last night – not exactly the best time to be reading this horror-ghost-recovering-addict story in a house with a damp, dark basement and parts of the house which knock at random moments. Yeah, bad idea.

First off, this is not my normal fare. I avoid horror and mental-health/addict stories, but it was in the Modern Magic pack where I knew a number of Urban Fantasy authors so I read it. It took a long time to get to the “modern magic” part. But in the meantime a solid character study was created for Laura, the Main Character – an alcoholic whose downward spiral included backing into a police car when leaving a bar. After coming home to the empty house following the sentencing, voices whisper in her head about how worthless she is – children taken by husband, loss of job, and soon to spend a month in rehab where they would take the one thing she loved from her – the alcohol. “She would be better off dead.” Again and again the whispers tell her, or is it her own mind spiraling down.

And that remains the question with each situation – it is real or her addiction altering her world? Is the depression external forces or an natural internal reaction to her situation? And the real kicker – should she even care? Every step forward she attempts is matched by a failure twice as great. But three people do not give up on her – her two daughters and one police officer who has already taken the journey back from the bottle.

Will it be enough to recover from her descent into the cellar of life with the alcohol and to fight whatever has decided to reside in her basement?

Not for the faint of heart. I’m not sure which is scarier: the “horror” story or the alcoholism whispering its siren song to her.