Science Fiction is not just Literature at its Absolute Best

Literature

The following is typical of what you get if you 'Google' literature.

It is a noun, comprising written works, especially those considered 'superior' or of lasting artistic merit.

"a great work of literature"

synonyms:

written works, writings, (creative) writing, literary texts, compositions, letters, belles-lettres,  printed works, published works;  humanities, arts, liberal arts.

The accumulated rain on this brass sundial hides the time of day unless you adjust your perception to appreciate the beautifully detailed instrument as well as the accuracy it can produce. Yet some people claim to look for only the best books by blinkering themselves to some truly exceptional books. 

Believe it or not, there are those who do the equivalent of looking for literature under the letter 'L'. They have much in common with people who gather to taste wine because it's not vulgar like beer, even though it really is. I call them 'Long Noses' because beer tasting is just as much fun and you get to taste more without abusing your nose. 

There are also literary 'Long Noses' who have conditioned themselves and many of us into believing that truly great literature can only be an autobiography or a novel based on fiction or history. But seriously, who would really want to read a book written by someone with such an inflated ego? So, for most real people, 'Literature' is effectively 'the' novel based on history or fiction and everything else must be either crass or boring.

Yet any novel based on history could be interesting, but it's already finished. Another based on fiction will never happen, simply because it is fiction. They are quite limited.

Like any other book, Science Fiction can be written any way from poorly to extremely well and in as many styles as any novel, but because it is a logical, if sometimes far fetched extension of today, it requires the writer to create a tomorrow in which it can be reasonably played out.  I would consider that to be far superior to re-describing yesterday, or presenting a version of tomorrow that is destined to be forever fiction, because by that definition it can never happen.  

Science Fiction 'Literature' must be well written, but must also create a logical if sometimes incredible tomorrow that becomes more credible as the link to today is demonstrably maintained and even strengthened. It becomes even more acceptable when today is demonstrably derived from a previously distant and possibly undocumented past. 

Catalysis is Book 1 of the Catalysis Trilogy and it describes today just as it is about to diverge into a very real or an alternate tomorrow. Who can say which, until tomorrow actually happens. After all, that's the way tomorrow has always historically happened.

Ochre is Book 2 of the Catalysis Trilogy and it describes a yesterday just before documented history, but then everything that happened only 5000 thousand years ago is largely undocumented. So who can say what did or did not happen back then, especially when today is the very demonstrable result.  

Imago is the final book of the Trilogy and it will present you with a tomorrow unlike any you've ever dreamed of, but one that is based on yesterday and today, so it can never be discounted.

The Catalysis Trilogy is three separate worlds created from the simple fact of today. One retraces history while the other advances into the future. It is probably as far from the tired retelling of yesterdays as you can possibly get, and because it produces a viable tomorrow, it is every bit as 'Literature' as a Tale of two Cities. In fact, it has as many fabulous cities as it has viable worlds.

The real definition of 'Literature' is something to read anytime and any number of times and unlike a bottle of wine, it will always be full and never become bitter if left for a day or two. Enjoy 'The Catalysis Trilogy' sensibly because it is physically too big and conceptually too vast to be ingested as quickly as you will wish.

Happy Christmas.

October Again

The last terrestrial and also extraterrestrial dialogues of IMAGO, Book-3 of THE CATALYSIS TRILOGY, occur right here. Intriguing but true. Also, the basic image for the cover graphics of IMAGO was captured from this little bridge. Both books are just now complete and published with details added to my site http://www.denismcclean.com.

I dedicated Imago to the 'Spirit Within' because last October was a much darker time for us and during times like those we all need to be more than just seen. We need to radiate hope, even if we don't always feel it because the sad fact is that one of us will definitely be the last person another of us will ever see. That could be the selfie with us they take with them.

That dedication is proof that not all SF is photon torpedoes and zero to warp 10 in twenty seconds. This trilogy is Science Fiction and maybe Fantasy, but it's mainly about humanity and where we might be going and with whom. It is about people that most of us would consider flawed but who radiate enough to dazzle Destiny and then co-author our futures for us.

October means not forgetting, but also learning and moving on.

A Vocation - Just like a Priest's

 It's 3.30am and our house is quiet, but my vocation won't let me sleep. The Catalysis Trilogy is just now finished and published with this third book, but no-one knows yet except me, which means it's only begun for you. I know you will love this epic story.

                                      

                                      In the coming months, you are going to hear a lot about "The Catalysis Trilogy", and especially about the last book, IMAGO but don't worry. Now that production is finished, I can focus on sharing my ideas with you and I have reduced all three books to make that possible.

                                      I undertake to keep my price to $2.99 for each book for as long as I possibly can. The retailers will add to that so please do shop around. I am also retailing Book of Plebs at the same price.

                                      I will be releasing the Trilogy box set in about two to three weeks and that will be the biggest E-Book out there, with the most cutting edge ideas expressed in the most articulate fashion to create a virtually new genre of Science Fantasy/Science Fiction with unique Spiritual and Literary overtones that will enthral and amaze and just show you what can be done when you fear nothing. 

                                      When you read any one of these books, in any order you like, you'll quickly see that it was never about money. It's a vocation, just like a priest's, but it's not about religion. It's about us, as flawed, scared and brilliant as we are.

                                      Here. Why not download your 3 chapter Mini-E Book preview, or ME-Book, as I call them, and then scroll down to get the 3-Chapters from the other 2 Books of The Catalysis Trilogy and also Book of Plebs. I can do that because I am firm believer in WYSIWYG.

                                     You will not find a better read, but don't believe me if you don't want to. Very soon, other people are going to tell you anyway.

                                      Have an epic day. 

                  

OK - So let's get down to talking about the Elephant in every thinking persons room for just ten (10) seconds and absolutely no more. 

Thanks for your attention and let's start the count.
Apparently, God is no longer cool and the musings of those who claimed to be inspired by a God Entity through 'Revelation' or similar nonsense are all rubbish because 'Creation' and all that 'Shit' has been determined to be  incompatible with modern physics. 


Do I  hear a cheer? YAY.

Think about this. We sterilise things to keep our younger  kids healthy and we irradiate cancers to neutralise and then kill them. Yet 13.8 Billion years ago, this universe was small enough to hold in the palm of your hand but so hot and dense that it would be literal ages before it could cool enough to permit the first atoms of hydrogen to form. It was pure energy at billions of degrees Celsius and irradiated so hard that we can still detect the radiation today. Now that has to be as sterile as you can possibly make it and yet here we are.

Because we are, the only viable conclusion is that God is not only alive but evolution is evidence that It is also kicking quite strongly.

It was we who made religions and they are all flawed because we don't seem to work these things out very well, but the fact is, something else had to make us coz we weren't around to do it for ourselves. The result is that we search or if we are too busy or too stressed, we don't.
The point is, when we decide to put restrictions on hope, we might as well forget about progress because if we are all there is, we are so screwed and we don't deserve to get off this rock and we all know it.

But if we don't evolve we become extinct. So why do we have children if we are not serious about creating some kind of a future in which they can also hope and expect a result?

No-one of us is Human

This is yours truly with the 'Old Keep' of the Catalysis Trilogy in the background, though on a warmer day.

I'm standing quite close to where the story really begins and also to where it comes full circle in the Trilogy Finale, which is now quite close to completion.

(Take the link to my site for details)




Catalysis is a project that will ask you to engage in just a little less introspection than it demanded of me to produce it.

Please bear with me for just a moment while I remind you that I also made the claim in a previous cover that 'Revelation Still Rains' and to prove the truth of that one also, I invite you to repudiate my claim that no-one of us is human, even though that apparently illogical statement questions the validity of the term 'Human Being'. Catalysis is a work that takes an alternate view of our humanity and also our more than occasional lack of it, so it's not implausible that I had this minor revelation while working on that.

The fact is, our most fundamental viewpoints don't come down to our religion, our spirituality or our ethnicity. Our most basic perceptions before all of that later conditioning comes down to whether we are male, female or something in between. If Male and Female are our Alfa's and Omega's or our sometimes very polarising extremes of fundamental existence, then in between there is an ever increasing choice of letters to designate everything from gay to bi-sexual, curious or transgendered etc. The thing is, all of these MUST be equally valid. I say that because none of us is 100% what we physically appear, or claim to be.

The thing is, all 'human' babies are naturally equipped to be configured male or female for up to six weeks before they begin to diverge and maybe not all of them end up 100% one thing or the other. Let's face it. There are just as many guys who'd cry at sad movies as women who'd laugh at them crying. So despite what each of us appears to superficially be, there is not one of us who can look at any subject with the all encompassing scrutiny of all humanity, because we are simply incapable of all the implied variables. At a guess, I'd say each of us lacks maybe 40-60% of what it takes to have that 100% total human perspective.

We can only see our own, comparatively narrow and by deduction, blinkered viewpoints. We have to depend on our total opposites to appreciate the rest of it for us. It's only when we share what both of us can see, that we can really claim to have anything close to 100% of what is there to be seen. 

The alarming thing is that although we are told that opposites attract, we seldom end up with total opposites. We prefer terms like soul mate, which suggests that we want to be with people who possess at least some of our own intrinsic values. However, for the sake of this argument let's just say that every couple has something close to the complete human outlook. Then again, we also know that none of us is perfect. Whether we like to admit it or not - we are all flawed.

So when we talk about our humanity or our lack of it, what we really mean is our ability or inability to empathise with each other and also with those less intelligent species that sometimes depend on us to do the right thing for them, because they're not quite up to it. However, because we are inadequate, we are just as likely to simply walk past someone or something that needs us, unless our opposite number just happens to be there and compels us to acknowledge their presence.

Then again, maybe that's how we get to meet those opposite numbers, alter egos or whatever they are.

That poses a further question.  If we have to pause and give our complementary alter egos the opportunity to catch up to us, so we get teh full perspective, is it possible that Destiny and what we call Humanity have something in common?

I wrote that but I also have to think about it sometimes.

Book 3 Of Catalysis.

PROLOGUE

Nobody has ever been created equal and until we mature enough to value principles as highly as we do our more substantial possessions, no-one ever will. Genuine equality was only possible once and that was in a past so remote and toxic, that none of us alive today would survive it for long. This is the rarity of an absolute truth because we now know that everything alive had to start from a common primeval origin in a vastly different time and place. So we blame flaws in evolution for our obvious 'discrepancies' and also for being handed down a range of senses so poor that they only seem to underline our inherent fragility.

Our mortal enemies throughout this 'Human' epoch in which we discovered everything, including ourselves, seem to have fared much better than us. They were naturally endowed with the means to effortlessly hunt us down and devour us. Fossil records suggest long periods of human misery and attrition, but we were never alone. We also unearth the relics of many separate hominid species who also walked that pristine Earth, but who succumbed to extinction somewhere along the way.

"Nature can be very dangerous." We constantly remind ourselves. " It has always been faster and even though largely tamed these days, it still boasts of sharper fangs and splayed claws, a keener nose, ear and eye." Yet here we stand, living testament to our own greatness.

The scale of our victory against those odds is such that we can afford to be magnanimous, but our conceit is merciless. He tells us that nature might see with superior range and depth perception, but the key to our success was our thinking eye.

"Our long experience of not simply looking but also analyzing, means that we have seen much more than what was there. We fostered the ability to also see what could or should be there in due course. What sets us apart from nature is our ability to apply logic and then visualize outcomes."

We willingly accept this reassurance of our superiority and look down our short impotent noses at the fickle nature of evolution, as it continues to mould small things in the mud at our feet. Our promise to devote even more of our precious time to a fuller understanding of such an obvious paradox lacks sincerity, because we're busy. Everything waits for us.

Evolution, who is never deaf to anyone or anything was as we observed, also too busy to take notice or insult, and was in any case unconcerned. Our tendency for grandiose and possibly premature assumptions is nothing new. Only unnatural things truly endowed with some alien nature can claim to be aloof from natural processes.

"Only these," says logic with more than a smattering of inherent authority, "- can possess sufficient objectivity to make such impartial and absolute judgements."

It then hesitantly asks. "Does humanity deny that its own human nature is and always was perfectly natural?" A question that only a human could definitively answer, but none could be seen, even if one had the ears to hear it.

Meanwhile, Destiny stirs the waters with the slightest of touches as she passes by and graces each of her agents with the reward of a knowing smile for their jobs well done.

"Come." She softly commands, and each obediently falls in line behind her.

Evolution hesitates, surprised at such an unexpected summons before the task is complete and is therefore the last of them to comply. Like us, evolution always assumed endless time.

"But it is done." Destiny's small admonishment betrays her ability to selectively hear the wish of a sleeper on a world half a universe away, but only silence prevails when nothing dares to speak uninvited in her presence.

"I know I seldom intervene but here I am." Destiny says, by way of explanation and with almost aberrant patience adding. "Also, sometimes it is the absence of some things that can make something else more obvious."

But only one set of thinking eyes was there to witness what a merely seeing eye would most likely never register. The splash that marked her exit froze in time and yellow sunlight as she waited for evolution to join her. While those distorted drops of water hung motionless above their reflected images in the mirror, the lack of any fluid or moving surface stilled all glinting action.

In that snapshot of a long drawn out moment, the wingless wet nymph only partially emerged but it was still transformed into a beautiful imago. Its hard shell cracked open like an egg which was then re-immersed to fall back under water. Imago was the only moving and living thing in the frame as it simply stepped onto a surface as apparently silvery and motionless as mercury, and was already dry.

Evolution could only watch bemused because a metamorphosis from nymph to final form just wasn't feasible without the additional pupa or immature stage. The new creation took its leisurely time adjusting to the alternative reality of life as something so much more than a wet nymph in the brilliance beyond the water. It disregarded half a billion years of ingrained caution and stood as only other insects should, on the film that separated lake from sky. Fearless of finned predators below and oblivious to the hovering hazards of a splash rendered temporarily immune to time and gravity, it was clearly already immortalized by being the first of a new kind.

Having achieved perfection, Imago indulged itself with a moments reflection and then turned, looking for some wind. It lifted lazily into the warming air to rise above the still frozen splash that hung in suspended space-time. Learning quickly and straightening its initial erratic course, Imago angled towards the sun. Once it was high enough to stay dry and safe, Destiny released the splash to fall and close the rift behind her but forbade it sound.

In mute silence then, the ripples spread out towards infinity from a tiny and insignificant lake beneath the ruins of an old keep.

And so the mood is set for the epic finale ...

Destiny's Decisions.

True to Celtic Tradition, I consider this tree to be venerable and warm, especially on the sunny side of it I chose for this photo.

There are no prizes for guessing that I was born after the tree, but our pose is evidence of Destiny in action, and not necessarily on any small scale. Great things lie ahead for both of us to celebrate.

Catalysis Book-1 (Changes Imposed) and Ochre, Book-2 of Catalysis make for some fascinating reading, but they're not a simple chronological progression to some 'Happy ever after' in Book-3.


I HAVE BEEN ASKED HOW DESTINY IS GOING TO BRING BOTH BOOKS TOGETHER.

She'll do it because Destiny is not some unstated, random and abstract non-entity that places any one of us under a benevolently solid friend like mine above, for absolutely no reason. It's not a random coincidence that either happens or not without consequences. To explain this clearly, I had to start by documenting the hierarchy of changes that Destiny can invoke at any time in order to irrevocably alter the world we would otherwise like to become accustomed to living in, thereby making evolution redundant. Destiny is not a mute witness to change but works alongside and even dictates to evolution. It is the process of Global and even Universal Catalysis that was always going to produce one very specific result, just like a very measured test in the science laboratory that was always going to have one well anticipated outcome.

Catalysis Book-1 (Changes Imposed) introduces us to an obviously inferior human being who turns out to be anything but inferior (No surprise here). When it becomes undeniable that she is not just unusual but more special than any human should ever expect to be, it's already too late because she was never alone. Destiny was always walking with her and holding her hand so she could oversee the final implosion of the global order and usher in the new age. We have a history of ignoring Prophets, so it should come as no surprise that those who should know better choose to ignore her. This proves to be an error of cataclysmic proportions and so many changes on the same scale then become unavoidable, which is the way Destiny works.

Ochre (Book-2 of Catalysis) is a place that is very distant in time and space from our here and now of increasingly futile todays. We arrive there on the first page and immediately begin to appreciate the timeless vast depths that Destiny routinely travels, as she does what she does. Under the mass of Ochre, a very divided civilisation faces its Nemesis. To the technologically advanced Yan, their perceived enemy is nothing but an unfortunate quirk of the cosmos that will arrive before they can develop the means to escape it. To the spiritual but also superstitious Bi-du, it is retribution from the Godly Constellations for the crimes of the Yan against their kind. All of them will perish, but the spiritually enlightened will be reborn into alternate worlds of their own making (There is a vaguely familiar ring to that).

To the supposedly altruistic Spoke, who are merely passing by, engaged on their own mission of redemption, there are so many reasons to turn a blind eye to the impending apocalypse. Meanwhile, the autonomous artificial intelligences who command the Spoke starship remain apparently oblivious to Destiny's plan as it unfolds. Only their cyborg Prophet, who serves as a trusted intermediary of sorts, between the biological Spoke and their synthetic AI's, seems to be aware of being called to possibly witness some higher purpose in an impending and otherwise meaningless extinction event amongst the stars.

Hope is a synthetic avatar entrusted with command of the Spoke starship as it traverses the ages. She is appointed by Destiny to join some seemingly tenuous dots in the Godly Constellations to make the ludicrous and laughable Bi-du aspirations a possibility while opening up some, even more, mind-blowing possibilities concerning us.

It wouldn't be unusual for you to question how something as apparently abstract and innocuous as Destiny could possibly bring two such seemingly diverse books together in the third book. So, here's a concept that might help you get your head around Destiny's size and potential influence. By inference, you can then see how our fantastic past has always created our mundane present, which will contribute to the creation of futures that could be considered magic to us today.

Science has proven that everything we will ever see, touch or interact with on any level, came with the Big Bang and also that the original constituents of the same phenomenon were initially and totally confined within a very small space. That means that every part of what the universe has now become was once within a literal arms reach. Therefore, every part of this expanded reality still remains as much an integral part of it as the soil in your back garden and the bugs that live in it.

How can we be remote strangers to something that we were born with, and remain gravitationally attracted to for 14 billion years? Destiny just decided to put that bit there and our bit here. But for all we know, it could just as easily be the other way round.

Solstice, Spring, Hope and Ochre

Why does the sea seem to call out to us, even in winter when it's almost cold enough to kill us?

We joke of course, but evolution is never so flippant. It whispers in our ears that it very recently knew us as simple tetrapods that walked clumsily out of the waves and into the forests for more food diversity.

Our delusions of perfection tell us to deny that we were anything less than what we are today, but we confess our sin by our presence on the shore, always looking out.


This Mid-Winter 2015/16 Solstice Sun, reflected on frigid sand and sea seems to double its apparent elevation to give us false Hope of better things ahead. Longer days of warmth and life will mean happy smiles and a spring/summer of plenty, but for that to happen we must still depend on the further rotation of our tilted planet within the cosmos.

The virtual e-Book pages of OCHRE reveal a far more potent aspect to Hope. Between its covers she is also the artificially intelligent and autonomously sentient avatar of a Spoke star ship, engaged on a mission of redemption to save an alien but parallel version of humanity from itself.

Hope has a number of problems that sometimes threaten to divert her from her duty. One of these is that she was compelled to stop at Ochre because a 'Prophet' designed a contingency sub-routine for her program which dictated that she must. This, despite a simple mathematical intuition that advised her to quietly pass it by. Though she doesn't yet fully appreciate the implications, she is also in love with the delusion of the Prophet's infallibility. These considerations are not fully explored in OCHRE because all of its characters are somewhat preoccupied with an impending apocalypse.

OCHRE is Book 2 of Catalysis and is now available on Amazon and Smashwords. It will very soon be retailed by Barnes & Noble, Apple, Kobo, Sony and all reputable and sensible outlets.

With this second book, all readers of the Catalysis trilogy will begin to see where it was always destined to go. Only Destiny is empowered to make all futures everywhere happen or not. To Her, the unbelievable and the impossible are simply what She does while She also transcends time and space. When you've read it, you might also understand why She seems so willing to grant us Her ear.

Sweet dreams to mother.

Ochre is now as real as Hope and available with a click, from Amazon, Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple and many more.