Woody
This book is not presented in such a way as to be appealing to the public in general (or is it?) Much like the script for a play, Nalengua is intended to be used to form the basis of a production like a play. I started off writing it as a script for a comic. The format described in 'So you want to write a Comic' sounded tedeous in the extreame for the writer (describing each scene frame by frame), and relying on the artist for nothing other than the tangible art. So I've been much more general, on the whole, about the low level realization, which has allowed me to concentrate on the higher level design and let the artist deal with the low level design, and hence give them a more creative ro^le.
This laziness on my behalf has worked in another way too: Nalengua can be used as the basis for not only a comic now, but for a play, film, animation (if anyone is willing to spend that much time on it - probably about three lifetimes worth of work), or even a decent book!
As the artist/director is required to take a large interpretive ro^le, it is inevitable that some parts of my text will seem inappropriate to them. Where this is the case more relevent text should be inserted wherever neccessary. Scenes should be removed and added in an attempt by the artist to produce something they're happy with. This can be taken to the extent of using one or two of the fundamental ideas, and basing a completely new story around it.
To reinforce the fact that absolutely nothing in Lover's Limit is sacred, and to encourage artists to use the book, no renumeration is required for any parts of 'Nalengua - Lover's Limit' that you scab, be it the whole book, or just one sentance. Copyright has been taken out, not (as is normally the case) to ensure that people pay for use of the book, but to protect the people using it. As I'm trying to persuade as many people as possible to use Nalengua, it is conceivable that someone who has based a comic on it will be sued by someone who's made a film out of it. The copyright on the book will only be used in such circumstances, where people are being prohibited from publishing their version of Nalengua. This introduction is your guarentee that you are free from paying any royalties. It would be nice though if you could send me a copy of your comic, or give us an invite to the school production of it. Give us a bell on (0602) 524935 in the UK.
The story is quasi-auto-biographical, and is set in a society that has adopted a 'system' which has superceeded democracy. Horror of horrors, the world is run by cooperative conglomorates (or more accurately, the companies within the conglomorates), but unlike most similar scenarios posed to date, this system works. Don't believe me? Read on. The system was implemented on a wide scale about one / two generations before the time of the book. Democracy is now of historical interest only now that power has been taken by the people.
I have paid a reasonable amount of attention into getting the physics of space travel correct. The Lover's Limit phenomonen which shares the title of the book is a real physical oddity that has been ignored by sci-fi and physics communities alike, until now.
One last word of warning about reading Lover's Limit. As I have said, it is autobiographical to a limited degree and as such is a record of how my mind works. Another record of my mind is my use and misuse of words and their spelling. To pass Nalengua through a spell checker would remove all trace of this aspect. Sometimes my inability to spell and generate xxxxxx (reader insert descriptive word) text may leave the reader cringing. Still, there it stays. Many misspellings are deliberate, but I have no doubt that others exist.
I know it is very hard to reject the current democratic system and live within another as you read the book. The tendancy is to reject the whole system and put it all down to na"ivity on the behalf of the author, but please try to read it with an open mind. Give the book the benefit of the doubt wherever you come across something you disagree with. Try to think of ways that the system could address a problem you can see (as members of that society would have to) rather than rejecting the whole system at the first sign of trouble. As you get to understand the system, I think you'll agree that it has the potential to work considerably better than democracy.
Hope you like it,
Woody.
Critique #1
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Nalengua - Lover's Limit deals obstensively with man's inevitable emigration from the solar system and the practical implications and physics involved in doing so. The titles reflect these respectivly. This superficial story is as entertaining and interesting as any others that might constitute a genre/. Lover's Limit can be enjoyed purely at this level, however it is more. Considerably more. It provides our society which desires a 'Green', sustainable lifestyle with a social structure to support it without compromising what we consider to be our freedom. In fact it augments freedom. All national governments are forced into impotency, only sevices such as electricity, telecommunications and transport are left under local government control to varying degrees. The world is run by small companies under the protective wing of a fairly small number of conglomerates that are owned by the workers and customers as cooperatives. This is surely every 'right on voter's' doomsday scenario, but Woody asserts that only one fundamental change in human behaviour could support the system: customers and suppliers choosing who they buy from / sell to on both financial and ethical grounds equally. The seeds have already been sown for this as such attitudes have prevailed in personal purchases since the Green revolution a couple of years back. Companies however (and more specifically the people within companies) seem to have beeen immune to this so far.
Woody suggests that if democracy was going to be the structure of the ultimate society, it would have worked by now, maybe we should look at ways to get closer to that ultimate society. The proposal she forwards requires no government to adopt it, only individual people. As more people take on responsibility themselves, so responsibility is taken from the few in government, and given to the masses. Anyone can live their lives in such a way, infact many do already but not at work. For a social capitalist society to superceed democracy, people in positions that already carry responisibility need to adopt the philosopy.
Nalengua deals in varying depths with all aspects of life within her society. She has used the story as a vehicle to record her life, and to discuss the personal options availiable to her. In particular the two main characters, Miranda and James, trace two possible outcomes of her life as she sees it.
The speed with which her life progresses is reflected by the pace of the book - skimming over life towards the end, as she obviously feels she is now doing herself.
What makes the book so refreshing though is not the frank
discussion about what life is all about, nor the beautifully constructed
society that we shall necessarily live within sometime in the future, but
the style of writing. Written as it was, in such a way that someone else
can fill in the gaps that she can't be bothered with, Woody only deals
with what she considers fundamentally important to life or her new society.
Every scene has a completly new style, making this pure form of Nalengua
required reading for anyone who has enjoyed the film or comic.
Critique #2
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Once again the tired old 'Man leaving (yorn yorn) Earth' scenario is trooped out for a book that the author couldn't decide on a title for. The physics of the situation and mechanics of the 'New Society' is addressed in such unneccassary detail that one could almost forget that there is no real story other than that I've summarized above. That any substainable society can exist without addressing Man's fundamental tendancy to look after number one is in the least na"ive. The whole of this trait of man is seemingly symbolized by one character that is unconvincingly converted in toto.
Mr Woody may well feel personally traumatized by life, but I fail to see why he feels he needs to highlight the unresolvable (to him) questions in life to us in such a patronizing manner. It gives the feeling that he is lecturing at you and the world, shouting 'aren't I smart that I can see things like this and you plebs can't'.
However unbearable the many interpretations of this work are, they pail into insignificance when one tries to make head or tail of a writing style that seemingly changes every hour on the hour. In summary: wait until the film comes on the tele and miss that.