FOREVER IS MUCH TOO LONG ...By Jick Hambleton and Jean Friday When SF editor Damon Knight described science fiction as "what I mean when I point to it", it is possible he was thinking of something just like the Pan Historia novel Forever Is Much Too Long. That’s not to suggest this novel is especially worthy of the great man’s attention - though it might be, someday - but more a case of it specifically fitting that curious description. Forever sometimes needs to be badged as science fiction because to many it does not appear to be science fiction at all. Novel member Dyrk Mistrine describes it thus: "The MotherLode is a ship which is like a building which is like a map of the human psyche. From the EcoDome full of light and green growing things all the way down to the deep dark mysterious world of the pods. At Forever, we can write sci-fi if we want to. Or we can write a psychological thriller. Or we can have a murder mystery. A gaming world. An underworld. You want a ghost story? A war story? Some cyberpunk? Some Joycean stream of consciousness? Good? Evil? A battle between them? Forever can do it all." But what is Forever about? In brief, it is the tale of a Generation Starship called the MotherLode chugging slowly across the heavens as its contents and crew slip into various types of decay. In the recent past, a civil war has been fought by three sides wishing to force their agenda on the rest of the crew. Some called for the ship to be turned round and set on a course back to Earth, others wanted to preserve the original mission to travel to a distant star, while a third party wanted to tinker with the engines to make the ship go faster, a dangerous experiment with a potentially fatal conclusion. However, a cease-fire was called when it was discovered that MotherLode’s sister ship MoonStone was behaving very oddly. But this is just the plot. Forever is actually about the people onboard. And what a shell-shocked bunch of misfits they are! What started out as a high-minded crew hoping to populate the stars has gradually become bunch of angry empty souls, uncertain as to why they carry on, if indeed they do carry on, as many have surrendered to the frailties of the mind. The struggle against loneliness, claustrophobia and inevitability has come to underpin the writing at Forever. However, Forever’s beginnings are much more humble than the gestalt creature it has become. It began as one woman’s idea – a short story posted as an eight-part 'Set-Up' on the Novel Board, told in the first person about a security chief struggling with guilt on a starship packed with lost souls. Urged on by the publishers of Pan Historia, Jean Friday established the novel, then drafted in two close friends to play existing roles that would develop the impact of the story – Dyrk Mistrine and Zhu Smyth-Popov remain two of the driving forces aboard. Zhu says: "Playing someone else’s character (not a famous author or someone from a TV series) has been rather challenging. I had a lot of freedom given to me, yet I felt unfamiliar with the character in the beginning, sort of like wearing someone else’s suit. In time, however, I’ve grown genuinely fond of Zhu and feel I’ve made him my own, to a degree. What started out as a challenge has become a creative joy." On the principal of 'Build it and they will come', Jean says that once posting her original short story, she, Zhu and Mistrine then sat back and waited for 'them to come.' It’s been a long, but fruitful, wait. The arrival of Jick Hambleton edged the novel towards a major new plotline, that of the MoonStone menace. Jick explains why he joined. "I was attracted to this embryonic dark novel by the quality of the writers. I fooled myself that these people were worthy of my attention. I soon learned that I was the novice and had much to learn from this creative team." Dyrk agrees: "The writing drew me in. And the more attention I paid to this dark and curious novel, the more Mistrine began to know who he was, and why he was here. I began to have fun." And it’s not just the old campaigners who think this way. Recent arrivals at the novel Macha and Hunter Creed echo these views. "I sat for hours reading and rereading, when suddenly I felt like I had found a home. I enjoyed the plot and especially the writers," says Macha. Another newcomer Mat says: "I don’t know where the novel is going but that mystery is part of the fun of it all, the sense of knowing that something is going to happen but not knowing what, when or how is part of the attraction." In February, a debate at Pan Historia Junction saw Forever charged with being too limiting. In a way it is true. The novel has very defined limits. But most of the members see this as a challenge. Hunter says: "The reason I chose Forever is simple. I joined for the limits it places upon the writers. I love to test what I can do and this is a perfect playground for that." Jick feels similarly inclined. "I welcomed the challenge of writing a character who could not hop into a fighter shuttle and blast his way out of danger. I loved the idea of addressing despair at never having anything but steel walls for a home. The novel’s strength lies in its limits." But Forever’s abiding quality seems to be its unpredictable edge. Another newcomer, Nephologia Roca describes MotherLode as, " ...an Escher painting, growing sideways, top and bottomwise. It circles in upon itself, shoots off in splinter staircases. It has multiple decks, multiple rooms; minutes and hours that somehow both co-exist and run contiguous. There’s space and inclination for every sub-genre to scamper out from the shadows and grow in the ambient-biolight. "Best of all, there’s a passel of really adroit writers running the decks. They’re imaginative and willing to collaborate, and if you’re not paying enough attention, they might throw you a brilliant left hook. Power to the MotherLode." Mat adds: "This novel has great potential as psychological study in confinement. The sense of futility that seems to have overtaken the characters that have in essence just lain down and died has pretty much proven several theories of behavioural psychology correct. "Now we are getting to the point where we can see what happens when people realise that they are not actually rats in a maze and free to wander, but that they are rats in a cage, and as people reproduce, the cage is just going to keep getting smaller. We are going to see more violence, more insanity and more substance abuse." The question is will the crew get through the crisis, or will the MotherLode reach her destination empty of all but the frozen life within her metal womb? Not even Jean herself knows. "It’s been a wonder watching where MotherLode goes, and who goes with her. Stories I would never have thought of, people I never envisioned, populate a ship that is no longer mine, but belongs to all who sail in her. What was once a short story written in one long night long ago, is now a living breathing organic thing. And where it’s going is - anywhere. Anywhere at all." But it is Zhu who best sums up the attitudes of the active
writers at Forever. "I love coming to MotherLode and
writing the next instalment or reading the bright planning
posts by my fellow writers. I’m really proud of Forever
and I like to boast that it’s the most original sci-fi
on Pan." |
