Looking Into The Crystal Ball

Our theme, where publishing is going, is pretty much anybody's guess. Back when I started writing, paper books and magazines were the only way to go. Okay, I admit I still love the feel and smell of a paper book. But things have changed rapidly in the last few years, and not only with publishing. Remember Superman ducking into a phone booth to change? No matter how smart a phone is, it won't offer cover for costume donning. Now almost everybody has a cell phone—and they can be life saving in an emergency. Which is why I got my, not smart, cell in the first place.
I have to be honest, I was dragged into the computer age kicking and screaming. My first encounter with a computer terrified me. I was sure I'd push the wrong button and blow the entire building to smithereens. Slowly I learned to use the thing, and then I began to like the thing. Today, my laptop and I have a love-hate relationship. I love what it does, but sometimes I want to throw it out the window.
The same is true of electronic publishing. Yes, I was once one of those paper snobs who believed e-publishing wasn't REAL publishing. Once  again, time proved me wrong. Today I've had short stories, novellas, and novels published electronically. And I wouldn't trade the experience for anything. Electronic is the way to go.
Does that mean I believe the future will be paperless? That all reading material will be electronic? Let me look into my crystal ball and tell you.
I see electronic publishing growing and changing in ways we can't imagine right now, and in many ways staying the same—a different version of paper books and magazines. Paper isn't going anywhere, at least not anytime soon. There are too many people who prefer paper, and who dislike or even hate computers and spinoffs like tablets and e-readers. Still, e-books are going to be a bigger and bigger part of the publishing pie. I have two books available in both paper and electronic formats. The e-books outsell the paper by a huge margin, and I hear the same from my writer friends.
It's hard to believe, but electronic reading material is only a few years old. Try to remember that when you see typos and format issues in e-books. We as authors, and our publishers, are still learning. And besides, NY Times bestselling hardcovers have typos too.
It's true, you know, sometimes, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Have a great week!
Cheryel
www.cheryelhutton.com

Earth of the Future?

When I think of the future I think about how different the landscape will be. I mean, if you think about it the world is constantly changing.

I think this really hit home for me because last year at this time we had snow and we were below zero for temperature (I'm sorry my temperature readings are going to be in Celsius, I am Canadian. LOL!) and currently it's 15 degrees. We have no snow, in fact it's raining. I've been on this Earth for thirty some odd years and I don't ever remember a November like this.

At all.

Usually I dread November. It's the first kiss of winter, but this November has been ... nice. So it got me thinking, what is the weather of the future going to be like?

I mean, they found frozen palm trees in Antarctica. Was Antarctica a paradise much like the Caribbean or Hawaii?

I mean, look at how our glaciers are receding.














This is the Athabasca glacier in Alberta (which I get to go see this summer). Just look at how much it's receded in the last nineteen years.

Even Niagara Falls is on it's own progression of recession.













Crazy eh?

I guess that's why I've always been curious on people's ideas about how the world will change. I remember being awed by the possibility of 2010 a Space Odyssey and the Jupiter turning into another Sun so that Earth would no longer be in darkness. Think about how the world would change then. I was also obsessed with post apocalyptic novels, still am actually, and the landscape of the world after a devastating war. The first one I can remember reading was John Wyndham's The Chrysalids.

The future has always intrigued me, but I'm looking towards the changing landscapes, the shifting of plates and environmental aspects.

What do you think the Earth will look like in the next century?

The Future of Myth

When I remember to blog, I usually blog about mythology. What is mythology but stories about how mankind has dealt with the big picture questions - Who am I? How did I get here? Why am I here? Where am I going?

Science insists that we crawled from primordial ooze. Various mythologies, however, give us beautiful accounts of the creation of man by gods and goddesses - all of which sound way better than evolving from bog bacteria. But those creation stories and our faith in them can seem very foolish in the face of the Almighty Scientific Fact.

What place, then, will mythology have in the future? Will there be room for stories about the big questions of humanity as anything other than something at which people far more educated in facts can point and laugh for our primitive beliefs and thought processes?

Will there be new gods and goddesses? New pantheons? New heroic sagas? Or are we at a place now where there is nothing new, only old stories and old gods that get recycled and retold for each new generation?

If that's the fate of our myths, our gods, then perhaps the new myths will be metaphors that turn the old gods new again. We will find new heroes who echo Hercules and Beowulf from a perspective we can't yet see. I hope the old stories will always be useful, will always teach us that there are things more powerful than mere facts. And I hope that our new myths reflect a better world.

Thanksgiving - What will it look like in the future?

While the American holiday of Thanksgiving has been celebrated from Colonial times, it wasn’t until the American Civil War that President Abraham Lincoln decreed it would be each year in November. When the first European settlers landed in the New World in Massachusetts Bay, they stayed in their ship for the winter – where they suffered from exposure, scurvy and disease. Scurvy is caused by a lack of Vitamin C, and British sailors would be given limes in later years – hence the term “limey” to refer to a British navy man.

Or, alternatively, to a really scary British father looking for his daughter's killer, but I digress...

According to many, the first Thanksgiving festival was held in 1621 as decreed by the Governor, William Bradford. The festival lasted for three days and is a fall harvest festival. Alternatively, some have argued that the festival in 1621 was not the first Thanksgiving on American soil, but that Spanish explorer Pedro Menéndez de Avilé held the first such festival on American soil.

(Pedro Menéndez de Avilé)

Others say it was in December of 1619. Native American peoples object to the celebration and portrayal of the holiday, saying that it glosses over the violence and bloodshed between the European settlers and the indigenous population already living here.

Regardless of the exact lineage of the holiday in America, it is certainly true that Harvest Festivals have occurred since ancient times. While many of the trappings of ancient celebrations have not survived to present day, gathering around a family table with our loved ones to celebrate with a large meal is something likely to continue. How might it look in a hundred years?

Assuming we don’t suffer an environmental cataclysm, it’s probably safe to say we will have turkeys. I think, though, that due to the rising population of people of Mexican descent, we will probably have other dishes incorporated into the traditional fare. Perhaps Turkey with Molé Sauce (composed of chocolate and chili and spices) will be on the traditional table of the future. It is probable that other sources of protein will become more popular, particularly as populations rise; soy is a viable and sustainable alternative for protein. Tofurky is a brand of today; will we have Tofurkey on the traditional table of the future? (My husband shouts “No!” in a resounding voice, but people a hundred years from now will see food differently and might not be as stuck on having meat at every meal.)

Mashed potatoes are a stable item in traditional Thanksgiving meals, but the starch place on the table is taken up by bananas in a large portion of the world (over 50% of the population of the earth consider the banana to be a staple food). In the U.S., the common “banana” is the Cavendish variety, and these trees have suffered a cataclysmic blight and may well be extinct in the next ten years. This will lead the American consumer to have to select a different banana from the over 500 types available – and it’s possible that one might “take off” as the next starch in our diet. Plantains instead of mashed potatoes might grace the table of the future.

How will we prepare the meal of the future? As fossil fuel prices continue to rise and reserves to fall, it’s probable that what we take for granted in terms of transportation today (trucks and trains, ocean liners and air freight) will not look that way in the future. As the localvore movement expands (placing a strong focus on foods purchased from local farmers), regionalization of the Thanksgiving menu is likely to occur. Rather than the homogenization of the menu, we might have regional favorites – beef in the upper Midwest, fish on the coasts, etc.

One thing uniquely American is the pumpkin. Found in the New World by the settlers, it’s become ubiquitous and a symbol of Thanksgiving and of Autumn (who has seen Starbucks’ Pumpkin Spice Latté?), and as such it’s likely to continue. But with rising obesity rates in the American population, will we continue to indulge in pie?

I hope, since I love pumpkin pie, that we don’t take it off the table but instead change how we relate to the dinner itself. Rather than settle on the couch afterward to watch a football game, what if we started a tradition of walking? Perhaps the Thanksgiving of the future will have elements more like the “Trick or Treat” of Halloween where folks wander from house to house, sharing a beverage and conversation.

There’s another angle we haven’t considered yet, and that’s whether or not we’ll even be ON this planet in a hundred years. Richard Branson is hard at work, developing his in-space hotel, and President Obama has spoken of revitalizing the space program and missions to the moon, Mars, and the International Space station. It’s entirely probable that humans will be in space in a hundred years, so our Thanksgiving meals might be in small packets to avoid mucking up the zero-gravity space we’re living in. Vegetables might be raised in hydroponics on a space station or even a Moon colony. Your turkey might even come from a farm on the Sea of Tranquility (the site of the first moon landing in 1969).

Whatever the tradition, I think some form of celebration of the harvest will continue long into the future. I hope that you have your own traditions and, if not, that you decide this year to start them. After all, “First Annual” is a perfectly fine title for a tradition that could have a long, long lineage.

May you have much to be thankful for and always remember to be grateful.

References:

History .com, “Thanksgiving” A&E Television Networks, 1996-2011, http://www.history.com/topics/thanksgiving/ Accessed 11/21/2011

Crosta, Peter, “What Is Scurvy? What Causes Scurvy?” MNT (Medical News Today),
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/155758.php Accessed 11/21/2011

One Hundred Years of Amazing

Telephone operator circa 1945 

The future. I've thought a lot about the future, about what things are going to be like in 100 years. Logically, to do that we need to look at what life was like 100 years ago.

A century ago, in the USA, the Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory burned, taking the lives of 145 workers—mostly women—with it. This one event changed the way we thought about factories and led to reforms that benefit workers today. At the same time, women were struggling to gain the right to vote.

The Boy Scouts were founded in 1910. The Incan city of Machu Picchu was discovered in 1911. In 1912, the Titanic sank. The Model T automobile was spreading the luxury of driving to the masses. Electricity use was becoming widespread. Big changes, and bigger changes were on the horizon.

Today, the world has changed so much as to be unrecognizable to a person from the early 20th Century. In the 21st Century, the car is a necessity in most of the United States and a lot of the rest of the world. People tend to view electricity as a right. American women don't bother to vote, even though we've only had the right for 91 years.

The 20th and early 21st centuries have seen such amazing technological advances that some have speculated we had help from aliens from far away planets. While that idea intrigues me as a writer, as a science lover, I'm just thankful to have been born in a time of such forward thinking. I've seen so many things change, from typewriters to computers. From phones that required a human to physically switch the calls, to a phone I carry with me everywhere. Humankind has walked on the surface of the moon. We've learned to use the power of the atom. We have the ability to instantly communicate with anyone, anywhere there is an Internet connection.

Maybe one day we'll even learn how to live together in respect and peace.

I hope so.

Cheryel
www.cheryelhutton.com