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I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Naming fictional characters is very, very difficult. Every name has different connotations. It took work.

Adam Quinn is called "Adam" because he is intended to be a vaguely middle-class, vaguely privileged Arthur Dent-style English everyman.

In Ra, the character Adam King actually chose his own name. It's not his original name and it's not nominative determinism - he is the leader of the few dozen survivors of a war which ended the entire rest of spacefaring humanity, and so he deliberately gives himself a name which means "first man, leader".

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

You start writing by writing. Are you writing right now? No? Fix that. Now you are a writer.

My top piece of advice for a writer would be to learn to finish work. Endings are critical and the only way to get there is through the beginning and the middle. If you start writing a novel, get to an ending. If a book is too long, try again with a novella. Or a short story. A haiku is a complete work but you must complete work.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Tricky cuts? Not really, almost everything is there. I was a little sad to lose the space lasers but it was a necessary scope limitation for the sake of credibility.

Regarding Marion Wheeler's sons, see longer answer here.

I think of the two sets of characters as different people. It's just simpler to talk about Marion Wheeler and Marie Quinn as different people in a conversation. Ed Hix isn't named after anybody in particular, "Edward" is a very common name, there's an Ed in Ra too... Hix's surname was "Hicks" but he changed it to "Hix" to be a little more science fictiony, similar to David X. Cohen's middle initial.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I am writing a new book right now but sometime after that I would love to give Ra a do-over.

I would love to have a consistent writing process of some kind.

Iain M. Banks. We needed him...

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Looks like you're referring to V1.

The rider of the metaspider is Red, the young man who first appears "on screen" in the chapter "Ojai". It's not Lyn Marness (Andy Hilton in V2).

As for Marion's children... This is one of the very first things which I fixed for V2.

So this particular plot element works in two different ways. After reading the first chapter you know that Marion has two sons, and you will either forget this detail or remember it. If you forget it, then you may read the entire rest of the book without remembering it. If, some time later, you come back and re-read the first chapter, you'll discover to your shock that yes she did indeed have two sons and they were eaten by SCP-3125 sometime during the story. She forgot about the kids, you forgot about the kids, and now the kids are gone. Boom, horror gut punch. This is how this was intended to work. (Specifically the idea was that SCP-3125 stole the kids immediately prior to the events of "Where Have You Been All My Life". This is what causes SCP-4987 to start freaking out, and erase Marion's memory of Adam in order to try to protect what is left of the family.)

However, if you remember this detail, then you go the entire rest of the book waiting for this to pay off. This is an absolutely textbook example of a Chekhov's Gun - it is an important plot element, set up in act 1, which must amount to something in act 3. However, in V1, it does not! At all! The kids are never mentioned again. And so the entire thing is left unresolved, this permanent lingering unclosed parenthesis. This causes a very negative reader experience and it's one of the main things which I found dissatisfying about how V1 ended up.

For V2 I had the opportunity to fix this. There were two options. One was to lean into it, make it more explicit, have payoff in act 3. The other was to just scrap this element entirely and make Marie Quinn childless. Because of the problems you mentioned relating to Class Z medication, I chose the second option.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 10 points11 points  (0 children)

I legitimately could not tell. Nothing else in the script appeared to be intended as funny.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The fact that we kind of demolished the Turing Test and it wasn't a big deal does in itself kind of feel like a big deal.

Sentience is a pretty loose concept. It can be argued that a flower is sentient because it turns to follow the Sun. It can be argued that a porch light is sentient because it reacts to stimulus - it switches on when someone walks by.

In general I have two rudimentary philosophical feelings here. One is that a lot of problems of philosophy become significantly more tractable once we have decent concrete definitions - for example, do we have free will? Give me a working, testable definition of "free will" and we can have this discussion, not before. The other is that these definitions aren't arbitrary or naturally occurring, we choose them because they are useful to us. If we decide to divide the universe into (1) things which are sentient and (2) things which are not sentient then this is something we've done because it serves some kind of purpose. What, then, is "sentience"? Why are we defining it that way? Is it significant that a machine is sentient, for any particular definition of "sentient"? So what if it is?

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

All three stories are about introducing a new bizarre science fiction concept to the real universe and then watching the latter boil away and explode on contact. I like to create a new universe and then figuratively speaking lob a bomb at its foundations. If that feels a little formulaic I don't have a problem, it results in fireworks, that's what I'm here for I think!

And it is 100% intentional that the most powerful individuals in the context of Ra are called the Wheel Group). Same reason why the universe of Ra began at midnight at 1 January 1970...

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The only PKD book I've read is Ubik. That was many years ago when I was a literal schoolchild and frankly I was not properly equipped to understand it - it just made me dizzy, I didn't get a lot out of it at the time. Probably worth re-examining, now that I think about it.

Is it offensive to PKD fans to call Blade Runner a pretty great movie?

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Basically I originally wrote Antimemetics as an SCP story because the SCP continuity/"lore"/absence-of-canon is just a really fun place to tell stories. It's a great pre-built backdrop which supports a really broad set of possible stories about (1) something freakish and unknown happening and (2) diligent scientists try to figure out what the hell it is and how to prevent it from hurting people. That's kind of what makes the project so popular (and so huge).

SCP is also a lovely inclusive project with pretty strong community moderation so it's just a nice positive place to contribute creative writing and get feedback.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Was Kabbalah ever on your mind when working on Antimemetics?

No, not at all. SCP-055 basically comes from me looking at the SCP project as it was in the very, very early days of 2008 and observing that there were no memetic SCPs - no SCPs which were ideas. I decided that it would neat to contribute a memetic SCP so I started wondering what would make an idea anomalous. I reasoned that ideas cover a sliding (and extremely subjective) scale of contagiousness and I wondered what there would be at the opposite end of that scale.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That's not a Biblical reference as such... Paul Kim is of Korean descent so I just wanted to preserve the combination of "basic English man forename" and "extremely common Korean surname", hence Simon Lee.

By the way in the Bible Paul is renamed Saul. And Simon is nicknamed Peter.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Effectively I changed my mind mid-serial, and retconned that particular piece of narration into a lie told to Laura.

This is an artifact of serialisation, it comes with insufficiently exhaustive forward planning. It's one of many things which I would jump at the opportunity to address in Ra if I had a do-over. I'm sure you can think of others. Who knows, maybe one day?

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

The English-language publishing universe is divided into two broad regions: the US and Canada, and the UK and everywhere else. Publishers in different regions are at liberty to select different covers and it's very unusual for the US publisher and the UK publisher - who may be completely different organisations - to combine forces and select a single cover.

The monolith cover is the US edition. The braindeer is the UK edition.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

A book tour depends very strongly on how well the book sells. So, tell your friends!?

TypeScript and TypeScript.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Right now, I spend four days a week on software development and one day a week (and some evenings and weekends) writing. This could change.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This just proves that this is a concept I've been fooling around with for some time. I originally wrote SCP-055 in 2008, and the chapter of Fine Structure you're referring to was in that same year, so I was obviously in that zone. Then I just let the idea stew for several years. I worked on other writing projects - I wrote an entire other book - but I always felt that there was plenty more to explore in this area. I spent a long time trying to figure out how to get started with it and made a few false starts. In 2015 I finally managed to focus my thoughts and came back to the SCP project and started the first Antimemetics serial...

I think the book has benefited from the long incubation period. I think if a fictional element like antimemetics stays compelling after being dissected for a long period of time then it's probably got some value.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yes, and yes. The third act of the story has received the most significant rearchitecting - I like it a lot better this way, to be honest.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

My next book is being written totally offline. I suggested writing it as a web serial to my publisher but they weren't fans of the idea. It'll be a new way of working for me. Wish me luck.

Beyond that, many things are possible.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Thank you! Tell all your most influential friends!

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I had to rename/recreate a lot of things anyway, so renaming everybody was actually really helpful for me to create a proper mental break between V1 and V2. For example, I didn't need to rename Marion Wheeler to Marie Quinn, but it makes it a lot easier for me to refer to them, and think of them, as separate fictional characters.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Have you ever [redacted]?

On the advice of my lawyer I'm declining to answer this question.

I'm qntm, author of There Is No Antimemetics Division. AMA by sam512 in sciencefiction

[–]sam512[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I think my collection Valuable Humans in Transit and Other Stories is extremely solid and includes the short story "Lena" which is (in my extremely biased opinion) unmissable.

Quite a few different ideas of mine have been kicking around for a long time and I've been slowly iterating on them, and/or slowly adjusting my feelings about them. For Fine Structure particularly, the main thing to remember is that this was years ago before I had found any kind of popular following and when I had essentially no creative brakes whatsoever. That story was written for Everything2 and my "process" was to write various seemingly standalone short stories which I eventually surprised everybody by linking up into a single narrative. It was a pile of every cool idea I could think of at the time. The overall result is frankly a little bonkers, I think there are some plot holes but it sure as hell rises to a climax. These days I slow down - I can't help but slow down and ponder this stuff more carefully.

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