My Favorite Things with L.E. Sterling

They might not be raindrops on roses or whiskers on kittens, but that doesn’t mean that we love them any less. Welcome back to My Favorite Things, the weekly column where we grab someone in speculative circles to gab about the greatest in geek. This week, we sit down with author L.E. Sterling, who’s wrapping up her True Born trilogy with the final installment, True North, which will be available next Tuesday on May 1st!

What does L.E. Sterling love when she’s not writing about a future where your very genes can kill you? Spoiler alert: the science of the stars, a film based on a classic Afrofuturist book, personality transfers, a superhero show directed by women, and a new position at a university. Trust me, you’re going to want to read on for more!

I’m going to get real on you here for a minute: I’ve had a hard year. In fact, it’s been ano-good knock down, terrible kind of year for me. My year has been the kind of hard-luck story that, if you heard someone tell it to you in a bar, you likely wouldn’t believe them. Or maybe you’d be weeping. (Or both).

But listen: I’m not here to kvetch. I might like to write dystopian speculative fiction, but I sure don’t like living it. So I decided to look around to see if I could find things that would bring me comfort and hope. In essence, I went seeking a counter-apocalypse to balance out all the dystopian-ish bad news in my life. And guess what? I found it.

I’m here to tell you that the world is not ending, folks. After reading this I’m hoping maybe you’ll agree with me, that despite so much that seems to be going wrong, the world is definitely heading in some awesome directions.

Stars Like Us: Listen, whatever you may think about astrology, it’s wicked awesome to think that a whole new generation is not just versed in astrology, it’s actively embracing it. Astrology (defined here as the ancient study of celestial objects and their effects on humans and the natural world) dates back at least to the ancient Greeks, who took the subject very seriously indeed. And, according to this recent article in The Guardian, so, too, do Millennials.

Photo from Free Nature Stock.com

Why, you might ask, am I so excited about this seemingly inane fact? Frankly, I want to live in a society that looks at the arcane study of our cosmic fingerprints as important enough to become nuanced scientific studies of dark matter and its affects on us from the time we’re born. What if it’s possible that planets, minor planets, asteroids, and stars exert tugs and pulls on individuals in the same way that humans are affected by the moon and the tides?

Even if astrology IS bunk, I still love the idea of our first space colony, planted by Elon Musk, being named Leo or Gemini or some such thing. I want the first colonists to travel in style on the Capricorn (a là Battlestar Galactica). I may not be around to see it, but darn, the thought makes this gal happy.

Brown Girls are in the Ring! I could go all Black Panther on you, but instead I’d like to talk about a lesser-known Afrofuturism production, Brown Girl Begins, based on Nalo Hopkinson’s award-winning speculative fiction novel, Brown Girl in the Ring.

This gem of a novel, first published in 1998, has literally haunted me for years. The story is set in Toronto, Canada (the city where I live), featuring places I frequented as a youth (subterranean food courts, anyone?). Yet what sets Brown Girl in the Ring apart from other dystopian novels of its time is that it features a very different kind of heroine: a young black woman. Infused with Caribbean culture, spiritualism and magic, this novel takes speculative fiction into a whole new (and very satisfying) stratosphere.

Now, thanks to Sharon Lewis’s feature film, the novel is getting a second wind. But instead of retelling the Hopkinson novel, the film stands as its prequel. It’s a daring move, and I for one am very excited to see this film!

Altered Carbon: What CAN’T I say about this fabulous new addition to my sci-fi addiction? This new Netflix series, developed from a novel of the same name by Richard K. Morgan, has it all: body swapping, gender swapping, race swapping. What I love best about Altered Carbon is its bold courage to suspend the concept of the regular “skin deep” character.

In the world of Altered Carbon, personalities exist on “stems” that record a person’s experience. These personality chips can be swapped from body to body (known as “sleeves”), literally sweeping away divisions of gender and ethnicity. The show leans on the stem concept to critique class, and brings discussions around gendered violence to a whole new level.

If you haven’t yet watched the very swoon-worthy season one of this show (there are some very compelling love stories in there), I highly recommend you tune in. Or pick up the book! My only complaint is that I now have to scrap that manuscript I was writing with a similar “personality transfer” premise….

Leading the Revolution: I’m more than halfway through bingeing on season two of Jessica Jones. You know, that crazy good television show starring a woman with superpowers (yet, oddly, not in an iron bodice and tiara?) and her sidekick bestie?

For those who haven’t seen this unbelievably addictive show, Jessica Jones sits within the Marvel speculative stronghold of supes with altered DNA. More importantly for a show about superheroes, it uniquely revolves around a strong female friendship. The characters of this show are remarkably compelling in that they are all complicated and imperfect — both the women and the men. Jessica has rage issues. Her sidekicks are a recovering drug addict and a former child star/addict. And the lawyer in the show (played by the brilliant Carrie-Anne Moss) is a strong but let’s face it — terrible — person who somehow manages to elicit sympathy.

This show is groundbreaking for more than its characters, though. The storyline for season one, for instance (holding back on the spoilers!!) explores territory surrounding abusive relationships and the scars, visible and invisible, these leave on women…. Only, you know, via a suped-up supervillain with unbelievably strong telepathic abilities.

Well, here’s a story for you: a while back, this Marvel Comics universe show, helmed by Melissa Rosenberg (writer for the Twilight flicks) had their own speculative fiction moment as they explored the question: “Hey, why don’t we have season two directed by WOMEN?”

It makes sense, right? After all, it is a story about women. Yet, a 13-episode season featuring 13 women directors is a lot less common than you might think (in fact, the stats are staggering). Frankly, I love this excellent show all the more for making more space for women to tell stories.

Professorship in Magical Studies: THIS IS NOT FAKE NEWS, PEOPLE! A major Canadian university, Carleton, recently began advertising for a new field of study it’s hiring in: magic.

Yep, the inaugural Allan Slaight Chair for the Study of the Conjuring Arts is expected to set up a new interdisciplinary and international center for the study of magic. Imagine: magic can be taken seriously as a study across the disciplines of neuroscience, anthropology, history, and more.

What if it can be proven (and in a setting of higher learning, nonetheless) that some humans have an innate ability to alter matter, space or time — the results of which we call magic? To sweeten the pot, the new inaugural chair will also have a heck of a magic library collection to play with, donated by the late Mr. Slaight. I can only begin to imagine the grimoires and diaries and alchemical manuscripts just waiting for discovery.

Ahem. I want the hiring committee to know I’m ready to apply, and I have the chops! (I just so happen to have completed my PhD on magic.) As long as the committee understand that instead of writing essays I’ll be churning out novels….

There. Feel better about the world? Yep, so do I.

L.E. Sterling had an early obsession with sci-fi, fantasy and romance, to which she remained faithful through an M.A. in creative writing and a PhD in English literature — where she completed a thesis on magical representation.

She is the author of cult hit YA novel The Originals (under pen name L.E. Vollick) and the Urban Fantasy Pluto’s Gate. True Born, first in the True Born trilogy, won the Athena Award® from the RWA. Originally hailing from Parry Sound, Ontario, L.E. spent most of her summers roaming across Canada in a van — inspiring her writing career. She currently lives in Toronto, Canada.