Karen Memory by Elizabeth Bear: A Review

Karen Memery kicks some Old West butt.

Elizabeth Bear’s newest novel is a steampunk romp through the fictitious northwest U.S. town of Rapid City.

The obvious star of this novel is the title character, Karen Memery. Her voice is fresh and immediate, and draws you in from the very first lines:

You ain’t gonna like what I have to tell you, but I’m gonna tell you anyway. See, my name is Karen Memery… and I’m one of the girls what works in the Hôtel Mon Cherie on Amity street. “Hôtel” has a little hat over that o like that. It’s French, so Beatrice tells me.

Delightful, fresh takes on steampunk tropes include steam-powered mechas; rootin’-tootin’ ladies of the night seamstresses-cum-U.S. Marshal deputies; and mind control.

Bear’s skillful narrative style, tight plot and fertile imagination bring us along effortlessly. Through Karen’s eyes, we see the crazy jumble caused by Rapid City’s hasty growth, the unregulated west, quite a few crazy mechanical inventions, and backdoor political maneuverings.

As I would expect from an Elizabeth Bear novel, these Rapid City women don’t wait for the U.S. Marshals to save their city, although they happily greet them as allies. Yet this book is not stuffed full of gun-toting women whose only purpose is to wield a six-shooter and belt back a shot of rot-gut. Bear’s main characters are fully realized with the ability to surprise the reader.

Though I truly enjoyed this novel, one thing disappointed me: the tired plot device known as the prostitute serial killer. In my opinion, any additional urgency this plot device engendered, its location in the story arc of the novel, and the satisfaction of the eventual discovery of the protagonist did not warrant its inclusion into what was otherwise a truly original tale.

In short, I give this book 4.8 out of 5 stars.

If you are looking for a fast read during your summer vacation, this book is one to put on your reading list.

Elizabeth Bear

Title: Karen Memory

Author: Elizabeth Bear

Publisher: Tor Books (February 3, 2015)

Dialogue: Do All Your Characters Sound The Same?

Don't Put Your Readers To Sleep!
Image by artist Steve Lambert.

Character One: "How are you this morning?"
Character Two: "I am fine, how are you?"
Character One: "I am fine as well. Did you sleep well?"
Character Two: "Why, yes, I did. How about yourself?"
Character One: "I slept fine as well."
Character Three: "Hello, how are you both this morning?"
Character One: "I am fine, how are you?"

Reader: Zzzzzzzz.

There's a disease in the world of fiction—or even non-fiction—that plagues some writers. It seems that all their characters sound the same.

The same inflection, sentence structure, vocabulary. Even if slang is used, it is all the same slang words, used by all the characters interchangeably.

"Allow your characters to speak for themselves!"

Having all your characters speak the same is just as if you were having them all look the same or have all the same interests and opinions. Why is this acceptable?

The answer, of course, is it's not acceptable! A skilled craftsperson will be so adept at writing dialogue unique for each character, that she will not even need dialogue tags half the time, because readers will know exactly who is speaking by the carefully crafted dialogue itself.

A true master of this craft is the author Jan Karon. Her characters for her Mitford series are almost all uniquely identified by their dialogue alone.

Here is a sample of her dialogue, in which I've taken the liberty of editing out dialogue tags and some narration:

"Dearest?"
"Ummm?"
"Shall we bring the armoire over this Saturday?"
"This Saturday, I'm taking you for a little... recreation."
"I love recreation! What are we going to do?"
"It'll be a surprise."
"Good! I love surprises!"
"What don't you love?"
"Exhaust fumes, movies made for TV, and cakes baked from mix."

In this long series (up to ten novels at this writing), there are two central characters. The first character is a stick-in-the-mud bachelor of 60-odd years. The second is an artist, a lover of life, an embracer of new things. In the dialogue above, it is easy to understand which character is which.

Karon takes these traits and weaves them into her dialogue, revealing and strengthening her characters', well, characters! One of her more masterful talents is to establish her two central characters' conversational habits, and track their evolution. As an example, at the beginning of their relationship the bachelor—Tim—is fascinated by the artist's—Cynthia's—joie de vivre. She often proclaims her love for whatever is going to happen or is happening in her life. As the novels progress, Tim will respond to her proclamations of love by saying, "Cynthia, Cynthia, what don't you love?" and she will answer by listing three things she doesn't love (as in the example above, exhaust fumes, TV movies and cake mixes).

Karon's minor characters also have had this care and attention lavished upon them. Each one has unique sayings that belong to themselves alone. If you listen, you'll hear this proclivity in your own real life acquaintances. What better way to develop your characters than to individualize their speech patterns?

That said, this is not the easiest craft to master. Dialogue is almost effortless to write when our characters think and speak like ourselves. Allowing your characters to speak in their own voices takes patience and familiarity with their personalities and quirks. Most of all, it takes the willingness to get out of your characters' way.

Individualized dialogue takes work, but the worth to your readers is almost immeasurable. It will make all your characters seem like personal friends (or enemies!) It's another way to get your readers to trust you with their reading time and energy. Allow your characters to speak for themselves, and they may surprise you with their individuality.

Narrative: Do You Overuse It?

Does This Character Frequent Your Fiction?

Narrative! It's very useful in its place, but as SF/F fans we've all read those behemoths whose narrator is the most prevalent—and the most boring—character in the novel.

Don't get me wrong; I love detailed, long, involved novels. However, length shouldn't be a license to spew every detail of every happening in every country or planet of your universe all over the page. Instead, length should be used to develop your actual characters and reveal the plot.

"You don't have to hit your readers over the head with a huge iron chunk of narration to prove you've thoroughly conceived your world."

So, how to know if you're overutilizing The Evil Narrator?

Well, take a look at your first chapter, especially your first several pages. Are there huge chunks of paragraph? Is there no dialogue in sight? Then you may be overusing narrative. When does your MC—or any character—show up? If your answer is the first page, then you are probably getting right to your story. If there's no character for your readers to engage with, then you may want to rethink your first chapter approach.

In some ways, especially at the beginning stages of writing a novel, I find narrative to be easiest to write. I will sit down at the keyboard and out comes all this detail. It's fascinating, and I have a great time writing it, but in the end most of this narration is never used in the finished work. I'll either reveal the details in dialogue and action, or I'll keep it in mind to explain the structure of the world.

If you are confident in the structure and sense of your own SF/F world, your readers will trust you. You don't have to hit them over the head with a huge iron chunk of narration to prove you've thoroughly conceived your world. The most amazing novels are ones where the details of the worlds are revealed throughout the entire novel or novels. This takes patience and aforethought.

An example of excellence in world- (or galaxy-) building is Jack Vance's Oikumene. This galaxial structure is revealed throughout the five Demon Princes novels he wrote over the course of 17 years. A specific example of Vance's patience is the Rigel Concourse: 26 habitable planets orbiting the sun Rigel. Since such a solar system is probably impossible even in our vast galaxy, Vance explains it by saying that the planets were towed into perfect orbits by some advanced, now-vanished race. Yet, instead of instantly telling us ad nauseam about all the planets in the Concourse, he saves details of many of them for subsequent novels.

This patience can also be a gift to you, the writer. By leaving a few, choice details nebulous in your own mind, you can have the luxury of filling in those informational gaps with details that will best suit your evolving story.

Narration. Is it fun to write? Yes of course! All that creativity without the bossy characters getting in there and mucking around messing things up. Is it necessary? Yes, at some points narration is definitely vital. Yet, it's better to use characters and action to reveal most details of your well-conceived world rather than having your narrator brag all about it. Narration is best when it's a minor character.

Flashback: Keeping it 'Offpage'

This is the third post in a series entitled Backstory: You Need It More Than Your Readers Do

Yes, flashbacks can actually be useful!

Yes, here is that dreaded word, flashback!

And yes, I think it can be used to advantage in stories. Especially in SF/F where the backstory is huge and sometimes crucial to what is going on in the present.

I do use flashbacks, sometimes as a character's musings about the past, less often as an actual flashback plopped into the story (this is the least effective and smooth option, in my opinion, but also useful at certain points). The most elegant solution, though is employing a flashback the way it naturally occurs in your own daily life.

Does this ever happen to you? You're walking down the street with a friend. You see a car parked on the side of the street that looks exactly like the first car you owned. Suddenly you're transported to the past for a full five minutes, remembering the first time you drove alone, that sense of freedom you gained when you were able to go wherever you pleased, or that time you ran out of gas. Meanwhile, your friend is standing there bored out of his skull because you're immersed in your flashback—immobile, unresponsive, lifeless. Does it?

Well, of course not. This doesn't happen in real life. Why should it in your novels?

What really happens:

Tim and Helen were walking down the street one evening in June, on the way to their favorite pizza place. Helen paused beside a rusted Pontiac, shaking her head and smiling.

"What's up?" Tim asked.

"That's the same as my first car," Helen said, motioning with her chin.

"It's an old beater."

"No kidding. Once I got pulled over for driving without a back license plate. Turns out the bolts had rusted through and the plate fell off without me noticing. My dad had put the fear of God into me about never being pulled over, and yet here I was being cited. Don't laugh! It wasn't funny."

"Yes ma'am." He made a mock serious face.

She nudged his arm with her shoulder. "Come on. I'm hungry."

This sample scene is relatively benign in its topic. Yet this technique could be used for all sorts of important reveals. Dialogue is a speedy way to reveal past events, for it's natural for people to talk to others about important things that happened in their past.

If your character is alone, though, or with people that she doesn't trust, then she can think about past events instead of speaking about them. However, to keep this from becoming a dreaded info-dump, it's crucial for your character to think about these past events in relation to what's going on in the present moment!

"The most elegant solution is employing a flashback the way it naturally occurs in your own daily life."

There are many ways to weave the past into the present in your novel or story. Honest to goodness flashbacks, however, are not always—and I would posit not usually—necessary. Revealing the past while keeping the immediacy of the present is always good writing.



Backstory: You Need It More Than Your Readers Do is a series of posts that will explore how much you need to know about your story versus how much you need to tell. It's that old show versus tell conundrum explored in a new way.

Danielle Ste. Just is the author of several short stories including The Forgottens and The Effect-Displacement Assassin. Her new novel, Lethe, is forthcoming.

Your Main Character's Personality: Reveal It Piece By Piece

This is the second post in a series entitled Backstory: You Need It More Than Your Readers Do

Pieces of your character's personality can be written into each scene

So you have a character you absolutely love, and you can't wait to tell everyone about it!

• You've built up the character in your head or on paper
• You've envisioned her childhood
• You've got his features firmly fixed in your mind
• You've been working out her entire employment history

Now what do you do? How do you reveal all this backstory without killing the plotline or boring your readers half to death?

Reveal it piece by piece.

Let's use an example character: Veronica Tsosie. She has had a terrible childhood, was orphaned early and was shifted from relative to relative, ending up with foster families where she was never truly wanted.

These childhood experiences will affect her personality in a fundamental way. Perhaps you'll write Veronica as a person who is needy and is constantly seeking approval. Perhaps you'll write her as the opposite extreme, as a person who finds it almost impossible to trust anyone.

If you reveal her childhood history at the beginning of your work, though, all that exposition will kill the tension and pacing of your story, and any mystery your character might hold for your readers.

"This is all not to say that your character can't reveal her past. But that's her job, not yours!"

Instead, let your MC's actions reveal her history. Veronica's distaste for authority figures and unwillingness to let her guard down in front of other people will speak for itself. How about a scene where she is trapped in a room with another character, yet cannot allow herself to fall asleep in the company of that person? She forces herself to stay awake until she passes out from fatigue. This would show the reader without a doubt that she is carrying around major pain.

This is all not to say that Veronica can't reveal her pain to another character. But that's her job, not yours! She is going to have to build trust with another character or be pushed to the point where she reveals her childhood tribulations.

Characters need background, they can't be thrown into your story without a past. However, don't turn around and choke your readers with a huge chunk of exposition. Instead, reveal your MC's past piece by piece, and allow your characters to do their own talking. Blend the past with the present when it's the most meaningful for your storyline.


Backstory: You Need It More Than Your Readers Do is a series of posts that will explore how much you need to know about your story versus how much you need to tell. It's that old show versus tell conundrum explored in a new way.

Danielle Ste. Just is the author of several short stories including The Forgottens and The Effect-Displacement Assassin. Her new novel, Lethe, is forthcoming.

Detail Maps: Move Your Characters Around Confidently

This is the first post in a series entitled Backstory: You Need It More Than Your Readers Do

The less famous—but still fabulous—detail map of the Shire from The Lord of the Rings.

As science fiction and fantasy writers and readers, we are all familiar with maps. Star and galaxy maps à la Star Trek, and world maps à la Tolkien.

I love world and galaxy maps, and use them a lot for my fiction. However, there is another tool that we can employ as writers, and these do not necessarily have to go into our finished work.

I'm talking about the detail map.

This could be a quick sketch of a street or a neighborhood, or even a map of a particular city where your characters spend a lot of time.

Benefits of creating a detail map:

• All In One Place: You don't have to keep scrolling upward to check where you had placed that building in a previous scene.
• Concretized Ideas: Things take on a permanence when they're down on paper.
• Creativity Boost: You'll start to create things you'd not thought of before when you map out your neighborhood. Things like, "...wait, where do these people walk, shop, stable their animals/park their spaceships."
• Verisimilitude: Movement will flow once you've got a neighborhood charted—instead of a boring move from point A to point B, perhaps you can follow your character through that neighborhood. Incorporate a spice market or community water fountain, or the off-planet customs office.

Once you've created the map, you don't have to use every detail! Only utilize those details relevant to your storyline. Remember, you need this information more than your readers.

Take the Tolkien Shire map for example. Many neighborhoods and physical features in the map pictured above are not explored in the work. Some are referenced in passing, though, which helps the reader to place people and events. For example, Fatty Bolger's family came from the Budgefords of Bridgefields, yet he himself had never been over the Brandywine Bridge. This character reveal makes more sense to readers when they see on the map that the Brandywine Bridge is quite close to Bridgefields and yet Fatty had never bestirred himself to cross it. Yet, Bridgefields is named only once in the entire three volume novel (although it is also mentioned in the appendices).

One of my favorite places-as-characters is Martha Wells's city Charisat in the novel City of Bones. I have to believe that she created a map of that city!

In one of my own works, two characters must break into a house and explore it. Of course, they are attacked and must fight their way out. Not only did I draw a detail map of the house and its immediate environs, but also the doors, windows and some of the furnishings. I then referred to the map while writing the scene. All that detail made the breaking in, exploration and eventual fight much more realistic.

Enriching your story with detail maps will help you to bring your story to life!


Backstory: You Need It More Than Your Readers Do is a series of posts that will explore how much you need to know about your story versus how much you need to tell. It's that old show versus tell conundrum explored in a new way.

Danielle Ste. Just is the author of several short stories including The Forgottens and The Effect-Displacement Assassin. Her new novel, Lethe, is forthcoming.