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It’s November, bringing us ever-closer to the end of 2018! It’s time for the FWG Blog Post!

 

Guild Newsroom

For those that missed the announcement last month, membership is now available to self-published authors! For more details on how you can qualify as a self-published author, check out our membership guidelines.

 

Member Highlights

Some highlights from last month, as featured from our FWG Member News section on the forums:

• Pre-orders are live for “Well, It’s Your Cow”, featuring stories by both Madison Keller and Frances Pauli.
• Two more stories by Mary E. Lowd have come out in Daily Science Fiction: “Wing Day” and “Jetpack and Cyborg Wings“.
• By S. ParkS. Park, “Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme” will be released in just a couple days! More details can be found on their Tumblr page.
• Televassi has begun a Patreon for his stories! Check it out and support him if you like his work.

To our members that have had something exciting happen in the past month not featured here: be sure to keep up with your Member News thread on the forums! Not only is this how we get our information, but these threads are able to be viewed by any person logged into the forums. Share your achievements with the rest of the writing community!

 

The Marketplace

For those of you looking to submit, keep an eye on the open markets on our website. For those of you who just forget, The Marketplace is your reminder for all things open for submissions!

Short Story Markets:

Publisher Title Theme Deadline Pay Thurston Howl Publications The Furry Cookbook Furry stories featuring a food or beverage item November 1st $10/story + one copy of the anthology Goal Publications The Daily Grind Furry stories featuring coffee November 14th $0.0075/word + one copy of the anthology Fanged Fiction Thrill of the Hunt Furry erotica featuring a predator/prey dynamic December 1st $0.0075/word + one copy of the anthology Zooscape Zine Zooscape Excellent furry stories N/A (continually open at this time) $0.06/word (maximum $60) for original, $20 for reprints Thurston Howl Publications Species: Bunnies Furry stories featuring bunnies January 1st One copy of the anthology (non-paying) Thurston Howl Publications Breeds: Bunnies Furry erotica featuring bunnies January 1st One copy of the anthology (non-paying) FurPlanet Inhuman Acts 2 Furry noir stories February 1st $0.0050/word + one copy of the anthology Thurston Howl Publications Even Furries Hate Nazis Furry stories against Nazism February 15th One copy of the anthology (non-paying)

Novel Markets:

• Goal Publications is open until the end of the month for “Pocket Shots”, which are novelettes from 15k-30k words.
• Fanged Fiction is open until the end of the month for 18+ “Pocket Shots”, which are novelettes from 15k-30k words.
• Thurston Howl Publications is open to novel/novella submissions, with no planned date for submissions to close.

 

Special Events and Announcements

Our revitalized Member Spotlight will be posted on the 7th of November. In addition, our Title Spotlight will be posted on the 15th of November. Stay tuned for those!

In addition to being a Guest of Honor at the upcoming Midwest Furfest, Kyell Gold will also now be a Guest of Honor at Furrydelphia!

 

 

Wrap-up

Our forums are open to all writers, not just full members of the FWG. Check them out here and join in on the conversation. While you’re there, check out how to join our Slack and Telegram channels. Before joining any of these, though, we ask that you please read up on our Code of Conduct! With all the negative going around in the world these days, both furry and non-furry, we want to make sure the guild feels like a safe place to all its participants, free of threats and hate speech.

We have two weekly chats, called our Coffeehouse Chats! Our first one is Tuesday at 7:00pm EST in our Slack channel, and our other is Thursdays at Noon EST on our forums in the shoutbox. Both of these chats feature writers talking about writing, usually with a central topic. As with the above, these chats are open to both members and non-members.

Another monstrous item we somehow missed, but now we found out about it thanks to Antarctic Press — and Bleeding Cool. “Cower at the presence of Gao, colossal kaiju of cuteness! This lovable leviathan spends his days under the sea until visiting aliens convince him to make friends on the surface. Gao thus leaves the ocean depths, only to spread shock and d’awww in his wake. This adorable mountain of menace unleashes destruction with every step…but how can you be mad at a face like that?” GAO! was written and illustrated by Alfred Perez for some time as a mini-comic, but now the folks at Antarctic have brought it to light as a new full-color comic miniseries.

image c. 2018 Antarctic Press

Poor thing, he just wants a happy birthday. Just your typical wendigo [1] problems. "Kevin is lonely and only has one wish: To have someone to celebrate his birthday with. But there is one problem, He's a wendigo." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendigo
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Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

A Peculiar School, by J. Schlenker.
Olive Hill. KY, Binka Publishing, September 2018, trade paperback, $11.95 (326 [+ 2] pages). Kindle $4.99.

“Miss Ethel Peacock strutted and proudly displayed her plumage as she paced around the waiting room of Mr. Densworth Lion. She had come unannounced, but she was so excited about the idea she had received in a dream, that she dared not lose any momentum. She could have called ahead, but what if he refused to see her? No, she decided not to risk it.” (p. 3)

This is an animal fantasy, but not a furry one. The peacock plumage is on the male, but hey, this is a fantasy. Besides, Jerri Schlenker knows that.

“‘A peacock? A peacock, you say? What is a peacock doing here?’ Mr. Densworth Lion asked his secretary, in disbelief.

‘Technically, she’s a peahen. Her husband is a peacock. That is, if she has a husband. I don’t think she does as she introduced herself as ‘Miss’. But together: they would be peafowl,’ his secretary [a lioness] corrected.

Mr. Densworth Lion uttered a slight roar of impatience.

‘She’s a teacher at the aviary,’ his secretary added.” (pgs. 3-4)

This is at Cub Academy, run by principal Mr. Densworth Lion, in a nature preserve. The animals are civilized; Mr. Lion wears eyeglasses and sits at a desk with papers and a candy jar upon it.

But not too civilized. Or, not into the 21st century:

“‘What I propose. Mr. Densworth Lion, is that we use your school as a model – a model for a bigger school, a university of sorts, one that houses all animals.’

‘All animals?” he roared. ‘We teach cubs here – lion cubs. Such a proposal is ludicrous.’” (p. 11)

Mr. Lion will not even listen to Miss Peacock’s proposal for a school in which all animals are treated equally. Well, maybe not the animals domesticated by humans, like dogs and cats. They’re different:

“The dog barked for a good solid hour almost every night. What was he trying to say? Since dogs had taken up with humans, their language had become garbled and unrecognizable. It was obvious the humans didn’t understand them either as every night the human came out on the porch and yelled something to the dog in the scrambled tongue of humans.” (p. 13)

The human is a zookeeper, of a zoo at the edge of a forest in which the Cub Academy is located. The next day after her turndown by the lion principal, Miss Peacock – or Ethel, if we may be informal – is visited by her friend, Miss Luce Pigeon. Ethel tells Luce more of her dream of an animal school than she had the chance to tell Mr. Densworth Lion; perhaps luckily, because peacocks come from India, and Ethel’s dream of an animal school was vaguely Hindu led by an enlightened Yuga.

“‘Such a school would certainly be an enlightened thing.’ Ethel sighed. ‘Maybe I’m just a silly old peahen. Me. Densworth Lion said it was not in an animal’s nature to get along, in fact, quite the opposite.’

‘He’s wrong there.’ Luce said, reaching for another macaroon.

‘I would truly like to believe that is so. Do you really think so, Luce?’

‘I don’t think so, I know so,’ Luce said with a satisfied smirk.

[…]

‘I don’t understand. What do you mean? How do you know so?’ Ethel asked with a puzzled look on her face.

‘There is a whole group of animals, different ones, living and working together where I live in the city – some old, some young – a badger, a tiger, a hyena, and an orangutan.’

Ethel sat motionless for a full moment, not believing her own ears. These were the animals she saw staring down at her from the moon. Truly this was a sign, but erring on the side of caution, she asked, ‘Is this gossip, hearsay, some wild fantasy, something perhaps made up during a drunken spree with the bongo player?’” (p. 31)

Luce explains that the animals (also a polar bear) are escapees from the city’s zoo who are hiding out together in the tunnels under the city. They have been forced to cooperate to survive, but are miserable. Ethel is sure that this group is meant to become the nucleus of her dream school – if she can get the flighty Luce to introduce her to the filthy, sullen animals, if she can clean them enough and encourage them into enthusiasm for her school, if she can present them to Mr. Densworth Lion as a symbol of success, if, if, if…

I’m unsure if A Peculiar School is supposed to be a comedy or an exercise in frustration. Or both. Everything that can go wrong does, but Ethel perseveres. There are also Unexpected Surprises.

The reader has to ignore how much the animals are not living close to nature, and how blind the humans are to not be aware of them. Here Ethel decides to bring a present to the hiding animals (she comes from a Hindi culture where you always bring a small present when you go visiting):

“‘I don’t know what I have they would like. We will have to make a stop. We will take a little side trip to Squirrelly Emporium. It’s on the way. Well, nearly on the way.’

‘The squirrels have an emporium?’ her friend asked.

‘That’s what they call it. It’s not as big as the shops in the city, but it winds in so many different directions. They have been squirreling away various trinkets for years. They have a rather large inventory.’

‘An inventory of what?’ Luce asked.

‘Oh, of this and that. Mostly that. Things discarded by humans, a lot of arts and crafts, a lot of things made from nut shells. Believe me, you can find about anything there. Things you would never expect to find.’” (p. 40)

In the emporium, they hear of an owl that is trying to translate Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone from English into Animal, but is stymied by “Some new language he is not used to humans using.” (p. 45) Comedy plus frustration.

The cover of A Peculiar School is by the author; an exercise in Photoshop of animal photographs, two taken by Chris Schenkler, the author’s husband, at the Cincinnati Zoo. The book has the air of a family project. Sometimes it seems overly cute; Schenkler has a fondness for alliterative names for her minor characters: Mr. Sebastian Squirrel, Mr. Oliver Owl, Mr. Filbert Fox, Ms. Rhonda Rabbit, Mr. Ronald Raccoon, Mrs. Betsy Bear. On the whole, though, it is an enjoyable read; good for all ages. Recommended.

– Fred Patten

• Buy on Amazon

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon.  You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward.  They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

A Furry Fandom favorite moves further into the eye of the mainstream, thanks to AMP! Comics For Kids. Now they bring us the Ozy and Millie Graphic Novel Volume 1 — written and illustrated by Dana Simpson, of course. “From the creator of the enormously popular Phoebe and Her Unicorn series comes Ozy and Millie, a playful comic exploring the friendship between two foxes. Meet Ozy and Millie, two middle-grade students in Seattle who also happen to be foxes. This comic centers around these two best friends as they take on the everyday challenges all middle-graders face-bullies, tests, and the dread of going back to school after a surprise snow day. Ozy is a young male fox whose adoptive father happens to be a dragon and frequent presidential candidate. Ozy’s calm and thoughtful demeanor is constantly tested by Millie’s rambunctious and rebellious pursuits.” Find out more over at Previews. Available now from Andrews McMeel.

image c. 2018 Andrews McMeel Publishing

Barnaby Dixon has re-created the The Oogie Boogie Song but now with PUPPETS!
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It's time for the holiest time in the furry year - Halloween! We read your stories and dramatize them into radio plays in this episode filled with spoopyness and spectres! You ready?





NOW LISTEN!
Show Notes
Special Thanks

Skylos, for reading our stories.
Vaos, for mixing the story audio.
Vance, for submitting to the episode.
Josh, for submitting to the episode.
Moriar, for submitting to the episode.

Music

Opening Theme: Sara Alfonso: Jupiter Freak Show. Free Music Archive, Unknown. Used under Creative Commons license. Original source: http://freemusicarchive.org/member/Sara_Afonso_1551/blog/Jupiter_Freak_Show
Space News Music: Fredrik Miller – Orbit. USA: Bandcamp, 2013. Used with permission. (Buy a copy here – support your fellow furs!)
Closing Theme: RetroSpecter – Cloud Fields (RetroSpecter Chill Mix). USA: Unpublished, 2018. ©2011-2018 Fur What It’s Worth. Based on Fredrik Miller – Cloud Fields (Chill Out Mix). USA: Bandcamp, 2011. ©2011 Fur What It’s Worth. (Buy a copy here – support your fellow furs!)

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Plus Tier Supporters

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Lygris S8 Episode 3 – Halloween 2018 - It's time for the holiest time in the furry year - Halloween! We read your stories and dramatize them into radio plays in this episode filled with spoopyness and spectres! You ready? - NOW LISTEN! Show Notes Special Thanks

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

Civilized Beasts volume III, editor-in-chief Laura Govednik, editor Vincent Corbeau.
Manvil, TX, Weasel Press, September 2018, trade paperback, $8.00 ([vii +] 109 pages).

Here is the third annual volume of animal poetry from Weasel Press. It contains 98 pages of poetry, of mostly one page or less. Several authors have two or more poems. There are far fewer familiar furry fan names this year than there was last year; other than the editors, I recognized only Michael H. Payne. There are five poems by Larry D. Thomas, the 2008 Texas Poet Laureate.

Civilized Beasts is popularly advertised as an anthology of furry poetry, but it is almost all about realistic animals or the wonders of nature. Many authors have written poetic portraits of their own dogs, cats, horses, or goldfish. To be fair, it’s hard to write a work of furry fiction of one page.

There are some rhymes and a lot of blank verse. The cleverest poem graphically is the one chosen to end the volume: “Telltale” by Ruth Sabath Rosenthal. It’s in the shape of a wagging tail.

Civilized Beasts volume III (cover again by Darkomi) is another charity for the Wildlife Conservation Society. “All proceeds from this anthology go towards the Wildlife Conservation Society.”

Full disclosure: I have five poems in this.

– Fred Patten

• Buy on Weasel Press

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon.  You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward.  They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

Really my only excuse for this is I'm hungry for cereal right now. Also here is also a classic spot: https://youtu.be/O2Izh2NPDzU
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Something that slipped by us last summer, but were happy to catch up with it now, thanks to Boom! Studios’ Kaboom! imprint: Ruinworld. “Writer/Artist Derek Laufman (Adventure Time Comics) brings his worldwide hit digital comics series to life at BOOM! Studios. Intrepid adventurers Pogo and Rex are on a quest for fame and fortune. Their discovery of a special map leads them on an epic journey through dangers, demons and old enemies. Just one problem-they’ve already lost the map.” Check out the preview and interviews over at Boom!

image c. 2018 Boom! Studios

They can’t all be winners right? We came into producing this episode in a bad mood from the start and it shows. Luckily the next few episodes are being posted at the same time as this one so… Up to you.

Download MP3

Watch Video Link Roundup:

• How To Rock When Your Parents Are Religious Nut Jobs
• An important message to those who booked FurFlight for 2018 and 2019 flights.
• A financial fuss about FurFlight – can it fend off a fandom fiasco?
• FurPlanet’s Furry Friday: FurryAir – At Least It’s Not Pet-Screwing

News:

• Furries assist authorities, leads to charges and arrest of Levi “SnakeThing” Simmons

FC-311 Honestly A Lousy Episode - They can't all be winners right? We came into producing this episode in a bad mood from the start and it shows. Luckily the next few episodes are being posted at the same time as this one so... Up to you.

They can’t all be winners right? We came into producing this episode in a bad mood from the start and it shows. Luckily the next few episodes are being posted at the same time as this one so… Up to you.

Download MP3

Link Roundup:

• How To Rock When Your Parents Are Religious Nut Jobs
• An important message to those who booked FurFlight for 2018 and 2019 flights.
• A financial fuss about FurFlight – can it fend off a fandom fiasco?
• FurPlanet’s Furry Friday: FurryAir – At Least It’s Not Pet-Screwing

News:

• Furries assist authorities, leads to charges and arrest of Levi “SnakeThing” Simmons

[Live] Honestly A Lousy Episode

So here’s what we just found over at Slash Film: “Variety reports that [Dreamworks Animation] is in final negotiations for the movie rights to Jerry Hawthorne’s board game Mice and Mystics. The role-playing game, which was our No. 1 pick for games that should be adapted to film, follows mice heroes who must race through a vast castle to break the curse of the evil Vanestra, fighting rats, cockroaches, spiders, and the castle cat, Brodie. Its complex, deeply involved story seemed perfect for a big-screen adaptation, and it seems that DreamWorks thinks so too. If talks go through, The Hills Have Eyes and Horns director Alexandre Aja is set to direct a script by Aquaman scribe David Leslie Johnson. Vertigo Entertainment’s Roy Lee and Jon Berg are producing.” Sounds like there is some serious talent behind this project, yes?

image c. 2018 by John Ariosa

And the moral is ... seek help? Yes, seek professional help.
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furflight.com

Distressing news has come out about a furry-organized travel service, which appears to be in trouble with some big financial obligations at the moment. The fur is flying, and not in a good way.

FurFlight bundles furries together for group air travel from highly-active fandom regions to highly-attended conventions, most notably from Seattle and San Francisco to Midwest FurFest. The idea is to improve the boring parts and the endpoint arrangements. It happened successfully in 2017. (As far as I know, no fellow travelers complained about fur allergy flareups or the plane smelling like a zoo – score for fandom image!)

FurFlight isn’t affiliated with Midwest FurFest. One of the con staffers told me about previously advising people not to buy in because of no accountability for an independent operation. Trusting other fans comes with risks known to anyone who’s been burned by bad art commissions.

Mike Folf is the organizer and principal of Canis Vulpes LLC, FurFlight’s corporation registered in 2018.  Nobody else appears on the paperwork (although I’ve seen references to unnamed other team members or execs.) Mike goes to my local events and I’ve liked knowing him as a friendly furry guy. (I have no business relationship with the service). I’ve also seen many good recommendations and social media posts about the trips. So I was happy to host Mike on the site as “community access” so he could promote it:

• It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s Furflight! West Coast to Midwest Furfest – sign up by Sept. 21.

Now that a problem has reared its fluffy head, I’m guessing that the September timing may have involved pressure to increase signups and income. That unfortunately synchs with a LiveJournal post by Aloha Wolf made on October 24.

If you entrusted FurFlight with your money and your tickets, you need to know that you’re likely going to need new travel plans.https://t.co/lbxb8iRhnt

— Aloha (@alohawolf) October 25, 2018

Aloha Wolf reports that shortly after the Dogpatch article went out, Mike told him there was an imminent travel booking deadline with Alaska Air, and difficulty with the bank limiting a payment over $10,000.  On October 9, Aloha Wolf was convinced to advance a credit card payment of over $35,000 to cover costs. Making the deadline would keep FurFlight on track to honor obligations to paying users (113 of them).

One can see the pressure that led Aloha Wolf to help in an emergency – and the trap he got into if FurFlight’s finances can’t match promises to repay the credit. On October 20, repayment from Canis Vulpes LLC to Aloha Wolf bounced, leaving him holding a major debt, at least for now.

A trusted tipper and FurFlight user sent me a chat log showing the events. Mike admitted to misleading about repayment ability, so he could secure the $35,000 in credit – which I can’t read as anything but criminal fraud. (Edit: I’m saying this to clarify rumors, but not sharing the doc because I would say it’s up to others to decide how to resolve it.)  The tipper also gave further info about loan requests that supported a desperate lack of funds.

Fiduciary Misfeasance is my guess, which is different from fraud. It can best be described as "robbing Peter to pay Paul." Although the allegation they induced someone to pay on a credit card with a promise to reimburse when there was no ability...that's fraud if true.

— Boozy Badger (@BoozyBadger) October 25, 2018

There’s more info about how things went downhill. According to Aloha Wolf, his casual review of records showed insubstantial budget or accounting, and flights were being sold at a loss. He judged the company planning as unsustainable if things can’t turn around. Commenters judged the prices as “too good to be true“.

Where did FurFlight’s income go? According to the chat log, company setup included costs of thousands for Twitter marketing, costs for Mike Folf to visit places being marketed to, and GSuite software. There was merchandise planned to earn funds but production time extended into 2019.

Flights were being sold for 2019 to cover 2018 costs – which social media observers compared to a Ponzi scheme. That synchs with FurFlight’s October appeals for more signups for new service to new conventions:

Ahoy mateys! While you eagerly await to set your anchor in @FurryWeekendAtl this weekend, come set sail with us on our lovely furry-filled airships? https://t.co/u4M94ZrOmY #FurFlightATL pic.twitter.com/0sBV10aDly

— FurFlight (@CVFurFlight) October 18, 2018

Signups and details for #BLFurFlight are now open! Fly to @BiggestLittleFC with all your fuzzy friends from either Seattle or SoCal! https://t.co/Qo8WR5mEwJ pic.twitter.com/683CFJgxm9

— FurFlight (@CVFurFlight) October 16, 2018

The more I read, the more it makes me think there was months of time where Mike Folf knew and didn’t address a looming problem before what looks like using false pretenses to buy more time. I wish I’d known this before promoting FurFlight.

There were some people with closer involvement who saw this coming. I don’t know if there’s more to know about why Aloha Wolf was convinced to pay so much, but Asic Fox corroborates being misled to cover $5000 in FurFlight costs. (Most of that debt is paid down, but he claims it was caused by malfeasance.)

one is an abnormality, two is a pattern, seem furflight had issues last year with funding as well @DogpatchPress can you assist with digging in to this? https://t.co/BvE5BruEbK

— Pumpkin Spice Fox (@Just_fionna) October 25, 2018

Scaleup problems are often a dramatic way that apparently successful ventures derail (remember Fyre Fest, where fraud just got prison time for its organizer?) Luckily, this didn’t hit hundreds of travelers en route, perhaps leaving them high and dry – just two creditors, so far.

It doesn’t help that the personal @MikeFolf Twitter account was just deleted. However, I haven’t directly spoken to Aloha Wolf or Mike Folf about this yet, so this is where things stand. It could be possible for things to turn around – perhaps with additional funding appeals.

Personally, given what I saw Mike Folf admit in the chat log, I can’t see this happening without his position of responsibility going to someone else. He would be very lucky if it ends there. It would be nice to see a formal statement (I’d be happy to host one.)

Time will tell if repayment is made, obligations are honored, and FurFlight’s public problem is smoothed over. Travelers may or may not get what they expect.

Our main event organizer has been out on medical leave for the past 24 hours and communication is slow. We, the rest of the FurFlight team, ask that you please bear with us as we get through this and get FurFlight back on track. We are currently look at all of our options.

— FurFlight (@CVFurFlight) October 25, 2018

An article is circulating currently, Has been a lot of goings on but as of now FurFlight is being honored by the airline and we are on-track to deliver. We've hit a speed bump but the team is still making it happen.

— FurFlight (@CVFurFlight) October 25, 2018

UPDATE: Boozy Badger has his own take with the bluntest headline ever, about state law of licensing for travel service.

FurPlanet’s Furry Friday: FurryAir – At Least It’s Not Pet-Screwing https://t.co/Y1GLIXwAMn

— Boozy Badger (@BoozyBadger) October 26, 2018

UPDATE: a closing message from FurFlight on Telegram. Also I spoke to people close to Mike Folf and would personally suggest sympathy for someone who got in over their head.

@DogpatchPress please update your story #furflight is dead https://t.co/qJpJdBmdPW

— Pumpkin Spice Fox (@Just_fionna) October 29, 2018

Follow up to Furflight:

As I said on a panel last nigh, I represent a number of small businesses. In my experience, the majority fail not from intentional wrongdoing but from financial mismanagement, ignorance of the requirements, and inexperience.

While by no means good /1

— Boozy Badger (@BoozyBadger) October 29, 2018

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon.  You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward.  They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

Next year it looks like we'll be getting at least 2 new Pokemon films with a live action Pokemon film (Detective Pikachu) and the animated feature posted here (The Power of Us). For those of you that are not up on Pokemon films, there have been 19 films and from that point they decided to reboot the series continuity. Last years Pokemon film "I Choose You!" was the first in that new reboot which was a loose retelling of the original Kanto League saga [1]. The upcoming film "The Power of Us" is the next chapter in this new Pokemon series and I present you here with the English Trailer that was just released. "For a group of strangers, fortunes can change like the wind!" [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Pok%C3%A9mon:_Indigo_League_episodes
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Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

Mechanical Animals: Tales at the Crux of Creatures and Tech, edited by Selena Chambers and Jason Heller.
Erie, CO, Hex Publishers, November 2018, trade paperback, $19.99 (417 pages), Kindle $5.99.

This is not a furry book, but an anthology of 22 stories and articles about mechanical animals, including a cyborg. Most of them are about mindless clockwork robots. There are a few that feature self-aware AIs in the form of animals. These are close enough to furries to warrant Mechanical Animals to be reviewed here.

Mike Libby, in his Introduction, talks about being fascinated by mechanical animals from his childhood. “When I was ten I wanted one of those battery-powered motorized dogs you would see outside Radio Shack, that was leashed to its battery-powered remote control, and after a couple of high-pitched barks, would flip backwards, landing perfectly, ready to repeat his mechanical trick.” (p. 9) Jess Nevins, in his 13-page “Mechanical Animals”, summarizes them in literature from Homer in The Iliad to real examples in history (“The German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Müller von Königsberg, aka Regiomontanus (1436-1476), was reliably reported to have constructed a flying mechanical eagle for the Emperor Maximilian in 1470.” – p. 29), to the present.

“Two Bees Dancing” by Tessa Kum is the first story:

“Focus. This pain is old and familiar. It is not important. Focus on what is important.

‘We aren’t going to hurt you.’

It is on the table before you. Small. Antennae relaxed, wings spread, legs locked and unmoving.

‘We need your help.’ (p. 33)

A nameless government drone pilot on permanent disability is kidnapped and forced to fly a reprogrammed bee for criminal purposes. Instead, the reprogramming puts him into mental contact with the HiveAI and into a whole new world.

“Brass Monkey” by Delia Sherman is set in a clockwork late Victorian London. The characters in Jenny Wren’s Doll and Mechanical Emporium are elderly, crippled Mrs. Wren, the shop assistant Miss Edwige, and Mrs. Wren’s adopted daughter Lizzie. “If Mrs. Wren was the heart of the emporium and Miss Edwige its back and legs, then Lizzie was its inventive mind.” (p. 53). When the emporium becomes especially busy at Christmastime, “The door opened and out came Lizzie in her leather apron, her magnifying spectacles pushed into her cloudy hair, and on her shoulder a small capuchin monkey, such as commonly accompany organ-grinders, wearing a little scarlet vest.” (p. 54). The monkey is Annabella, Lizzie’s clockwork invention, made to help sort out the beads and ribbons and coins of the business day. When Annabella proves skilled enough to tell real coins from counterfeits, the three women set out to find the counterfeiter – but it’s Annabella who solves the case.

“The Rebel” by Maurice Broaddus and Sarah Hans takes place in modern America. “Garrika Sharp hunched over a tray of gears, scrounging through pieces like a scattered metal jigsaw puzzle.” (p. 74)

“Her critics dismissed her first forays as steampunk taxidermy. All about recycling and repurposing, she once sourced roadkill for skeletons, combining preserved remains with machinery. Like stuffed pets with bionic parts. Her favorite from back then was a squirrel whose spine had been replaced by a series of gears and winches so that it looked like its vertebrae had unzipped. Its head dangled at an odd angle from a broken neck. Her mother, fearing her a necromancer, waited until Garrika was at one of her treatments, gathered the mechanized corpses, and threw the desecrations away.” (p. 76)

Garrika’s friend Phonse is a street artist whose taggings include rune magic. His magic and the weed she smokes bring her constructs – Eagle, Elephant, Rabbit, Lion, Unicorn, Giraffe, and more – to life.

“Exhibitionist” by Lauren Beukes, a story about an art gallery featuring a meat art exhibit, is the first story that’s not furry at all. It’s good; it’s just not furry.

The protagonist in “Stray Frog” by Jesse Bullington is Schiller, a truant officer of the future. He’s also the villain, a doped-up sadist who uses his pipa to over-narcotize (to death?) the prep-schoolers that he thinks may be playing hooky from school. His pipa gun is the mechanical animal here:

“‘There, there,’ Schuller murmured to his pipa, the veiny grip pulsing in his palm as he dipped the fingers of his free hand into its slimy holster, smearing it with hydrating ichor. The weapon croaked its appreciation. He made sure to work the goo into the freshly emptied divots in its back, and applied a far lighter touch to the live pockets that were still bulging with narcotic eggs. His little shootout with these thugs had used up half his ammunition. He’d have to feed it as soon as he got back to his desk to make sure it laid new rounds before their next shift.” (pgs. 113-114)

There is much more detail on just what a pipa is. It’s not intelligent, so this isn’t a furry story, but it is fascinating.

In “The Hard Spot in the Glacier” by An Owomoyela, Ayo is part of a research expedition on Enceladus, one of Saturn’s moons. She is looking for Parker, another explorer who may have been injured in a moonquake, when a series of quakes endangers her and her mechanical centipede. She must decide whether to continue the search for Parker, or give him up for lost and return to base. The centipedes are programmed to offer balanced advice, but Ayo thinks that her centipede sounds scared. Is it, or is she reading her own emotions and desires into its speech?

“‘What do I do?’ she muttered, mostly to herself.

She was surprised when the centipede answered.

((I don’t like this. I think we should go home.))

Irrationally – because she’d had the same thought, after all – Ayo felt a surge of anger. She was out here, and she wasn’t complaining. What right did this idiot piece of equipment have?

But it wasn’t programmed to complain. It was programmed to make a threat assessment and deliver it in an emotionally-relatable way.” (pgs. 127-128)

“Every Single Wonderful Detail” by Stephen Graham Jones begins: “Because he knew he wasn’t going to be there for her teenage years, Grace’s dad built a German Shepherd to be there in his stead.” Grace’s dad, dying of cancer, builds the best German Shepherd he could to guard Grace. But sometimes a teen girl doesn’t want a big dog who can be counted upon to get between her and the boys who ask her out; who is more efficient at that than any live dog.

“The Nightingale” by Hans Christian Andersen is the first classic reprint, from 1843. The Emperor of China is delighted by the singing of the dowdy nightingale until a clever inventor makes a clockwork bird that can sing just as prettily and is made of gold and jewels besides. But the clockwork bird breaks down, which the real nightingale doesn’t. This is the first story in which the mechanical animal is clearly inferior to the natural animal. Also, the real nightingale converses with the Emperor, making this an undeniably furry story.

It’s unclear whether “Le Cygne Baiseur” by Molly Tanzer is an Adult erotic story or a horror story. Emily is the moderator of a museum film program on “Erotic Parodies” showing a seldom-seen Le Cygne Baiseur, based on the legend of Leda and the Swan. In it, “Mr. Hubert, the celebrated toymaker”, makes a mechanical swan that ravishes a maiden. The museum also has on display the prop model of the mechanical swan with an erect human phallus that was used in the old film. At night when everyone is gone, the mechanical swan comes to life and ravishes Emily. Or is it Zeus inhabiting the mechanical swan?

“Among the Water Buffaloes, a Tiger’s Steps” by Aliette de Bodard is set in the far future, when:

“After the sun goes down, the girls huddle together in the remnants of a house by the sea – every screen, every scrap of metal since long scavenged to keep their own bodies going – and tell each other stories. Of animals, and plants, and of the world before and after the Catastrophe. Thuy is outrageously good at this. Her sight allows her to read the other girls’ microscopic cues from heartbeat to temperature of skin, and adapt her tales of spirits and ghosts for maximum effects. Ngoc He stutters, barely hiding the tremors in her hands – nerve-wires that broke down and that she hasn’t yet scavenged replacements for – but she has the largest range of tales of any of them. Ai Hong speaks almost absent-mindedly, playing with those few crab-bots that aren’t frightened by so much light and noise – they skitter away when she puts down her hand, and draw back again when she frowns in thought, trying to recall a particular plot point.” (p. 190)

The story follows Kim Trang, a repair construct (or the distant descendant of a repair construct), as she brings a “tiger” into their midst; the girl Mei who may destroy them all. The mechanical animals are the girls themselves, who have raided this post-Catastrophe society for metal parts and electronics to keep themselves alive. I consider the story less interesting than its background.

“The Twin Dragons of Sentimentality and Didacticism” by Nick Mamatas has a colorful view of the near future:

“Things had changed. First had come mechanimals: robotic elephants, and safaris that allowed tourists to hunt them down and keep them wound via the gigantic if purely decorative keys on their backs. As the animals died off, they were replaced, but not in the order in which the ecosystem was collapsing. The big ones were rolled out first, like cars used to be. Tigers and orangutans and wildebeests and great golden bears, those last beloved of Silicon Valley. Every seven-year-old scion of a techie family rode one to school. The bulletproof golden bears could eat rampage shooters, it was believed, though this feature was never widely tested in the field.

Only later came microdrones in the shape of perfect dragonflies and hummingbirds, then deer ticks. […]” (pgs. 214-215) Sorry, but this goes on and on and on. It’s a really stunning description of how society is changed, but it’s not at all furry.

“The Artist of the Beautiful” by Nathaniel Hawthorne (1844) is the next reprint. Peter Hovenden, a retired master watchmaker, becomes jealous about the secret project that his young successor and former apprentice Owen Warland is working on. Warland, “the Artist of the Beautiful”, becomes despondent that he will never make anything more delicate and intricate than Hovenden has. Warland gets the idea of trying to infuse a spirit into machinery. This story being in Mechanical Animals, you can guess that he succeeds. What happens then?

There are eight more stories. Two are excerpts from 19th-century novels; Electric Bob’s Big Black Ostrich: or, Lost on the Desert by Robert T. Toombs (1893), and The Steam House; Chapter V: The Iron Giant by Jules Verne (1880). Both feature huge clockwork marvels, the Ostrich and an Elephant. “The Clockwork Penguin Dreamed of Stars” by Caroline Yoachim is definitely furry; its main character is Gwin, one of the penguins abandoned on Earth when mankind emigrated to the stars:

“It was one of those rare nights when the smog thinned out enough for stars to be visible in the sky above the penguin enclosure. Gwin adjusted her synthetic feathers with her beak, arranging them neatly and plucking out any that were broken or bent. She didn’t want to groom, but her programming said it was preening time, so she had no choice.

[…]

Gwin was a dreamer. The other animals judged this to be a flaw, but she saw nothing wrong with snapping at fish that were beyond the reach of her beak. She was tired of being confined, tired of the constant noise of the automated educational recordings, tired of acting out the same routines day in and day out.” (pgs. 361-362)

“Closer to the Sky” by Carrie Vaughn is a traditional Western, except that Copper, one of the horses, is a cyborg:

“Now, instead of flesh and blood for legs this singular cowpony had steel and pistons, rubber tendons, and brass flywheels, slicked with oil and faster than bees’ wings. He had interchangeable shoes: broad plates for sand, spikes for ice, rubberized points like a billy goat’s hooves, and regular polished-for-parades horse’s feet. Mostly, though, this cowpony could now run fast. And he still loved his girl. (You can tell a horse loves his girl by the way he rests his nose on her shoulder, whuffing softly, like he has come home. You can tell a girl loves her pony by the way her arms exactly fit around his head when he lowers it to greet her.” (pgs. 380-381)

Mechanical Animals (cover by Aaron Lovett) isn’t a furry anthology, but it doesn’t pretend to be. These are stories of automata built to exhibit biomimicry. It’s close enough to furry fiction that you should enjoy it.

– Fred Patten

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The comic largely passed us by this year, but now Dark Horse have a new trade paperback compilation of Angel Catbird — written by none other than Margaret Atwood, creator of The Handmaid’s Tale. “A genetic engineer caught in the middle of a chemical accident all of a sudden finds himself with superhuman abilities. With these new powers, he takes on the identity of Angel Catbird and gets caught in the middle of a war between animal/human hybrids. What follows is a humorous, action-driven, educational, and pulp-inspired superhero adventure–with a lot of cat puns.” Illustrated by Johnie Christmas and Tamra Bonvillain, The Complete Angel Catbird is available now.

image c. 2018 Dark Horse Press

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