First, I haven't mentioned yet what I have in the August issue of Bookslut. My column is all about escapist fiction and includes the new MInx title, three books that involve Greek/Roman gods and goddesses who are alive and well in our world, a historical mystery set in Japan, a most unusual ghost story, a fantasy collection that includes the likes of Jane Yolen and Midori Snyder and two SF novels (okay - one is more a novella). Of the group I have heard practically nothing in the blogosphere about Breakfast With the Ones You Love, a SF story with a kick ass and very conflicted heroine that includes vengeful old ladies, a group of Jewish Rabbis who congregate in a sewer, the devil and a spaceship built in a Sears store.

How come you are all not raving about this book?!

I also have standalone reviews on four adult titles: Dangerous Space by Kelley Eskridge, which artfully tackles all kinds of boundaries, Interfictions edited by Theodora Goss and Delia Sherman and including 19 interstitial stories some of which I truly loved, Territory by Emma Bull which I hope is the kind of hit she deserves and a must read for anyone remotely interested in the thought of combining the Old West and fantasy (Wyatt freaking Earp people!!!) and Nicholas Christopher's marvelous literary mystery, The Bestiary. I adored that book and if any of you liked AS Byatt's Possession, then you must seek this novel out immediately. (I really can not recommend it enough.)

Now to the writing stuff. I have a question about my AK Memoir. One of the funky things about my job was the division between what the guys did and the girls did. When I went to work at the Company there was almost a division in the building - the girls never strayed far into the hangar where not only were the planes being worked on, but all the mail and freight were stored. They checked in passengers and figured out the loads but they never physically looked at the stuff that had to be loaded. You can imagine how screwed up this was when you consider the size difference between boxes of 200 pounds of canned goods and those of 200 pounds of potato chips. The girls just wrote down numbers for what they thought would fit on the planes and the cargo guys and pilots changed them. The guys had little respect for the girls and the girls thought the guys were mostly jerks.

That was the world I walked into.

One of the first things I did was go out onto the ramp and look at the mail as it was being loaded. I still don't know why anyone would think they could do that job without looking at the boxes. Soon enough I realized that seeing the boxes (and bags and whatever else) wasn't enough - if I wanted respect I would have to know what it was like to load. So I started helping the cargo guys when I could, so I could see where stuff got loaded and how it fit. This made my job a lot easier and it had a huge bonus - the guys decided I wasn't an idiot and actually talked to me and listened to me. It was understood that maybe I knew what I was talking about when I set a load. (Keeping in mind of course that the pilots always set the weight limit - I just figured out what that weight would be comprised of.)

So, my question is does this gender war stuff matter to the story at large? It's not like I was harassed or anything - no one hated me or that sort of deal. And we did have a female pilot and there was never any issue with women flying (the competition had several over the years). But is this the sort of information that contributes to a book on Alaska aviation? I think the girls who worked there before me were basically lazy twits - they didn't want to get their hands dirty or leave their heaters and go out and freeze. And since no one told them they had to, they didn't. I took the job more seriously but I'm sure that was because of my aviation background and the fact that I knew how to fly. I had worked in the field for years before in the Lower 48 and was comfortable on a ramp; it seemed impossible to me to do the Ops job without going out there.

I could write a few pages on this or none at all. I'd appreciate your feedback - if you think it's a non issue or something that piques your interest. I'm trying not to waste time on things that don't matter, so any opinions would be appreciated.

(Photo from the Univ of AK archives; that's Ben Eielson one of the first bush pilots.)