Cities of the future

April 11, 2018 By Jule

The buildings, towns, and cities we live in are slowly transforming as we use technology to make our lives more comfortable. Voice and AI controlled heating, lighting, white goods, entertainment, personal assistants are already taking over the home. Will climate change have an accelerating effect on this transition? In the future, technology might not just help us live more comfortable lives, but it might also protect us from extreme weather. If climate change means that living in the way we do now, under the sky, exposed to the elements, becomes precarious because of rising temperatures and the regularity of super storms, the wealthy might invest in ways to protect themselves.

Ideas and experiments to date, led by NASA, the European Space Agency, and the University of Arizona, explored the feasibility of humans living in outer space. The International Space Station is a closed, self-sufficient system for supporting human life. In Russia, a project run by the Institute of Biophysics created an underground closed ecosystem to support three humans. The Eden Project, an educational project and tourist attraction in Cornwall, UK, is a biodome, simulating different ecosystems. In Dubai, a project to build the ‘Mall of the World’ a city under glass to protect people from 45 degrees Celsius summer temperatures, was scaled back when the investment didn’t materialise.

Imagine, though, if climate change pushed temperatures in southern Asia, as some predict, above what is tolerable to humans by the end of this century? What if in the next century that happens in the Western world too?

Sceptics talk about the fabulous cost and impracticality of such domed cities at scale, but a combination of scientific advances, in particular, the creation of new materials, and dire necessity are likely to be the drivers to create artificial ecosystems to protect at least the wealthiest people within the next few hundred years.

Such cities could make use of bioengineering research being carried out today by organisations like NASA and will likely include closed system water recycling, atmosphere revitalisation advanced waste management, synthetic biology, and sustainable energy production.

Resources

The Kind QnA – Interview with Lauren St John for the book launch of The Kind

April 11, 2018 By Jule

At my recent book launch, award-winning author, Lauren St John, interviewed me about my new book, The Kind. Here’s the transcript of the interview.

A large part of The Kind is set 450 years in the future. How can you know what will happen then?

The more you understand things that are happening now the more you can make an educated guess, but in reality, there are too many random variables to make accurate predictions. All science fiction is really about the time the author is writing in. Think of Frankenstein, or Brave New World, War of the Worlds. But because it is difficult to imagine the future, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. In fact, humans are programmed to think about the future. It is how our brains work. Every time we plan a holiday, we are thinking into the future. Most animals can do it to some degree. It is an essential survival skill, being able to imagine dangers, risks so that we can avoid them or do something to prevent them happening. This is probably why we are predisposed to dystopia and catastrophe thinking. So the novel is partly me doing this – exploring my own anxieties about the future – but also my hopes and dreams too.

What is the world like in 450 years – in the novel?

My cities of the future – the ones that exist in 450 years – are covered over with roofs made of self-replicating, self-repairing material. The cities are really wonders of science – biospheres – powered by fusion energy, entirely enclosed, with water recovery systems. They have become a necessity because of climate change, but once you inside, you are in a wonderful place full of extraordinary buildings, many plants. It is very green. You don’t need a door key – your DNA is your passport everywhere. There is no money – there is a notional concept of Credits, but everyone is given some – you can’t be destitute (universal basic income). The problem is that not everyone can live in a city. Outside, people are living the best way they can in the ruins of former towns, at the mercy of the super storms and bad weather. And there have been many wars over resources and many of those involved biological warfare, so only a minority of people can have children. The populations of the cities are dwindling so they offer water and food to the towns in order to bolster their population. They buy their children. Isobel is thrown into this world. She has been the citizen of a city but she has been thrown out beyond the walls because of a crime she has committed.

Is your new book a dystopia?

The bits that are not so optimistic are about climate change – although you might argue that is just realism. But there is a large dollop of utopia as well.

Which parts of utopian?

This novel sits in a broader universe/world that I created, where I imagine the very far future, 10,000 years from now. In my stories, the beings that have evolved from humans are no longer really human at all. They are data – replicable, backed up, resilient, immortal, able to create any body for themselves they would like. My idea of the very far future is highly utopian because these beings have overcome many of the physical and mental things that hold us back as a species. They are never sick, there is no war, they don’t die, they have no material needs and they are very playful. They exist only to learn. There is a character in the novel called Clay. It is a historian that has hopped back in time to record the lives of the significant characters from its own ancient past. The historical figure Clay is recording is Isobel Twelvetrees. One of the many twists is that Clay decides it doesn’t like the original story – and so it intervenes – it changes it. In the ‘real’ version of events, Isobel dies, but Clay saves her and uses her to change other parts of history it doesn’t like.

Where do you get your ideas?

I read a lot of popular science books, journals etc. and I’m addicted to the New Scientist. In science journals, there’s a constant stream of scientific wonders. There’s much in my stories that about that simple wonder and excitement. I remember seeing Michio Kaku’s TV series, Visions of the Future many years ago. I was fascinated by this show – I watched it again and again. He was explaining quantum entanglement and how a home replicator might work and now teleportation has been done with photons. I love to imagine futures where some of this stuff has happened when people are living with these technologies and taking them for granted like we use mobile phones.

The Kind: Stark Imagining of Britain Five Hundred Years from Now

November 19, 2017 By Jule

London, England. November 19th, 2017.

Four hundred and fifty years from now, England will be unrecognisable to today’s inhabitants; a desert archipelago. The green patchwork quilt of the south and the east, will either be under water or burnt to dust by heat caused by man-made climate change. Britain’s coastal and riverside cities will long have succumbed to flooding, their historic buildings lost. The coastline itself will have been re-drawn. There will be new islands, like those made from the former North York Moors. Climate change will have raised global average temperatures over 10°C. In the south, being outside, even in the shade, will cause potentially lethal levels of heat stress in humans.

Jule Owen’s new novel, The Kind vividly brings to life a possible future world. Jule says, ‘As scientists gather more evidence about climate change, it is becoming increasingly obvious that we are handing an impossible and terrifying legacy to the young and to unborn generations. We are living at a time of extraordinary technological advance and availability of knowledge, and yet we are marching forward with self-destructive intent, apparently unable to change our behaviour. I wrote this novel to try to imagine a version of that future world.’

Jule Owen was born in Merseyside and now lives in London. She had spent many years helping to make software and is fascinated by science, technology and the future.

It is 2472. The wealthy and privileged have retreated to high-tech walled cities. Those beyond the walls are known as the Non-Grata. They live a precarious, hand-to-mouth existence, surviving on the “charity” of the cities. In return, these non-people must pay a Quota, a tax paid in human life. Specifically, they give the rich something their money cannot buy: children.

Isobel Twelvetrees has been put outside the walls of her city and left to die in the lethal heat for a crime she cannot remember committing. She was saved by someone or something, but when she wakes, the only companion she has is a dog with odd coloured eyes. When she learns the terrible truth about the plight of the Non Grata, she turns into a new kind of warrior. As she crosses continents with the threadbare armies of the Non Grata, in a deadly race against time to destroy the Quota and right historic wrongs, she starts to uncover the truth about herself and what she left behind.

The Kind is published by Mean Time Books and will be available to buy from all major bookshops in early December 2017.

www.juleowen.com
[email protected]
@juleowen

Virtual Futures Near-Future Fictions is open for submissions until 21 December 2017

September 28, 2017 By Jule

I’m really pleased to be able to announce that there will be another series of near-future fictions for Virtual Futures and this time I’ll be co-curating with Stephen Oram. Other writers Stephen will be co-curating with are Allen Ashley, Britte Schulte and Vaughan Stanger.

It’s going to be good…

So, authors and poets, we need your best imaginings of the future of infection and infestation, of personhood, of war and of brains.

Successful stories and poems will form a series of live reading events in London between February and May 2018 with an opportunity to be included in an anthology of Virtual Futures Near-Future Fictions.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Virtual Futures events, take a look at some of the video footage here https://m.youtube.com/user/virtualfutures

We are open for submissions until 21 December 2017 on the following themes:

1. The (dis)ease of the i-Mortal: Born of earth or brought back from far away, biological or viral invasions or diseases can affect humans on any scale; from protecting or plaguing an individual to becoming an epidemic that affects us all. Take on a topic that Literature has meditated on from its inception; from Defoe’s Journal of the Plague Year, to Mary Shelley’s The Last Man, to Marquez’s 100 Years of Solitude, to Camus’s The Plague, to King’s The Stand.
Show us the good, the bad, but not the bland; we are relying on you to predict the future of infection and infestation in any of its various forms. What is the nature of the diseases, contagions or contaminations have in store?
Curated by Allen Ashley and Stephen Oram

2. E-Me’s: The digital world is a personality playground that offers us an unprecedented ability to curate and create a public persona — but what does this ability mean for the future of personhood?
As the digital world expands around us and the Internet of Things combines the physical and virtual do we have a moral obligation to represent ourselves with truth and integrity in the digital realm, or should we view it as an opportunity to explore new and radical ontologies?
Curated by Britte Schulte and Stephen Oram

3. Tomorrow’s Battles: War has, so far, been inevitable throughout human history – but what will the future of conflict or cooperation look like? Will the discoveries of the future lead us to a world without violent disagreement, or just result in us killing one another in more creative ways? Paint us your future of what kind of conflict – or lack of – will emerge from the caldron of tomorrow’s technologies: what utopia or dystopia will we be exposed to?
Curated by Jule Owen and Stephen Oram

4. Post-Brain: As technology gets smarter and smarter, the human brain is forced to reflect on itself in the mirror of the future and question what value it will have in a world in which wet tech, cerebral hacking and commodified consciousness could reign. A world not of enhancement or augmentation, but replacement. We implore you to enquire what the future of our most precious organ will be, while you still have one.
Curated by Vaughan Stanger and Stephen Oram

Submission guidelines:
Stories or poems should be no longer than ten minutes reading time (around 1,000 words for stories) and the author/poet should be available to attend the event, preferably to read their work although alternative readers can be found.
Submissions should be emailed as attachments to [email protected] with Near-Futures Fiction, the title of the work and the relevant theme in the subject line. Please include your name and title of your work in the document name.
Submissions for more than one theme are very welcome, but not multiple submissions for the same theme. Please attach a separate file for each submission.
The work can already be published, but the author must have permission for it to be used in the context of the Virtual Futures events and anthology.

The deadline for submissions is 21 December 2017 and successful authors and poets will be notified in January 2018.

Advice for writers on getting published

August 5, 2017 By Jule

A friend recently said that his mother had written a book and asked me how I thought she should go about publishing it. It made me reflect upon the fact that there really isn’t a straightforward answer to that question. However, I did share what I know, and perhaps this might be useful to others, so here goes.

Before I start, my knowledge comes from my own experiences of publishing my own books and as the long-term partner of a traditional author, which gives me a little insight into both worlds from an author’s perspective.

I should also say up front, that this isn’t a blog post that claims to make anything easy. Writing and getting published is not for the faint hearted. It requires a lot of practice to be a good writer and a lot of effort and experience to get published. I think this applies to pretty much anything you want to do seriously, yet for some strange reason, people thinking writing is different from other professions in this respect. It really isn’t.

Practically every person I ever meet tells me they want to write a book. Every third person has started one. My partner who is among the minority of people who actually makes a good living writing gets this all the time. If you’ve ever finished a book, you’ve done better than most ever achieve, so well done! But unfortunately, finishing a book is only just the beginning. If you want people to read your books and engage with them, you have to make them available and tell people about them. Whichever route you take, this is a lot of work. It’s a marathon, not a race, you need to put on that ego armour, and you need to be pretty tenacious! If this makes you groan and feel hard done by, then I really can’t help you any further. This is how it is. Put the manuscript back in the drawer.

The traditional versus the self-published route

Much passion in ink has been expended on the subject of whether or not getting traditionally published is ‘better’ or not. In spite of the charged debate, I think there are benefits, advantages, trade-offs & pitfalls, with both options. I think in an ideal world, from an author’s perspective, a bit of both is very healthy. This is the ‘hybrid’ author approach, but that supposes you have produced a number of books and are in the position to choose. My honest advice is, consider your options. But don’t take a ‘bad’ traditional publishing deal because it makes you feel validated. Do what’s best for you and your books.

The advantages of self-publishing

As a self-published author (often called ‘indie author’), you are more in control of every aspect of the production of your book. This includes speed to market, choice of cover design, whether or not you get to sell internationally, and how to best market your books. The only people indie authors have to ‘ask permission’ from are your readers. On the other hand, being in control means you have to do or drive the work that would have been done by a publishing company for you, that includes being your own worst critic and your own coach.

Self-published authors, on average, make more money. The Author Earnings Report gives detailed insight into this. JK Rowling is in the press all the time. She’s a children’s author and a multi millionaire, therefore, many people think, all children’s authors must be millionaires! Book publishing is a little like the national lottery because you are always hearing about the winners, you think it’s more likely that your ticket will come in than the actual 1 in 45 million chance of winning (see things that are more likely to happen to you than winning the National Lottery). There are millionaire writers, but in truth, most authors earn below the minimum wage.

In simplest terms, when you traditionally publish, your agent and your publisher take a reasonable cut of every book sale. When you self-publish this doesn’t happen. Agents fees are typically about 15% in home markets and 20% for overseas sales. Traditional publishers who buy your books will often (but not always) pay you a cash amount up front. Depending on whether the book earning this back. After it has then you will be paid royalties. In general, hardbacks attract a 10% base royalty and paperbacks 7.5%. Self-published authors don’t have to pay agents fees and they get all the earnings from their books after costs.

However, there are many up front costs associated with self-publishing. These are things your traditional publisher will ‘take care of’ as part of your package. In my experience, it still massively works out on the balance sheet in favour of the self-published author (unless you are a megastar), but you do have to pay up front out of pocket and this is something to consider. Here are some of the things you’ll need to pay for (not an exhaustive list):

A professional editor: Nonnegotiable. Fees vary wildly and the price doesn’t always equate with quality. Shop around, try a few. It’s quite a personal relationship and they often specialise in genres.
A book cover. This needs to look like the other books on the Amazon bookshelf. The cover is very much part of the experience of the book. I do choose to do my own covers, which is against all advice, and probably not a good idea, but it is part of the creative process for me and I have all the software! Do as I say, not as I do, in this case.
Special software (Scrivener if you’re going to make your own e-books, but it’s also good to write with, things like KindleSpy which help you with categories)
ISBN numbers
Proofs (for paperbacks)
Amazon (and other book distributors) costs. Amazon has a variable margin model depending on how you price your book. This is taken whenever you sell a book and not paid up front.
Marketing (specialist book marketing services, Facebook advertising, website, mailing list software)

You might decide to use a service (or services) that does some or all of this for you. In particular, there is work involved getting your book into ebook and paperback formats. I do all this myself, but it takes time to do, and it took time to learn. But paying someone to do it, does reduce your profit, so it will be a personal decision and a bit of maths to work out what is good for you. If you are paying a few thousand pound up front to get your books published, do you think you will make that back and if so how quickly?

It’s actually very difficult to predict how well your books will sell, which is why traditional publishers take on such risk and why (I think) their fees are justified. The only company I have had direct personal experience of that does this kind of thing well is SilverWood Books. Organisations like the Alliance of Independent Authors are an excellent place to find ethical, professional help with all aspects of making your book.

The advantages of being traditionally published

A good agent will be on your side. They will read your manuscript, give you advice, go out and pitch it, and fight like a Pit Bull for the best deal for you with the best available publishers. A great publisher does an extraordinary amount of work. As I mentioned, they take on a lot of risks when they take on your book. They pay you up front for something they are only guessing will sell. They will line and copy edit your book, type set it, commission and pay for a cover, get your book typeset for paperback and ebook, manage the production and distribution. They will sell your international rights, get your book translated, and do the really hard job of getting it into book stores and stacked up by the tills at newsagents at airports. Publishers only make money if you succeed, so theoretically they should be invested in your success. This all sounds great, doesn’t it? Why wouldn’t you try and go this route?

The first problem is that every third person in the world has written a book and many of them are simultaneously submitting them to agents and those agents are submitting a smaller, but still statistically significant, number of them to publishers. So getting an agent and publisher is a lot of work in the first place. The Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook 2017 and Writer’s Market 2017: The Most Trusted Guide to Getting Published are the places to start with this process (there is a special edition for children’s writers of the first book).

Publishing houses are businesses and not charities. Agents and editors do not have to publish your book. They don’t owe you anything in fact. They are very busy people who are trying to do quite a hard, not especially well-paid job. They have bosses who care about revenue and profit, just like you do if you have a day job. So publishers are not stupid or philistine if they don’t choose your book, they just don’t think they can sell it. Sometimes that will be because your book is not very good, sometimes it will be because it doesn’t fit with their taste, what’s going on in the market, what happened at a book festival the week before, what their boss told them yesterday, and all sorts of things you can’t do anything about. Every very successful editor has a story about when they turned down “so and so author” who turned out to be a raging success. All the people who turned down JK Rowling now look like complete idiots, but they really weren’t. They were making a call.

Let’s assume you get through this process and you land an agent. The agent then has to sell your book. All of this so far has taken months, by the way.

You may have already had to edit your book on the basis of your agent’s feedback. You are likely to re-edit your book again to fit with the feedback of the editor. You might not like their feedback. They might want you to do a lot of re-writing that you either don’t want to do or feel you can’t do, for whatever reason. But now you have sold your book. It doesn’t belong to you anymore. You have to change your book. It might not feel like your book anymore.

Next stage: You and your editor are happy with your book. All good, yes? Well, not necessarily. Just because an editor at a publishing house takes on your book and likes it, doesn’t mean you are fully supported. That editor has to pitch the book to the rest of her/his colleagues and convince them to “get behind it”. At this stage they may want to change the name of your book, they may choose the cover for your book without consulting you, they are very likely to form a marketing and sales plan without consulting you.

You certainly have no choice over the amount of money being spent to promote your books. This is likely to be a very small amount unless you are James Patterson. They’ve just spent several thousand pounds buying your book. They may not have any budget left for you.

Also, critically, although they are slowly adjusting, many traditional publishing houses are absolutely rubbish at selling digitally. Many of them distrust Amazon and don’t have the in-house skill to market through them, but Amazon is now the single biggest marketplace for books.

My key point is once you sell your book to a publisher you have to accept you have handed over control. At any stage, you are dependent on your publisher fully supporting you and at any stage for a number of reasons that situation might change.

So, in summary:

	Pros	Cons
Traditional	If you are lucky and the publishing house gets behind you, they will edit, typeset, commission a cover, manage print & e-book production, international translations, bookstore distribution, marketing, PR, get you reviews in broadsheets and everything else! You will have a supportive team on your side for the bad days.	Agents & publishers cut reduces your earnings considerably. You could be selling a ton and making less money than an average indie author. Lack of control over things like cover and marketing and promotion direction (unless you are very successful) Publishers may drop your book or publish and not promote your book. Everything takes a very long time. You are highly vulnerable to the whims of others and your hard work might get stranded unloved but sold to others You are reliant on the “approval” of a lot of random strangers.
Self-publishing	Make more money (on ave) You are in control of every decision You only need to ask permission from readers You can do pretty much everything a traditional publisher does if you are willing to do the work

Resources

Biosphere cities – domed cities – artificial ecosystems

Underground cities

Bioengineering