Reading Branches Beyond Faction Paradox
Sept 17, 2022 18:53:21 GMT
Anastasia, doctornolonger, and 4 more like this
Post by desertkris on Sept 17, 2022 18:53:21 GMT
I’m curious about some of the reading tracks other readers have followed beyond the fiction of the Faction. Some of us are already readers who explore the other branches: From Doctor Who to the Time Hunter of the Telos novellas, Bernice Summerfield, Iris Wildthyme’s Obverse (and the other branch, the novels and stories of Paul Magrs). Naturally, there’s Faction Paradox, now published by Obverse Books. There’s Obverse Book’s published works, which have expanded The City of the Saved setting as it emerges from Faction Paradox, as well as many other interesting fictional series’ that sometimes intersects with FP.
What about other works that might have influenced FP; or developed independently? Or just pre-date it and might have no connection yet might be of interest? I came across a novel by Lin Carter called The Time War, but I haven’t read it yet; but it seems like it might cover part of what interests me in FP. There’s another more recent book, called This is How You Lose the Time War, by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone, which sounds intriguing.
Naturally, we could pick any author whose FP stories we like, and track down their other writings. Anyone have any favorite authors they’ve followed beyond the scope of FP?
Then there’s type of fiction, that might have something of the aesthetics, or explore the ideas of FP. Alternate History is a whole sub-genre of fiction one could delve into. I’ve kind of felt that the works of HP Lovecraft shares a little of the aesthetic, especially stuff like Dreams in the Witches House and Shadows Out of Time; the EDA novel The Taking of Planet 5 makes them feel connected, in my overall reading experience (in fact TToP5 is what finally got me to follow up on all the previous references to Lovecraft being infused into DW fiction).
The comic book series The Invisibles, by Grant Morrison, came to my attention as a series that pre-dates and may have provided some inspiration to The Matrix movie/trilogy (whatever), and also may have provided inspiration to FP. Has anyone come across this as a FP-adjacent recommendation, for FP fans? One recommendation suggested that one might look at it as a version of what a FP comic series might be like. Does anyone have thoughts about this series?
The Book of the War got me enthusiastic about that kind of encyclopedic-style of storytelling. Not quite choose-your-own-adventure, but there is the joy of being able to bounce around as one chooses. Additionally there is the joy of a small reading commitment, being able to dip in and out; dabble-reading. A reviewer for The Book of the War flagged The Dictionary of the Khazars by Milorad Pavic, which is a book I’m glad to have and dip into; Milorad Pavic has written many other books that experiment with structuring that a reader can choose their reading journey. These kinds of encyclopedic books also led me to be receptive to the Dune Encyclopedia (for fans of the novel/series Dune by Frank Herbert). The Dune Encyclopedia is a really fun world-building-by-encyclopedia book, much like The Book of the War.
Then there’s the idea of The Book of the War as almost being like a roleplaying game supplement or campaign setting, without a designated roleplaying game system attached. So one could pick a preferred system and plug The Book of the War in and play. Sometimes I just like to read the world-building suggestions that RPG books suggest, which may be why I agree that The Book of the War is almost like an RPG book, a spring-board for expanded storytelling.
There are at least three obvious RPG systems; the three different Doctor Who RPG’s. The original, which might not be the best, which is old school D&D-type gaming, maybe. I like the Time Lords book, which is very rules-light. But the current DW RPG is also very rules-light, and the new 2nd edition has tried to push even further in streamlining the rules.
In terms of actual story-content, The Sixth Doctor Sourcebook has a lot of material for how many of the Sixth Doctor’s television stories intersect with the/a time war. The Eighth Doctor Sourcebook also explores how a series of individual adventures can be strung together to explore how a time war grows and intrudes on the universe, manifesting more strongly as the stories progress from one story to the next. It suggests ideas like how versions of the war might have a Doctor-shaped hole in the universe, or multiple alternative Ninth Doctors might co-exist in parallel, fighting in the war from different angles. The Ninth Doctor sourcebook has storytelling material suggesting how the aftermath of a war might look, which sounds like it might be fun to reference in light of what the title Faction Paradox: The Book of the Peace suggests. The Time Traveller’s Companion has some ideas that my mind was able to combine for element of what a post-war universe might look like, and who might be new groups self-appointed guardians of time.
Finally, I came across an independently published rules light, kind of off-brand, roleplaying game called Beautiful Anomalies. Here is part of what I wrote about Beautiful Anomalies, in a post on Gallifrey Base:
“How much is Beautiful Anomalies DW? or A Wrinkle in Time? (or Faction Paradox?) Fans of Faction Paradox and DW will find that the story-lore developed in Beautiful Anomalies is somewhat close to home. I was very surprise to see that there's a time war; although The Watchers (which are characterized quite a lot like Time Lords) are not one of the major combatants in Beautiful Anomalies' time war; the major opposing factions are broadly characterized as Snakes and Spiders.
Snakes and Spiders are the different sides of the war; and sometimes The Watchers will intervene to edit alternative temporal warfare into that main conflict, to keep it a simple "infection" within the body of space-time (web of time/Spiral Politic).
The negative perspective of history (history is a tally of casualties, disasters, and fallen civilizations) is a sentient concept-force-of-nature that will react to characters making too many positive changes to history, too quickly...as a sentient-conceptual-aspect of the universe, it will react against too much change and manifest as a future-version of a character gone wrong (shades of the Valeyard, or a version of Grandfather Paradox).
Then there's It. It is "The specter of a dead univere perhaps, or the living blueprint for the next, much improved model." (p. 51, Beautiful Anomalies). It makes the devil's-bargains with people, one's fondest wishes at a terrible price. It's makes things unnaturally ordered, where it manifests. So It in Beautiful Anomalies is partly the Enemy from the war in FP (a process, hostile alternative history), partly the Celestis, and partly A Wrinkle in Time's own It, all rolled into one."
What about other works that might have influenced FP; or developed independently? Or just pre-date it and might have no connection yet might be of interest? I came across a novel by Lin Carter called The Time War, but I haven’t read it yet; but it seems like it might cover part of what interests me in FP. There’s another more recent book, called This is How You Lose the Time War, by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone, which sounds intriguing.
Naturally, we could pick any author whose FP stories we like, and track down their other writings. Anyone have any favorite authors they’ve followed beyond the scope of FP?
Then there’s type of fiction, that might have something of the aesthetics, or explore the ideas of FP. Alternate History is a whole sub-genre of fiction one could delve into. I’ve kind of felt that the works of HP Lovecraft shares a little of the aesthetic, especially stuff like Dreams in the Witches House and Shadows Out of Time; the EDA novel The Taking of Planet 5 makes them feel connected, in my overall reading experience (in fact TToP5 is what finally got me to follow up on all the previous references to Lovecraft being infused into DW fiction).
The comic book series The Invisibles, by Grant Morrison, came to my attention as a series that pre-dates and may have provided some inspiration to The Matrix movie/trilogy (whatever), and also may have provided inspiration to FP. Has anyone come across this as a FP-adjacent recommendation, for FP fans? One recommendation suggested that one might look at it as a version of what a FP comic series might be like. Does anyone have thoughts about this series?
The Book of the War got me enthusiastic about that kind of encyclopedic-style of storytelling. Not quite choose-your-own-adventure, but there is the joy of being able to bounce around as one chooses. Additionally there is the joy of a small reading commitment, being able to dip in and out; dabble-reading. A reviewer for The Book of the War flagged The Dictionary of the Khazars by Milorad Pavic, which is a book I’m glad to have and dip into; Milorad Pavic has written many other books that experiment with structuring that a reader can choose their reading journey. These kinds of encyclopedic books also led me to be receptive to the Dune Encyclopedia (for fans of the novel/series Dune by Frank Herbert). The Dune Encyclopedia is a really fun world-building-by-encyclopedia book, much like The Book of the War.
Then there’s the idea of The Book of the War as almost being like a roleplaying game supplement or campaign setting, without a designated roleplaying game system attached. So one could pick a preferred system and plug The Book of the War in and play. Sometimes I just like to read the world-building suggestions that RPG books suggest, which may be why I agree that The Book of the War is almost like an RPG book, a spring-board for expanded storytelling.
There are at least three obvious RPG systems; the three different Doctor Who RPG’s. The original, which might not be the best, which is old school D&D-type gaming, maybe. I like the Time Lords book, which is very rules-light. But the current DW RPG is also very rules-light, and the new 2nd edition has tried to push even further in streamlining the rules.
In terms of actual story-content, The Sixth Doctor Sourcebook has a lot of material for how many of the Sixth Doctor’s television stories intersect with the/a time war. The Eighth Doctor Sourcebook also explores how a series of individual adventures can be strung together to explore how a time war grows and intrudes on the universe, manifesting more strongly as the stories progress from one story to the next. It suggests ideas like how versions of the war might have a Doctor-shaped hole in the universe, or multiple alternative Ninth Doctors might co-exist in parallel, fighting in the war from different angles. The Ninth Doctor sourcebook has storytelling material suggesting how the aftermath of a war might look, which sounds like it might be fun to reference in light of what the title Faction Paradox: The Book of the Peace suggests. The Time Traveller’s Companion has some ideas that my mind was able to combine for element of what a post-war universe might look like, and who might be new groups self-appointed guardians of time.
Finally, I came across an independently published rules light, kind of off-brand, roleplaying game called Beautiful Anomalies. Here is part of what I wrote about Beautiful Anomalies, in a post on Gallifrey Base:
“How much is Beautiful Anomalies DW? or A Wrinkle in Time? (or Faction Paradox?) Fans of Faction Paradox and DW will find that the story-lore developed in Beautiful Anomalies is somewhat close to home. I was very surprise to see that there's a time war; although The Watchers (which are characterized quite a lot like Time Lords) are not one of the major combatants in Beautiful Anomalies' time war; the major opposing factions are broadly characterized as Snakes and Spiders.
Snakes and Spiders are the different sides of the war; and sometimes The Watchers will intervene to edit alternative temporal warfare into that main conflict, to keep it a simple "infection" within the body of space-time (web of time/Spiral Politic).
The negative perspective of history (history is a tally of casualties, disasters, and fallen civilizations) is a sentient concept-force-of-nature that will react to characters making too many positive changes to history, too quickly...as a sentient-conceptual-aspect of the universe, it will react against too much change and manifest as a future-version of a character gone wrong (shades of the Valeyard, or a version of Grandfather Paradox).
Then there's It. It is "The specter of a dead univere perhaps, or the living blueprint for the next, much improved model." (p. 51, Beautiful Anomalies). It makes the devil's-bargains with people, one's fondest wishes at a terrible price. It's makes things unnaturally ordered, where it manifests. So It in Beautiful Anomalies is partly the Enemy from the war in FP (a process, hostile alternative history), partly the Celestis, and partly A Wrinkle in Time's own It, all rolled into one."
