One of the wells I go back to when work is troubling is the Solar Age of the Golden Clipper series.
This is a series about merchant marines IN SPACE. There's five pages about the proper way to brew coffee, ten pages on how to change air scrubbers and water filters, and a lot of concern over how to progress in ranks to make sure you're never out of work.
The first three books -- quarter share, half share, and full share -- present a trilogy where our young protagonist learns the ropes, advances through the crew ranks, and becomes a leader among the enlisted crew.
There is one act of violence in this trilogy. It takes place off screen, to the best buddy of the main character -- he's robbed. This is the impetus for constructive work done by our main character, the officers of the ship, and the crew as they pitch in to help him, and solve the underlying issue the behaviors of many crew members were engendering -- essentially trying to sell goods to shady individuals without backup.
The violence is not pictured onscreen, and the fallout for sure is. Both emotional and physical, as the crew comes to terms with what happened.
I want to see more of this in my fiction -- where constructive work to better a situation is done by our characters, and they can't solve problems by punching them. And wouldn't want to anyway.
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Anna Kreider who maybe wrote a game in which there's no violence move. :-)
ReplyDeleteNow, granted, in the second trilogy -- Double Share, Captain's Share, and Owner's Share -- there is violence. Both on screen, and implied. And worse things than punches.
ReplyDeleteIn my mind, those represent a huge failure of imagination by the author -- who is, of course, a middle aged white guy.
This makes me think of the Steampunk craze and Hugo. Most steampunk stuff seems to revolve around guns and heavily armed ships and stuff, but Hugo shows that it could instead be about a love of mechanical things and crafting and fixing them up.
ReplyDeleteOf course for me the way you describe those first novels sounds incredibly boring so... to each their own and all that. :P
ReplyDeleteAlso, that's not exactly accurate. There is violence in the game, just no way to hurt other players physically.
I'm also reminded of fuzzy memories of The African Queen. Which of course ends with a heroic attack on a Nazi boat, but IIRC most of the movie was just about trying to keep this ramshackle boat running.
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