318. Catherine Lundoff (a.k.a. The Fantastic Wolf) — An Interview (Out of This World)
http://media.blubrry.com/skiffyandfanty/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/archive.org/download/SandFEpisode318InterviewWCatherineLundoff/Sandf–Episode318–InterviewWCatherineLundoff.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Android | iHeartRadio | Podchaser | Podcast Index | Email | TuneIn | Deezer | RSSShakespeare, queer noir, and vampire yaoi, oh my! Catherine Lundoff joins Jen and Paul to talk about her new collection of short stories, Out of this World: Queer Speculative Fiction Stories, which is also the first release from her new independent publishing house, Queen of Swords Press. We travel through genre and history as we discuss the wide variety of stories in the collection. We hope you enjoy the episode! Note: If you have iTunes and like this show, please give us a review on our iTunes page, or feel free to email us with your thoughts about the show! Here’s the episode (show notes are below):
#SkiffyandFanty Episode 101 — Modern Influences on SF/F, Werewolf Myths, Steampunk and More w/ Catherine Lundoff
http://media.blubrry.com/skiffyandfanty/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/archive.org/download/TheSkiffyAndFantyShow–Episode101–ModernInfluencesOnSffWerewolf/Sandf–Episode101–ModernInfluencesOnSfAndFWCatherineLundoff.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Android | iHeartRadio | Podchaser | Podcast Index | Email | TuneIn | Deezer | RSSAuthor Catherine Lundoff joins us for our 101st episode to talk about her latest novel, Silver Moon, and some other amusing topics (the influence of the modern world on SF/F, QUILTBAG literature, steampunk, werewolf myths, etc.). Plus, Shaun sticks his foot way back into the recesses of his throat, and then sticks the other one in there for good measure. It’s one heck of an awesome episode, we think, so tell your friends all about it! We hope you enjoy the episode! Note: If you have iTunes and like this show, please give us a review on our iTunes page, or feel free to email us with your thoughts about the show! Here’s the episode (show notes are below): Episode 101 — Download (MP3) Intro and Discussion (0:00 – 1:00:50) Catherine’s Website Lethe Press Buy Catherine’s book! It’s good. You can also support this podcast by signing up for a one month free trial at Audible. Doing so helps us, gives you a change to try out Audible’s service, and brings joy to everyone. Our new intro music is “Time Flux” by Revolution Void (CC BY 3.0). That’s all, folks! Thanks for listening. See you next week.
Guest Post: “Writing Silver Moon and Menopausal Werewolves” by Catherine Lundoff
I would love to say that when I first thought of the premise for Silver Moon (middle-aged woman unexpectedly becomes a werewolf), I was engaged in some sort of deep and thorough analysis of the dearth of female werewolves and of middle-aged female protagonists in genre. In reality, I was watching Ginger Snaps, films 1 and 2, and the prequel. The Ginger Snaps movies, for those who haven’t discovered them yet, are a series of Canadian films that managedto successfully combine horror, feminism, satire and lycanthropy. In the first movie, teenage sisters Ginger and Brigitte are disaffected high school students contemplating either running away from home or dying by sixteen. Then, Ginger is attacked by a werewolf. She has, inevitably, just started her period. The plot escalates from there as Ginger revenges herself against their classmates and begins to lose her humanity while Brigitte tries desperately to cure her. The movies, apart from being entertaining, got me thinking about depictions of female werewolves in sf and f and horror. There aren’t a lot to choose from, particularly as main characters: Ginger Snaps; Suzy McKee Charnas’ protagonist in “Boobs;” Millar’s Lonely Werewolf Girl; the anthology Women Who Run with Werewolves and a few others. The best-known female werewolves in science fiction and fantasy and horror are young women, often teenagers or in their early twenties. And the women often transition to lycanthropy as the result of the onset of menses, which triggers a werewolf attack. While I was cogitating on this, editor JoSelle Vanderhooft contacted me about writing a story for an anthology of lesbian werewolf novellas that she was working on (now out as Bitten by Moonlight from Zumaya Press). So I started pulling my previous noodlings together into a story idea that went something along the lines of “If it can happen at one change in life, why not another?” Add to that the indisputable fact that there are very few middle-aged female protagonists in sf/f and put the two together, at least in my brain, and ta-da! Menopausal werewolves. I decided that I wanted to write about a middle-aged woman who turns into a werewolf as she entered menopause. And she wouldn’t know that it was going to happen, until it did (not unlike some aspects of going through menopause). This woman would have a community of some sort around her, as well as people who didn’t want her to change, because I wanted to write about those relationships. Once I got that far, I needed a rationale for why there would be more than one werewolf near my protagonist to support the story I wanted to tell. This was, as it turned out, closely connected to the question of how she or they became werewolves in the first place. One of the marvelous things about writing about werewolves is that there is such a wealth of interesting stories about how the change is brought about. My personal favorite, though not the one I used, is the legend that suggests that you can become were by drinking rainwater from a wolf’s paw print. You can also put on a belt made of wolf skin, apply magical ointment, or simply sleep outside under the full moon. Given the options, being bitten by a werewolf or just plain being born that way were pretty prosaic. I had already ruled out the option of her being born a werewolf if I wanted it to be unexpected. So that meant that either she had to get bitten by another werewolf or something else had to happen. I wanted to do something besides transmission by biting, in part because it would start her off with an antagonistic relationship with the other werewolves. I wanted to do something different, something that felt more in line with the tone of the story. But the rainwater from the paw print thing seemed a bit much. What I came up with instead was the idea of using place-based magic. This had to do with my desire to write a story that touched on ideas about community and activism. Why not a place that impacted some of its inhabitants in unusual ways? I bowed to tradition in keeping the lunar-based transformations, though these werewolves can break from that if they have enough control. Otherwise, the magic of the place picks and chooses who changes and when. The place in question is a town called “Wolf’s Point” in a valley in the American West (I opted not to put it in a specific state). Generations of Native Americans from different tribes and immigrants from different parts of the world combined elements of their various magical traditions to create a special place. It was one guarded first by the spirit of the wolves, then actual werewolves. And who better to call as guardians than healthy older women who’ve been written off as too old to be desirable or to bear children? My protagonist, Becca Thornton, is a fairly recent transplant to Wolf’s Point. She’s divorced and working in the local hardware store for Pete and Shelly Peterson. Shelly Peterson has a secret, one shared by several of Becca’s neighbors and some of the other women in the Wolf’s Point Women’s Club. Shortly after her fiftieth birthday, the valley’s magic calls Becca to join them in the local werewolf pack, comprised of women of a “certain age.” And she’s not wildly enthusiastic about it. In fact, Becca is pretty conflicted about a lot of things. She doesn’t want to be menopausal, or a werewolf, or have a crush on her neighbor, Pack Beta Erin Adams. She wants to be normal, at least some of the time. This is what leaves her open to the offer of a “cure” from a group of aspiring werewolf hunters who arrive in Wolf’s Point with an agenda of their own. My werewolf hunters are an odd bunch in and of themselves. Most of them are former military, and several of them are “ex-wolves” (the
