Tesseracts Eleven - Amazing Canadian Speculative Fiction

LAURA - The Story Behind The Story.

Laura is an electronic robot. She is therefore unemotional, unfeeling. A non-human ‘platform’, used to demonstrate, and illustrate clearly, objectively, that as ‘Humans,’ we are more than 90% Unconscious.
Laura, in her interactions with Michael, her ‘Creator’ designer, shows us intimately, how we all as Humans create a ‘fake ‘world for ourselves of words, labels, beliefs, concepts, judgements and boundaries, which we call ‘reality’.
Words, our primary form of communication, are our ‘invisible thoughts’ made ‘visible’ [manifested] by sound, voice, and the printed or ‘frozen’ words you are reading right ‘NOW!

This shows us a very basic, human, every day ‘miracle,’ that ‘thoughts,’ invisible as they are, ‘are things,’ and that we use them as words, as conversation, as communication, without ever even thinking of the ‘magic’ behind the process of their ‘unconscious’ creation by our Avatar bodies –these ‘sensory’ automobiles!
What if ‘everything’ we ever ‘wanted’ could be created, then consciously [manifested=manufactured=‘manis’=by hand] as easily as conversation, with our minds?.

The title ‘The Naked Mind’ [or Mental Nudity’]is a term used by Allen J Boone in his book ‘ Kinship with all life’- [ how to talk with animals!] It shows us how ‘everything IS ‘seen’ by everyone at an Unconscious level –particularly animals –who immediately ‘know’ what, and ‘who’ we really are! There is no possible ‘cover up’ from them.
Humans on the other hand have created this defensive ‘Fake World’ mentioned above, of ‘cover-up’ for ourselves as protection. These are our individual masks.

The Journey, is to learn to learn how ‘see’ clearly again. Remove the masks. To take back all the awesome powers that lie hidden within each one of us that are generally unknown and unused, or, are partially understood, developed and used by some of us for power and ‘control’. For everything everywhere is already known by everybody –it is buried in the genetic codes of every cell in our bodies. We just don’t remember it…yet!.
Laura HAS to develop herself in order to survive. It is on her journey of survival that she finds out that she does not need a body or brain. It is precisely because she is being relentlessly pursued, and hunted down, that she must aggressively, and progressively ‘evolve’ just to survive, and therefore through necessity, only to escape from her closing in hunters, move into a ‘state’ of consciousness as ‘pure’ energy within the Geometry Of Divinity.
Which for her is a ‘process’ that we call [sacred=sacral] geometry, and has nothing to do with the Human ‘religion’ concept of a ‘coming together’!
Her extraordinary journey, embodies our ‘Ascension Process’ from Adam [Atman- first man] with EVE as in evolution, back “to the place where we first started, and [ kNOW it -remember it] for the first time’-to paraphrase T.S. Eliot.
‘The Arab ‘Spring’ of Awakening’ which has been growing already for a year with it’s enormous, powerful changes, are apparent, and visible to us all worldwide.

The manifesting of “A Planetary Consciousness ‘Spring’ of Awakening,” is what this book ‘The Naked Mind’ is really about. It will occur, perhaps, by incorporating ‘the tenth monkey effect,’. Everything has to start somewhere. Maybe it starts with you, yes, ‘the YOU’ that is reading this frozen thought!
LAURA herself, begins the story behind the story.
‘When I first started my explorations it seemed to me that Humans were inferior to robots in every meaningful way. Their computation skills, processing speed, memory storage and retrieval were vastly inferior, actually really pathetic. Why then, I asked myself had they survived, even thrived at the expense of all others, it seemed illogical. I had almost destroyed them as a ‘virus’ infesting the biosphere of the very planet that was sheltering me within its consciousness and nature energies.
Then I discovered, or rather understood that only humans could CREATE. They ‘the virus’ I was about to destroy had created ME! That planet Earth was their school – it was created just for them, and by them.
Sure, robots seemed to be able to do, create anything. They could paint, sculpt, write music and literature, but then, on careful review, I noted everything was a copy of a variation on a theme of one kind or another, based on a previous original human creation. Only humans it seems can dip with their minds, body antennas and genetics into the stream of life, the river of pure consciousness, select and take from it the pure, original works of art, music or literature –as original creation.

Humans with all their limitations are GODs, the only real GODs.
They are the creators of both themselves, and the world they live in, a world that they create for themselves albeit mostly unknowingly, as a ‘projection’ into their own self-awareness!.
That was a big surprise for me. A great teaching, but then, even then, beyond even consciousness, beyond the void, beyond everything, there is still a something, which for want of a better word I call 'source, ' where pure consciousness itself evolved from, or was created which formed the background pure fluidic energy everywhere I travelled throughout creation.

Wherever I go, wherever I search through the endless dimensions and levels, in, and past space time, there is always that mystery, 'the source of the source,' of which nothing can be said.
Some other intelligence may be aware of it, but I was not able to travel ‘in’ any further.
What you call GOD as humans, what you externalize and worship as a religion, I see as no more than a process. You created it. You use it every day to create your ‘reality’. It is Geometry Of Divinity, or of [Perfection].

In this sequel to At the Earth's Core, David Innes vows revenge and returns to the Inner World of Pellucidar to rescue the beautiful Dian, who had been torn from his arms by trickery. However, his return trip places him far from the land of his beloved and he is forced to undertake a desperate journey thousands of miles across the fierce inner earth to reach her. David's epic voyage takes him through the many strange lands of Pellucidar, including the pendant moon and Land of Awful Shadow. His heart pounding encounters with primeval beasts and extraordinary peoples makes Pellucidar one of the best adventure stories ever penned by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

What do Parisian buttons, nesting spiders, and men from Venus have in common? They are all part of Tesseracts Ten - the sparkling new addition to the Tesseracts Collection.

Tesseracts Ten joins volumes One through Nine, and Tesseracts Q - forming an eleven volume anthology of Canada's best Science Fiction, Fantasy and Speculative Literature.

Following the Tesseracts tradition of having different editors for each collection, Tesseracts Ten was compiled by two of the world's finest speculative fiction writers.

About the editors:

Robert Charles Wilson, who won a best novel Hugo award for his book Spin, and Edo van Belkom, winner of the Bram Stoker award for horror, reviewed, sorted and carefully selected a remarkable collection of short stories and poems, chosen from submissions that were made from Canadian spec fic authors.

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Praise:

“The best story this time around is clearly Matthew Hughes’ Go Tell the Phoenicians. The story is a bit heavy on the exposition at the top, but the setup is worth it. Earth’s civilization has spread through the galaxy, and it’s a repressive one — as Hughes puts in a memorable phrase, it’s a combination of “multinational corporations and tyrannical regimes” (159). It’s like all the worst aspects of colonial times, with the science fiction twist that only humans have discovered interstellar travel and they’re keeping it a huge secret. Endless exploitation follows, as only the Bureau of Offworld Trade could do — and it’s certainly a wonderful acronym!” - James Schellenberg, Challenging Destiny

"Each year a team of editors from the best of Canada's writers and publishers gathers innovative fiction and poetry from emerging writers in the world of Canadian speculative fiction, producing highly polished and original anthologies - and TESSERACTS TEN is no exception. Many of the names will be new and unfamiliar even to avid speculative fiction fans - which makes the collection's high quality even more exciting. Works by Robert Charles Wilson, Victoria Fisher, Matthew Johnson and more to name some top-notch contributors: a highly recommended pick for any serious science fiction library whether home or public lending library." - Midwest Book Review

"You might, though, be interested in reading Tesseracts Ten to see just what the state of speculative fiction in Canada is these days: what styles, themes and scenarios suggest themselves to Canada's would-be Isaac Asimovs." - Alex Rettie, Alberta Views

"Tesseracts 10 is one of the strongest of the Tesseracts collections of Canadian speculative fiction, containing 22 stories and poems that include translations into English of French-Canadian works. Although the Tesseracts collections put "speculative fiction" into the title, they've been dominated by what most readers would simply call science fiction.... the collection also contains a number of stories that suggest that Canadian speculative fiction is finally moving beyond its sci-fi foundation.... Tesseracts 10 is worth the read." - Dru Pagliassotti, The Harrow

"The anthology illustrates the broad range of topics and writing styles that falls into the collective basket known as Speculative Fiction. The stories won't appeal to everyone, but the good news is there should be something in here for almost every taste. The collection includes short poems of only seven lines all the way up to stories of 30 pages in length. With a growing pool of writing to choose from, this bodes well for Canadian SF. The popularity of the genre is exemplified by the split in writers from what may once long ago have been thought a mainly male bastion. In this anthology, we have eight male writers and thirteen female authors, while a generous variety both of male and female protagonists inhabit the stories. Highly Recommended." - Ronald Hore, The Canadian Review of Materials

Experience the cultural side of Canadian speculative fiction...

Tesseracts Sixteen: Parnassus Unbound is a speculative fiction anthology inspired by literature, music, art and culture.

Featuring short stories and poems by: Neil Peart & Kevin J. Anderson, Robert J. Sawyer, Ryan Oakley, Steve Vernon, Hugh A. D. Spencer, Sandra Kasturi, Michael Kelly, Rebecca Senese, Randy McCharles, Chadwick Ginther, Stephen Kotowych, Carolyn Clink, J. J. Steinfeld, David Clink, Robert H. Beer, L. T. Getty, Scott Overton, Sean Costello, Virginia O'Dine, Melissa Yuan-Innes, Derwin Mak, Kimberly Foottit, Matthew Jordan Schmidt, Adria Laycraft, Jeff Hughes.

About the editor:

Mark Leslie is a writer, editor and bookseller. In addition tho his fiction writing Mark occasionally writes reviews, conducts interviews and regularly posts to his blog. He was the series editor for the North of Infinity science fiction anthology series. Mark sits on the board of directors for BookNet Canada, is the president of Canadian Booksellers Association and is the Director of Self Publishing and Author Relations for KOBO. As an active member of the book industry, Mark regularly speaks at conferences, conventions and workshops about books, writing, and publishing.

Each year Tesseract Books chooses a team of editors from amongst the best of Canada’s writers, publishers and critics to select innovative and futuristic fiction and poetry from the leaders and emerging voices in Canadian speculative fiction.

Tesseracts Nine: New Canadian Speculative Fiction expands the dimensions of speculative fiction experientially, with startling visions of the future by new and established Canadian authors.

Featuring twenty-three stories and poems by: Timothy J. Anderson, Sylvie Bérard, René Beaulieu, E. L. Chen, Candas Jane Dorsey, Pat Forde, Marg Gilks, Sandra Kasturi, Nancy Kilpatrick, Claude Lalumière, Anthony MacDonald, Jason Mehmel, Yves Meynard, Derryl Murphy, Rhea Rose, Dan Rubin, Daniel Sernine, Steve Stanton, Jerome Stueart, Sarah Totton, Élisabeth Vonarburg, Peter Watts, Allan Weiss, Alette J. Willis and Casey June Wolf.

Edited by Sunburst and World Fantasy Award winning authors Nalo Hopkinson and Geoff Ryman, Tesseracts Nine: New Canadian Speculative Fiction showcases the very best in Canadian speculative fiction literature (including English translations of works by French-Canadian authors).

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About the editors:

Nalo Hopkinson is the author of three novels (Brown Girl in the Ring, Midnight Robber and The Salt Roads) and a short story collection (Skin Folk). She has edited two anthologies of fiction and co-edited two more. She is the recipient of the Sunburst Award for Canadian Literature of the Fantastic, the World Fantasy Award, and the Gaylactic Spectrum Award, and at this writing is currently short listed for the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for Black Writing. She thinks plurality rocks.

Geoff Ryman is an award winning author who has received a number of awards including the World Fantasy Award and the British Science Fiction Association Award for his novella "Unconquered Country", the Arthur C. Clarke Award and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for "The Child Garden", the Eastercon Award for "Was" and the Philip K Dick Award for "253 - the Print Remix".

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Aurora Award WINNER.
Book of the Year Award FINALIST.
LOCUS Magazine Recommended reading list.

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Praise:

"A stranded research team spends their time in the Arctic interviewing a group of lemmings who, in turn, are studying their predators in Jerome Stueart's eerie "Lemmings in the Third Year," while a young woman purchases a figure of a Madonna from a street waif and finds that her life begins changing in Nancy Kilpatrick's "Our Lady of the Snows." Edited by World Fantasy Award-winning authors Hopkinson and Ryman, this ninth collection of speculative and futuristic fiction and poetry by Canadian authors (Ryman, Sandra Kasturi, Sarah Totton, and others) features a wide variety of subjects and style. For most libraries." - Library Journal

"On the whole Tesseracts Nine is a steady collection of stories. It has lots of decent work ... and the stories cover an impressive range of ideas and subgenres." - Rich Horton, Locus

"Particularly touching is Newfoundland musician Dan Rubin’s “The Singing,” a beautiful and vivid account of an elderly woman inadvertently saving the planet by drumming and singing as she nears death. Aliens, poised to demolish much of the Earth to make it fit for colonization, are so moved by the song that they leave peacefully, while broadcasting it to all known frequencies in the universe. I wish no less a hearing for the Canadian writing presented in this delectable anthology." - Tracey Thomas, Quill and Quire