U Are Not Alone ...

 Haitian Creole is French as she is (was) spoke, which is a great relief to those who had to suffer through French conjugations. Even if one kept the distinction between singular and plural, the subtractive morphology, in which the plural contains a consonant absent in the singular, is unpredictable and complicated from the default direction of pluralization. The simplification of spelling is welcome, but it has one unanticipated side effect: the elimination of u as a singular vowel. In Creole, the solitary vowel u becomes i, as is the fate of most high rounded vowels. A learner who failed to distinguish between orthography and speech might miss this feature altogether.

Amethyst (Amy Reeder, Wonder Comics)

        Amethyst, written and drawn by Amy Reeder under the Wonder Comics imprint, is elaboration and evolution of the reliable but basic plot of the original Amethyst Princess of Gemworld miniseries. This seems to be a good way to handle characters who cannot sustain ongoing series: the non-ubiquity of the character permits the possibility of growth, both personal and political - and politics is critical to the Gemworld saga! For such an example, one can look at the evolution of the Shazam series; unlike the Shazam series, however, the Wonder Comics series avoided the edginess of the New 52. The original Amethyst Princess of Gemworld series was a gem-themed lost princess tale, suitable for a thirteen-year-old protagonist - although Amy Winston ages up in Gemworld much like Shazam or, more contemporary, She-Ra. The protagonist of Reeder's Amethyst is sixteen, a three-year difference which marks great change in a teenager's life while still limiting the aging of comic characters.

          The inciting incident of Reeder's Amethyst is another basic idea which many fantasy sequels use: the land is in chaos or distress when the protagonist returns. Every television or movie sequel to MGM's The Wizard of Oz is an example. Another example is Stephen Donaldson's The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. Amethyst discovers her subjects missing and her alleged allies shockingly hostile. The threat is well-balanced: the subjects are not dead, but could die easily. Then Amethyst finds out that she is not as orphaned as she previously believed. This revelation and following ones connect to the title of the original maxiseries, Amethyst Princess of Gemworld: they confirm why she is a princess rather than a queen as seen in the other realms, and that the appellation "of Gemworld"  might be presumptuous in-world as ppposed to an Earthly perspective. Amethyst's journey exposes a more complex and ambiguous history of Gemworld than the Twelve Kingdoms and fantasy Travelers, along with the Good/Evil and Order/Chaos axes, might suggest. None of it, however, is presented in a gritty or "mature" manner, and the climax allows further development of Gemworld without undermining the foundational principles of this fantasy realm.

         This is a good introduction to the history and politics of Gemworld, past and present. A great aid to this introduction is the map, which provides a reference for the itinerary while still keeping some things secret. Any adults with young daughters who grew up in the eighties with She-Ra, The Never-Ending Story, and Return to Oz should consider buying this book.

In Your Eyes I See ...

 In Haitian Creole, aka Kre`yol, the official language of the Republic of Haiti, the words for 'man' and 'woman' are not derived from l'homme and la femme, as one might expect from something so deeply French. Instead, the words are gason and fi, an indication of the legacy of oppression. But if 'boy' and 'girl' have become 'man' and 'woman', what does one use for actual boys and girls? An application of the word ti from French petit produces tigason and tifi. This use of diminutives and pejoration does have one happy result: the Creole word for child is timoun, in which the moun comes from French monde '(entire) world'. If a child is one's entire world, perhaps that sentiment allays some bitterness of that country's history.

Ghost Machine

 Ghost Machine is a preview anthology of multiple related series. The first character to appear is a preexisting one, Geiger, whose name evokes the post-apocalyptic setting. The Unnamed timeline, however, is expanding the Geiger universe with other immortals and rivals, most notably Redcoat. The immortals include Benedict Arnold, Albert Einstein (shown as a child), Davy Crockett, The Northerner (a Union soldier), Annie Oakley, and Simon Pure, Redcoat himself. War connects these figures and others who are committed to the Unknown War. There is a timeline which includes characters not already mentioned in Ghost Machine, such as American Widow X and the First Ghost. The immortality of the characters in the Unnamed War seems to be less than absolute, since Benedict Arnold is described as the only immortal, other than Redcoat, to survive the Revolutionary War. What litte is said about the encounter between the Northerner and Redcoat suggests that Simon Pure was a Confederate or at least a sympathizer. First Ghost is an intriguing concept: a female veteran goes to space and then becomes president of the United States. Her experience inspires her to become the First Ghost. Given the timeline, she is the last of next-to-last President before the start of the Unknown War.

Rook: Exodus is an extrasolar corporate dystopia; specifically, the dystopia after the corporation's terraforming engine has failed and the corporation has abandoned the Wardens, its own employees. The Wardens are animal-themed and have helmets which control their associated animals - a reversal of the usual functions of a totemic mask. The Wardens disagree on how to handle the dwindling resources and each Warden has oversized animals at their command, so it's clear that a War of the Wardens would be ugly. What is not so clear is why the corporation chose oversized animals to colonize a partially terraformed planet.

The Family Universe is less clear as a shared universe, although Peter J Tomasi is credited on both books. That does inspire confidence. The first title, The Rocketfellers, is about a family from the Twenty-Fifth Century in a temporal witness program in the present day: the future is not secure. It seems a family-friendly series, although  it's not clear whether the movie of Junkyard Joe in the final panel is an easter egg or a connection to the timeline of the Unknown War. The other Family Universe series, Hornsby & Halo, seems to be based on the child swap of the New Gods, only set on Earth, involving Heaven & Hell rather than their cosmic analogs, and centered on Little League baseball, Both series are written by Peter J Tomasi, so that is promising on the family front. His depiction of Clark and Jon Kent's relationship was terrific.

The last shared universe, that of Hyde Street and Devour, seems more fluid and ambiguous. The third year definitely-not-Boy-Scout is well designed but almost certainly not his true form. The image on the neckerchief slide is appropriately creepy. Devour seems to be a series about eating disorders, while Hyde Street takes advantage of the repetitiveness of American street names to allow a freedom of location for terror tales.

Thursday Night Adventures

    On a recent Thursday, I ventured to Mission Bay for a high school alumni function. I had believed that this event was, in fact, indoors. When my Lyft driver dropped me off, I noted with dismay that this was an area of the city where my phone did not work well. The pouring rain did not help. After a substantial wandering on both sides of a block, one well-maintained, the other shattered and uneven, and through a passageway, I established that the meeting spot was SF Social, a food park across from the shattered sidewalk. I crossed to it, but still failed to find my alleged party. I rechecked the invitation and belatedly noted that it was "casual." There was no note of cancellation, so I could only conclude that the event was stillborn due to the weather. I had already braved the weather and was in the midst of a food court, so I decided to reap some benefit from my journey. After I had eaten, I went to the stop for the 22, but I just missed it. I explored the longer block across from the food park, which turned out to be a minigolf course. The 22 home was less crowded and less questionable than I was accustomed to. The event may have been a bust, but I did learn about recreational places easily accessed.

Scout Sunday 2024

 On the first Sunday of February, a large contingent of the Troop attended Scout Sunday at our sponsor, a church. Unit Commissioner D. H. played the prelude, a work of his own creation dedicated to a late friend in Scouting. The hymn after the Call to Worship, Hymn 351, "All Who Love and Serve This City," was labeled in the genre of 'urban hymn', a genre hitherto unknown to yours truly. Some of the verses, however, though no doubt well-intentioned, could be misinterpreted in a less than Christian spirit. The scripture was Mark 1:35-45, the tale of Jesus and the leper who did not follow protocol and could not keep his mouth shut. The sermon, "Change of Plans," was well delivered with an ending that provoked further thought. Growing up, I thought that when in this passage Jesus could no longer work openly in these towns, it was due to his fame, rather than his infamy. This is not the case! The leper's failure to go to the priestly authorities was bad enough, since Jesus' healing would be widely known soon, but his indiscretion spread it faster. Jesus could no longer operate within the system. The leper's failure established Jesus as a challenger rather than an ally to the authorities on a time table he did not choose.

The service extended longer than usual because the church was ordaining its new elders and deacons. All church terms are subject to change in meaning, both subtle and gross, depending on denomination, and this was no different. In the language of the writer's home church, ordination is permanent status, but in the sponsoring church ordination, while confirming a sacred duty, is temporary. Nor are their elders young men on mission! The Scouts served the congregation coffee and pastries in the main hall and overall charmed those who had little to no interaction with Scouts or Scouting.