Posted by Athena Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/09/10/the-big-idea-t-a-chan/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=57230

All is fair in love and war. But what if instead of a bloody battle, wars were games to be played? Author T. A. Chan brings us a near future world in which violent wars are a thing of the past, and games usher in a new strategy of fighting each other. Follow along in the Big Idea for her newest novel, One Last Game, to see how the cards play out.

T. A. CHAN:
Big Idea: Must there be consequences?
My 21st Century Anxiety-induced Roman Empire has consisted of two things the past couple years: 1) Knowing Earth is a ticking time bomb from irreversible climate disaster at the rate things are going and 2) The ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza and other international conflicts.
One Last Game was my attempt of channeling those dreads into a more hopeful future where the climate disaster has been resolved and international conflicts are settled in a non-violent play-by-the-rulebook sort of way. Despite my attempts of creating a grounded utopia, I have somehow ended up with a world that is both so much better (yay for eco-friendly civilization practices!) and also so much worse (nay for lethal board games!) than today’s state of affairs. And it all started with how “ethical warfare” might look like in the future…So welcome, and enjoy the ride!
Why are we so predictable? And I don’t mean “we” as in you and me and them on an individual level, but rather “we” as a collective human society and our habit of settling major conflict via some sort of warfare, whether that be of the economic, psychological, or conventional variety just to name a few. It’s almost like there has to be consequences for anything to be taken seriously.
For the purpose of this Big Idea, let’s focus on conventional warfare.

What makes war bad?
I mean, obviously the list is loooongggg — from destroyed infrastructure to loss of lives, from environmental damage to the trauma imparted on whole generations. And yet even over the course of thousands of years, we haven’t been able to escape using “war” as a way to resolve conflict between tribes/kingdoms/nations/etc when verbal communication fails.
In a perfect world, all global disagreements could be resolved with talking and votes and things of that nature.
But if history is anything like a crystal ball, a war only ends when the cost to continue the engagement can no longer be afforded and/or justified.

But what if we minimize the cost and harm of war?
Imagine this: The year is 2145. Through the desperate will to survive, humanity has painstakingly implemented eco-conscious measures over the course of decades and restored Earth back to its healthy, environmental glory. Having barely escaped extinction of the human species, there’s a very strong consensus that minimizing environmental damage and protecting existing resources is Good.
Thus, bombs are banned, chemical warfare is banned, scorched-earth policy is banned, hell anything that leaves a scratch on a tree is banned. Human-on-human interactions have been tempered as conventional warfare is done away. Debilitating injuries, famine, home displacement, and painful deaths are relics of a bygone era.
The outcomes of international conflicts are settled simply: with a gameboard and players representing their respective countries.

What’s stopping countries from disregarding the outcome of a silly boardgame?
Yeah, I get it. Letting a game of chess determine who gets territorial claim over a highly contested shipping route does seem rather ludicrous.
Even nowadays, international agreements and treatises are broken with the implication–and occasionally, execution–of consequences ranging from economic sanctions to retaliatory acts. See Exhibit A: Paris Accord and Geneva Convention.

And so, herein lies the heart of the Big Idea: Must there be consequences for anything to matter?
I’m inclined to say yes, particularly with a grounded spec-fic set in the near future. And the consequences must be universal enough that it carries weight, no matter what culture or class you come from. In the particular case of One Last Game, this translates to human lives. After all, human conflicts should only affect humans, right? And death is ubiquitous and serious enough that no entity would want to wage needless war when there are less drastic methods of reaching an agreement between states.
Imagine this: It’s the year 2145 and you’re surveying the aftermath of a battlefield that took place in a city. All the skyscrapers gleam under the sunlight, unscathed and standing proud. Verdant leaves unfurl from oak trees in the parks while squirrels argue with pigeons over a slice of cheesy bread that missed the compost bin. It’s quiet, but you know by the end of the week, the streets will once again be bustling with civilians going about their day. On the news broadcast, a reporter discusses how Country A has formally ceded control over shipping routes to Country B after its latest game loss–along with the lives of citizens unlucky enough to be in the randomly selected city.
Their deaths were quick and painless.
Just like falling asleep.

But is it ethical? Is this the best we can do? Must there be consequences?
In conclusion, I don’t have a conclusion to the question of “is there an ethical way to conduct warfare?” But I know we can do better.
Humans are messy and so the solution will be messy. And I have hope that the collective we will strive to understand and recognize an individual’s humanity in all its messy glory, and find a better way forward.

One Last Game: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Bookshop|Powell’s

Author socials: Website|Instagram|Bluesky

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/09/10/the-big-idea-t-a-chan/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=57230

Posted by Athena Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/09/09/the-big-idea-sharon-shinn-4/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=57219

It’s never too late to tell a good story. Author Sharon Shinn has returned years later to her Twelve Houses series to bring you a fresh novel in a familiar world. Follow along in her Big Idea for Shifter and Shadow to see how she’s breathed new life into a finished series.

SHARON SHINN:

Sometimes I write a book with a grand theme in mind. I want to explore issues of racism, maybe, or cultural diversity, or colonialism or religion or grief. But sometimes I just want to follow a couple of characters around. I just want to tell their story.

That’s the case with Shifter and Shadow, a new short novel in my Twelve Houses world. I wanted to explain what happened between two characters, Kirra and Donnal, whose relationship had unfolded off the page between the end of the second book and the beginning of the third. During the seventeen years since I had published the last book in the series, many of my readers had asked for their story, and I finally decided to write it.

But the idea was a little daunting. First, I had to come up with a storyline that would be a bit more interesting than a reconciliation and a declaration of love. There was no real suspense involved, because anyone who had read the whole series already knew that Kirra and Donnal ended up together. So what plot could I devise that would slot neatly in the gap between those previous books? What obstacles could I throw in their path, what surprises could I manufacture, what tension could I generate from surrounding circumstances? 

Even more difficult, how could I believably bridge the gulf that had always existed between the titled noblewoman and the peasant’s son? What could possibly move Donnal to openly admit his feelings when he had spent, oh, fifteen years trying to conceal them? How could Kirra convince him she returned his love when she had spent the entire second novel involved with another man?

Finally—seventeen years later—how successfully could I recapture the tone and rhythms of the earlier books and the personalities of the main characters? Kirra is one of my more irrepressible heroines and a lot of fun to write, but Donnal is significantly more reserved. Would I be able to tell a story from his point of view?

The questions about this particular book just added complexity to the task of writing a series, which can be challenging at the best of times. Simply keeping track of characters’ names, ages, heights, eye colors, and random personal details can be a monumental chore. (I keep a running file where I add pertinent details as they come up, but if I forget to update the file during the editing process, I end up doing a lot of searching through works-in-progress. “I thought he had two brothers, not one.” “Did she say she’d never been to the royal city?”) I find myself frequently rereading whole books in existing series every time I want to write a new one, hoping not to make a continuity error.

There’s also the ongoing problem of how much background material from previous installments needs to be reprised in the current manuscript. To some extent, an author writing any science fiction or fantasy book has to balance world-building with plotting, avoiding the infamous “info-dump” while still offering enough detail to bring an imaginary place to life. But in a series, it becomes particularly important to remind readers of pertinent events or relevant magic. One of my fellow authors says that there are always certain touchstones that readers expect to see and that the author has to include because they’re what make the books in a particular series familiar and unique. 

I knew writing the book would be tricky. But I had characters I loved and a plot that I found intriguing—one that fit nicely around the romance. And anyway, there were already some built-in grand themes, because the Twelve Houses world always incorporates issues of bigotry, persecution, and fear-based hatred. In Shifter and Shadow, many of the secondary characters are forced to examine their own biases—and maybe overcome them, maybe not. They also have to make hard choices, weighing deep personal risks against powerful rewards. What can they live without? What can they never give up?

I’m not an artist, but I’ve always thought that painting a picture must be similar to writing a novel. I might spend a week on one scene, two days on another, but neither scene is meant to stand alone; each one should merely be part of one seamless narrative. Similarly, I imagine that an artist might spend hours getting the folds of a gown just right or capturing the precise way sunlight illuminates an ocean wave. But that particular section of the canvas will ultimately be viewed as part of the overall picture, something that is taken as a whole.

Ideally, I think, the background effort that goes into a creative endeavor should be largely invisible. The artist might be calculating angles and the implementing the rule of thirds; the writer might be strategizing about plot and pacing and strategic disclosures of information. But the hope is that the audience just enjoys the finished work. At least, that’s what I hope when someone is reading one of my books.

I recently saw a meme that first showed the front of a completed piece of embroidery, a beautiful piece of artwork with clean lines and lovely imagery. The caption reads, “What the reader sees.” Beside it is shown the back of the same piece, with all the threads chaotically crisscrossing and all the knots and trailing ends making a glorious mess. This time the caption says, “What the author knows.”

My goal in writing Shifter and Shadow was to keep track of all those threads and balance all those conflicting imperatives in ways that the reader would never notice. All that’s left, I hope, is the story. 

Shifter and Shadow: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Bookshop|Powell’s

Author socials: Website|Facebook

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/09/09/the-big-idea-sharon-shinn-4/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=57219

Posted by Athena Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/09/05/being-introduced-to-zaynab-issas-third-culture-cooking-by-cultflav/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=57171

I have followed CultFlav on Tik Tok for a while now, enjoying their thorough reviews of cooking products as well as cookbooks. For all the reviews of theirs I’ve seen, I’ve never really been tempted to buy anything before. Most of what I have seen are things like pan reviews, a comparison of knives, talking about stand-mixers, basically a bunch of stuff I already have and don’t need to replace any time soon. So while I like their content, I have never felt compelled to buy anything they’ve talked about.

About a month ago, I watched a twenty minute video on Tik Tok where they reviewed Zaynab Issa’s cookbook, Third Culture Cooking. That’s right, I watched an entire twenty minute Tik Tok video. I have never done that before, to be honest. But for this video, I was sat. They had my attention from the start, and kept it all the way through. Here’s the Tik Tok video:

@cultflav

9.2: Third Culture Cooking by @Zaynab Issa cookbook review! This book is special without being fussy. It takes freezer ingredients and takes them from getting food on the table to taking care of yourself. Hope you enjoy the review! Check out our website for Gyoza recipe(s): cultflav.com

♬ original sound – Cult Flav

CultFlav’s video sold me completely on buying this cookbook. I had to place a special order to get it because I bought it through my local independent bookstore, but it was worth the wait.

I have always had this awful tendency to buy a cookbook and then never cook anything from it. It is a problem that extends into other areas of my life, too, such as buying a ton of video games on Steam and never playing any. I’m sure many of you can relate. Yeah, I see your TBR pile of fantasy novels on your nightstand there, don’t try to hide it, we’re all friends here.

For Third Culture Cooking, I was determined to cook something from it. I had bought it because CultFlav’s video had made me excited about the book, and eager to try the recipes, and by golly I was going to do it.

I decided to follow in CultFlav’s footsteps and sit down and read the whole thing first. I’m glad I did, because Zaynab Issa has some very interesting things to say on “American” food and how being a woman impacts how we view the act of cooking.

All the praise I’m about to give the book are exactly what CultFlav has said in their videos, but I’m going to do it anyway.

I love the look of the book. It’s a really well made, nice looking book that is going to look great on any shelf, or even displayed on a coffee table. It’s well-shot and well-organized. I like the textured lettering on the cover.

I love the accessibility aspect of the ingredients. It can be daunting to try to cook a dish that has ingredients you’ve never used before, or is a very different cuisine than what you’re used to, but Issa makes a point to include tons of substitutions in every single recipe. I find her recipes to be very approachable, and if you read through the recipes as well as her section on “pantry and fridge staples”, you’ll find that once you buy something for one of her recipes, chances are very high that you will use it again in about a dozen others. This is especially true of things like spices. Everyone knows the feeling of buying a whole jar of spice just to use 1/4 tsp of it in a recipe, and then never touch it again. I can guarantee that if you buy a spice she uses in a recipe, you’re going to see it again and again throughout the book.

Issa has a section in the beginning of the book that lists a handful of moods, and then tells you some recipes to cook for that mood. If you’re in the mood for something cozy, she recommends her udon carbonara, or her banana cake with tahini fudge. If you’re in the mood to celebrate, why not try her biryani, or chocolate cake with chai buttercream? I think this is a really unique and fun thing to have in your cookbook.

In the couple weeks of having this book, I’ve made four things from it. French Onion Ramen, Super Savory Chicken Soup, Red Curry Orzotto, and Coffee Cake Muffins. Everything has been really good so far, and has been pretty easy!

For the French Onion Ramen, it mostly consisted of caramelizing onions, adding things like white miso paste and rice vinegar for flavor along with beef broth, and boiling noodles. I loved the inclusion of fresh grated parmesan on top. I even managed to make pretty perfect soft-boiled eggs that were nice and jammy. I couldn’t find ramen noodles at the store, so I used yakisoba noodles instead, and I think it turned out really well. I would like to make it with actual ramen noodles in the future, I think it would be even better that way.

When I made the Super Savory Chicken Soup, it was because my mom was sick, and I wanted to make her a soup that really packed a punch. This soup has tons of garlic and ginger in it that I was sure would help her feel better. The noodles in this dish are also ramen noodles, which I did manage to get ahold of this time. In the recipe, she says to cook the chicken thighs in the broth, but I didn’t have time to actually cook the chicken and shred it and all that, so I used a rotisserie chicken and shredded it up before adding it in, and I think it turned out pretty amazing. It was super flavorful and full of good stuff. I will say, you can’t skimp on the fresh lime juice, it really brightens the soup up and adds some excellent acidity to the hearty broth.

The Red Curry Orzotto is probably my favorite out of all these recipes so far, even though everything else was really good, this dish just turned out so delicious and cozy and I can’t wait to make it a regular in my rotation of dinners. The recipe calls to include mushrooms and peas in it, but also says that if you want to include a protein, she recommends shrimp or chicken. I picked shrimp and I think it was an absolutely amazing addition. I’m kind of biased because shrimp is my favorite protein in general, but honestly the flavors are just perfect together. I used a mild red curry paste for this dish but you could easily use a spicier one for some extra kick.

Lastly, the Coffee Cake Muffins. The dessert section of this book is the one that interests me the most, with recipes like Coconut and Cardamom Cake, Almond Mocha Blondies, Melon Sorbet, and Salted Brown Butter Pecan Shortbread. The Coffee Cake Muffins had a really simple ingredient list and were pretty easy to make, and they tasted really good, but oh my goodness they were so crumbly. The streusel on top was so crumbly you couldn’t eat one of these bad boys without hovering over a plate or the kitchen sink. I felt like I had done something wrong to make them turn out this way, so I actually emailed Issa and asked her if there was something I might’ve done to cause the seemingly-extreme-crumbliness. I was very surprised she actually responded to my email the next day!

Everything I’ve made so far has been pretty great, and nothing yet has been too difficult or daunting! I really like this cookbook, and I like that it has made me genuinely excited to get in the kitchen and cook something yummy. It’s a nice feeling, and I owe it to CultFlav for so very thoroughly reading, testing, and recommending Third Culture Cooking.

If you want to see their full, hour long review over the book, rather than the twenty minute Tik Tok version, here’s the YouTube video:

I will say my one critique of the cookbook is that sometimes (rarely, but honestly once is more than enough) Issa opts to put a photo of an empty plate to accompany the recipe, rather than a photo of the food before it was eaten. The empty plate might have a spoonful or two of remnants of the dish, or smears of sauce here and there, but we don’t get an actual photo of the dish. That is definitely not my favorite, but it happens so sparingly that I can get over it. It was actually that way for the Red Curry Orzotto, where there’s just a little tiny bit of orzo left on a sauce-smeared plate. Wouldn’t be what I do, but, it’s not my cookbook.

Overall, I highly recommend giving this cookbook a shot, it has been so fun to read and look through, and I’m so excited to try more recipes from it. I’m really loving it so far!

Don’t forget to check out Zaynab Issa’s Instagram and Tik Tok, as well as CultFlav’s Instagram and Tik Tok, so you can see tons of awesome cooking-related reviews.

Which dish sounds the most yummy to you? Do you have any cookbooks you’ve been loving lately? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!

-AMS

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/09/05/being-introduced-to-zaynab-issas-third-culture-cooking-by-cultflav/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=57171