effect universe and an irrational, supernatural, fantastic
universe. Either the FBI is hunting the escaped mutant from the
genetics lab, or the drill-bit has bored straight into Hell -- but
not both at once in the very same piece of fiction. Even fantasy
worlds need an internal consistency of sorts, so that a Sasquatch
Deal-with-the-Devil story is also "Tabloid Weird." Sasquatch
crypto-zoology and Christian folk superstition simply don't mix
well, even for comic effect. (Attr. Howard Waldrop)
Deus ex Machina or "God in the Box." Story featuring a miraculous
solution to the story's conflict, which comes out of nowhere and
renders the plot struggles irelevant. H G Wells warned against
SF's love for the deus ex machina when he coined the famous dictum
that "If anything is possible, then nothing is interesting."
Science fiction, which specializes in making the impossible seem
plausible, is always deeply intrigued by godlike powers in the
handy pocket size. Artificial Intelligence, virtual realities and
nanotechnology are three contemporary SF MacGuffins that are cheap
portable sources of limitless miracle.
Just-Like Fallacy. SF story which thinly adapts the trappings of
a standard pulp adventure setting. The spaceship is "just like"
an Atlantic steamer, down to the Scottish engineer in the hold. A
colony planet is "just like" Arizona except for two moons in the
sky. Space Westerns and futuristic hard-boiled detective stories
have been especially common versions.
Re-Inventing the Wheel. A novice author goes to enormous lengths
to create a science-fictional situation already tiresomely
familiar to the experienced reader. Reinventing the Wheel was
traditionally typical of mainstream writers venturing into SF. It
is now often seen in writers who lack experience in genre history
because they were attracted to written SF via SF movies, SF
television series, SF role-playing games, SF comics or SF computer
gaming.
The Cozy Catastrophe. Story in which horrific events are
overwhelming the entirety of human civilization, but the action
concentrates on a small group of tidy, middle-class, white Anglo-
Saxon protagonists. The essence of the cozy catastrophe is that
the hero should have a pretty good time (a girl, free suites at
the Savoy, automobiles for the taking) while everyone else is
dying off. (Attr. Brian Aldiss)
The Motherhood Statement. SF story which posits some profoundly
unsettling threat to the human condition, explores the
implications briefly, then hastily retreats to affirm the
conventional social and humanistic pieties, ie apple pie and
motherhood. Greg Egan once stated that the secret of truly
effective SF was to deliberately "burn the motherhood statement."
