But I found a nice surprise in my Google Alerts this morning: Tor.com has posted an excerpt from The Coldest War.  Hooray!

We finished editorial revisions on the manuscript today, meaning that Necessary Evil is officially moving into production now.  Hooray!

And, just now, I've received a first look at the cover.  Sneak peek below the cut.

ARCs have been out for a while, so early reviews are starting to trickle in.  I'm pretty militant about not reading discussions of my books, so when my editor and publicist start forwarding reviews to me I know that's a good sign.  I'm proud of Coldest War and can't wait to see the print and ebook editions out in the world.

Nothing like that ever happened in any of my offices.  But I did briefly share an office with Sigmund.

And besides, these three updates are really cool.

So that's two Milkweed-related giveaways currently underway at Goodreads—I'm also giving away 3 copies of the new-as-of-last-week mass market paperback of Bitter Seeds (details here).  That giveaway runs until May 13.

And I think that's quite enough self promotion for one day.  Don't you?  This is the part of writing that I enjoy the very least.

On an entirely different note, here's one of the very few jokes I can actually remember.

What I've seen around New Mexico—in my yard, and in the flower gardens at the Santa Fe Opera— is one of these.  They're called hummingbird moths because they really, really look like hummingbirds at first glance.

There are some cool videos online.

Everybody I know locally has been inundated with moths over the past week or so.  It's like The Swarm, but with moths instead of bees.  (Which is good.  I'm not so keen on the stinging.) 

But, according to several online retailers, the mmpb edition of Bitter Seeds is now available! 

This is the US paperback edition, from Tor.  It includes the first chapter of The Coldest War, as well as the short story, "What Doctor Gottlieb Saw."   This edition is wrapped in fantastic artwork by Chris McGrath, a piece of artwork I like to call, "Do Not Make Eye Contact With the Sociopathic Clairvoyant Woman."  (I doubt that's what Chris calls it.)

This is distinct from the Orbit UK edition, which will come out on July 12.  (The full schedule, as best as I know it at the moment, is available here.)  That edition will also contain extra material, including an interview.

I'm giving away 3 copies.  For free!  More details below the cut.

But.

Remember that time when I almost got caught in a ghost trap straight out of a Powers novel, and I started to wonder if maybe I wasn't a real person but instead a character in a book?

And remember that time when somebody found a pair of handcuffs buried along the foundation of my house?

Yeah, well, it's happening again.

It's very exciting, typing up the final pages of a manuscript.  Granted, this is only the fourth time I've done it.  But it's still a happy thrill.  I hope it never loses its appeal.

There's still so much work left to do on this thing…like make it coherent, and readable, and perhaps even find a way to make it not suck.  But that's rewriting.  Rewriting is almost always less taxing than writing.  At least now I have something to hammer on, rather than a blank page.  But that's a task to tackle another day.

What a lovely year we're enjoying on the bus stop, no?  This February, the temperature never hit the -20s, like it did last year.  This March, the wind didn't blow 60 miles per hour for a month straight.  And we're getting rain in April!  Which makes everything smell so lovely, thanks to the water in the air and the blossoms on the fruit trees.  This is a wonderful time of year to be riding the bus, to get to spend those few wonderful minutes outdoors every morning and evening. 

We're a smart bunch, aren't we? 

And yet…

This book is very different from my other novels, not only in terms of story, characters, and world, but also in terms of how I've approached the writing.  I outlined this one just as much as the others—the 4' x 3' corkboard in my office is completely covered with notecards—and yet this book lent itself to far more improvisation and in-the-moment reinvention along the way. Which sounds strange, when I hear myself say it, because I hewed more closely to the outline for this book than I did to any of the original outlines for the Milkweed books. 

But the rewriting for this second draft will have a different focus, a different goal, than it did on any of the Milkweed books.

I was a little sad to read that they're closing down Encyclopedia Britannica.  The company is hanging around—they only make a fraction of their revenue from the encyclopedia anyway; I didn't know this—but the actual Encyclopedia Britannica is soon to be a thing of the past.  And that bums me out.

I've known Leah Bobet and Brad Beaulieu since my days hanging around at the Online Writing Workshop.  Leah had arrived long before me, and so was already a sage presence on the mailing list when I stumbled along; Brad had been there longer than I, too, but not quite as much.  He and I traded a few critiques back in the day.

Anyway.  Excuse me while I wax sentimental.  Flash forward a few years, and wow!  Leah's debut novel has just hit shelves in the US (it debuted earlier in Canada), and Brad's brand-new second novel is out today.  He's running a contest to celebrate and there's still time (just barely) to win some major prizes.

ARCs of The Coldest War have been sent out, and the audio edition is available, and the print and electronic editions will be appearing very soon.  That means the time has come for my publishers and I to put our collective heads together and turn our thoughts to the best format for Necessary Evil, the finale of the Milkweed Triptych.  We had to weigh a number of factors.  Most of all, however, we had to look for the best fit between the format and the story.

But once we considered all of our options, the answer became obvious!  Which is why Necessariy Evil will be published exclusively as a coloring book. 

We're very excited about this.  It's a perfect fit!  There's even talk of an expanded edition that might come packaged with extra scenes as well as a box of crayons.  The details aren't set in stone yet, but I'm confident that the coloring book format is the perfect approach for the final Milkweed novel.

Golly.  July is going to be a busy month—that's just 5 days before the US hardcover/ebook release of The Coldest War.  (The updated publication schedule is here.)

How do I know that?   Well, first of all, I had the distinct pleasure of a sneak peek at this novel at Leprecon almost a year ago, where Bear read an excerpt.  It knocked my socks off.  (Also, I have an ARC.  But I'm not going to brag about that (much).)  But don't take my word for it.  Here's what Brit Mandelo has to say about it, and SF Signal gave it a glowing 5 stars.

If you're still not convinced that it's worth a look, you can read an excerpt here.

Luckily for me, I have extremely kind and diligent readers willing to take up the slack on my behalf!  (I've said it before and I'll say it again: it's better to be lucky than good.)   Which leads to the coolest interview I've done online, at the French website Unwalkers.com.

Tom and Linda were kind enough to provide me with the newspaper clipping ("Trying a 9-volt shortcut to expertise", pg E4, Tuesday, February 14, 2012).  And am I grateful for their generosity—while reading the newspaper article I ran across a fantastic detail that I'd completely missed in the New Scientist article.

I'd been expecting the package.  But I definitely wasn't expecting what I found inside.

Back in November, when I was attending the World Fantasy Convention in San Diego, I spent some time hanging out with folks from Tor's art department.   We got to talking about cover art, and I mentioned how pleased I've been with their efforts on my behalf.  (Yes, I can be an obsequious little toad on occasion.  But in this case I was being sincere.  I really do love the work they've done on the Milkweed books, both the old cover and the new work.)

And then somebody asked me if I had seen the cover that John Jude Palencar painted for my second novel. 

To which I said, "Um, no," because as we all know, JJP did not do the cover art for my second novel.

But now I absolutely must move it atop the To Be Read stack.  Why?

But anyway, yeah!  I am thrilled beyond words to announce that Tor has purchased SOMETHING MORE THAN NIGHT, my first post-Milkweed novel. Hooray!  Oh Frabjous Day!

Details below the cut.

It sounds crazy—like something out of a science fiction novel.  I mean, what kind of weirdo would imagine that wiring a battery directly into somebody's brain would give them heightened abilities?   Well, DARPA does, for one.

Anyway.  Below the cut, I've posted my schedule for Boskone 49, along with the panel descriptions. I always look forward to my yearly trip to Boston.  It's a great convention.  And I'm a little more excited about attending conventions this year because I finally have a new book coming out.  Hooray!

I'm arriving a day early, tomorrow, and flying out a day after the convention ends, next Monday.

But I hate it when I let the blog lie fallow for so long.  Sometimes it's just inevitable, though.  Especially when I'm working like mad.  And I have, lately -- working like a possessed thing.  And I'm pretty damn pleased… even if it means that certain important things, like news and website updates, have fallen by the wayside.

The very idea depresses me.  If personal resolutions work for other people, encouraging them to strive for self-betterment or greater personal success, that's terrific.  And I can certainly understand the urge to make a new start as the calendar rolls over.  I'm not immune to the personal and aesthetic appeal of a clean slate.  But I don't make resolutions. 

Thanks to alert and super considerate reader Steve Halter, I can confirm that The Coldest War is finally out in the wild.  The Audible.com edition of Milkeed #2, the sequel to Bitter Seeds, is now available!  It went up this morning at Audible.com, and it also appears (this morning, as of January 17) on their "Just Added" page.  And right on schedule-- as I posted here last month, the original release was slated for December, but the narrator, Kevin Pariseau, had a scheduling conflict that required moving the release back a few weeks.  January 17 was the target date provided to me by Audible, and they hit the mark.  Audible.com has been a very enthusiastic supporter of the Milkweed books, and I can't wait to give it a listen.

It's been a long time coming, so it's a great feeling to know that The Coldest War is finally making its way into the world.

See?  I told you guys it was a real book.  (But who could blame you for experience moments of doubt, given all the delays?)

This is the audiobook release, but there's also the hardcover/ebook edition coming in July.  It is rather strange to have the audio edition out before the hardcover, but then again, this book's journey to publication has ever been anything but normal.  But I reckon anybody reading this already knows that.

Below the cut, I'll reiterate the current release schedule for all editions of the Milkweed books, insofar as I know it at the moment.

So I was pleasantly surprised to discover today's Dilbert comic features a similar idea.

Now that the American adaptation of the book has hit theaters, I'm seeing another surge in website traffic.  But now people are probably looking for information about the David Fincher/Daniel Craig/Rooney Mara film.  To anybody who read my previous Dragon Tattoo blog post about the Swedish film thinking I was actually talking about the American version instead, sorry about that.  I'll bet that was a bit confusing.  But we'll laugh about it someday, yes we will. 

I saw the American version, directed by David Fincher, on New Year's Day.  For the most part, I enjoyed it more than I expected to, given that (1) it's almost 3 hours long, (2) I'd already read the book, AND (3) I'd already seen one film adaptation. But Fincher is quite a director, and both leads were quite good in their roles.  (Even if James Bond Daniel Craig exudes more rugged manliness than the Blomqvist character in the book.)

Every film adaptation of a book has to make choices, and this screenplay made different choices from those in the Swedish film.  It makes for an interesting comparison.

From here on out, it's spoiler city: spoilers for the book and both films.  (And by the way, Melinda Snodgrass has already posted her thoughts here.)

So, rather than December 19, it'll be coming out on January 17.

(More below the cut.) 

And now, at the end of the year, the anthology is out in the wild.  Hooray!

(Below the cut, photos of the feast.)

I've seen many strange things, but Kat in a Londo Mollari wig isn't one of them.  

YET.

Orbit UK has acquired the Milkweed Triptych for publication in the UK and British Commonwealth! 

That's right—Raybould Marsh and Will Beauclerk are going to be published in their home country.  I cannot begin to describe how delighted I am... but let me try.

I guess you had to be there.

This is an exciting stage because this is the first place where I get to see the pages more-or-less as they'll appear in the final physical hardcover, complete with elements of book design.  It's really fun to see a book at this point in the process.  This is where, for me, it begins to feel more real—this is the point where it becomes easier for me to imagine the big pile of words as an actual book written not by me but by an actual writer.

But anyway.  There I was, minding my own business, when Derryl Murphy waved me over and said, "Hey, Ian, check this out.  This guy's doing card tricks."

Taken together, that's almost half of the blogging collective known as the Night Bazaar.

In other words, there is a big-screen Wild Cards film in development!  This is a first for Wild Cards, and incredibly exciting.  The screenplay will be penned by Melinda Snodgrass, who will be a co-executive producer on the film along with GRRM.  (George and Melinda, in case you're confused, are the co-creators and co-editors of the Wild Cards series. )   This has been in the works for a very long time (years) and it's a testament to Melinda's passion for the project and her incredbily hard (and uncompensated) work for years on end that there's finally officially a deal on the table.

When the news came out on Friday morning—and because this is the Internet, after all—the fanboi hatefest started immediately.  Below the cut, I'll address the misconceptions that keep tripping people up.

But enough about me.  This evening I came across a piece in the Mineeapolis Minneapolis Star-Tribune that very nearly broke my head.

Take yesterday, for instance.  I worked at my desk from about 8 in the morning until it was time to meet people for dinner.  Or today's work session, which again started at 8am, with a brief break in the afternoon to fold laundry, sort socks, and update the blog.  Yep, weekends are a thrill-a-minute at the Tregillis household.

My problem, as I've grown older, is that I seem to have developed a 5-second attention span.  (I blame the internet.  And television.  And everything that was invented after 1935.)  It's not such a problem with paper books, probably because I'm long accustomed to flipping back and forth between pages.  But this has led to some retraining efforts as I take audiobooks for a spin.

Unless I'm careful to avoid distractions, my forays into audiobooks usually go like this.

Well, okay, it's not a REAL planet.  And there's a possibility it's not named after me specifically. 

But I think the odds are pretty good...

Overall, the work seems to be going well.  Loren, the contractor, is fantastic and very efficient.  And up until yesterday afternoon, there were no big surprises, just the usual quirks of New Mexico construction:  "Hmm, that pipe isn't on any of the drawings.  Wonder who put it there, and why."  Which is pretty much par for the course in these parts.

But then, yesterday afternoon, he sent me a cryptic message.

It's a question much on my mind lately as I have found myself just about up to my eyebrows in work, with no strong sense of how or when I'll escape.  Granted, musings on the state of my workload do tend to veer into the mildly apocalyptic when I'm at the nadir of the sleeplessness cycle... but I've been aware of a gradual increase in my work-related stress level the past couple of weeks. 

Both day-job work and writing work.  Sometimes they do not play nicely together.

After a lovely crepe lunch on the Plaza, I visited my friends Jim Moore and Pat Rogers, who are working on a dig just a minute walk from the La Fonda Inn; their current work is part of the archeological survey required before a building restoration can take place downtown.   Jim is an archeologist who has worked for the state of New Mexico for decades.  He's a fascinating guy to talk to, extremely knowledgable and terrific at conveying his knowledge.  Pat is a corrnerstone of our little SF/fandom community here in northern New Mexico, but she has had an avid love of archeology forever, and she can swing a pick like nobody's business.

(Prior to working on the Santa Fe Plaza in the chilly October rain, the crew did a dig at Spaceport America.  I love the image of archeologists digging up ancient pottery on a site where spaceships will someday land.  How cool is that?  Less cool are the helish working conditions they enduring while on the dig.  Backbreaking manual labor during high summer in southern NM?  No thanks.)

It's the time of year when the aspen trees in the mountains have begun to change color.  So the mountains, which are predominantly black or dark green owing to evergreens, currently have huge swaths of gold splashed along their slopes.  That's nice enough in the early morning.

But the weather forecast this morning (which turned out to be correct) called for thick, low cloud cover and a 60% chance of rain.  Low clouds often make for the best sunrises, because during those few minutes when the sun is over the mountainous horizon but below the clouds the underside of the cloud bank takes on every color from the red end of the Crayola box. Today, though, we had rain advancing on us from the west while the sun rose in the east.  And as the first bit of sunlight peeked through a cleft in the mountains, setting the sky above us on fire, it also created a rainbow. 

But because of the bright pink glow shining down from the clouds, it washed out most of the blue and green from the rainbow.  It was a red rainbow.  A redbow. 

As the lightshow faded, I realized that my working day is circumscribed by one red glow after another.  Some uplifting, as with the sunrise, while others induce madness.

Autumn in New Mexico is particularly attractive for hot air balloonists owing to something known as the "Albuquerque Box", a strange but fortuitious wind pattern well-suited to the endeavors of those who seek to emulate the brothers Montgolfier.  I don't know if the box persists all day long, but it starts early in the day, perhaps even before sunrise.  Which means that if you go to the Fiesta, there will be thousands of people watching the first wave of balloons getting inflated well before sunrise.  And there's hot chocolate and music and vendors and funnel cakes.  It's like the State Fair, but at 5:30 in the morning so nobody is fewer people are drunk.

And there are balloons.  Lots and lots of balloons.

Some of these things are delightful, such as the lizards the zoom up and down the neighbors' wall outside my writing office, to sun themselves on the stucco.  The concept of native lizards tickles me, probably because I never saw a single lizard when I was growing up in Minnesota (several snakes, though).  (Strange, too, because it can get fairly cold here.)  In fact, I like the lizards so much that I find it positively charming when one sneaks into the house.  I think they're cute; they don't trigger the "icky pest" reflex in me.  (Except when they hide in my shoes.  That's an icky surprise.)  

Some of these things are less than delightful.  Such as the Shelob-sized spider I found in the kitchen sink the other night.  It was, in all honesty, the largest spider I've ever found in any place I've ever lived.  I hate spiders.  And I am not crazy about living in a place where people occasionally find tarantulas (oh god nightmares tonight la la la go to your happy place Ian la la la). 

Another thing that's less than delightful?  Chamisa.

But, in the meantime, there have been some exciting developments, so I wanted to give another update on the Milkweed books.

A logical person might wonder why I didn't instead dive for the lamp.  Perhaps I could have turned it off, and saved myself the lingering stench of death?  Well, sure.  But then I'd still have a moth fluttering around, wouldn't I?  A moth planning to wait until I fell asleep so that it could land on my face and lay eggs in my eyeballs.   To which I say, burn you little bastard.

Still.  It's not as bad as the piece of Gene Simmons I was "invited" to sniff last Friday.

Well, okay.  It wasn't really ogling.  There was nothing creepy about it.  I guess it was more of a curious glance.  But it was definitely directed at Melinda, or at least her toenail polish, and it was definitely definitely Val Kilmer.

Which is just an annoying way for me to mention that the copyedited manuscript for The Coldest War has been turned in.  So the publication process continues to move forward.  Hooray!

And, frankly, if I don't find something confusing, it has to be pretty straightforward.   I'm easily confused.  It's my curse.

The really fascinating people weren't available this week, but I did my best to be a decent followup to Aliette's interview.  Our conversation is posted here.

I've never been a big fan of the bona fide all nighter.  I did that only rarely.   Even so, I didn't get a lot of sleep that year.

Until near the end of the academic year, when I contracted a very mild case of mononucleosis.

It's also how I spent my Saturday morning, after (finally) recovering many gigabytes of music from the dead laptop. 

So far, as far as my own personal usage patterns go, the new Mac gets a solid "A" in every category except one.

Until the lady two rows in front of me started having an argument on her cell phone.  For the next 45 minutes. Loud enough, mind you, that several people dragged out headphones to try to drown her out.

Including the guy directly behind me, who decided the best way to deal with her annoyance was to listen to speed metal at full volume.  For the next 45 minutes.  Loud enough, mind you, that I could hear it just as clearly as if the headphones were cupping my ears.   And I am not, in general, a huge fan of speed metal. 

So, to you, Cell-Phone Lady, I say:  thank you for sharing the intimate details of your sister's divorce with the rest of us.  And to you, Speed Metal Guy, I say: thank you for broadening my musical horizons against my will.  Also, I hope you both get bitten by stray dogs.  And that the dogs run away and you can't find them to determine whether they have rabies, so you have to go in for the rabies vaccine and that it's really uncomfortable.  Just like in that episode of Different Strokes.

And I didn't really kill it.  I just, sort of, lobotomized it.  But, like all responsible brain surgeons, I didn't bother to check to see whether I actually had backups of all the critical driver software before pulling the plug, er, reformatting the hard drive.  Which meant that getting it back up and running wasn't just a couple of hours of work.  Kinda hard to download replacement drivers when you don't have a working ethernet card.  

Lesson learned there, I want to promise you.

A comment on my previous post reminded me of yet another odd telephone conversation I had.  This was quite a long time ago, when I had to call the telephone company to clear up a question about my bill.

It happened a few summers ago.  Along with another coworker (one who is neither crazy nor rude, and actually quite the opposite of both), I've mentored several college students in summer research projects.  It's a very pleasant and rewarding experience.  But it can be a lot of work, even before the students arrive and the resarch begins.  Many hoops must be jumped before a student can get up and running.  These hoops involve (but are by no means restricted to) establishing a workspace for the student; getting a workstation configured for the student; and ensuring the student is up-to-date on all required training.  That last point can take half a day or more, depending on circumstances.  If things don't go well, it can be a week or more before a student is able to begin his or her summer research.

So, because of that, my co-mentor and I have made it a point to attempt to be as efficient as possible when it comes to arranging things for our students.   Which means that I once made the baffling mistake of calling the "training help desk," which is supposed to field simple questions about the training program.  Because this took place several years ago, I obviously don't remember the entire dialogue verbatim.  But I do remember the progression of the conversation quite clearly, and I do remember certain statements because I wrote them down.

May lightning strike me dead if this isn't an honest rendering of the ensuing conversation.   It's not a transcript, but it's a good-faith effort to convey the sense of the interaction.  It's also an honest rendering of the tone of the conversation, on both sides.

I'll try to think of new ones soon.

In the meantime, though, Bubonicon was a blast and a half.  I make no claims about the merits of my weekend stint as toastmaster, but I can at least take comfort in knowing that I won't go down in history as the guy who permanently destroyed Bubonicon.  I only wish I'd had more time to hang out with so many great people.  (I tried to be somewhat responsible so that I didn't blow out my voice prior to introducing my friend Steve Leigh at his Guest of Honor presentation on Sunday.)   Man, what a good time.

But, as anybody who knows me even the tiniest bit will know by now, I'm useless when it comes to writing up convention reports.  So let's not insult ourselves by pretending I'm likely to do that.  Instead, let's just take it for granted that it was a hell of a thing.  I met a ton of awesome people, including Alex Brown, Lauren Beukes, Saladin Ahmed, Katy Stauber, and Courtney Schafer; caught up with other convention pals like Corry Lee, Chuck Gannon, Dany Kollin, and Cory Doctorow; and watched GRRM dance the Time Warp. 

But now that I've just about recovered from Worldcon, it's time to prepare for Bubonicon 43!

Whew.  Sure, it's like the 13,000th day in a row when that hasn't happened... yet.  Still, though, a nice way to start the day.  I'll take what I can get, morning-wise.  (Why yes, I am a morning person.  How could you tell?)

I haven't seen all of Miyazaki's films.  Just Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, Howl's Moving Castle, and Ponyo.  Some of which I enjoyed a great deal, though maybe I wasn't in the right mood or frame of mind for Ponyo.  Then again, I was raised by wolves.

Anyway.  Yeah. 

For the record—and I'm sure this will do absolutely no good, since anybody reading this has already managed to find the proper spelling at some point—my last name is spelled

T-R-E-G-I-L-L-I-S

It is not spelled TREGELLIS, nor is it spelled TRIGELLES, TREGELLES, TERGIILLIS, TREGILIS, TEGILS, $%*@#$@%, or anything other than the above.

As I've already said, I'm glad I made the effort to attend.  I was on the fence about it well after I went through the airport and boarded the plane.  But once there I knew almost immediately that I'd made the right decision.  I only wish I'd had (we'd had) more time, and that more of my classmates had attended.

Flew back to Minnesota for a high school reunion.  (The actual kind, not the Disney musical kind.  There was no singing.)  In order to make it back for the reunion, I made a 2 1/2 hour drive straight from work to the airport on Friday evening (thank you, unannounced road construction), did some flat-out sprinting through the terminal in Dallas (only to be the last person on the plane, and then to sit there for an extra 45 minutes because I-don't-know-why), arriving in Minneapolis around midnight.  The next day I picked up my rental car and made my way to the far far north, and generally had a fantastic time.  Got back to my hotel quite late, couldn't fall asleep (thank you insomnia) until sometime after 3:30, got up at 5:30, and traveled most of the day to get back safe and sound here on Sunday evening.

Totally worth the trip.  I really enjoyed the reunion.  I only wish I'd had more time, and that more people were there. 

That said, I'm tired of being tired.  I travel for both my day job and my writing life, and travel for some reason always entails a very taxing schedule on at least one end of the trip.  It's getting old.  As are we all, apparently.

You do have shelter, but are faced with rapidly dwindling supplies of air, water, and food.  You're just barely able to contact Earth, but he spacefaring nations of the world can't help you—they'll never get supplies to you in time.   So you appeal to less conventional means of survival.

But at this point you're faced with a difficult choice, because all but two of the world's superheroes are busy.  (Also, most of them have a grudge against you, which is why they don't care when they hear about your situation.)

So: to whom do you appeal for help?  Aquaman, or The Atom?

But then I realized maybe it's not all fun and games.  Maybe that's just what the bananas want us to think.

At long last!  I've been waiting a long time for this!  Felt like I'd been waiting forever to see the new package.  (I learned about the repackaging in August of last year; I wrote a long blog post about it here.   All of the information in that post about the original cover art, bookseller reaction to it, and the decision to revamp the marketing approach is still relevant.  The projected publication dates in that post, however, are no longer up to date, as has also been chronicled in excruciating detail.)

It was worth the wait.  WELL worth the wait.

Below the cut, feast your eyes on major awesomeness from the superb Chris McGrath.

The programming folks gave me a fantastic schedule this year; I posted it below the cut, along with the relevant blurbs from the program book.

(That's Tom Sawyer as in the book.  Not as in the Rush song.)

At least I didn't have to repaint an entire fence.

Jenn co-edited the anthology with the late, great Martin Greenberg, the legendary anthologist who passed away just recently.

A while back, I posted about DARPA experiments into the possibility of using cranial electrodes to enhance peoples' performance at particular tasks.  (Which is just slightly reminiscent of a particular book.)

Now reader Chris Bachmann just sent me -- Thanks, Chris! -- this link to a piece in Wired.

Sibling #2:  You could just point to him.  Or you could say he's the guy in the red shirt.

Sibling #1:  I like my way better.

Which sister is correct?  YOU DECIDE.

I had the great pleasure of blurbing (is that the verb?) Jo Anderton's debut novel, Debris, which is coming out from Angry Robot in December.  (This is the part where you get really jealous.  It's very good, and I got to read it months ago.  Still waiting for Jo to send the sequel, even though I know it's finished and just sitting there...)

Jo's book marked the first time I'd been asked to blurb something.  I was delighted to do it, because I happened to know Jo is a knockout writer.  But I was also a little alarmed.  I worried that my endorsement would actually degrade Jo's project.  After all, who the heck am I?  Just some guy.

But anyway, yeah.  This week's glimpse of new cover art got me thinking about potential blurbs for The Coldest War.

It's too early to unveil them yet.  But I will say this: Wowsers!

I just can't wait to have framed prints hanging in my house.  Can't.  Wait.  They're gorgeous.  Absolutely gorgeous.   And, when seen together, they're clearly part of the same series-- that elusive "package" has finally materialized!  And it is good.  It is very good.

Speaking, of course, as somebody whose entire knowledge of high culture comes from Bugs Bunny cartoons and Muppet Show riffs on famous performances.

Below the cut: a few lists, proferred solely for the sake of general interest, and without commentary.

The party took place on a bluff overlooking Lamy, New Mexico , and just a stone's throw from a mysterious structure deep in one of the neighboring ravines, and which is just barely visible from surrounding hilltops.  So I joined two adventuresome Scotts on a trek to find the entrance to a lost subterranean city site.  

That's right.  We had our very own adventure JUST LIKE THE GOONIES.

Fix as in "use tools in an intelligent and productive manner". 

Well, it was a good idea.  Noble, even.

Anyway, if you take a look at these photos, you get a poor-man's time lapse of the fire approaching LANL.  More specifically, you can watch the fire approaching the building where I work.

I've received a few emails from folks wondering if I'm in the path of the fire that's threatening Los Alamos county and the lab.   I appreciate the concern, very much!  But I'm comfortable and safe.  I don't live near the Las Conchas fire area.  Please save your good thoughts and prayers for folks in the path of the fire.

(I actually live much closer to the Pacheco fire near the ski basin in the Santa Fe National Forest.)

The Las Conchas fire, which started in the Jemez mountains just this afternoon, is already burning so badly (thanks to this afternoon's 50 mile per hour wind gusts-- now you see why I complain about wind all the time) that they're closing LANL tomorrow.  And they're talking about evacuating the county. (That part doesn't effect me, because I don't live in Los Alamos county.)

The Pacheco fire, to my east, continues burning up the Santa Fe National Forest, very close to the ski basin.

Not even the bed. 

I realized that might have been tarring things with an awfully wide brush.  I don't have any concrete evidence that rates of mental illness are higher in the high-level chess playing population than in the general population.  There is plenty of anecdotal evidence that some elite chess players might be a bit bent.  But the plural of "anecdote" is not "data", as the saying goes.  I'm not the first person to wonder about a correspondence, so perhaps somebody really has found a correlation. 

In the meantime, I dug up some anecdotes about great chess players of the past.

Please stop.  Please. 

Your persistence was endearing if a little bit maddening.  But now there are fires, big fires, and you're just making the situation worse.  People are losing their homes. 

Please stop.

Love,

Ian

Also, I almost forgot to update the blog today, and I just hopped out of bed.  So here's something random.

I did back up all my old email (and music, and, of course, writing) before doing this.  But I don't have the energy now to reorganize everything on my much newer netbook.  So for the time being my email is spread all over the place, and some of it is possibly lost.

I'll get to re-integrating when I can.  In the meantime, if you've sent me a note and I haven't responded, feel free to re-send.

This volume takes place in and around a previously unexplored piece of the WC universe: the NYPD's Fifth Precinct, square in the heart of Jokertown.  (Think Fort Apache, The Bronx with mutants and superpowers.)  It's a great entry to the universe.

But if you're on the fence about it, you can read the first story in the book for free…

It's weird, though, the way every morning and evening takes on this sickly yellow hue, as though the world itself has a case of jaundice.

Back in the day, I was also an avid fan of the X-Files. (Although, just for the record, I knew it was fiction.  I have never believed the show was secretly priming the American people for major revelations about the truth behind UFOs.  Nor did I ever view it as a documentary.  I just feel the need to make that clear.)

All of which means that I was absolutely powerless when I stumbled across Nick Cook's mind-shattering book, The Hunt for Zero Point: Inside the Classified World of Antigravity Technology.

(Below the cut: this baby will Flip. Your.  Wig.  But only keep reading if you're positive that you'll be comfortable living THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS.)

And they don't come any crazier than "the world is secretly controlled by shape-changing lizards from inside the hollow earth".

This sprang to mind today while I read this article about a pair of conjoined twins who are believed to share sensory information, and possibly even thoughts, through a neural bridge between their brains.  Amazing, fascinating stuff.  Touching, too.  I'm particularly stricken by  the musings over whether the twins will become more or less individual as they age.

As entertaining as it can apparently be to watch Rainn Wilson hit people with a pipe wrench, though, my favorite moviegoing experience of the weekend came while watching Kung Fu Panda.  (Which, I just want to point out, is a very strange sentence.)

This article in yesterday's New York Times provides a brief update on the He-3 situation from a legislative point of view, although there aren't any surprises here.

Because who doesn't love a gothy rock band with cellos?  Especially one that writes songs inspired by J.G. Ballard stories?

This came just a couple of months after a similar experience when I tried to contact a teacher who had been very influential to me.

This has brought home to me just how terrible I am at keeping in touch with people.   I'm not particularly outgoing even at the very best of times.  Most of the time I'm pathologically introverted; I just don't reach out to folks, even when I want to.  Even longtime friends, and folks I think about often.  I've always been like this.  I'm beginning to regret it.

I suspect, that if she were to read this, Margit would be surprised to know I thought about her at all.  The truth is I ought to have given her more thought than I did, and I should have been a better friend to her.   I was, at best, an indifferent friend.  Or, maybe more accurately, a lazy acquaintance.  Perhaps I'm too wrapped up in myself; perhaps I have a cold, hard heart.  Probably both.

It's too late for me to make up for all that.  Though I wish I could.  But I feel I owe it to Margit, a gentle soul who showed me a few undeserved kindnesses over the years, to record my memories.  These vignettes have been playing through my head on a nonstop loop since I learned of her passing.

So let me tell you about Margit.

This time my friend was younger than me, and passed away two years ago this summer.

Wow.

He did a nice job documenting lots of little moments from the week.  (You might notice that one of the only blurry photos is of yours truly-- proof that I really do have a superpower, and that superpower is being supernaturally unphotogenic.)

(Interesting folks, writers.)

(You hear me, weather?  We need the moisture, so the snow is okay for now.  But some rain would be nice, too.)

And David Levine said, "What did he say now?"

Insights like this exchange, which came about during this morning's round-table criqitue session:

"The Dalai Lama is very good at observing people."

"Yes, but he doesn't eat their heads."

I find crackpot theories endlessly entertaining, especially ones that touch on fringe science and/or fringe scholarship.  And this takes the cake.

The full recording of our conversation can be found here.

I think it came out pretty well, even if our conversation was completely dour and not at all lighthearted or frivolous.

Perhaps you didn't receive my earlier letter.   In fact, I'll have to assume that's the case.  Not only because I never received a written response from you (but maybe that's my fault for not making my expectations clear), but also because it is snowing as I type this.

Sure, not a LOT of snow, but it's snow, in the air, falling between the sky and the earth.

Well, okay, the issue isn't so much about the sugar itself.  More about how it's served.  (And by "sugar," I mean "sugar."  Artificial sweeteners don't count.)

I judge restaurants and hotels on the sugar issue.  Because I'm a jerk, I suppose.

And that continues to be the case!  In fact, I'm over the moon about my new editor.  We've had several great conversations about the books, and it's clear that we're entirely on the same wavelength.

I received the official editorial letter for The Coldest War last month.  (Just a few weeks after my new editor received the manuscript, and about 21 months after the manuscript was originally submitted on the contracted deadline.)  The editorial suggestions were absolutely spot-on.  They honed in on exactly the issues that I personally wanted to improve in the next draft anyway, and also provided some great advice on how to go about these improvements.  So I'm really happy with the notes, and with the revised version of The Coldest War.

The long wait for editorial notes had a silver lining, too.

Yes.  Soon, you will crush my sanity like an overripe canteloupe, and when I go gibbering to the madhouse, wrapped in rags and possibly my own filth, I shall hear your heartless laughter in the incessant howling of the wind.

This time I'm trying to use notecards from beginning to end.  For other books and projects in the past, I've used whatever technique seemed best for whatever piece of the story I was thinking about at the time.  Milkweed started out on one giant whiteboard, and then I worked on notecards and scraps of paper as I got into the details of each book, act, and chapter.

IL TREGILLIS of U.S.A., Congratulations on Your Nomination to Who's Who in Medicine and Healthcare

Finally!  Some validation.  It's like the folks at Marquis Who's Who have known me my entire life.

I've been doing quite a lot of that lately.  Enough that I used up one of my favorite editing pens this evening.  So I thought it would be fun to post some pictures of how the pages actually look once they've been savaged by the dreaded red ball point.  (Or, failing "fun", at least it's an easy blog post.)

Below the cut, photos of a work in progress.

Why not consider a weekend trip to Arizona?  If you come to Leprecon, we can hang out!  When I'm not on programming.

Speaking of which, my schedule is below the cut.

And, because I'm old-fashioned when it comes to revisions, working with pen and paper, I can physically see the work improving.  I can touch the improvements.  Feel them.  I do it this way because I'm practically incapable of carrying out successful, big-picture revisions purely on my laptop screen.  I can't see the sentences as they're actually written, can't see the story, if I can't also touch it.

It's not that I'm jealous.  So what if I grew up reading and watching stories about time travel?  So what if there are countless things in my life I'd like to undo, or redo?  No.  This is about trust, and secret time travelers just can't be trusted.  Why are they here?  (Actually, I blame time travelers for the economy.)  What could possibly be so interesting about today, or yesterday, that's worth all the trouble to visit it from 2327? 

What aren't they telling us?

Back in the 70s, she played Sarah Jane Smith:  one of the most iconic companions from the decades of the original run of Doctor Who.  Sarah Jane eventually got her own spinoff show, many years later, but I always thought she belonged in the TARDIS.

Reader John Murphy (thanks, John!) sent me a link to this article in Nature. 

Why?  Because DARPA is funding research that involves hooking people's heads to batteries to improve their abilities at certain tasks.  Oh, and one of the pioneers of the modern incarnation of this research?  A German neurologist who experimented on members of his own family.  (And dare I wonder if this implies the research was carried out on his family land?)  Meanwhile his colleagues were telling him that the research was unethical, "fucking dangerous", and that he ought to stop it right away.

I can't help but get a chuckle out of this... a very worried chuckle.

Which I suppose is typical of a Friday evening.  But anyway. 

I'm very tired, and not feeling particularly clever at the moment.  (Well, I'm never clever.  Although sometimes I rhyme accidentally.  Even so I feel even less inspired than usual this evening.)  So here's a random assortment of stuff that's going on, of interest to nobody but me.

You've aged so quickly.  How is it possible?  It seems like only yesterday you were nothing but a vague, faintly naive idea.

I remember how thrilled I was when I took you home from the hospital first saw you in a bookstore.   I thought you were the cutest book ever.  I still do.  But not  everybody agrees, and that's why your mommy and daddy your publisher and author are working hard to make new clothing devise new cover art for you

And he made me sound much more polite than I am.  I did at one point actually yell out, "You guys are wimps."

From Goodreads:  James Culshaw

From this blog: Dawn Sabados

Congratulations to James and Dawn!  I hope you enjoy the anthology.

Mailing those books became a vivid reminder as to why I'm so hilariously inept at being, you know, an adult.

How's that for a lovely compliment?  I'm amazed that anybody would feel compelled to take up a pen and compose verse after reading Bitter Seeds.  Wow.

The poet, David A Marcillo, has graciously consented to let me post his poem here.

But that wasn't the only time I got outwitted by a squirrel at the University of Minnesota.  Oh, no.  Not hardly.  When I returned to the U of MN for graduate school, the squirrels stepped up their game.  They went from subtle gaslighting to outright demonstrations of contempt for my intellect (such as it is).

Why do I get such a kick out of these commercials?  Sense of humor, they has it.   I like the best.  I push to limit, every time.

In related news, I'm now #572,156 on the waiting list for my own petite lap giraffe.

People in the audience thought she had said "webfoot".

So now it is generally believed that I am descended from the fish people of Innsmouth.

What does one do with the world's most powerful laser complex?  Well, I don't want to give away too much right now.  Early days, and all that.  Let's just say that when—not if—my plan comes to fruition, we won't be calling it the "moon" any longer...

Blog posts will be a bit shorter than usual this week because I'm traveling a lot for the next few days.

This reminder just in from Ur-Bar co-editors (and Wonder Twins) Joshua Palmatier and Patricia Bray:  there are still a few days left to enter the Tales from the Ur-Bar contest!  They're taking entries until the end of March, which means you can still toss your name in the hat to win a big pile o'books-- something from each contributor to the anthology.  Plus chocolate.

My own contribution to the giveaway is a copy of Bitter Seeds.  Thank you to Josh and Patricia for obtaining a copy for the contest.

Contest details can be found at the link.  No purchase necessary, etc.

The depiction of revenant spirits in this book is haunting and lyrical; I'll never be able to see a homeless person without thinking of this book.  And, as in all Powers novels, the magic system is depicted in a way that makes everything sound entirely plausible.   Everything sounds obvious, like common sense, when Powers explains it.  Because of course magic works that way.  And of course you'd trap a ghost like that...

I'm lucky I read it before arriving in Adelaide.  (Which is a lovely city and I'm sure many of the people there are NOT ghosts.)

You really don't see many Nabokov mashups.  I'm not sure if that's a good thing or bad thing.  But once this got me thinking about mashups it compelled me to something not nearly as clever as Paul's review [or Steve Halter's Kinks and Moody Blues mashups, or Scott Denning's Simon & Garfunkel and Chuck Barry mashups, in the comments below] but certainly inevitable:

Yesterday, I learned of the passing of a teacher and educator who was extremely influential to me. Jeanie Davis Pullen was a very special person; I can't imagine anybody who knew her not sharing my opinion. She touched and brightened the lives of many, many people.

I'm very saddened by the news of her passing. I'd been thinking about her recently, and had been meaning to contact her, which I suppose is what motivated me to google her name and thus find her obituary. How is it possible she's been gone from the world for more than two years? It isn't. It just isn't.

Jeanie had, I have no doubt, a string of eulogists who sang her praises and remembered her with an eloquence I can't hope to approach. She brought that kind of goodness out of people. A proper remembrance would include a long litany of the lives she touched. Anything I say will fall short of properly honoring her. But she's on my mind today, so I'd like to tell you about Jeanie Pullen.

I have two extra copies of Jonathan Strahan's anthology, The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year, Volume 5.  So, I'm giving them away!  And in two separate venues, no less.

I've listed one giveaway over at Goodreads.  If you're on GR, you can go to the giveaways page to sign up to win a copy.  [ETA: The giveaway at Goodreads is still pending approval, as of Monday evening.  My apologies for jumping the gun on this.  It's up now, Tuesday afternoon.]  If you're not on Goodreads, or if you'd like to increase your chances of winning, read on.

This question isn't prompted by a recent experience or anything that has happened to me.  (Honest.)  But I'm genuinely curious about something: why do some people tend to heap so much scorn on the simple practice of posting spoiler warnings in online fora?

Not everybody does this, of course.  And I'm sure there are plenty of folks to whom the notion of spoiler warnings wouldn't even merit a cocked eyebrow.  But enough people seem so dead-set against the idea that... well, it baffles me.

I've been meaning to do this for quite a while, but lately I've been more scatterbrained than usual.  But!  Thanks to yesterday's blog comment from Steve Halter (hi, Steve), I finally got my act together and posted a couple of short stories on the website.  One Milkweed story, and one standalone.

Right now they're both in PDF format.  More formats will come later.  A lot later.  (I know, I should be all Web 3.0 and stuff.  I will.  Later.) 

Links to the new stories are available on the Words page.  And there are also links below the cut, where I've written a little bit about the history of both pieces.

Wow.

You guys.  I mean... wow.  Just, wow.

I cannot believe how much attention my previous blog post has received.  When I posted that entry on Sunday, I did it to clear the air, and so that I'd have a long and detailed explanation available for when people asked about the books.  I honestly never thought it would be seen immediately by anybody other than my usual readers (hello, all 5 of you!).  When I asked for folks to spread the word, I had no idea just how far you'd spread it.

I'm blown away by all the blog comments and many private messages of support.  I know I've already said this dozens of times, but the support and affirmation means the world to me.  Everybody has been incredibly kind.  Thank you.

There are two reasons for the difficulty.  First and foremost, this topic makes me feel helpless, and furious, and very very depressed.  Second, I've been dithering over how much of this I can talk about in public.  The very last thing I'd ever want to do is sound like a disgruntled troublemaker.

But a few days ago I unwisely let something slip in the comment thread to a recent blog post, where I thought very few people would see it.  Instead, it ended up on Twitter.  (I really wish I'd taken a more moderate tone in my off-the-cuff comments there.)

So I'll cut to the chase: My publisher has delayed—yet again—the publication dates for the mass market paperback of Bitter Seeds, as well as for the hardcover of Milkweed #2, The Coldest War.  This means that contrary to my last announcement (which came on the heels of a face-to-face meeting with my editor), Coldest War will NOT debut in October 2011.

This post isn't intended as a woe-is-me story.  But lately I've been getting a lot of questions about the publication date for Coldest War, and I've decided that if I have to announce yet another delay, I'm going to lay out the situation in as much detail as I can.  My intent is to give a clear and complete accounting of the history of the Milkweed books' publication process.  Because it seems that every so often I'm forced to come up here to eat my words and rescind a previously announced publication schedule.  Which makes me look, and feel, like a lying bastard.  Which, you know?  Not fun.

But anybody kind enough to care about my books deserves to know why I keep changing my tune.  Please believe me, brothers and sisters: it ain't by choice.

Below the cut, I'll try to explain how and why this is happening.  (I say "try" because, frankly, I don't fully understand it myself.)   But I want to be very clear that I've never, ever announced a publication date that didn't come straight from my publisher.  And in the meantime, my agent and I have done everything in our power to try to push this series forward, including most especially meeting my contractual obligations and even finishing each manuscript ahead of schedule.  (Which is pretty much the only thing an author has power over.)

Sigh.

OK.  So what happened?  And why will more than 2 years pass between the publication of Bitter Seeds and its sequel, The Coldest War?

At times like this, my daydreams tend to drift in well-traveled directions, to follow the well-trodden paths of my dilettantism.  Like iron filings before a superconducting magnet, my thoughts are drawn to pleasant memories of other introductions to the strange.  Because I like to remind myself—I need to remind myself—that we do live in a strange and interesting world.

Which is probably why I've always been fascinated by number stations.

One of the first books I picked up that summer was Grammatical Man by Jeremy Campbell.   Though it's a little dated (and was when I first read it) this is a really wonderful book, as suggested by the subtltle: "Information, Entropy, Language, and Life."  It's about all sorts of cool things like error-correcting codes used in spacecraft telemetry and viral DNA and the entropy of language.

It's also where I first heard about the Voynich Manuscript.

Or, more accurately, I should say I don't gravitate toward reading novels on my laptop.  But I don't mind at all when I'm so engaged in what I'm reading.  As was the case these past few weeks!

If you choose to try sneaking past the Audit Dragon, fill out form 1040-Schedule X.  If you choose to wield the Wand of Deferred Tax Credits For First Time Home Owners Who Are Also World War I Veterans, fill out form 1040-6652N…

So anyway, he told me our high school graduating class is having a reunion this summer.  And I thought, "Wait... that reunion?  Are you sure?  That isn't possible."

How in the world did so much time pass?  What have I been doing all these years?

"...so I found a company and got a price, but in the end I decided I just didn't need to own that much tantalum."

Self-promotion is an important part of an author's job.  (And it's no secret this is the thing I dislike the most about writing.)  Which isn't necessarily a good or bad thing, but just a reality of the publishing landscape.  But I've come to realize that we writers aren't the only folks who struggle with self-promotion. 

Maybe it's endemic to all creative endeavors.

Those worlds are not this one.  But, oh, if only they were.

But thanks to this post, I've just learned that "What Doctor Gottlieb Saw" (a standalone piece set in the Milkweed universe of Bitter Seeds) is included in Locus's list of recommended short fiction reads from 2010.

And, gosh, now that I look at the actual list, I see that Still Life (A Sexagesimal Fairy Tale) is up there, too.  Wow!

And I just received another copy in the mail from Barnes and Noble this evening.

Yeah.  That's why I hate insomnia.

But I'm lazy, and I'm tired.  And this day has been complete crap.  So no writeup tonight.  Instead, I've posted two photos from Tasmania below the cut.

But it's not the opportunity to go down as one of the worst toastmasters in Bubonicon history that has me so thrilled.  (As exciting as that is.)  I'm jazzed because this year's writer Guest of Honor is none other than my Wild Cards cohort Steve "S. L. Farrell" Leigh, and the artist Guest of Honor is the amazing John Picacio.

And Boskone 48 is coming up very soon!  (In fact, gosh, by this time next week I'll be in Boston.  Barring another epic snowstorm.)   And, as always, the programming folks at Boskone have done a bang-up job.  My schedule is posted below the cut.

In Part 1, I talked a little bit about why helium is a nonrenewable resource.  In Part 2, I tried to achieve a layman's understanding of the world's helium markets, and the various reasons why they've suddenly become unstable in the past 15 years (after decades of remarkable stability).

This is the last post of the three; it's more of a list than an essay like the previous posts.  Today I'm going to try to outline some of the many wonderful uses that make helium special, and make the case that a total depletion of the Earth's helium reserves (both helium-4 [4He] and helium-3 [3He] ) would be a tragedy. 

We stand to lose much more than party balloons and squeaky voices if we run out of helium.

The previous post, Part 1, tried to give some explanation as to why helium is a nonrenewable resource.  The next post, Part 3, will try to make the case that helium is extremely valuable for science and industry.  In this post, below the cut, I'll try to come to a layman's understanding of the world's helium markets, and why they've become dangerously unstable in the past 15 years or so.

Many people don't realize that helium is a non-renewable resource.  Even fewer people realize there's a very real possibility that the earth's helium reserves could be catastrophically diminished within our lifetime.  Even if the world's supply of helium isn't entirely tapped out, the remaining supplies face the alarming prospect, within the next 15 years, of becoming extraordinarily expensive.  Expensive enough to make helium inaccessible for many of the applications considered commonplace today.

I know it sounds a little silly at first blush (big deal, Ian, no more party balloons) but this is a genuinely serious issue.  The depletion of the Earth's helium reserves would be a tragedy for science and industry.  The reason for this looming calamity stems from some extremely poor legislative decisions going back well over a decade, but more than that, it stems from the very nature of helium itself.

This subject is a little long for a single post.  So, I'm going to break this discussion into three parts: In Part 1, I'll try to address the issue of why helium is a nonrenewable resource.  In Part 2, I'll say a little bit about the history of the world's helium reserves, and current threats to the world helium market.  In Part 3, I'll talk about why we need helium for more than just party balloons, why this unique element is an awesome and irreplaceable resource for science and technology, and why its loss would be tragic.

I tend to get a little jaded about publicity and marketing gimmicks, but I've loved paper airplanes ever since I was five years old, so I can't help but be utterly charmed by this.  It's kind of astonishing the kinds of cool things one can do relatively easily these days.

Today's mail contained a copy of the brand-new The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year Volume 5, which contains my story, Still Life (A Sexagesimal Fairy Tale).

Which in this case means I came home this afternoon to find an inch of water on my kitchen floor, courtesy of a broken pipe.

The bus was 20 minutes late.

I thought I was being smart by catching the later bus, which is to say the bus that comes after the sun has risen.  Ha.

I listened to this interview with Dr. May several months ago, and it only served to make me respect the man even more than I already did.  He just seems like a really smart, really talented, down-to-earth guy.  And he's accomplished in both the arts and the sciences to an extent that's quite rare these days.   A modern day Renaissance Man, is Brian May.

The parody of internet fame—which is almost the same as internet meme-ification (that's my word but feel free to use it)—works all the more because it references a real-world internet meme at the same time.  It makes me imagine internet memery (that's mine, too, but go ahead and use it; I'm a generous soul) is like some kind of vast, virtual ecology.

(As far as making difficult decisions goes, I have a long track record of doing that.  Like every other human being on the planet.  But on a more personal record, I also have a long track record of making poor decisions.  But that's a topic for three days after never.)

My thoughts were brought to this subject from two different directions.  One from television, one from books.

Below the cut: The Cape vs Lord of the Rings.  (Spoilers follow for both.)

Sometimes it means sitting in the same room for 12 hours, and writing down a few numbers every hour or so.

Like today, for instance.  (Lasers were involved.)

All scientists have a duty to perform their work honestly and ethically.  Ultimately, this obligation springs from the symbiotic relationship between science and society, the give-and-take between scientists and the society in which they partake.

But sometimes science turns around and lays additional obligations upon the intrepid explorer.

Down near the bottom of his post, he's gone one further.  He has issued a challenge.  And there's money on the line.

The game itself will stay up indefinitely.  So, if you'd like to take a crack at it by yourself, or if you'd like to play along with the walkthrough, feel free!  The links above provide some useful tips for getting started. 

You'll notice that appears to be a broken link.  It points to this website's 404 error page.  It also happens to reveal part of somebody's journal for 4 April (4/04) 1919.  You'll probably also notice that below the missing pages, the phrase chronicle of my sorrows is emphasized.  If you ask the homunculus about this, he'll give you three of the missing pages.  This is where the game begins.

The rest of the missing journal entries are arranged into three separate threads, one for each of these journal entries.  Below the cut, I'll describe the path through the game for each thread.  I'll also try to mark things clearly, so that people who need a hint but don't want the entire game spoiled for them can scroll through to the troublesome journal entry.

And to celebrate, our inteprid editors have been working like crazy to spread the word.  (Have I mentioned the personalized M&Ms at World Fantasy?)  Below the cut, lots of links and signing madness.

This is strange and delightful.  I'm a little taken aback that people apparently predicted this quite a long time ago.  (And it's in the literature, so they really did.)

Since I spent my graduate student days thinking about high energy radiation processes, I can't help but speculate about this.

Late last year I wrote a relatively short piece for a new DAW anthology edited by Jennifer Brozek.  I'm happy to be able to say that "The Mainspring of His Heart, the Shackles of His Soul" has been officially accepted into the forthcoming Human For A Day anthology.

It's a story of tulips and alchemy, clocks and human rights, slavery and unconsummated love.

But.  Now that the nomination period for the 2011 Hugo Awards is now open, smart and organized people are making it easy for interested nominators/voters to get the information they seek via posts like this and this.  Meanwhile, others have mentioned how nice it is to be able to reference such posts when considering this year's Hugo nominations.   Which means that a (very) few people have requested that I list my 2010 publications and their relevant categories.

So, below the cut, a (very) short list of my eligible 2010 publications.  And then I take a shower.

Since we unveiled the Chronicle of Sorrows puzzle game last year, over a hundred people have sought to rummage through the files on John Stephenson's desk.  I've received many hint and clue requests since last spring.  And I'd be lying if I said I didn't take a slightly sadistic pleasure in doling them out.  But I'm a bad person; we already knew that.

The prizes have been claimed, but the game is still available for those that feel inclined to play!  It starts here...

I'll post a complete walkthrough later.  Today, below the cut, I've posted the winners and their prizes.

My days are full of sunrises and sunsets.

The venerable Pat of Hotlist fame has posted his year-end Hottie awards.  (That's a play on the blog name, you see, not a reference to attractiveness.  Though I'm sure my trademark "just woke up in a damp haystack" look would win big.)  He calls Bitter Seeds "the crème de la crème of SFF debuts" this year, and also had some nice words for the author.  I'm extremely honored.

Meanwhile, the Yeti Stomper has posted his 2010 recommended reading list.  Bitter Seeds is included among the four novels he recommends.  Hooray!

The venerable Pat, of Pat's Fantasy Hotlist fame, has included Bitter Seeds in his list of the Top Ten Speculative Fiction Titles of 2010.  And over at Fantasy Book Critic, Bitter Seeds is listed among the Top 25 Novels of 2010.  And the Mad Hatter has included Bitter Seeds in his list of the best genre books of the year.

It's a great relief to see that people still remember a book that came out way back in April.  (Holy cow.  Has it really been that long already?  Seems like yesterday, yes it does.)

Apex Book Company has posted a very positive review of Bitter Seeds on their blog.  Jenn Brozek's review also includes an interview with me about the Milkweed books, demonology, and other sundry topics.  I met Jenn at LAX in August, while we were both waiting for our flight to Melbourne en route to Worldcon.  I was flattered by her interest in my book, and I'm deeply pleased that she enjoyed it.

Meanwhile, over at Locus Online, short fiction reviewer Lois Tilton lists two of my stories in her roundup of the year in short fiction!  (Tilton's original review of "What Doctor Gottlieb Saw" can be found here, and her review of "Still Life (A Sexagesimal Fairy Tale)" can be found here.)

And the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel lists Bitter Seeds among 2010's "Transporting Book Successes": personal recommendations from their reviewer, Jim Higgins.  Wow!  That's my book listed alongside fiction from Connie Willis, Kim Stanley Robinson, Alan Furst (!), and Emma Donoghue (a Man Booker Prize finalist, no less).  What a compliment.

I'm very happy to see these things here at the closing of the year.

My friend and mentor Walter Jon Williams brought it to my attention that the venerable and life-changing Clarion Writer's Workshop is now accepting applications for the 2011 class.  Ditto Clarion West.

The Clarions are a marvelous, once-in-a-lifetime experience for people who are really serious about writing.  I wasn't kidding when I used the term "life-changing".  Clarion isn't for everybody, and it isn't 6 weeks of 24/7 fun.  It's hard work, and can get pretty draining at times.  Some people discover that they don't enjoy writing that much; others learn the thing that will push their work over the hump and launch their career.  Everybody learns something and comes away changed.

I can't recommend it highly enough.

If only, goes my constant lament, somebody would build a mechanical tool for devising plots automatically.  Preferably out of wood and Bakelite, and possibly powered by coal.

Little did I know my prayers were answered over 40 years before I was born.  Feast your eyes on this wonderment of modern scenario development: the Plot Robot.

Anyway...  I'm super, super thrilled to announce that editor extraordinaire (and newly-minted World Fantasy winner!) Jonathan Strahan has chosen to include my story from the October issue of Apex Magazine, Still Life (A Sexagesimal Fairy Tale), for inclusion in his upcoming anthology, The Best SF and Fantasy of the Year, Volume 5.

Hooray!

That is all for now, while I continue to wrestle with epic internet problems.

Hey, we all make mistakes, right?  She had a good run going, with some terrific posts from a string of interesting people.  I made certain that came to a screeching halt.  Instead of being interesting or funny or thoughtful, I decided to lay bare the quivering ball of neurosis that lurks deep in the soul of many writers. 

You can read my post here. 

And speaking of not believing the internet exists...

When I was in Sydney back in September, my friend -- the up-and-coming superstar of Angry Robot, Jo Anderton -- recommended a visit to the Galaxy Bookshop.  There I met a cheery and affable bookseller by the name of Mark Timmony.  He generously allowed me to deface some stock, and even wanted to know whether I'd be interested in defacing the store's blog, too.

Well, sure.

Officially, anyway, and so far, nobody is stepping forward about this.  The DoD, Navy, and Air Force claim no knowledge of the object or its origin. The FAA claims no knowledge of the incident.  Vandenberg Air Force Base and the Naval Air Station at Point Mugu both deny responsibility.

I'd be worried that it was a test by an Iranian stealth sub, or that the Giant Pacific Octopus has finally made its move, if not for one line in the article that caught my attention:

Egregious name dropping follows below the cut.

More later -- it's getting late -- but for now I'll simply state on the record that WFC is now my favorite convention.   I made some awesome new friends and saw lots of people I don't get to see nearly enough.  Even got to see some folks I hadn't seen in an extremely long time.

Few books grab me like that.  Last year, it was Arika Okrent's In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, Loglan Lovers, And the Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build a Perfect Language.  This one might have been written for me, I loved it so much.

More recently, with regard to my nonfiction reading, it's Sam Kean's The Disappearing Spoon and Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of Elements.  I haven't finished this one yet, but I like what I'm reading so far.  I have high hopes.

Behind the times as I am, I've only just discovered Caro Emerald's videos on YouTube.  I loves me anything that's steeped in the style of a bygone era.  So this and this kind of make me swoon. 

She's like the Michael Jackson of the Netherlands!  I'm really not surprised her first album has bested Michael Jackson's Thriller for the number of weeks on the top of the charts... in the Netherlands.

Still Life (A Sexagesimal Fairy Tale) is available online at Apex's website, and along with the rest of this month's awesome issue in various ebook formats. (Even if you don't enjoy my contribution, please consider making a donation or taking out a subscription or purchasing a digital edition of an issue or two, so that Apex can continue to publish awesome short fiction and poetry from the likes of Brenda Stokes Barron, Ekaterina Sedia, Rose Lemberg, and Elizabeth McClellan.)

I am just so dang happy to see this story in a good home with such vaunted company.  Editor Catherynne Valente discusses how she came to put this issue together on her blog, here.  More thoughts and behind-the-scenes trivia below the cut.

No surprises there, since I'm generally pretty awful at keeping my blog up to date.  This time, at least, I have an excuse for the long silence— I was fortunate enough to get to spend all of September down in Australia.  And generally having the time of my life.  (Tasmanian Devils are TEH KYOOT.)

Worldcon made a good excuse for my first trip to the Southern Hemisphere.  And I figured that if I was going to travel across the International Date Line for maybe the only time in my life, I ought to make the most of it.  Hence the month-long vacation.

Also, the timing worked out very well, because I turned in the manuscript for the third and final Milkweed novel, Necessary Evil, a couple of weeks before I left for Melbourne on August 30 (it was due on my editor's desk September 1).  Which meant that the trip coincided with the first time in over four years when I could enjoy down time—actual, honest-to-goodness down time with no obligations or deadlines pressing on me—and relax and veg out without being stricken with the crippling guilt that I wasn't working on Milkweed stuff right now.  Which is sorta how I've spent all of my free time since I started planning the Milkweed Triptych, way back when.

So I spent the month traveling around Australia while not thinking about Marsh, Will, Gretel, Klaus, Eidolons, Enochian, and all the rest.  And it was awesome.

I'll try to say more about my antipodean adventure in upcoming posts.  (No promises.  Because as we all know, I suck at keeping the blog up to date.)  But, while at Worldcon, I did get to sit down with my editor at Tor.  So, speaking of Milkweed, some updates below the cut...

And, unlike me, Kevin can actually do accents and different voices.  So if you're curious about how the novel is supposed to sound, check it out.

Anyway, several people have asked me to post my GoH talk.  It took me 4 months to do this, but the talk is finally up on the words page.

Believe it or not, the Milkweed books required a bit of research.  (It's true!  People even ask me about this from time to time.)  So this is a topic of no small interest to me.

Meanwhile, in a completely unrelated turn of events, I bought a new camera this weekend.  And find myself completely incapable of using it effectively.  (Big surprise).  So I thought it would be fun to post a few photos of the bookshelf where I kept many of my research materials while working on the Milkweed Triptych.

Below the cut: blurry photos and puppet robots.

Patrick contacted me a couple of weeks ago (again through GRRM; thanks, George!) to inquire about doing an interview.  He asked some very thoughtful questions, and I did my best to give him thoughtful answers.  So, while it took longer than either of us expected, the end result is a Q & A that we both feel is pretty strong.

The interview is posted here.

Ate three tonight.  Verdict: juicy and perfect.

It will come as no surprise to some folks that the writing of fantasy alt-history novels is a topic of no small interest to me.  So I was absolutely delighted to see Debra's discussion about what it's like to tackle such a project. 

In their case, Doyle and Macdonald took up the American Civil War, as opposed to the Second World War in Bitter Seeds.  Even so, Doyle's discussion had me jumping for joy.  Because she's right on the money.  I've heard exactly the same set of objections since the publication of Bitter Seeds.   And her take on the subject is pretty much the same as mine.

Below the cut: Testify!

This is the third novel I've finished (not counting one hilariously sucktackular piece of compost in my trunk that will never ever see the light of day).  But it's the first time I've finished a trilogy (obviously), and it feels a little different. 

It didn't really hit me until I shut down Word and copied backups to the thumb drives, which is part of my daily ritual for closing out a writing session.  And then I realized:  "Holy crap.  This is the last time I'll do backups to new Milkweed content."   And I got a little wistful.

(Yes, I'm a sentimental weirdo.  Pleased to meet you.)

And yet, it has also been the hardest of the three Milkweed books to write.  And that took me by surprise.  I knew for a long time that this book would be a little different. But it wasn't until I started writing Necessary Evil that I truly understood something that other novelists have told me time and again:  writing a novel teaches you how to write (or not write) that novel.  It doesn't necessarily teach you how to write the next one.  It gives you the benefit of experience and hones your skills along the way, but it's quiet on the details. 

Bitter Seeds was difficult because it required so much setup (exacerbated by the fact that the story relies on two weird things and is set in a well-known historical period).  Coldest War was a little easier, and probably for me the most fun of the three.  Necessary Evil has been a thicket from beginning to end.

So I felt a tremendous weight leave my shoulders this weekend, when on Sunday evening I finally found myself writing the second to last scene of the trilogy.

So.  I'm downright delighted to announce that I'll have a story appearing in After Hours: Tales From the Ur-Bar, an anthology edited by Joshua Palmatier and Patricia Bray, and to be published by DAW in March 1, 2011.  (Hey, that's just a month after the scheduled release date for Milkweed #2, The Coldest War. [Edit: Coldest War is now scheduled for October, 2011.])

To celebrate, Patricia is running Ur-Bar Bingo on her blog.  Match the authors to their story synopses to win fame and fortune!  (If you want a hint, Josh has posted the table of contents here.  The story titles might help.)  Though, people familiar with some of my other projects will find it easy to figure out which description applies to my own particular contribution.

I don't wear shoes in the house.  But I keep a pair of sandals near both the front and back door for quick trips outside, like checking the mail or filling the bird feeder. 

As I stepped into my hiking sandals, something cool bunched up against the toes of my left foot.  The left sandal happens to be the one with the loose lining, thanks to its most recent trip through the washing machine.  So I didn't think anything of it.  But then, as I was about halfway to the tree (all of five feet) it suddenly didn't feel like loose lining at all.  A little too cool.  A little too. . . wriggly.

Perhaps the best prison break movie since Shawshank Redemption.  Or possibly Chicken Run.

Okay, that's two sentences.

Also, the action sequences in this G-rated animated movie were far more exciting and engrossing than the action sequences in the vast majority of action movies I've seen.  It's interesting to me that I rarely come out of an animated film feeling like I'd just wasted time and money, but I rarely come out of a live-action film feeling like it was entirely worth my time and money.

(And, by the way, I'm so sorry to hear that you've had problems with your email solicitations getting intercepted because peoples' spam filters are set too high.  That's a shame.  In a just and fair world, spam filters would only intercept, you know, spam.  Like unsolicited emails containing vaguely targeted business proposals.  I now understand why you feel the need to randomly contact people who have commented on my blog.  Chin up and shoulder to the wheel, my friends!  Don't let those bastards at SpamAssassin get you down!  Also, in completely unrelated news, my irony meter just exploded.)

I also thank you for your gentle yet frantic, persistent yet ominous reminders that I may be — at this very moment! — neglecting my "international clientele".   Indeed, your warnings about my absence from the most popular Slovakian and Mongolian web search engines has caused much soul searching here in the international headquarters of my business empire (by which I mean my spare bedroom).  

Like zillions of other people, I've been devouring the Stieg Larsson "Millenium" "Millennium" trilogy.  My copy of The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest hasn't arrived yet, which has made for some painful waiting.  (Darn you, Powell's!  Why must you be so far away?)  But I anticipate an engrossing read when it does arrive.  The first two novels in the series made a joy of my 100 minutes of daily commuting.

I'm still processing my thoughts about these books.  They break many of the rules of thumb that we like to recite when it comes to writing and storytelling.  In many places they stand at odds with the standard advice beginning novelists receive.  But for all that they're compulsively readable and, let's face it, huge international megabestsellers.   So the late Mr. Larsson sure did something right.

Anyway, last night I zipped over to a local college campus to catch the film adaptation of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.  I'm glad I had a chance to catch it while the novel was still somewhat fresh in my memory.  I found myself continually comparing the film's storyline to that of the book, taking note of the places where the screenplay diverged from the book, and theorizing about why the filmmakers made the choices they did. 

Since The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is a mystery, it's kind of hard to do such a plot comparison without some major spoilers.  So, if you haven't read Dragon Tattoo yet and don't want it ruined for you, don't read below the cut.

I completely gave up on this movie when we hit the slow-motion shot of Russell Crowe yelling, "Nooooooooo!"

That is honestly in the film.  Hard to believe, I know.  And I'm pretty sure that bit was meant non-ironically, since this wasn't intended as a comedy or satire.  I'll bet I can guess what you're thinking: hasn't noooooo been a cliché since almost forever?

Yes.  Yes it has.

As of this posting, the Chronicle of Sorrows game is still unsolved!   (Though, thanks to the magic of Google Analytics, I see folks are making good progress.)  The first person to successfully access the contents of John Stephenson's desk is elegible to win a signed advanced review copy of Bitter Seeds.  (I say eligible because I recognize that some folks might not want an ARC.  And I'm not about to force somebody to take one.)

A summary of the game, and some suggestions, below the cut.

"What Doctor Gottlieb Saw" takes place roughly 18 months before the events in Chapter 1 of Bitter Seeds.  (So it takes place maybe 17 years after the prologue, which you can read for free here.)  I wrote it entirely as a standalone, so it doesn't require any foreknowledge of Bitter Seeds.

For people who have read the book, the story might shed a little more light on the relationship between a certain flying man, and a certain perfectly innocent girl who likes to pick flowers and who just happens, maybe, to see the future. 

(More thoughts on the story, below the cut.)

That is to say, the hard part.  Which is also, on good days, the really fun part.

I had the great pleasure of chatting with Tom Merritt and Veronica Belmont over Skype last night.  Tom and Veronica are the mad geniuses behind the S&L podcast, and (as I mentioned previously) they kindly chose Bitter Seeds as their most recent reading selection.

The full episode is here.  Hear me babble nonsensically for minutes on end!

Tool use, theft, and a crooked fight, all below the cut.

What an honor for a debut novel.  (Their previous selection, The Windup Girl, just won the Nebula Award.  Way to go, Paolo!)

I saw the occasional episode in which, generally speaking, the world was attacked by teapots.

and

It’s a law – well at least a guideline – in writing plays that if somebody is going to be killed with an axe in the third act, then the axe should be visible hanging on the wall in the first act, and, for the hard of thinking, should be the subject of a line of dialogue that would go something like “you shouldn’t leave that around, it could do someone a mischief.”

So, if things go according to plan, the Audible.com production of Bitter Seeds should be available by Labor Day, and quite possibly before that.

I'm grateful to Richard for photographing the festivities, and to so many friends -- From all over! From years back! -- for coming down to Uncle Hugo's to support a debut author. 

Bitter Seeds is currently out of stock at the warehouse, because all copies from the intial print run have been shipped to fulfill bookstore orders.  This doesn't mean the book has sold out -- not by a long shot -- but it does mean the first batch of orders exceeded expectations.   Speaking verrrry cautiously here, that's good news. 

The real question is how many of those copies shipped to bookstores actually sell, and how many get returned to the publisher.  It's possible of course that the entire stock of reprinted copies will end up moldering at the bottom of the Hudson River.  (I'm told my optimistic outlook will serve me well in the world of publishing.)

My agent, Kay, describes this as "quite a coup", coming as it does so soon after the release of Bitter Seeds, and while I'm still an unknown quantity as authors go.  I think the deal owes far more to her negotiating savvy than to anything on my end, but I'm pleased all the same.

As homecomings go, I'd be hard pressed to think of a better one.

The venerable Pat of Pat's Fantasy Hotlist is giving away 3 (three!) copies.  I'm not sure what the deadline for entry is, but details are posted here. 

And, Fantasy and SciFi Lovin' News and Reviews has one ciopy to give away.  Details (and some love for the awesome Palencar cover art) here; the deadline is May 11.  Plenty of time to toss your hat in the ring...

Aside from briefly wondering if I was going to get thrown out of the store, and some confusion about the actual start time, I think it went pretty well.

Likewise, I've avoided the comment threads at places like the Boing Boing review and my essay over at Scalzi's Big Idea column.  And I'm steering wide of the reader reviews at online vendors like Amazon and Barnes & Noble, as well as on Goodreads.  After all, not everybody is going to like the book, or even the idea behind it, and some might even hate it.  And they're completely entitled to their opinions-- I firmly believe that 50% of each book comes from the reader.  At the same time, I have a contractual obligation to my publisher to finish my current manuscript on time, and I find writing is easier (never easy, but easier) when I'm not sad.

Which unfortunately means I sometimes miss out on really cool stuff.

I've just discovered that io9, uber-clearinghouse of all things awesome and science-fictional, has included Bitter Seeds in its roundup of noteworthy April book releases!  Thanks, io9!

I've posted a review and roundup of launch-day news below the cut, and the first photograph of Bitter Seeds in the wild.

Hello and welcome to readers from Boing Boing and John Scalzi's Big Idea feature!  (And very sincere thank yous to Cory Doctorow and John Scalzi for kindly featuring my book on its launch day.)

Bitter Seeds has been getting great reviews.  To celebrate the release, we're running a contest/puzzle/game called Chronicle of Sorrows.  I've posted about it here, here, and here.  First prize is a signed ARC of Bitter Seeds!

I'm also doing a giveaway on Goodreads right now.  One lucky winner will receive a signed hardcover of Bitter Seeds.  So far, over 500 600 700 800 900 people have entered the contest.  Wow!

I've posted a list of online retailers here, should my poor little book strike your fancy.

I've posted before about Jack Williamson and the Lectureship held in his honor.  The Lectureship always delivers a grand time, so I'm excited to get to visit my friends in Portales over the next few days.  This year is a little bit different, because I've been asked to deliver the keynote address during the Friday luncheon.  I think I'm more nervous about this public-speaking arrangement than I was about my thesis defense.  In general this is something at which I'm fairly competent, but I feel extra pressure to repay the Lectureship Committee's kindness and generosity with a first-class effort.

More information below the cut.

Other choice excerpts below the cut.

They assure me this isn't an April Fools joke...

But, in the course of composing a suitably cryptic reply, I realized there's another technical suggestion that might make your life easier, if you're playing along.

First off, the prizes!  The first person to successfully access the contents of John Stephenson's desk will win a signed ARC (advanced review copy) of Bitter Seeds.  (That's right, play along and maybe you can make a few bucks on eBay.  Not a lot, though.  I'm not exactly Stephen King.)  Four runners-up will be eligible for other goodies.  The usual caveat applies: beta testers and people who have a key to my house aren't eligible for the prizes.  Sorry, guys.

The game starts here.  More suggestions below the cut.

It's a real, live book.  With a cover and pages and everything.

More are on their way to my house, but last night I got to hold my book in my hands for the very first time.  Not just the first time for this book, but the first time for me.  I suppose that very successful writers with very long careers might eventually get jaded about this sort of thing.  But I can't imagine that.

You might also notice that the Bitter Seeds cover art on my homepage is a link to another website, which just happens to require three pieces of login information. Hmmm...

So I'm holding a contest! I will send a signed (and personalized!) Advanced Review Copy of Bitter Seeds to the first person who successfully logs in to bitterseedsnovel.com. Consider the game an easter egg hunt through this website.  As an added incentive to (I hope) keep you playing along, each successfully decoded clue will reveal another piece of a complete short story set in the "Milkweed" universe of Bitter Seeds!  When you finish the game, you'll have the entire story to read, and a unique piece of backstory leading up to events in the novel excerpt.

The game starts here...

Over at Stomping on Yeti, the venerable stomper of yetis has included me in his list of 25 Authors Worth Watching in 2010 and Beyond.  I'm simply blown away, and more than a little humbled, to see my name listed alongside such incredible writers as Greg van Eekhout, Rachel Swirsky, Leah Bobet, Jack Skillingstead, Theodora Goss, Mary Robinette Kowal, Aliette de Bodard, and Beth Bernobich, just to name a few.  I can only hope that I earn a spot alongside them someday.  But who am I to argue?  He stomps on yetis, people!  And that's not something I want to mess with.

Stomping on Yeti has been following up the original list with in-depth looks at each of the 25 authors.  I was included in the second spotlight, number 2 of 5.

Bitter Seeds also made it into Simply the Best's weekly roundup for February 27, under a book recommendation from Daniel Abraham.  Hooray!

Read below the cut for a long and somewhat discursive report.

Also, as a reminder, I've posted a long list of retailers where you can pre-order Bitter Seeds.

But, you know... I'm not feeling super great about this.  "This" being the whole thing where Amazon decided a viable "negotiation" tactic in its disagreement with Macmillan was to hold hostage the sales of hundreds and hundreds of authors.  In fact, when you get right down to it, I'm feeling just the tiniest bit pissed off about it.  (My Milkweed novels—Bitter Seeds, The Coldest War, and Necessary Evil—are to be published by Tor, which is part of Macmillan.)

Because that's exactly what any debut author wants to see—a spectacular corporate hissy-fit that removes his or her book from the largest online bookseller in the world.

So.  Below the cut, I've posted a long list of booksellers, from chains to small independents, both in the USA and overseas, where Bitter Seeds can be pre-ordered (now) or purchased (when April 13 rolls around). 

And hey, if you don't feel like buying my novel, that's cool.  But please consider buying something from a Macmillan author whose work does strike your fancy.  Many, many people lost sales during Amazon's public display of ass-hattery.  Sales they need to make a living.   John Scalzi said it best here.

Update, 8 February 2010: Here's a cool service from the Author's Guild: Who Moved My Buy Button?

Read below the cut for an exclusive preview!

Apparently this is a slapfight over ebook pricing.  (Which makes this even more awesome for me, since of course I have no idea if my book will be released in an ebook version, and if so, when.)

Scalzi has the scoop here, with further thoughts here.  (And I second him, especially on the part about remembering when people trample me into the dirt.)  More details can be found here, here, and here.  For the record, and to be completely honest, I want my publisher to make a better margin on my books.  I have worked very, very hard to write the Milkweed novels, and it would be nice to one day see my efforts rewarded with the occasional royalty check.  (A guy can dream, can't he?)

Sigh.

I hope this gets resolved, and quickly.  Because, you know, it would be nice if my first book were available at one of the largest online booksellers on Earth.  For the moment, it isn't.   But it's available many other places. 

You can pre-order Bitter Seeds at any of these fine venues:

Barnes and Noble

Borders

Powell's Books

BooksAMillion

Tor.com

Macmillan

Anyway, I'll be discussing various facets of my experience working on Wild Cards.  And, after much delay on my part, my first post has gone live. 

Almost Like We Planned It is a moderately coherent essay on the plot breaking process and its relationship to Wild Cards.

Taos Toolbox is geared for science fiction and fantasy writers who already have a firm grasp of the basics — folks who've already been to workshops like the Clarions or Odyssey, or who have perhaps sold a couple of stories but are having trouble breaking through to the next level.  It's also aimed at novel-length fiction, unlike most other workshops.

If this sounds like it might be for you,  I highly, highly, highly recommend jumping at any opportunity to workshop with Walter.  I've been workshopping in one form or another pretty much constantly for most of a decade, and I can tell you that Walter is one of the best. 

If this sounds like it might be for you, keep reading.  Below the cut, I list five six reasons why you should apply to Taos Toolbox today.

By which I mean I played far more Wii Sports than was really good for me.  (That explosive pain in the wrist is normal, right?)

(Hint: It involves crocodiles, and this jaw-dropping cover by Michael Komarck.)

Click through for publication news!  And contests!  And exclusive platium-club behind-the-scenes insider info!

It involves robots.

Well, puppets, if we must be technical about it.  But they're puppets OF robots.  So that's pretty close, right?

And what a pity-- so many details of the adventuring life have been lost to the ages. What goods must one never offer for barter to the one-eyed witch priests of Zanzibar?  What music will soothe the savage bloodlust of the legendary Yeti?  Does Charon accept multi-zone bus transfers?  The loss of such knowledge is a tragedy.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why today I am pleased to unveil the Portable Letterpress.

To that end, I proudly unveil the culmination of my research on the bodily humours.  Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you -- straight from the bleeding forefront of Victorian steam-powered arcana -- the Aetheric Electro-Imager.

(Cory was one of my Clarion instructors back in 2005, the penultimate year of Clarion's long run at Michigan State before it moved to UCSD. That's right -- I've lived in a sorority house with Cory Doctorow. How many men can say that? Well, the other guys in my Clarion class, I guess.)

Anyway, because of the traffic bump, I thought this might be a good time to mention that we've added a newsletter signup form on the contact page. More info below the cut.

It is possible -- with the proper combination of enthusiasm, clumsiness, and dumb luck -- to throw the ball backwards, into the crowd, in Wii Bowling.

(Also, because I'm frightened and beguiled by the word "stitchpunk".  I don't know if a single movie really merits an entirely new 'punk genre, even if the conceit is wonderfully innovative.)

For a synopsis, I offer my first thought as the credits rolled:  Huh.  Who knew rag dolls lead such exciting lives?

Other thoughts, of equally little substance but a more spoilery nature, below the cut.

But the clocks I mentioned earlier share one enormous failing: they aren't powered by consuming life itself.

Well, now, finally somebody has seen fit to remedy this.

It reminded me of one of my all-time favorite documentaries, an episode of Nature called The Octopus Show.

Am I the only person to look at that and immediately think of the Last Redoubt from The Night Land?

Several new faces showed up to my reading, for which I am deeply grateful.  Poor Serge ended up sitting through the same reading I gave at the ASFS last May, but he was a perfect gentleman about it.

Speaking of Bubonicon, and World War II (which I frequently do, as in this post), I saw something wonderful at last year's convention that I haven't posted until now. I wanted to wait until a blog upgrade made it possible to do this justice!

I wouldn't miss it for anything.  I always have a fantastic time at Bubonicon.  You can find the full schedule for the weekend's festivities here.  Below the cut, I've posted my schedule for this upcoming weekend.

But just as I got to the last page of the manuscript -- zeroing in on the final sentence of this book, which I've had in mind for two and a half years -- the clouds parted, the sun came out, and a rainbow emerged.  Perfectly framed by my office window.

True story.

But!

More importantly, today -- April 28, 2009 -- is an auspicious day for book lovers.  Not one but two wonderful books are available for your enjoyment:   C. C. Finlay's novel The Patriot Witch, and S. C. Butler's novel The Magicians' Daughter, both debut today.

But over at Tor.com right now, Robert Bland just posted a nice argument (rant) about the Battlestar finale. My thoughts on his thoughts follow below the cut.

That's because the attendees of the annual Williamson Lectureship always end up congregating there during the programming break between the luncheon and afternoon panels, and the Lectureship draws an impressive crowd of SF luminaries not only from New Mexico's large local population of writers, but also from places far and wide. Sure, you might argue that conventions like Worldcon, World Fantasy, or ComicCon draw far more people and thus many more professionals. And that's true. But I'm talking sheer density here. Conventions like those are spread out over entire convention centers and multiple hotels.

You try cramming a dozen Hugo and Nebula winners and maybe a SFWA Grand Master or two into a single Dairy Queen some time. It ain't that straightforward. Dairy Queens are small.

More information about the Lectureship follows below the cut.

If you sent something my way and I didn't respond, please send me an email:

ian AT (i don't like spam) iantregillis DOT com

Just remove the bit about spam. I'll be taking a helium leak detector and some duct tape to the tubes later today. In the meantime, here's a haiku below the cut.

Update:  We think the contact form is working again.  But feel free to send email to above address.

Oddly enough, I discovered just this morning that GRRM himself has put up a blog post about the endings of Life on Mars, Knowing, and Battlestar Galactica.  (Great minds?  Heh.)  In this second part to my discussion of endings, I'll explain why I agree with George about Battlestar Galactica and Knowing, and why I think he's mistaken about Life on Mars.  Because sometimes you gotta speak truth to power, right?

Spoilers for Knowing, and lots of rambling thoughts about what makes for good and bad writing, follow below the cut.

And, on a related note, my friend Ty and I -- in a fit of boredom laced with mild masochism -- saw the Nicholas Cage movie Knowing last night.  Which also got me thinking about endings, but not in a good way. 

Spoilers follow below the cut, where I ramble on and on with musings about Life on Mars and some of the things that make for a successful ending.

And as with the previous two volumes, Suicide Kings boasts yet another fantastic cover by the amazing Michael Komarck.   I think he's outdone himself with this cover.  Check it out here and see for yourself.

Spoilers ahoy!

And, just to rub it in for the rest of us mortals, she writes some of the most amazing prose I've ever read.  She is seriously the most stone-cold talented writer I've had the pleasure of meeting.  I realized this about 2 pages into her submission at Rio Hondo last spring.  Oh, and she tops it off by being nice.  The nerve!

I guess I was feeling nostalgic recently. So, wishing to revisit those pleasant memories, I bought a new copy for enjoyment during my daily bus commute. And that's how I discovered, to my everlasting chagrin and embarrassment, that I had never actually read the novel.

I don't know what I read as a kid, but it sure wasn't 20,000 Leagues.

A slightly longer version of the trip report follows.

Bitter Seeds now has a tentative publication date (well, season): Winter, 2010

So, it should be hitting shelves about a year from now (January-March, roughly). O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

The cool part? Del Rey is releasing the books of his series in crazy-fast succession this year: April, May, and June.

Yeah. Because he's that good and it's going to be that huge.

But the coolest part? You can download a FREE PDF of the first book in the series, The Patriot Witch-- right now, in its glorious entirety -- from Charlie's website.

That's free as in no signup, no registration, no newsletters, no strings. Just download and read.

I didn't decide until relatively late in the game that I'd be making the trip to Boston.  Even so, the concom has even been kind enough to put me on programming, listed below.

I do like the thought of being on a first-name basis with tech support.

Today I had to listen to Jingle Bell Rock for seven agonizing minutes. That accursed earworm is still burrowing through my brain, hours later. I'm pretty sure it has done some damage.

I like Christmas music. Truly, I do. But come on, furniture store. Freakin' Jingle Bell Rock?!? What the hell did I ever do to you?

So I find myself wishing the people who selected songs for that tinny, canned on-hold music had more eclectic tastes.

But the big news today, of course, is that the newest Wild Cards novel, Busted Flush, is now available.

"Oh, Ian," they cry, "why do you yearn for that day when our steam-powered automata go berserk with the lust for freedom? And why must you labor to hasten its coming?"

Because, madam: the clockwork apocalypse will be beautiful.

But, in order to avoid having to face Glondoor in the Stone Circle of Death, I'll try to do better. Honest. More posts in the near future. Really.

Below the cut, I have posted my programming schedules for both cons.

As gentle reminders go, this will be hard to beat. ]]>Sun, 13 Jul 2008 09:49:00 +0000 odd things on my way to, from, and around work. This morning's walk would have been unremarkable (but glorious-- perfect weather and that wide, bright NewMexico sky) if not for the unicycle.]]>Fri, 30 May 2008 09:24:00 +0000 New York Times sports the headline, Monkeys Control a Robot Arm With Their Thoughts. ]]>Wed, 28 May 2008 02:50:00 +0000 seaborne arcology? Then seasteading might be for you! ]]>Fri, 23 May 2008 03:28:00 +0000 that page. I'm not receiving missives entered via the contact form, or at least, not receiving some of them. I don't know how long that's been the case... Sorry. So, if you have recently tried to contact me via the form, and haven't received a response, please post a comment below or send an email to ian AT iantregillis (dot) com. ]]>Thu, 22 May 2008 03:53:00 +0000 Tue, 20 May 2008 09:11:00 +0000 I'm back home now, after returning (somewhat reluctantly) from the Taos ski valley and a fantabulous week at the Rio Hondo workshop.

It's now up for a Hugo award, and deservedly so. Stop what you're doing right now and go read Daniel's story. Seriously. It's that good. ]]>Mon, 28 Apr 2008 06:23:00 +0000 Today, while waiting at a traffic light on my way to lunch, I noticed that the guy standing next to me was holding a large hourglass. He wore no wristwatch.