…of A, after 17 days in Germany, about 2 days in Denmark, and around 30 feet away from Switzerland.
Gracie was glad to see us.
Where the hell have you been?
Everywhere, man. Like Heilbronn:
Ludwigsburg:
and Nuremburg:
among others.
So much to show you that I can’t do it in one post. More to follow.
The Ship Finding God, that is. At 83,000 words, and some change.
Of course, that’s just the first draft, which is far from an actual finish. The wood has to be sanded and treated and then several coats of varnish applied before it’s ready for public use. If history is any judge, whipping it into shape ought to bring it down to a fighting weight of about 75-78,000 words. From boat building to fight training, how do ya like those metaphor mixes?
It is, for all intents and purposes, though, done. The frame of the story is right where I want it, which is somewhat surprising. Usually, about halfway through a first draft, I run into some unforeseen event that completely changes my direction. In the first Ship book, it was Otto’s rejection as a crew member. Up to that point, I’d seen his joining the crew as a given, and the rest of the book progressing through a series of engineering issues. But, one day, while I was minding my own business, the idea of Otto getting kicked out of Star City took over, and the book changed from Asimov to Tolkien. In the second one, I started out keeping the crew intact…and then, next thing I knew, crew members began disappearing. That changed it from Tolkien to Stephen King.
But, that didn’t happen this time. The original idea remained pretty much intact all the way through, although several unanticipated characters show up. What’s that original idea, you ask? That finding God may not actually be the point.
Which means the title is not a spoiler.
Seen these?
Being the maliciously sadistic and evil person that I am, had to try it with Gracie.
The result?
Too cool for school.
I’m just a bit shy of 70,000 words for The Ship Finding God, and I’m expecting this:
or this:
which, yes, I know, no one expects.
That’s because I am addressing creation and existence in a manner that, well, doesn’t coincide with popular teachings. Not that I’ve got the answers, mind you, just some rather oblique views. And, no, nothing outlandish:
just…different.
I’m still figuring another 10,000 words or so before it’s done, but that should go rather fast. I’m seeing my way clear. Then, you can judge.
Just not so harshly. Please.
So, there I was, minding my own business:
when snatch, grab,
and shoved inside the trunk of a car:
I’ve got a real bad feeling about this.
Got thrown in some outside waiting line. With these guys:
I am not happy.
Then, some clown in a smock reaches in, yanks me out by the neck and shivs me. I fly back so fast into the cage that I manage to bend the needle, but the guy who stabbed me said it was okay, the vaccine got in.
Okay? You think this was okay?
Got home, and that Krauss guy offered up some treats but, you know what?
Screw you.
Not really. More like Dis. Tracted. From The Ship Finding God.
My editor at Rebel E Publishers, affectionately known as Jayne the Impaler, is in the midst of whipping Tu’an into shape. We had quite the lively discussion about the Britanization of certain words. See, I think that certain words should retain their Brit spelling: armour, smoulder, etc., you know, that quite unnecessary “u.” Seems to me that it conveys the better sense of the word. I mean, armour is a tank; armor is a dog food company. But she, being an editor, demands consistency. The nerve.
Anyways, Tu’an is coming along nicely because Jayne is, well, good. For example, she pushed me to add a little teaser at the end to give the two or three of you reading the series a bit of a come-on. So I did. No, it’s not the first chapter of the third book of the trilogy, which shall be named Colm, but something…else. You’ll see. That is, if Jayne lets it pass.
Not that Ship Finding has been lying around eating cold pizza or anything. We’re up to 65,000 words now, and I’m still projecting about 75,000 to 85,000 to finish it. Maybe 95,000, ’cause there’s some things happening. Like the Suits showing back up. Couldn’t just leave those guys circling the dark world, now could I?
Stay tuned.
I didn’t do a pumpkin this year because none grew in my garden. The few plants that survived the Night of the Woodchucks didn’t bloom. Well, they bloomed, but produced no fruit. Suspect a dearth of honeybees caused that. And butterflies. Didn’t see hardly any of either all summer. Think it’s time to install a beehive in the backyard.
At any rate, I did grow some pretty good corn, and the stalks were lying around doing nothing, so:
Not bad. Enough to give the unwary ‘treaters a chill or two, so turned on the porch light, filled up the candy dish, and waited.
And waited.
And….no one. Just the kid next door, who ended up getting half the candy dish. And it was good stuff, Hershey Bars and things. No jellybeans and toothbrushes from me, nosireebob.
Guess I shoulda had a pumpkin.
I love board games. I’ve got probably fifty or so, mostly tactical and strategic kinds like Squad Leader and Wooden Ships and Iron Men. I have a lot of the old Avalon Hill titles and some modern ones, like Fortress America, and several Lock ‘n Load‘s like Heroes of the Pacific and Eisenbach Gap. Board games are one of my many weaknesses: I can’t pass a game store or a game booth at a convention without buying something. So when Dave Fisher, owner of Your Hobby Place, one of the best game stores in the Shenandoah Valley (if not the US), let me know they were having another block party, I had to go.
I did one with them last year, and it was a hoot, buncha fun folks running around listening to a local band and eating. This was pretty much the same,
except it was actually a benefit to help pay the medical expenses of a local family.
My set up:
Last year it was hotter than Hades. This year it was windier than the floor of Congress. Two struts on my canopy snapped, and I had a lot of fun (a) keeping the whole thing from falling down on me and/or (b) blowing away. Who said writing isn’t hazardous?
Lots of truck traffic. From the truly terrifying:
to the not-so:
The band, Quasi Flannel:
Those guys are good.
I ran into Angela Souders and J.M. Dean, two of the coolest people in America, whose acquaintance I had the pleasure to make during ID4Con. I’d post pictures but, of course, my camera batteries crapped out. Who said writing isn’t hazardous?
It was a pretty successful event, raising over $3000 for the family. Glad to be a part of it.
I broke tradition and did not buy a game. Did buy a comic book, though.
Black Bolt. Cool.
I have been an Alastair Reynolds fan ever since I picked up Revelation Space and got my mind blown. Man, you gotta read the series. Just gotta. So when I heard that he was the Guest of Honor at CapClave 2015, I had to go. Had to.
CapClave is not your run-of-the-mill scifi convention. There’s no cosplay, no girl-on-girl vampire action (at least not that I could discern), no TV or movie stars. It’s fans of scifi coming together under the behest of the Washington Science Fiction Association to celebrate the literary. It is refined, elevated, and intelligent. Why they let me in, I have no idea.
One slight drawback to it: the guests and panelists and a lot of the attendees were writers. Now, you may not have noticed this, but writers are a rather egotistical bunch. Any human being who believes their particular method of placing words on paper is excellent enough to attract readers and their hard-earned money is already in trouble. Add the particular geekery that goes with science nuts and, Holy Hannah, the validation needs were off the Richter scale. There were a few occasions I was downright cringing over the one-upsmanship and discourtesy some panelists and audience members displayed. But, hazards of the job.
And I got to hang out with Alastair Reynolds.
Well, I mean, it’s not like we were hoisting brewskis and exchanging phone numbers or anything, but I got to hear him quite a bit, including a presentation he gave about Mars in science fiction. The guy was an astronomer, so knows his stuff. He was on panels I attended like Democracy in Space (conclusion: there won’t be any), Generation Starships (there won’t be any), and Near Future Science Fiction (there’s plenty, but it gets outdated quickly).But, the best of all, I got to have coffee with the guy.
Sort of.
It was billed as a Kaffeeklatch and there were 10 other people there and you had to get your own coffee which I couldn’t because the line was too slow (a satellite Starbucks with one employee and about six Niles Crane types in front of me) and Mr. Reynolds had tea (it’s a Brit thing, you wouldn’t understand) so it wasn’t exactly coffee nor was it one on one. But, it was still great. Mr. Reynolds is charming and erudite and approachable and the conversation was informal and fun and ranged from his current collaboration with Stephen Baxter to binary stars and X-ray databases. Very cool.
Later, I got him to sign my copy of Chasm City, and even managed to slip him one of my buttons without looking too much like a helplessly geeky and desperate fan boy. Not too much.
Tell ya, even without Grandmaster Reynolds, Capclave was fantastic. I got to meet Allan Wold, Edward Lerner, Neil Clarke (of Clarkesworld fame, who is just the best guy), Walter Hunt, Jean Marie Ward, Mike McPhail, Barbara Krasnoff:
and Scott Edelman, who I’d met at AwesomeCon. I got to admire Catharine Asaro, Gordon van Gelder, Bud Sparhawk, and James Morrow from afar. And, to complete my name-dropping, I noted that an old friend from my Backspace days, Alma Katsu, was attending, but I never ran into her.
Going back next year. With, or without, Alastair Reynolds.
I went to MonsterMania again this year. It was in the same place, the Hunt Valley Inn. I set up my table in exactly the same spot:
right next to the same guy, Tj O’Connor:
Deja vu all over again, and I immediately suspected a time fold of some kind, except there were subtle differences. Tj and I had a new book each, f’rinstance. Abby showed up as expected, but, this time, not in costume. And, she added Dalton:
Captain Mango was there, but this time with the quite lovely Jenny Jannetty:
Damn photobombers.
The quite lovely Jenna Manson showed up, sans bunny mask:
We love Jenna. Bunny mask or no.
Even some of the costumes were the same. Here’s a group from last year:
Same group this year:
Okay, so, Sam is different, but, c’mon.
These guys from last year:
are these guys this year:
Bigger cleaver, but still.
Now, there were new cosplayers:
(By the way, she’s a nurse. Imagine waking up from a coma and she’s changing your IV…)
including the Killer Queen, who’s quite the guy…gal…whatever:
Still, I couldn’t shake the feeling I had been here before. Even in the bar Saturday night. Last year, it was girl-on-girl vampire action. This year, there were untoward activities, but different, such as floggings. And wrestling matches. I got bulldogged by the lovely Jenny, who can bulldog me anytime she wants to:
Damn photobombers.
I guess I’ll have to go again next year to verify if this is, indeed, some kind of warp thing. And get a rematch.
