Friends

I just read shweta_narayan's March story at Strange Horizons, "Nira and I."

It's very, very evocative, and it makes me think about the importance of bearing witness, and the recent and ongoing struggles in Iran.

Me and Charlaine Harris before here event at Borders Oak Brook tonight. It's so cool that I know celebrities.

Needless to say, she had many more in attendance than I had last week :)

They had an article on True Blood in the NYT this morning. Charlaine is keeping HBO alive all by her lil' ol' self.

She already knew Chats, but this was her first encounter with the Sprog.

Along with some people from Borders, Don R. from Penguin was there (Executive Director, National Accounts). He either knew about me and my books or did a fantastic job of pretending that he did. So that's something.

One thing Jim Butcher and Charlaine Harris have is a great sense of humor that comes through in their writing. My jokes read like jokes, not like humor, though every now and then I do a bit of very dark gallows humor that works. They don't do froth, but they do have nice repartee between characters who know and love (or sometimes hate) each other and I think that's one of the things you need to reach their stratospheric heights.

Of course Charlaine's whole mindreading thing is so much fun, because it allows you to get inside different characters heads without "head hopping" leading to the multilayer snark Charlaine can do. It's technique, but windowpane technique. The author's slight-of-hand is invisible, as it should be.

Normally, I pretty much hate anyone with such an enviable audience and career. What did Gore Vidal say? "Every time a friend succeeds, I die a little." There's a lot of that in me. But I don't mind Charlaine's success at all; she reminds me too much of one of my relatives, so it's like your quirky, bubbly aunt hitting the lotto. You just shout "wheeee!" and dance with her.

BTW, Borders was serving this "True Blood" smoothie concoction that was really tasty. Mostly raspberry, and bright red as Tom Savini's fake blood in Dawn of the Dead. I don't know if it's something they're doing in the cafes nationwide, but try one if you get a chance.

I'll be in San Francisco next week for some more medical appointments in connection with my cancer. Since I'm finding it logistically impossible to schedule time with people, I thought I'd throw one of my group dinners.

On Monday 7/20 at 6pm, calendula_witch and I will be at Kezar Bar & Grill, at the corner of Cole and Carl in Cole Valley. Exact address:

900 Cole St
San Francisco, CA 94117-4316
(415) 681-7678

This is just off the N-Judah street car line, among other things.

This is an open dinner. That means if you're reading this, you're welcome to come, whether we're old friends, nodding acquaintances or total strangers. If you think you'll be there, please let us know. That way we can warn the restaurant.

Originally published at jlake.com.

Your Monday moment of zen.

Old truck, photographed by me in Mendocino County, CA.

Originally published at jlake.com.

1,500 words on the plane. Closing in on the ending. Definitely running short, but as calendula_witch says, I have left out some key descriptive passages etc. Fred's been running ahead of chemo to get the plot and story bones sorted out, I think.

( And a bit of the old WIP... )

Originally published at jlake.com.

A Field Guide to Surreal Botany is now available in another brick-and-mortar bookshop: Pandemonium Books & Games in Cambridge, MA. Pandemonium has been servicing the science fiction, fantasy, and gaming needs of the Cambridge community for the past twenty years, and it's just the type of specialty bookshop that I know I'd be spending way too much time and money in were it nearby. It's also nice to see a bookstore that specializes in science fiction staying afloat right now, and they deserve the support. Here are the deets:

Pandemonium Books & Games
4 Pleasant Street
Cambridge, MA 02139 USA
617-547-3721
orders@pandemoniumbooks.com

If you happen to live near this fine bookshop, please consider paying them a visit and picking up a copy of Surreal Botany whilst you're there. Supplies are small right now, just a handful of copies, but there's a good chance that they'll reorder if the existing stock gets snapped up.

As always, you're welcome to order the book from our ordering page, but please also patronize independent bookstores such as Pandemonium. They're the lifeblood of the bookselling industry, and are the ones willing to take a chance on indie titles like our own. It's hard enough for independent bookstores to keep their doors open in these tough economic times, but the shops that specialize in just one genre have an even tougher time of it. Please show them some love.

Many thanks to Surreal Botany contributor Cassandra Phillips-Sears for persuading Pandemonium to carry copies of the book.

Good bye, aloha shirt man. Enjoy that permanent Con in the sky.

Originally published at jlake.com.

ugh. That's pretty much all I have to say about the current book-to-be-reviewed on my desk.

In other news, got a short story nearly ready to go out (it's an old one, never satisfactorily finished, never sent out, but Real Soon Now it should be ready), sent 10 queries via email and got 4 positive responses so far--"positive" means, 'yes, we'll look at your CV and clips and keep you on file', not 'we've got a job for you'. Not yet, at least.

So overall, it's been an 'up' kind of day.

But I'd like some fireworks.

# of queries read last week: 163
# of partials/manuscripts requested: 0
genre of partials/manuscripts requested: n/a

Dear Authors:

Someone wrote me back recently in response to my email declining to read their material. They were, shall we say, put out that I listed myself as "actively looking" on a website and then did not agree to read their manuscript. Am I to infer from their response that one cannot be both particular in what one chooses to request and also actively looking? Is a person that goes into a bookstore and only buys one book not actively looking for something to read? This writer was not the first to make this implication, though they did so in a manner that I deemed to be on the impolite and unprofessional side, which is why it caught my attention. But not in a good way, of course. (I don't encourage going this route. Or using language that might make a biker's mother blush.)

And let me not mention that the person in question was submitting something that my website and the DMLA website and agentquery.com all list as something that I do not represent. Nor shall we dwell on the fact that the website they mention that lists me is not one that I have heard of or that wrote and confirmed any details whatsoever. (Why are there so many random sites like this? And why do so many people believe everything they read on the internet? And why don't more people fact check? But, I digress.)

My suspicion is that the person in question was not familiar with the daunting statistics of authors writing versus available agents and publishers to supply them with the opportunity to have their book represented and sold to the general public. (As an aside, someone recently posted on the subject of "landing an agent" and how they found the phrase problematic -- it was a writer not an agent who said it, but I got where they were going. One cannot acquire an agent in much the same manner as one obtains a gallon of milk. Nor, they argued, is an agent a possession -- a position with which I heartily agree, of course.)

I find it ironic that I'm writing this during a week when I requested no submissions. Regardless, I do not feel that I am less actively looking for new books that will excite me with plots or characters or settings that I can get caught up with, or ideas that will make editors fall all over themselves in making an offer. Suffice to say that I would hardly be reading hundreds of queries a week and thousands of queries a year unless I was actively looking.

Our landlord had to give the apartment in the building that was going to go to terri_osborne to someone else due to an unforeseen emergency. Unfortunately, Terri could only afford the place because she wouldn't be required to do first/last/security, just start paying the rent. So she needs to find a place elsewhere (which will require that), which means she can't save up the money until the end of the year.

It's been a roller-coaster for the two of us, but after this weekend, we were both feeling okay about things -- but that was predicated on the clean break that would come when she moved out.

How-some-ever, we also roomed together at Shore Leave, and drove there and back together, without any significant difficulties. We should be able to manage for the next five months or so.

To add insult to injury, I took my parents' minivan down the hill to do some food shopping. I parked in a Staples parking lot, intending to go into the Staples after I did the food shopping. I came back to find someone trying to tow the minivan. This is what I get for not going into the Staples first -- they have security cameras, and if someone parks there and doesn't go into the store (or one of the ones in the same center), they call the tow truck.

$100 later, and I got the minivan back. Yeesh. Oh, and I didn't bother shopping at Staples. Fuckers.

Do you like getting newsletters from writers?  Do writer newsletters annoy you?  Do you feel spammed?  Do you love them?

What do you love/hate about them?

I get two newsletters.  They're both text, so they don't take any time to load.  I like them fine, but they don't "wow" me.  What wows you?  Pictures? Exclusive novel excerpts? Stories about regular life stuff?  What is your favorite writer newsletter?  I'd really, really like to hear what you think about this.  (yes, I'm thinking about doing a newsletter, but would hate for people to feel spammed.)

Oh, and here's a reminder about the awesome signing with awesome writers I get to participate in on Saturday.  If you're in the area, please stop in!

Fantasy Becomes Reality at Escape Fiction
( Six awesome writers in one place! )( Six amazing authors! )</div>

The Medal of Honor was authorized for the U.S. Army by the United States Congress (1862)

PHOCENSIAN DESPAIR

PHOCENSIAN DESPAIR describes a situation in which victory is snatched unexpectedly from the jaws of defeat. The phrase derives from the men of Phocis, who, during Philip II of Macedon's reign (386-336 BCE), were subject to perpetual attacks from their neighbors for daring to farm the sacred field of Delphi. So great was the Phocensians' despair that they vowed to end their lives in a mass human sacrifice. However, just before mounting the pyre on which their women and children were stacked, the Phocensians mounted a last-ditch attack on their foes and defeated them.


Hpapiness: a good bank account, a good cook, and a good digestion.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-78)