An Unconvincing Narrative

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I like them, I do, Sam I Am.

All found one day after we got back from AggieCon.  Quite a bit of work for only five chickens.

Laura made a souffle.

As they say, “You can’t play the blues without breaking a few eggs.”

There were a few comments recently that have caused me to explicitly state my comment policy.

The specific comments seem to be from the sort of person who would walk up to someone they don’t know and ask them “Why on earth are you wearing that hideous blouse?”  When the blouse-wearer is offended, the critic seems genuinely surprised and baffled at the reaction.  After all, they’re right.  That is, not only are they convinced of their opinion, they’re convinced everyone must share it, even the wearer of the blouse.

If you want to read the comments in question, they are 21,  22, 24, and 25 on the Contact Me page.  If you want to read them with their vowels intact, browse through the RSS Feed for Comments to find the appropriate ones–the Disemvoweller does not effect the feed.  Do not be confused by the different names. The gentleman in question posted as Sean first, then as Greg, but his IP and email addresses were the same.

(Mr. “Noam Chomsky” seems to be a different poster who thinks I only want “Ass-kissing” at this site.)

Patrick Nielsen Hayden’s YA reprint anthologies New Magics and New Skies (published in the US in 2005 and 2004) are coming out in Korea. I think it’s cool because my Hugo and Nebula nominated novelette, “Peaches For Mad Molly” is in the New Skies part.

I’m waiting for the exciting royalty check that will ensue. Well, mostly I’m just chuffed to appear in Korean in short fiction. I’ve already been published in Korea with editions of Jumper and Jumper: Griffin’s Story.

I’ve heard that SFWA Grandmaster James Gunn will give a keynote speech for the Cushing Library’s Exhibit above.  I wish I could be there.  After all, for the last 35 years I’ve witnessed some of that “SF & Fantasy” at TAMU.  I remember the first time I ever met Jim Gunn–he came down for something and Dr. Kroiter brought him to the SF as Literature class to talk to us.  I hadn’t read much of his work at that time but I was a big fan of the TV series The Immortal.

Since then I’ve learned usual lesson.  The source material is almost always better.

Brad Denton was a graduate student under him, writing some of his early short fiction in the program.  Read his post about meeting Dr. Gunn back in college, “First Contact with a Grand Master.”

I owe a long post on what a great time I had at AggieCon but for now let me say that my piece from last May’s Analog, “A Story With Beans” is on the 2009 Locus Recommended Reading List.  It’s also been picked up for three best-of-the-year anthologies.

That’s nice.

I’m sitting on a panel about blogging at AggieCon with the queen of snark, Caroline Spector, but she isn’t being very snarky.

Click the Pic for their blog with all the up to date stuff

I’m the Writer Guest of Honor at AggieCon 41. I’ve known most of the guests listed below longer than I’ve known my own wife (who is also a guest.)  Selina Rosen, Toastmaster is the only one I haven’t met.

Editor Guest of Honor: Ellen Datlow

Artist Guest of Honor: David Lee Anderson

Media Guest of Honor: Marv Wolfman

Toastmaster: Selina Rosen

Special Guest: Martha Wells

Special Guest: Noel Wolfman

Hope to see you there!

Over at her blog, Kristine Kathryn Rusch has been writing a series of ongoing posts called The Feelancer’s Survival Guide. This weeks post is about Jealousy and the line I’ve bolded below really struck me–like with a brick to the head struck me.

But jealousy isn’t about “them.” It’s about you.  What you want. What you’re missing.  And it’s also about your attitude.

We’ll get to the attitude in a minute.  You can find the key to what you want and what you’re missing once you figure out what’s making you jealous.  You might think you’re jealous of your friend’s lovely store, when really, you’re jealous of your friend’s thriving business—the one that allowed her to remodel her store in such a gorgeous fashion.

Figure out what it is that you are truly jealous of and you have the key to your own heart. [emphasis mine]

Then, figure out how the person you’re jealous of got that thing that makes you jealous.  Here are the unacceptable answers in this category: Oh, she’s more talented than I am. Oh, she’s prettier than I am. Oh, she’s luckier than I am. Oh, she’s more devious than I am.

Those comparisons do no one any good.  You have to step out of your emotional framework which is (sorry) I want what you have and I can’t have it. Waaa! and become a full fledged professional.  You have to calm down and look at the other person’s situation dispassionately.

There are 43 posts/chapters in her series so far.  Go here for the table of contents.

Offered without comment.

Photo by Al Grillo, Associated Press

One day after word came that Sarah Palin is joining FoxNews, Ireland’s biggest bookie reports that about half of bettors doubt the ex-Alaska governor can keep the gig a year.

Calling her “gaffe-prone,” bookmaker PaddyPower.com adds that the minority group she’s most likely to offend first is gays/lesbians/bisexuals (4-1), followed by African Americans and Muslims (both at 6-1).

Least likely to bear the initial insult: the Irish, the infirm and Inuits (all tied at 20-1), and Jehovah’s Witnesses (25-1).

Philly.com

A meditation on disability, beauty, and augmentation. My favorite line? “Pamela Anderson has more prosthesis than I do and nobody calls her disabled.”

That’s why.

(Zeppelin under construction 1933)

Ursula K. Le Guin resigned from the Author’s Guild over their so called settlement with Google.  I have very mixed feelings about the Google Rights Grab but I am totally in agreement that it is plain wrong for one party to appropriate another party’s property unilaterally.  And that’s what their so-called settlement does.

Ms. Le Guin says in her resignation letter:

I am not going to rehearse any arguments pro and anti the “Google settlement.” You decided to deal with the devil, as it were, and have presented your arguments for doing so. I wish I could accept them. I can’t. There are principles involved, above all the whole concept of copyright; and these you have seen fit to abandon to a corporation, on their terms, without a struggle.

So, after being a loyal if invisible member for so long, I am resigning from the Guild. I am, however, retaining membership in the National Writers Union and the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, both of which opposed the “Google settlement.” They don’t have your clout, but their judgment, I think, is sounder, and their courage greater.

Now she is also collecting the name of professional writers who want to be counted with her on this issue.  Read her full resignation letter and the follow up over at the Bookview Cafe.  And leave your name there, too, if you think it stinks like I do.

Last night I did my usual hour of Aikido followed immediately by an hour of Iaido. Halfway through Iaido class we were told to sit down and then two of us were called up. Shoden, Sensei said. We did the twelve forms (which I haven’t done in months since we’ve been doing the standing forms from Shindo Munen Ryu lately) and I completely blanked on the last part of #8. He gave me another chance to do it at the end and it came back to me.  By the way, the person above is performing the form I messed up on.

Sensei promoted us both to Shodan, the first rank I’ve had in Iaido.

Mur Lafferty, writer and creator of such award-winning Podcasts as I Should Be Writing, Playing For Keeps, Heaven, Lessons of a Geek Fu Master, and The Takeover, is hosting a new podcast for Tor.Com.

For over a year, Tor.com has brought you excellent short fiction on our site, but now, podnovelist extraordinaire Mur Lafferty is making the audio of these stories available to you in podcast form. We’ll be bringing you both new fiction and our archived stories, so don’t worry if you’ve missed anything archived on the site. The podcast will also include mention of the recent topics on the Tor.com blog, convention reports, and interviews from time to time.

First episode features “After the Coup” by John Scalzi, second features “Overtime” by Charlie Stross, third features “Farewell Performance” by Nick Mamatas, and the fourth features “Bugs In the Arroyo” by me.

If you do the subscribe thing, you can grab the pod feed or download the individual audio files manually at http://www.tor.com/rss/category/TorDotStories (or through the above links.)

Scott Edelman, over on Twitter, pointed out this amazingly awful attack on the great writers of science fiction by David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service. It’s not quite James Bond, Her Majesty’s Secret Service, but it does have a ring to it.

Anyway, his post, titled Beware of Science Fiction, uses Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Sir Arthur C. Clarke, Kurt Vonnegut, and Gene Roddenberry, as examples of agnostic or atheistic proponents. His descriptions are factual, using quotes from the writers in question. After reading every one of the quotes, my reaction is “Right on!” but he seems to see them as, uh, damning.

He finishes with:

Science fiction is intimately associated with Darwinian evolution. Sagan and Asimov, for example, were prominent evolutionary scientists. Sci-fi arose in the late 19th and early 20th century as a product of an evolutionary worldview that denies the Almighty Creator. In fact, evolution IS the pre-eminent science fiction. Beware!

So, I’m guessing that evidence based science is just right out of the picture, for him.

I laughed when I read the informational paragraph at the bottom of the website which includes:

OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY IS NOT DEVOTIONAL BUT IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR.

In conclusion, I’m making a unilateral deal with him. He shouldn’t read ANY Science Fiction and I’ll promise never to read his web site again.

(also posted at Eat Our Brains)

Very interesting post by Nicola Griffith about why fundamentally flawed books end up on the bestseller lists.

Blockbuster-book buying isn’t about books. It’s about human behaviour and group dynamics. It’s about belonging. The blockbuster consumer hears people talking about the the secret codes underlying national monuments, or vampires vs. werewolves, and they want to join in the conversation. Just as they haven’t spent much time thinking about dress design, they’ve never considered how narrative works. They don’t have the critical tools to see that the book is ugly and badly made. All they know is that they’re joining in and having a blast. They aren’t habitual readers; they have time/inclination for one book a year, so they pick the one that they’ve heard their coworkers and fellow students and clients raving about. A blockbuster novel is like a Halloween costume: it only has to last one night and provide something to talk about in the morning. It’s a way to feel part of the party.