Preview of cover for Scourge of God, by S.M. Stirling

Just got this jpeg of S.M. Stirling's new cover. This book takes place in Steve's post-Change world and reunites the reader with the MacKenzies, the Bearkillers, the Protectorate, and a whole host of new groups and cultures.

I've read it. If you like the series, you'll like this one. While in the first series, Steve took readers from science fiction to epic fantasy, in this series he takes them from epic fantasy into the age of legends. A very interesting project to watch develop, I have to say.

The email that Steve sent this in had, as a auto-generated footer that was right over the image, "Start the year off right. Easy ways to stay in shape in the new year."

Critgroup projects

So I haven't blogged yet about my last Critical Mass meeting. It was a good one. The upcoming book by MLN Hanover, I highly recommend it. It's a paranormal thriller that uses MLN's talents as a plotter and scene setter very well indeed. MLN is also known as Daniel Abraham, and the series is called The Black Sun. Publishing dates and details to follow.

Walter Jon William's book, spectacular. I haven't had this much fun reading in a long time. The main characters design Alternate Reality Games, for an example of what these look like, click here, you'll be redirected to a site where these games launch. Basically, these are games that make use of all kinds of real world interaction. You often start the game on a fake website, on which various clues are posted. For example, there will be a fake phone number to a game character; you call that phone number and listen to a voicemail or even sometimes interact with a live actor to get more clues. Thousands and hundreds of thousands of people play these and network together via internet forums to solve the puzzle. Once the game gets underway, players will receive phone calls, emails, and other communications from the game. Parts of the game are played out in real time, with players following clues to specific sites where hired actors play out a crucial scene.

So, okay, that's how ARGs work. This book's about a game that starts mixing with reality in ever more disturbing ways.

Sage Walker gave us an achingly gorgeous pair of novel starts, and Terry England's writing a short story that's in a very engaging, on the brink of singularity world. We only got to read part of that one; more to follow, I hope.

Contracts signed

Got the contract for my romance novel signed today, and a contract with a webdesigner to pretty up my E.M. Tippetts site. Now's the time to panic about it all being a big waste of time and effort because of fears that the novel won't see print, or that it will bomb once it does, or that it'll do worse than bomb, people will hate it so much that they sue me for negligent infliction of emotional distress and I'll be liable for millions of dollars....

Yeah, according to my friends, I'll be like this for a while. This is how we writers come to be overjoyed with moderate sales and little pay.

The business of setting up another pen name

So I wrote 6,000 words today. Not bad. In the meantime, I've been emailing back and forth with the marketing person at Covenant about setting up my E.M. Tippetts website. It is now online at www.emtippetts.com, but it's not much. I've contacted a web designer to doll it up a little more.

I'll keep my blog here, and just really just use that site to announce the publication of books under that name, answer any FAQ that might come along (or even inFrequently AQ) and post calendar dates, should I ever do signings or readings to promote the romance novels.

This blog refuses to move to www.emilymah.com. I'm gonna wait another day, then start calling service providers to see what gives.

Switching around the website

Starting this evening, my site will be moved to emilymah.blogspot.com, temporarily. I'm going to divide my site into two. One at www.emilymah.com, which will be this one, and another at www.emtippetts.com, which will be devoted to my spiritual romance books. It'll take up to a week to get all that working, so there will be some GoDaddy ads at this domain for a while.

Rough drafts... arg

I've written tons this weekend that I know I won't keep. So it goes. I need to get the awful stuff down on paper so that I can start dolling it up. At least things continue to roll.

Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow

How did I get to know Cory Doctorow? That's a good question. I think Cory's just a very astute networker. I first learned that he knew of my existance by finding pictures of me at a WorldCon on his website. I was surprised to see that he even got my name right (he later told me that he made sure to have my nametag in one picture so he would be able to label the pictures right.)

Other connections I've had with Cory. When I graduated Clarion West he sent my class free copies of the Complete Idiot's Guide to Publishing Science Fiction, hot off the press. I often ran into him at cons and remember him saying at a workshop panel that it had taken him five years to start selling stories after he completed Clarion. At the time it was rather heartening, as he's gone on to a stellar career.

I got to know him best when he was my instructor at Viable Paradise. Cory's an especially hardworking and conscientious instructor; he makes a point of reading everything his students have written. He's also a gifted speaker, able to give hour long talks on things like intellectual property that are engaging and interesting from beginning to end.

Of his books, my personal favorite is Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, most likely because I did part of my undergrad in economics, and because I'm one of those people who probably doesn't really "get" cyberpunk. I confess, rather a lot of it blows right past me. This book takes place in a future when humans can be backed up and restored, thus making them immortal, and when economics has evolved to be based entirely on goodwill. Thus, how rich you are depends on how others think of you. A new form of government, the ad hocracy, now controls Disney World, and the main character works on the Hall of Presidents. Somewhat depressed by being murdered, this main character and the government in charge of the Haunted Mansion are locked in a ridiculously low stakes battle about the fate of their respective rides. The novel is tongue in cheek, but only up to a certain point. Cory doesn't shy away from serious issues about identity and personal integrety as the main character chooses the path less traveled.

I also recently finished Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town, which is a fantastic book. Why isn't it my favorite? I've got a shallow reason for that. I've got a really weak stomach when it comes to gore, and Cory's an evocative writer. This world that he creates is not safe for people like me. As I read, I was constantly braced for more unpleasantness. Having said that, this is not an especially violent or graphic novel. My reaction is entirely due to Cory's skill in making the scenes engrossing and vivid. I highly recommend either novel, and really need to get reading more of his. They're in my endless stack.

The spouse

Trevor and I got married in the Albuquerque Temple in 2003. We met at church, and were two out of three singles in the entire ward at the time. Neither of us thought we'd meet anyone during our time there.

But, it only takes one. This picture was taken while we hiked Machu Picchu last fall. We went with my parents and a tour group, and this day was also my 32nd birthday.

Together, Trevor and I have also traveled to Argentina (where he served his mission), southern Mexico, Costa Rica, and the UK (where I lived for five years). We both love to see new places and we try to get somewhere Spanish speaking once a year so that Trevor can stay bilingual. Me, I'm slowly getting to the point where I'll try to converse in Spanish.

George RR Martin isn't dead

But I guess someone thought it would be cute to say that he was in a Wikipedia article which has since been taken down. Actually, the word is that the person tried posting it twice inside of an hour. George is alive and kicking, or typing at least.

Ben's book is listed on Amazon

I was very happy today to see that you can buy Ant King: And Other Storiesby Benjamin Rosenbaum on Amazon. Ben's one of my favorite short story authors, is in the top sixteen of my favorite Clarion West classmates, and saved the novel that I sold to Covenant with an amazing crit that enabled me to fix some major issues.

Private Detective Molly, by A.B. Goelman

Ari, a.k.a. A.B. Goelman was another one of my Clarion West classmates. While we were at the workshop, he wrote one of my many favorite stories of all time, Bird of Paradise. Did that one ever get published, Ari?

I just finished reading his story, Private Detective Molly, on Strange Horizons, and loved it. Ari is able to hit notes of whimsy interspersed with notes of heart-wrenching tragedy without downplaying either aspect. He also writes under the name Adam Ferguson, as he did for his short story, The Prophet, on Dragons, Knights, and Angels.

On top of writing great stories, he also makes a mean miso soup.

EDIT: Okay, Ari just emailed me to let me know that Bird of Paradise is still unsold. This is tragic, as it's a beautiful story. The main character is a young girl named Tzipporah and the setting is Argentina during World War Two. Of the 96 stories I read at Clarion, this one still remains clear in my memory. I hope it finds a home somewhere, sometime.

Good days

Today was the kind of day that I live for. The novel's become really, really hard. I'm having to work like crazy writing, deleting, cutting, pasting, chewing on pens, pacing the floor. It's been work. I am so grateful to have the main stress in my life be writing. Not only is the book having problems, I need to fix them. I've got to get this off to the publisher.

For so many years, writing was what I did in spare moments. Half an hour a day and half a Saturday in law school, whenever I had some spare time in undergrad, from 5am until it was time to leave for work when I was a lawyer, and if I was lucky, I'd be home in time to do another 20-40 min before bed. During all that time, the only person who cared whether or not I finished a project was me. Now things are starting to change, and I can only hope that continues.

Writing to me was never about fame or fortune. It's been about hard work with little reward, inconvenient deadlines, nasty cover art, projects getting orphaned by editors and put off for years. No matter how much of this I've seen, though, I still think, "Yeah, that's what I want. Sign me up!"

So today was a good day. The writing wasn't great, but there was lots of writing.

Finishing up for this month's meeting

I want to get another chunk out to Critical Mass before this month's meeting. The more feedback I can get from them, the more personal crises I can have about how inadequate I am.

I mean... er... the more I can polish this book. I got 2,700 words written in this sitting. Not sure how much I got down for the day. It's been stop and go.

Preliminary Nebula Ballot

Jay Lake, the 2004 Campbell Award winner who can do the flippy hair thing, has posted the Preliminary Nebula Ballot on his LiveJournal. He himself is nominated in the novel category for his book, Mainspring, and three graduates of Viable Paradise are nominated in three different categories.

The Outback Stars, by Sandra McDonald (VP V) is up for best novel. A Flight of Numbers Fantastique Strange, by Beth Bernobich (VP V) is up for best novelette, and Captive Girl, by Jennifer Pelland (VP VI) is up for best short story.

Woot! Go Carrie!

So the word is that Carrie Vaughn's latest, Kitty and the Silver Bullet, is number 23 on the New York Times bestseller list. And I can't find a copy anywhere!!!! People keep buying them from the bookstores, darn them! (Excuse the strong language). Actually, wait, I should be telling anyone reading this blog to go buy a copy. Please do. Really.

*mutters about price of gas and calculates how far to drive to get one versus waiting on a delivery from Amazon*

Hate being sick

I've had a cold this week, and it started out not so bad, but now it's really annoying. I like breathing, really. I wish I could do more if it and want this virus to get out of my system and leave me alone. Meanwhile, the first part of the novel is out to Critical Mass. It's past the stage where I can see the problems, thus making it ripe for my colleagues to pounce on it and tear it to shreds.

I remain the most inefficient writer I've ever met, having condensed about 190 pages into 72 for the beginning. I'm slow. I need to get a lot of material down before I figure out what the most interesting and compelling plot elements are.

Being in Critical Mass for six years, I had hoped to hone my first draft skills. I'd thought that with regular crits, I'd write with fewer silly errors and new writer mistakes each time around. Critical Mass has driven me to rewrite and rewrite like mad.

And the result hasn't been better first drafts. It's been greater endurance to plow through rewrite after rewrite. I have 44 versions of my first published novel on my hard drive. That is an insane number that most professionals would cringe at. The conventional wisdom is that that many drafts kills the central idea and produces an overworked, mangled piece. But, that's what it took to make that novel saleable; I workshopped it with different groups of readers, getting new ones each round who hadn't seen the earlier drafts, and the comments were absolutely consistent. The later drafts were better.

So, it appears that this is what I'll be doing for the rest of my life. Lots of freakin' rewrites....

Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine

Rejection today from ASIM. Not a huge suprise, as the story is very American in bent, but I thought it worth a try. They're a great market. The editors were very helpful and easy to work with when the .rtf file came through corrupted. They kept track of my submission when I re-emailed it from a different address with no trouble.

Members of Critical Mass: S.M. Stirling, Part II

So as I said in my last post, S.M. Stirling has two series going right now. Aside from doing post-technology, high fantasy, alternate history, he also does adventure science fiction alternate history in the spirit of Edgar Rice Burroughs. He wrote The Sky People a couple of years ago, and that one went in the direction I expected it to. The premise is that when Earth developed early spaceflight, landers sent to Mars and Venus found both planets inhabited by homo sapiens and other suspiciously Earth-like fauna.

The Sky People takes place on Venus and follows a group of Earth humans on a classic, pulp-esque journey on this wild and unexplored planet. There are giant direwolves and dinosaurs and women wearing fur bikinis. There are men being heros and women being Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I thought it was okay. Like I said, this isn't my usual thing.

Then Steve wrote In the Courts of the Crimson Kings, which went entirely against expectation, and I mean that in a good way. Unlike the wild and untamed Venus, Mars has an ancient society with a very advanced social order and bio-technology. The place just creaks with age and is sagging under the weight of its history. It's gorgeous. Then a group of Earth humans comes into the picture, with their superior strength, thanks to their high-gravity homeword, and the adventures begin. Steve's writing showed real insight and humor into the style of story he likes to tell. Suffice it to say, many cliches get remixed or thrown out altogether. I found this book to be a great ride, even if it isn't my kind of thing at all.

Members of Critical Mass: S.M. Stirling, Part I

Steve's got two series going right now, so I'll post about each one separately. Steve, better known as S.M. Stirling, began writing about the Change in his book, Island in the Sea of Time, which he wrote before I ever met him. In this book the island of Nantucket is shunted over three thousand years back in time. A few years after I joined Critical Mass, he began work on a series that deals with what happened to the rest of the world when Nantucket disappeared. Technology stopped working. Everything from electricity to combustion engines to even gunpowder fizzled out.

I began this series expecting a typical adventure story from Steve. He does a lot of high adventure alternate history, which isn't what I normally read. These books hooked me to the point that I chose to read the doorstop sized chunks that Steve submits every month first, before the rest of the submissions. His concept is very clever. Out of this post-Change chaos comes a mythic society, one where people beat car parts into swords and build castles out of concrete. Then magic starts to work, sort of. Degree by degree the genre changes from science fiction to high fantasy.

Watching Steve write has been a real learning experience. One thing about his long submissions is that I see draft after draft, how he reworks the prose and moves scenes around. He clearly spends long days at it, and the results speak for themselves. His books are hitting various bestseller lists. As he puts it, "After decades of hard work, suddenly I'm an overnight success."

Back to the grind

Only 570 words today. Still worried about those corrupted files....

Clarkesworld

Got a rejection today from Clarkesworld Magazine, personalized with lots of specific feedback. These are the best kinds of rejections, imo, because they're useful, and they also show that the editor read and thought about the piece. Nowadays, they can rarely afford to do that.

Enjoying the wealth

I bought a chair today with my earnings from 2007. Well, okay, I didn't spend all of my earnings from 2007 on that chair. I also got a lamp. Suffice it to say that I won't be paying off the mortgage any time soon.

Rejections from The Greensboro Review and Bat City Review

It's been a slow time for rejections. Got two today, one from The Greensboro Review and one from Bat City Review.

Anyone heard of MSN mail corrupting attachments?

I have horrible luck with computers. Weird stuff always happens to the ones I own. Now, MSWord document that I send as an attachment via my MSN account comes through corrupted. I can read the documents on my computer, I can print them out, and I can email via other email programs without a problem.

Anyone out there ever heard of this problem and know a fix? I'm using other email programs for the moment, but I worry about this being the beginning of other, bigger problems. This would be consistent with my history....

And I really don't want to be losing all of my MSWord files. I've printed all my stories and my last novel out just in case.

App period for Viable Paradise has begun

I went to VPX, meaning the tenth Viable Paradise, and highly recommend it for anyone looking for an intensive workshop experience with professional writers and editors. My instructors were Cory Doctorow, Debra Doyle, Steven Gould, James Patrick Kelly, James D. MacDonald, Laura Mixon, and Teresa and Patrick Nielsen-Hayden (Tor editors). The workshop is held in a lovely inn on Martha's Vinyard, in the fall.

Writing on vacation

I got about 15,000 or so words written, not bad. I've rearranged a bunch of scenes in the beginning.