What bumps books sales?

December 31st 2009 at 4:24 pm

Jim Hines has a graph.
I have a similar graph, and the graph looks almost identical (other books bump sales, release is a big spike, Christmas another).
Unlike Jim, my graph has some smaller spikes as a result of a regional book tour I did with John Scalzi, appearing on a local access cable show, and one [...]

Crowdsourcing FedEx? There’s a Tobias S. Buckell story for that!

December 31st 2009 at 9:05 am

Over at Futurismic Paul points out an article by Chase Saunders about ‘crowdsourcing’ mail delivery.
If you read Metatropolis, my story Stochasti-city has this little segment:

Suppose you had a package in Los Angeles that needed to get to New York. When I was a kid you’d go to a centralized post office, pay for [...]

Watch out Czechs!

December 30th 2009 at 8:55 pm

This magazine arrived in the mail today, the issue of Pevnost, which includes my story Waiting For The Zephyr in it.
I’m hoping a lot of Czech Stephenie Meyer fans pick it up and read it in utter confusion.
I’m just kidding. I know Pevnost is doing the media covers. The last few issues of SF Age [...]

A year, a decade

December 30th 2009 at 8:45 pm

How do you wrap up a year? A decade? I was wondering that while on my walk tonight, meandering along Riley Creek in the footsteps of what looked like a couple other people who had the same idea and their dogs’ zig-zagged/excited pawprints in the snow.
I’m still unpacking 2009. I’m glad I stayed away from [...]

Moff’s Law

December 21st 2009 at 12:59 pm

And we shall call this “Moff’s Law.”
Yes, I’m on board!
Of all the varieties of irritating comment out there, the absolute most annoying has to be “Why can’t you just watch the movie for what it is??? Why can’t you just enjoy it? Why do you have to analyze it???”
…
Believe me, the person who is annoying [...]

Authors behaving crack-head-edly

December 17th 2009 at 11:50 am

Over at Making Light, Teresa points out Candace Sams is doing their best to outdo Ann Rice in ‘attack the readers/bad reviews’ lunacy, including my favorite spit-taking comment of the week:

“I would suggest readers view Harriet Klausner’s reviews – she is a “professional” reviewer with experience.”

You mean this Klausner?
I love it.
As Teresa says: [...]

Daily slogging

December 14th 2009 at 2:14 pm

In some ways, I feel like I’m learning to write all over again these days. One, because I’m really forcing myself to use, and consider voice more than I have before. It means I read each paragraph as I write and think “is that how this character would flavor that paragraph?” And then I rewrite [...]

SF Author Peter Watts beaten and imprisoned at border crossing

December 11th 2009 at 1:21 pm

From Peter Watts’ journal:

If you buy into the Many Worlds Intepretation of quantum physics, there must be a parallel universe in which I crossed the US/Canada border without incident last Tuesday. In some other dimension, I was not waved over by a cluster of border guards who swarmed my car like army ants [...]

Where things stand: what I’m writing

December 8th 2009 at 5:51 pm

In October I wrapped up the last of my freelance nonfiction project obligations and various short stories (like Dirt for the latest Halo book) owed to various people. That got my medical bills paid and money buffered in the bank so I could get serious about what was next on deck.
In some ways, 2009 got [...]

Writing neepery: short story pay!

December 7th 2009 at 5:17 pm

John Scalzi’s been talking about short stories: how much he’s made at them, and how some people try to pay insultingly low rates and some writers pay it, something he calls Writer Stockholm Syndrome, which I love.
This spurs thought about handling short fiction from Sarah Monette, Cat Valente, and Jim Hines.
Lots of good thoughts all [...]