New Worlds: Greasing Palms

Oct. 3rd, 2025 05:02 pm
swan_tower: (Default)
[personal profile] swan_tower
For October, my loyal patrons in the New Worlds Patreon have voted for a turn toward the field of economics! Though what we're talking about this first week could potentially have gone into the "law and crime" category instead, as we're talking about bribery . . . comment over there!

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/UOvoSd)
lydamorehouse: (nic & coffee)
[personal profile] lydamorehouse
 Of course now that things are underway, it only now occurs to me that I could have easily had a Gaylaxicon icon and then those of you who wanted to skim or skip would have been forewarned. 

I wavered on whether or not I wanted to go to the GoH dinner last night, especially when I found out that [personal profile] tallgeese was not coming because he didn't feel well. The things that propelled me out the door were 1) Mason had planned to make a fancy curry dish for himself and Shawn.I tend to be the default cook when I'm home and I didn't want to come between that; and 2) I'd just been through one of these in Capclave and... frankly? Without the right people it can be fairly deadly.

We met out at Heather's in Minneapolis, a place I have never been before. They had a lovely, long table for us out on the patio. Turns out that Emma Törzs (rhymes with dirge--so, like terrge,) used to work with the Heather of Heather's, so that's kind of cool. I ended up, by accident, sitting in between KD Edwards and Emma, with Jim Johnson at the end of the table on the other side of KD (Keith.)  I should have, as soon as she arrived, switched places with Emma because I was pretty good at keeping the left side of the table entertained and Emma ended up somewhat stuck in conversation with someone who was, shall we say, enthusiastic in a hyperfixated way about a singular subject about which is was unclear that Emma was similarly enthusiastic. I asked her, later, if I should have done more to rescue her, but she said it was enjoyable enough though she did appreciate Bast and my efforts when we were able to pry her back into the larger conversation. To be fair to this person? I do the same thing sometimes?  We're all nerds here, So no shade. 

After a very lovely dinner, where I got to watch KD Edward's shoulders visibly relax when I explained that Minnesota is a blue state and that Minneapolis/St. Paul is so blue it might as well be navy (he's living in North Carolina), we all trundled over to Dreamhaven for the reading. 

I sort of thought that my herding cats portion of the evening was over, but Anton tapped me to do introductions so I jumped up to do that. I probably should have done more "here's a quick bio" of everyone and I managed to stumble over Emma's last name (terrrge! Like dirge!) which sucked, and I think, too, I should have had everyone go in the reverse order that we started with. Ending with Nghi Vo, instead of, like I ended up prompting, starting with her and ending with Jim Johnson. Especially since, unbeknowst to me, despite the fact that Jim is an author of several books, he decided instead to read the introduction to his newest Star Trek: Adventures book--which was... again, let's just say less high energy than spirit cannibals, which is what Nghi started with. 

BUT! The event was super well attended. Dreamhaven ran out of chairs and, really, room. (That bookstore is what you find when you look up cramped and byzantine in the dictionary.) I don't have even an unofficial count, but if I had to guess I'd say over 30. We ended up even getting an on the spot sponsor-level membership for the convention out of the deal. It was by almost all measures a success.

So yay!

Now, before I head outside to do a little more painting on the fence, I need to time one of my stories. There's a woman in-town, Cole, who runs SciFi Reading Hour at the Bryant-Lake Bowl and she's looking for an emergency replacement for their November 2nd show. I don't know that she's considering me for that slot, but she did ask me to time one of my stories when read aloud. So, I need to do that for her in case it will work out.

Then, it's off to the convention this afternoon.

TWICE in October

Oct. 2nd, 2025 04:23 pm
lovelyangel: Sana RTB Special in Japan (Sana Concert)
[personal profile] lovelyangel
TWICE One in a Mill10n Documentary Movie Trailer
TWICE One in a Mill10n Documentary Movie Trailer

This week TWICE announced the North America / Europe Leg of their This Is For Concert Tour. This portion of the tour starts in January 2026, and the group is returning to Seattle!

The expected bad news is that the ticketing is handled by Ticketmaster. Boo! Ticket presale is Thursday, October 9 – and it will be a random and chaotic bloodbath. I’m signed up for the presale and will be among the thousands and thousands of ONCE in the dreaded waiting room. Will I get a good seat? Will I get a seat at all? Who knows?

I’ve done my research on Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle, and I know where I want to sit. What one wants isn’t necessarily what one gets. And Ticketmaster hikes their prices for the best seats. Let’s just say I’ll be anxiety-ridden all morning – and perhaps the day before.

On the more peaceful side, the nationwide release of One in a Mill10n (One in a Million) – the 10th anniversary TWICE documentary movie – begins on October 20. (Movie Trailer - YouTube) At my local Cinemark Theater, the movie is showing all week. I bought a ticket for opening night. Can’t wait!

Books read, late September

Oct. 2nd, 2025 05:13 pm
mrissa: (Default)
[personal profile] mrissa
 

Kobby Ben Ben, No One Dies Yet. This is one of the most overtly gay books I have ever read. Gosh is there plot-essential homosexuality going on here. It's largely about the relationships between Ghanaians and the Americans who are visiting for Ghana's Year of Return, and we don't get many books like this in the US and I'm glad that's shifting, but also it means that some books will be quite a lot of "interesting in ways for which I am not the target audience."

Sylvie Cathrall, A Letter from the Lonesome Shore. Second and so far as I know last in its series. Not as strong as the first one. When I say that I like books with established pairings and not just watching people form new relationships all the time, this is not what I mean. It felt to me like the central couple's excitement and nervousness in dealing with each other was the main source of tension/anticipation in the first book in retrospect, because here it was a lot of cooing at/about each other in ways that...if these people were my real life friends, I would be happy for them but I would also want to get back to the subject at hand. Same with this. Ah well, still worth reading and I'll keep an eye out for what she does next.

Zen Cho, Spirits Abroad. Reread. Oh gosh I love this collection. It's one of my favorites, and with each story I reread, I thought, "oh, this one! I love this one!" Yay. Yay.

Paul Cornell and Rachael Smith, Who Killed Nessie?. I like cryptics, and I like Paul Cornell's work, but I probably wouldn't have sought this graphic novel out on my own. But since someone else brought it into the house I was perfectly happy to read it; it was fun.

Ben Davis, Art in the After-Culture: Capitalist Crisis and Cultural Strategy. Kindle. Davis uses the art movements of 20th century crisis eras to discuss different responses possible and how well they work. Interesting stuff, useful for the current moment.

Margaret Frazer, Strange Gods, Strange Men. Kindle. Another of her short pieces, a little farther afield but not particularly substantive. I expected this; I've already read the substantive ones.

Carolyn Ives Gilman, Arkfall. Kindle. This was an airplane double-feature with the Cathrall above; I had no idea that the theme of that flight was going to be "undersea science fiction and getting along with our neighbors," but it was and that was just fine with me. The setting was particularly vivid here.

Matthew Goodwin, Latinx Rising: An Anthology of Latinx Science Fiction and Fantasy. Read for book club. Most of the stories I liked were by authors I already liked, and the amount of sexism was startling considering how old a book it isn't. Not a favorite, I'm afraid, despite having some favorite authors in it.

Tove Jansson, Comet in Moominland and Finn Family Moomintroll. Rereads. For a mysterious upcoming project. Is it ever a bad choice to revisit Moomins: of course it is not. Unless you have not visited them in the first place, in which case what joy you have ahead.

Selma Lagerlöf, The Wonderful Adventures of Nils. Reread. So mysterious. The least of the rereads of this fortnight for me, because its didacticism suits me less well than the other books (and in fact less well than this author's adult works; I'm glad I went on to read them, because they're a different beast). On the other hand: idyllic romantic Swedish landscape writing, am I the target audience for that, sure, absolutely.

Suzanne Levine, Unfaithful: A Translator's Memoir. This is an example of a person who lived an interesting life but did not necessarily write an interesting memoir about it. I would have loved more about her translation work, more nitty gritty, what it was like to work with the notable authors she worked with. Instead it was a not particularly deep, not particularly vivid memoir without most of what made the subject of the memoir interesting to me. I suppose we're allowed to be interesting to ourselves in different ways than the obvious ones.

Astrid Lindgren, Pippi Longstocking, Pippi Goes on Board, and Pippi in the South Seas. Rereads. What could this mysterious project pertain to, it is a mystery that is very mysterious. Anyway it had been quite some time since I reread Pippi, and it was interesting which places I had the text so memorized that I could think to myself, "ah, they translated that differently than in the edition I had, they said barley soup in mine." I was actually surprised, given the element of making Ephraim Longstocking "king" of "South Sea Island" that there wasn't more horrifying racism than there was. Granted Pippi lies about people from other countries all the time. But she does lie; it's presented as lies, and it's generally not the shape of lie that reinforces ethnic stereotypes. So okay then, glad to find fewer razor blades than I feared in that lot of Halloween candy.

Linda Pastan, Almost an Elegy: New & Later Selected Poems. These are very straightforward, in places headlong, poems, and they deal with late-life issues for oneself and loved ones, but generally with a fairly light hand. I wanted to connect more than I did, but I'm not sorry to have read them.

Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front. Kindle. And speaking of not sorry to have read: oh gosh. Well, I see why this was shocking at the time and redefined a whole direction of literature. It was a harrowing reading experience. Glad I read it, glad I'm done reading it.

Delia Sherman and Ellen Kushner, The Fall of the Kings. Reread. One of my very favorites. I reread this for my panel on monarchy and non-monarchical forms of government in fantasy, and it was so good about that, and I loved the shape of ending, I loved how it finally completed a social arc that began before Swordspoint, gosh I love this book.

Rebecca Solnit and Susan Schwartzenberg, Hollow City: The Siege of San Francisco and the Crisis of American Urbanism. This is very short and full of photos. I think it's mainly for Solnit completists and people with a strong interest in turn of the millennium San Francisco. I lived in the Bay Area at the time and not before or after, so in some ways my snapshot was Solnit's turning point, which is a very weird place to stand.

Anthony Trollope, The Prime Minister. Kindle. My least favorite Trollope that I've actually finished. The politics stuff is fun and interesting and I like the arc of it over the novel. The other plot, though, oh HELL NO. The Antisemitism! The general, quite intense, narratively supported xenophobia! The convenience of both an infant death and a suicide! I cannot recommend this, and I don't.

Katy Watson, A Deadly Night at the Theatre. When I was reading this, I said to some friends that I felt I'd wished on the monkey's paw for more books that are centered on friendship, only to get this one where the friends can have just as many stupid misunderstandings based on poor communication as any couple in a romance. Sigh. The mystery plot was fine, but I don't actually read mysteries for the mystery plot, so...I hope she figures out other shapes of friend plot to do.

Amy Wilson, Owl and the Lost Boy. Second in its series, and the titular characters are fighting off what seems like an endless summer--in magical form. I like it when people recognize that summer is not infinitely good, and that endless hot weather is in fact quite terrifying in 2025. Also it was a beautiful MG with friend plots that I liked much better than the adult mystery above.

Ovidia Yu, The Rose Apple Tree Mystery. Well, they can't all be bangers. I've really enjoyed this series of murder mysteries set in mid-twentieth century Singapore, and I intend to continue reading it, but the characterization in this was very flat, and the twist was so obvious that I was writhing and yelling at the book for at least half its page count, someone just figure out the thing already.

kate_schaefer: (Default)
[personal profile] kate_schaefer
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects,against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

It Begins....

Oct. 2nd, 2025 08:48 am
lydamorehouse: (ichigo freaked)
[personal profile] lydamorehouse
 Tonight there will be two events for Gaylaxicon. First is the private dinner with the GoHs and the concom who have agreed to come. This will not include Nghi Vo, I presume, since she is very COVID cautious and I don't believe she is eating with others. Which is a shame because, for me, the fun part of the private GoH party is getting to see what people are like when they're not "on." But, I will get to meet her at the reading at Dreamhaven, which follows all of this at 7 pm.

Then, of course, tomorrow things kick off.

I don't know how I'm feeling. Am I ready? Am I ready for this to be over? Am I excited? I think I'm all the things at once, if I'm honest. I'm pretty sure that my family is ready for convention season to be over. Everything around here has been Gaylaxicon, Gaylaxicon, Gaylaxicon.

I had my phone chat with Ashley from AccentCare, the folks I'd be working with if I end up doing hospice volunteering. I almost missed it because my phone continues to be weird, but at about half past the hour she was meant to call I emailed her to tell her that my phone has been flakey and I am still around if she has time. I have been priming our fence to be painted, so I had nothing else going on until it was time to go fetch Shawn from work.

Ashley called less than a minute later. We had a nice chat. I was very clear with Ashley that I'm really uncertain if I have the emotional resiliance for this job as I feel things very deeply, and she had no advice for me other than to acknowledge that the work is hard and not for everyone. However, they are very aware of the emotional strain and so in-person hospice workers are only assigned at MOST two families, whom you see through their entire journey, including following up with the family after the funeral, etc. She seemed excited when I mentioned my wife in passing because they are always looking for under represented/marginalized folks to pair with like, though she did note that a lot of their patients/clients are Hmong. So, I'd be expected to be culturally sensitive, which honestly, made the job more interesting, in a way. (Though suddenly I'm looking at Duolingo wondering if I can learn a more useful language besides Japanese.) Similarly, she brought up that they also serve Jewish families, etc., as I think a lot of their volunteers do it for Jesus. (I was clear on my application that I'm not Christian.) I was glad to hear, too, that they will provide training, though it sounds like it's hours of online videos. Still, I'll take what I can get. 

Next steps seems to be meeting in-person and getting started on background checks, etc. We arranged to meet at my favorite coffee shop at 9 am next Thursday. Wish me luck? (I'm still not sure I'm up for this, but I would like to see if I can do it.)

Shawn and I talked about it a bit last night. She noted that, selfishly, she's hoping that if I get some of this training it will help when the time comes for her elder brother Keven. (Who has, by the way, responded really well to treatment. There's noticible shrinkage of his cancer, but it's all, in many ways, just about extending life and quality of life.) I thought about that, too, and I've been thinking, of course, of Terry Garey who I haven't seen since she moved to the Edina place, years ago. I think I'm hoping that learning more about this will make it easier for me to just make time to see Terry. I send cards and think about her a lot, but I feel really badly that I haven't been to see her in so long. I know that Laramie has been hired to care for her, so she's not alone--but Terry was one of my writing mentors.

Ayway, that's my own stuff that I need to work out, certainly before taking on this kind of volunteering for others.

Let's see, other news.

Yeah, so I alluded to the fence above. We had a new fence put in a couple of years ago and we have needed to either seal/stain it or paint it and I am FINALLY getting around to that. It's been good, actually, to have something physical to be doing, given how anxious I get sometimes around whether everything will work out (or not!) with Gaylaxicon. 

I'll try to remember to post some pictures when I'm done with it. We are painting it emerald green again. The problem is the posts. When we first got the original verson of this fence the wood was so BLAH and already painted an ugly brown. So we painted it a cheery green to spruce things up. Now that we could have a plain wooden fence, the posts are all dark green. We're sort of stuck with green unless we wanted to paint the whole thing a different color. And, part of me wants to keep the memory of our old neighbor, from 1990-whenever we were first painting it--looking across at it, not knowing I was in the yard, and muttering, "Those Micks will paint ANYTHING green!"  Which. Do people still use that slur? Also, I'm Polish, Czech and English? (That last one being the direct opposite of Irish.)  Shawn's family is pretty green--though, despite the whole Shawn Patricia, Keven Kerry, and Gregory Bryce (and her father being Kerry Patrick) the Rounds seem to mostly consider themselves Germans from Russia, at least in terms of the food they eat. Anyway, I still think that whole interaction was kind of funny, so I'm going to keep painting ANYTHING green. :-)

Hope you're all doing well, and maybe I'll see some of you local folks at Gaylaxicon this weekend!

I will, of course, try to do a con report, though given my schedule it may happen after the fact. I'll take copious notes, however!

covid and flu tests

Oct. 1st, 2025 01:54 pm
redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)
[personal profile] redbird
Bona Fide Masks currently has covid tests and combination flu+covid tests on sale at a good price. With a discount code they sent me, BFM15, I just paid $41 for a total of six covid+flu combo tests (three boxes of two), with free shipping. For both kinds of test, they list the expiration dates. The website is https://www.bonafidemasks.com I've bought KN95 masks from them; this is the first time I've ordered tests from them, but the company has been reliable.

This is probably only relevant to people who live in the US.

I still have a few of the free covid tests we got from the city of Boston last fall, but these tests are well past their expiration dates. The city stopped giving them away over the summer, and I don't know if they're going to restart the program.

Wednesday Updatery

Oct. 1st, 2025 08:22 am
lydamorehouse: (ichigo hot)
[personal profile] lydamorehouse
 Last night was a comedy of errors. 

I had really wanted to go to the badge party for Gaylaxicon because I had made a whole bunch of stickers for program participants to have their schedules on the back of their badges. I figured that since I made them, I could help put them on. But, I could not figure out what the plan was supposed to be. The information I got was "we will me back at Don's place after the hotel walk-through, oh, and here's a link to the concom Zoom meeting at 6 pm." Upon reading this, my brain went through these steps. Imagine this as one of those decision trees.

Okay, they aren't likely to have the Zoom meeting at the hotel, will they?  (Yes/No. I choose the No path). So then, probably the plan is to have the people meet in-person that can and Zoom in the rest.  (Yes/No. I choose the Yes path) So best guess is that the tour will be done by 6 pm and so meeting everyone at Don's house will work out.

I still dont' know the right answer to some of these questions, but at some point I definitely went down the wrong tree, as it were.

Because I showed up at Don's at 6 pm and found no one there.  Hopping on to Discord showed that Andrew didn't know where to meet people at the hotel and so then it dawned on me that, oh, okay, maybe the tour is at 6 pm despite the fact that's when the Zoom meeting is?  But, since Andrew was also confused, I decided to download Zoom onto my phone so that I could jump on to the meeting at 6 pm. That seemed like a smart bet since the Zoom meeting was DEFINITELY scheduled for 6 pm.  Only, when I finally got online, I discovered only two other people there, neither of them were Don and neither of them knew anything about where people were supposed to be or even WHEN we were supposed to be there. 

Then, I thought, I'm being dumb. I'll just text Don directly. He confirmed that the tour was happening at six. Now, here's where I could have solved this by driving to the hotel and trying to meet everyone there. Instead, I thought, "Well, by the time I get there, the tour will be over and they'll be headed back here." So, I let Don know that I was going to hangout at a Starbucks and, if he could be so kind, I'd wait for a text on when to come over. 

Then the true comedy hit.

Randomly and quite suddenly, my phone decided it didn't want to accept any data, including messages. 

At least I managed to hear from [personal profile] tallgeese  who noted that I could come hang out at his place until the text came through. At this point, since I got his message, I was unaware that my phone had decided to temporarily bork itself. So we hung out and chatted about life, the universe, and everything. That was quite lovely. I finally got to meet his two dogs in person, having seen them a bunch on Zoom during our Star Trek: Adventures games. No text came, however. I was, for reasons known only to my phone, able to go to Discord and noticed that someone was franically posting on all channels that "the Zoom meeting has started!" so, I hung out a tiny bit longer, and made my way back to Don's... only to still find no one at home. So, who knows where they were Zooming from? 

At this point, I gave up.

I left the badge stickers underneath a FedEx package outside Don's door. Then, I left him a message on Discord explaining what I'd done, and headed home. It was 8 pm by the time I got home. 

What a night!

I am only a little concerned that the stickers are going to remain AWOL. But, worst case scenario (and one I am planning on) I will bring a second set to the convention early and stick them on badges myself. 

In other news, there are a couple of previous items I wanted to update you all on. Remember how I speculated that people might be filming the exhibits at the National Africian-American History & Cultural Museum (Smithsonian) in order to preserve them? Well, my friend John spotted this: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/citizen-historians-document-smithsonian-exhibits-under-white-house-scrutiny  It turns out, I was right! 

Likewise, remember when I was talking about how stressful it was to leave a voice mail "tip" for The Racket? Well, they ran a story about us, which I found out about thanks to [personal profile] magenta : https://racketmn.com/gaylaxicon-wits-returns-oktoberfests-this-weeks-best-events  !!!!  They got some of the information wrong? Dungeons, Dragons & Drinks isn't running our D&D one-shots (though they will be one of our community tablers), Tower Games is doing our games. But, hey, The Racket listed us as one of this week's best events, so I'LL TAKE IT. I have zero idea if this will actually result in people signing up, but, you know, I feel like I gave this whole publicity thing a real try and 'nothing ventured, nothing gained.' 

I honestly kind of enjoyed the stress of the voice mail? I've been thinking about offering my services to other geek venues. (Personally, I think they should hire me to be their geek on the street!)  THIS would be a fun job for me. Instead, today I applied to work as an impound lot customer service attendant. Fun times. 

Today, too, at 2 pm, I'm going to be getting a call about volunteering to be a hospice worker. I will have to be honest that I'm currently looking for work and so might not be able to be as available as I normally would be. And, I know they're going to ask me why I want to do this work, and I don't have a very good answer for them. No one really likes the job of sitting with people at a time like that, but (and this is the part I have to work out how to articulate) the world is spiralling into chaos thanks to the current presidental administration and I don't know what I can DO to stop it. However, one thing I can do is sit with someone, talk about the weather, hold a hand, read a book, or otherwise offer comfort. Fascism wants us to devalue certain lives and this is one way for me to say NO.

Can I say that in an interview? I don't know, but it's the truth.

Out of the Everywhere Into the Here

Sep. 30th, 2025 11:23 am
madrobins: It's a meatloaf.  Dressed up like a bunny.  (Default)
[personal profile] madrobins
Four trade paperbacks: Point of Honour, Petty Treason, The Sleeping Partner, and Doxies Penalty

Okay, I promise not to keep doing this. But here are the four books in their actual glory. I am delighted.

Crafty Monday

Sep. 29th, 2025 09:03 am
lydamorehouse: (Default)
[personal profile] lydamorehouse
 Actually, I worked on crafting things this weekend. Here's my current quilting project.


whale sharks on a quilt
Image: very obviously amateur quilt with whale sharks and other sea patterns. 

I kind of hate that I have to tell social media when I post pictures like this that yes, I know my lines are crooked. I am an amteur not looking for advice. Or the kind of fake encouragement of "you'll get better some day! Just keep practicing!" which, of course, intended or not, implies that I currently suck. I used to love to post these on Facebook, but the number of folks who will come on to my comments just to tell me about how I could improve it or to tell me that "practice makes perfect" really wore me down. Like, no, this is me after years of work, thanks. I like my fucked up lines, actually? They go to the character of the piece. 

It never used to bother me. 

One of the defining moments of my childhood (and one of my clearest earliest memories) must have been from second or maybe even first grade because I was still at Jefferson Elementary. We used to have a principal there in the 1970s who was maybe named Mrs. Olsen or some other very Minnesotan name like that. She would come into classrooms to check on teachers and students and it was always very stressful for both. The memory I have is that I'm coloring away at some project or other, realy enjoying myself, and she stops to watch me and says, "Some day, dear, you'll learn to color in between the lines." I nodded enthusiastically and said, "Yep! SOMEDAY!" clearly implying at my tender age NOT TODAY, SATAN, NOT TODAY.

I have been stubbornly coloring wherever the f*ck I want ever since.

So, yeah, my lines are crooked and my stitches suck, but you know what? This is for me and I'm having fun. 


close-up
Image: close-up on some of the fabrics.

When Process Stops Being Smooth

Sep. 27th, 2025 08:26 pm
jreynoldsward: (Default)
[personal profile] jreynoldsward

Over the past five years, I’ve somewhat evolved a writing process that really worked for me, using Scrivener and Word together. Scrivener was where I put my worldbuilding details. Character notes. Oddball stuff like any weirdnesses about time, including timelines for the stories where timing was crucial. Synopsis. Anything that I needed to know about the backstory, all in one place, with easy access for reference purposes.

At the same time, I would draft a chapter in Word, with Scrivener open to let me refer back to the synopsis, or any other worldbuilding details—mainly because certain formatting things are easier for me to do in Word. As I finished each chapter, I pasted it in Scrivener, because I found it so much easier to look something up in an individual chapter rather than scroll through a full manuscript or open multiple documents to find a niggling continuity detail—or fix a continuity detail that became problematic later on in the story. I also devised methods for updating the synopsis as the characters changed and evolved, documenting the whole process. Oh yeah, I had it together. Really together. Not just for the Martinieres but for a couple of standalone books plus a couple of novellas.

Then 2025 happened.

I had finished the final work in what I had started calling the Martiniere Multiversal Family Saga. There wasn’t anything else I wanted to write in that world (after twelve books). Along with that also came the need to spend time not writing because we had a major project happening elsewhere. Plus, I needed to do something to revive interest in my backlist books. I spent time writing up some essays about my stories and…well, thinking about the next project.

Problem was, what I was facing for the next project was…something I had been poking at for five years (the Martinieres as well as several other writing projects between 2020-2025 kept me from having to deal with That. Damned. Project). I looked at other ideas and…none of them were adequately fleshed out to be ready to write. Either they required more work than the Damned Project or…they needed to cook for longer.

Sigh. The work in question is a followup series to my high fantasy series Goddess’s Honor, set in the world of the Seven Crowned Gods. I’d poked at the notion for five years, because while I had wrapped up the major threads of the Goddess’s Honor series arcs, there were still…things left dangling. I had intended to get back to the followup series but…it was a mess.

Yes, the Big Bad Emperor was dead. The hero(ine) who killed him in a magical duel (spoiler: he cheated first), also died but was raised up to be a Goddess. The fated hero(ine) became Empress. Meanwhile, in the new Empress’s homeland over the ocean, the Empress’s mother had defeated another Big Bad.

All well and good, except…it was clear within the story that the Empire was a mess. The Emperor had been covering up a lot of problems and they all showed up at his death. Over the ocean, that particular Big Bad showed signs of being defeated for now, but lurked as a potential problem.

I had written a few chapters. So once I was finished with the Martinieres, I blew the dust off, did some revisions, and…reached the 30k word mark, whereupon I realized that nope, what I was writing was more exposition than storytelling. I was facing the infamous “muddle in the middle,” plus…it just wasn’t falling together.

After the ease of writing the Martinieres, this was absolutely frustrating. I’d also started the story too late. Deep breath. Instead of that lovely writing process I had been using for the past five years, I needed to go back and rip everything apart. Expand events that I’d just mentioned as asides into scenes. Damnit.

And life just kept yanking me away from writing, so that I couldn’t give this book the concentration it needed.

Then I ended up with a nice cover for a previously released book from 2018 that I wanted to overhaul for various reasons. The process for doing that revision dragged me back into working exclusively in Word.

I didn’t like that. Especially since I’d gotten used to my combined Scrivener/Word system. Nonetheless, despite everything, I got it put back together, adding about 24k words to what was originally a 62k story. Filled in a few holes, added more material at the beginning, then completely rewrote the ending as well as setting it up for sequels. Klone’s Stronghold: Reeni, is a much stronger book than the original (if you want to check it out, it’s available at https://books2read.com/klonesstrongholdreeni).

But then it was back to the fantasy project. The more I hacked at it, the more I realized that the material I had originally considered sufficient for one book is…more like two books. There were conflicts I needed to expand upon, especially since my original concept was for a trilogy—and I couldn’t figure out where on earth the material for the next two books would come from.

I lacked subplots and subarcs.

Well, it was time to do the pantser thing. I had 30k, and too much of it brushed over what I had originally dismissed as not important to the main story. I’d made a big mistake.

So I returned to carefully expanding the story. But something happened as I worked. The stubborn, evasive story started coming to life. More backstory started hollering at me. Before I knew it, all the revisions expanded that initial 30k to 50k. I had a credible early arc, along with development of deeper themes and richer characters.

I’m now at the point where I can start ripping apart the synopsis for this fantasy novel and revising it. Back on track for my original methodology—once that synopsis is written. But at least I’m back on familiar territory, with a method that works for me. And I figured out the problem 30k into the book, rather than falling apart later. Definitely an improvement from my earlier writing days. Both books are stronger, thanks to those revisions. But it’s taken me…several decades of off and on writing to get to this point.

The lesson, of course, is that no one writing process is carved in stone. Different books will require variations in the process. I’ve been known to develop extensive and detailed scene matrices, but that won’t be necessary for this trilogy. The key is remaining flexible, and meeting the needs of whatever the story requires.

Sometimes those needs require a more structured process. Other times…a more flexible process. After twenty-four books, I’m still learning lessons about drafting my stories and—each book is a different lesson.

Which is as it should be. A good writer should never stop learning.


I did it again

Sep. 27th, 2025 09:06 pm
ksmith: (Default)
[personal profile] ksmith
I've had a copy of Thud for years and have never read it.

Currently addressing this omission.

Library Update #12: Painting Complete

Sep. 26th, 2025 06:05 pm
lovelyangel: Euphie from TenTen Kakumei, Ep 12 (Euphie Smile)
[personal profile] lovelyangel
Living Room, South End, Painted
Living Room, South End, Painted
iPhone 13 mini photo

Painting the library took all week, and the crew finished at 2:00 pm today. The room hadn’t been painted in 23 years, and the refresh is sleek and bright. All the brown wood trim and off-white front and back doors are gone. The room looks radiant.

Living Room, North End, Painted
Living Room, North End, Painted
iPhone 13 mini photo

Also, the red brick fireplace was painted black:

Fireplace, Painted
Fireplace, Painted
iPhone 13 mini photo

At various times during painting, we had restricted access to the kitchen, the new storage cabinets, and the front and back doors. I’m glad the noisy, messy week is over. I’m pleased with the result.

Next week: Bookwall installation.

errands and a bit of exercise

Sep. 26th, 2025 06:32 pm
redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)
[personal profile] redbird
For reasons, I ran some errands today so Adrian and Cattitude could stay home.

The main goal was to take a bathrobe to the Zipper Hospital, and ask them to replace the damaged zipper. So I did that, and was surprised by the sign saying they took cash and checks. Cash only would have surprised me less; in practice, I doubt they're being given many checks these days. They want payment in advance, but I had enough cash to cover it, so I didn't need to ask them for the location of the nearest ATM.

I then went to LA Burdick's, for a cup of hot chocolate, and a bag of chocolate-covered orange and lemon peel. The hot chocolate was good, but I spilled some on myself when I opened the takeout cup. So, I drank the hot chocolate, carefully; went to Trader Joe's; and then took the trolley home.

The trip wasn't a huge amount of walking, but it's the most I've done in the last couple of weeks. I did a little PT this afternoon as well; I've been keeping up with that pretty well.
mrissa: (Default)
[personal profile] mrissa
 

Thirteen Swords That Made a Prince: Highlights From the Arms & Armory Collection, Sharang Biswas (Strange Horizons)

Biologists say it will take at least a generation for the river to recover (Klamath River Hymn), Leah Bobet (Reckoning)

Watching Migrations, Keyan Bowes (Strange Horizons)

With Only a Razor Between, Martin Cahill (Reactor)

And the Planet Loved Him, L. Chan (Clarkesworld)

Holly on the Mantel, Blood on the Hearth, Kate Francia (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

The Jacarandas Are Unimpressed By Your Show of Force, Gwynne Garfinkle (Strange Horizons)

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Gorgon, Gwynne Garfinkle (Penumbric)

In Connorville, Kathleen Jennings (Reactor)

Orders, Grace Seybold (Augur)

Brooklyn Beijing, Hannah Yang (Uncanny)

New Worlds: Quartering (No Drawing)

Sep. 26th, 2025 05:01 pm
swan_tower: (Default)
[personal profile] swan_tower
Every U.S. schoolchild learns about the Bill of Rights, but how many of us remember why the Third Amendment -- the one about the quartering of soldiers -- was so important to the Founding Fathers? The problems with housing soldiers, in war and in peacetime, is the topic of this week's New Worlds Patreon essay; comment over there!

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/EL6gTw)

I Did a Thing or Two Today

Sep. 26th, 2025 10:11 am
lydamorehouse: (crazy eyed Renji)
[personal profile] lydamorehouse
 In my continual shilling for Gaylaxicon 2025, I actually wrote myself a script and called in a tip to Racket for Nghi Vo's early release at Dreamhaven. That was nerve-wracking, and, of course, I forgot to mention that it's free and open to the public, so I called them back and did a second take. (I'm sure half their tip line is people stopping halfway through and saying, "Fuck. Let me do that again.") I'm now trying to come up with a way to sell mundanes on the idea of science fiction conventions generally, and ours, specifically. WISH ME LUCK.

I did, at least, manage to get us a featured story in Twin Cities Gay Scene: https://www.twincitiesgayscene.com/editorial/scene-stories- which is basically my press release with a few changes.

Will the mundanes want to come? I have no idea. But, you can't say I didn't try.

The other thing I've been doing is looking for a job. It's very likely that the latest School District referrendum seeking revenue will pass here in St. Paul in November which will substantially raise our property taxes AGAIN. It's hard to say no to schools that need funding, you know? But, if we don't want to become unhoused ourselves, I need to start contributing more than my paltry royalty checks and fairly sad (but DEEPLY APPRECIATED) Patreon money. So, I've been applying to various secretarial and library clerk positions--most of them parttime, but that will help us be able to afford our property taxes (which, in our case, because we escrow this stuff, increases our mortgage.)  Wish me luck. I have very little hope because so many of my secretarial skills have proficiency in programs that... no longer exist. I'm a whiz at Word Perfect, y'all!  And, Paradox databases! I'm perfect for your job here in 2025--a century I swear I still exist in!

I don't know how vampires do this. I mean, I guess the presumption is that all vampires invested a penny in 1776, suffered no market crashes, and are all rich now and living off some kind of endowment.  I pity the vampire who started out life without a penny, was terrible at market speculation, and/or lost what little they did invest in the stockmarket crash of 1929 or the 90s or... recently. I once actually considered writing a novel about this called Account Dracula, in which the story follows the financial advisor to the vampires. It was one of those that was a cool idea but had no plot to hang the idea on. If I were Eleanor Arnason, I would have made the plot some kind of financial mystery, you know, like forensic accounting or something. But I *am* the vampire who does not understand the stock market, budgeting, or how to make any money whatsoever (see above.)

Yeah, so that's mostly me. In a little while, I'm taking Mason to go get his annual flu shot. As a family we signed up for Docket, which is supposed to help people track their vaccines. Of course, Wisconsin my home state is not on the list of participating areas so it looks like I never got ANY of my childhood vaccinations. I should ask my parents if there is any written documents about my vaccines from the late-1960s. After that, the plan is to pick up Shawn early from work so that we can go to St. Mark's annual rummage sale... and, with any luck, maybe hit a few early estate sales, too.

What about you all? Any weekend plans?

Now free to read!

Sep. 25th, 2025 10:20 am
mrissa: (Default)
[personal profile] mrissa
 In May the subscribers of If There's Anyone Left got to read my short story, The Things You Know, The Things You Trust. Now it's free to read online! Go, read, enjoy!

Further Adventures and Home...

Sep. 25th, 2025 07:39 am
lydamorehouse: (Default)
[personal profile] lydamorehouse
 I don't know what it is about traveling, but it wears me out.

I've been home since Tuesday (a.k.a. failed rapture day), but today is the first day that I sort of vaguely feel human again. I'm up early, so it seems like a good time to recount the last days in DC for you all. 

Speaking of up early, [personal profile] naomikritzer rarely is. To be fair to her and all the other crepuscular folks out there, I am an unusually early riser. Every day of the convention I popped out of bed without an alarm somewhere around 6:30 am CT/7:30 am ET.  The fact that it was an hour later in DC than at home worked to my advantage because by 7:30 am a lot of coffee shops are actually open. So, just like every day of the convention, I wandered across Rockville Pike to get us both a nice espresso drink. But, on Monday, I was in no hurry to get back because I very wisely made us no plans until noon. 

First of all, I figured that after GoHing at a convention, Naomi would appreciate a slow morning. Secondly, both she and I walked a little too far the night before and woke up feeling it. On occassion, I plan fantasy trips for myself and I'm now going to be giving any directions that include "a twenty minute walk" a bit of a side-eye. I can walk for 20 minutes, but I do start to drag if there are lots of those! I mean, it does kind of matter whether or not the view is interesting. Some 20 minute walks feel faster than others. I had, at least, taped up my arches. My arches have been giving me trouble lately (I've been seeing a PT) so I was prepared and had been doing my exercises, but, man.

DC is funny because a lot of touristy stuff in it is both really centrally located AND really spread out. As that ad reminded us last night, the  Smithsonian Mall is big!

My plan for us that morning was to check out the DC fish market.  Maine Avenue Fish Market is the oldest continually-operating open air fish market in the United States. It was founded almost two decades earlier than the one in New York City, believe it or not. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maine_Avenue_Fish_Market).  I will say? It doesn't look like much. 

Maine Avenue Fish Market
Image: fish market, with a haze of... my fingers? Not sure. Pretend it's an old-timey photo, since this was the best one I took.

The market is just off the L'Enfant Plaza metro stop (also on the red line!)  Enough people were headed to the market for lunch that we just sort of followed the crowd down to the wharf area. It is, in fact, little more than you see in the picture (minus my fingers). There's this set of stalls and another set of equal size directly behind. It's one of those places, though, where you can buy your fish or seafood on one side and bring it in a bucket over to the other and they will cook it for you fresh. Naomi bought a handful of shrimp for us to have this way and they were amazing. I ended up wanting something more like a full lunch, so I stopped at the little shop at the end which had prepared (but fresh!) sandwiches. 

crab cake and sweet potato fries
Image: crab cake with sweet potato fries.

I got the crab cake because crab cake is something I used to try to make at home without ever having experienced the "real thing." This was really very good and I will admit that I fed the pigeons, seagulls, and little brown ones (sparrows) bits of fries and hamburger bun. 

We could see the tip of the Washington Monument from the market and so Naomi convinced me (only slightly against my better judgement) that it was an easy "20 minute walk" (now my code word for any walk that I later come to regret) to the Smithsonian Mall. It wasn't bad, really. Washington, DC has a whole lot of really lovely parks along the river. This one had clearly been planted with a ton of cherry trees, many of which had been trained to droop and arch their branches over the walkway. I bet that in the spring, during cherry blossom season, the walk we took would have been absolutely stunning. In late September, it was a little muggy and kind of hot. 

We once again ran into a clot of Naitonal Guard, whom Naomi asked where they were from. Once again, it was West Virginia. She also asked them all what they did when they weren't serving in the Guard and it ranged from "just out of college" to "IT manager." Again, the group was largely white, though at least one person could have qualified as a PoC in my estimation. We wished them a good day, which, I know, was probably a wasted opportunity to yell at them about the current presidential administration, but, frankly, I don't see how being deployed here is their choice. For all I know, the whole lot of them voted for Kamala Harris. I kind of have to wonder at the fact that we rarely saw National Guard anywhere but touristy places (and subway/metro stops) if this wasn't a kind of quiet quitting on their or their commander's part. Like, they weren't actually marching in the streets. They were just boredly wandering the Mall or chatting amongst themselves at metro stops. 

I dunno. I will say, they were carrying guns, so just standing around did also feel threatening? If they were in Minneapolis/St. Paul doing this, I might feel really differently, that's for sure.

These days a lot of the popular Smithsonian museums require that you sign up for timed entrances. Naomi and I debated a lot the night before about how long we thought it would take to get from here to there, and what time would be most conveinent so that we could connect up with our friend [personal profile] mrissa .  We had settled on 3:00 PM for the National Musuem of Africian Amerian History & Culture, which nearly worked out? With our slow wander up from the wharf, it was close to 2:00 PM when we got to the Smithsonian.  We sat for a while in the shade, having bought cold water from the gift shop near the Washington Monument. Even though it was a crap shoot as to whether or not we'd've needed timed tickets, I convinced Naomi to consider wandering the National Museum of Asian Arts as it was directly across the mall, or thereabouts. We lucked out and were able to waste a bit of time in air-conditioning wandering the exhibits. I feel like the National Museum of Asian Arts is one of those museums that could be called "stuff a rich guy brought back from Asia in the late 1800s/early 1900s." Not unlike the Walker's Asian Arts section, honestly? But, it was nice not to have to be sitting in the surprisingly bright sun.  

My feet, at this point, were kind of killing me, but I had a secret plan to solve that once we were inside the Africian American History & Culture museum. Neither Naomi and Marissa like to sit and watch movies at museums, but my plan was to sit through all of them in the back row and massage life back into my feet. Which, once we got in, I totally did. 

I actually came out of that museum feeling almost kind of human again, though when another "20 minute walk" was proposed to get us to the restaurant, I will admit, I baulked and ended up hailing us a taxi cab. 

But, I get ahead of myself. 

The museum is huge. One of the reasons, of course, that the three of us wanted to go (or at least, I wanted to go) is because it is my darkest suspicion that if Trump gets a chance, he will destroy the collection as much as possible. I noticed a lot of people--mostly Black--actually filming everything they saw on their phones. I wonder if there is some kind of community or grassroots effort to collect and preserve the exhibit, particularly the history of enslavement, given just how many people I saw filming.  The musuem as it is set up now has its lower levels devoted to history. Very cleverly, you literally rise up out of slavery, as the story of kdinapping and enslavement starts at the lowest level, C, and you work your way up through the Civil War and Emancipation, B, and end in the Civil Rights to present level, A. Luckily for me and my feet, there was a nice 10 minute movie at the crux of each level (you go up these long ramps to move between eras) and so I watched each of those. 

I suspect I was supposed to do the opposite with the culture sections, ie, start at the top and work my way down? Because the top floor has a lot of physical art, like painting and such; the next level down has what I'd call the art of revolution--so like a lot of art that came out of the sixties and the Civil Rights movement, like this....

famous black power moment at Olympics
Image: statue of the famous moment at the 1968 Olympics when medalists Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their fists in the symbol for Black Power during the National Anthem.

...and then the next level down encouraged people to interact with art by doing a dance-dance revolution type thing to hip hop, etc. It didn't diminish my experience to do it the "wrong" way, but, because the museum closed at 5:30 pm, I sort of wish I'd had more time to explore the art at the very top. Ah well. 

I will say, it was one of the better museums I've been to in a long time. No surprise, I suppose, given that it is a Smithsonian, but I really could have spent the whole day there exploring. 

Marissa wanted to return to a place she'd had dinner at the night before, Oyamel. There is apparently also one of these in New York, but, obviously, we were at the DC location. I was not feeling nearly as adventurous as I normally am, and so I ended up just having a lovely chicken tamale. I absolutely ADORED the atmosphere of the place, however. The three of us sat outside and the evening was fully magical in terms of temperature, the company, and that sense you get when you're traveling that you are having An Experience, you know? 10/10 would again and the next time I would order the cricket tacos. 

The metro was quite close, so we all hopped on and returned to our hotel. 

All and all, it didn't necessarily feel like we did All The Things, but I think we did enough of the things. Oh, and I got to use my superpower of being able to summon a taxi in a world filled with Uber and Lyft in order to get the three of us to the restaurant. It is a superpower that is normally very useless, given that I live in a town where taxis must be called on the phone and appointments made. But, I have rarely failed to catch a taxi any time I'm visiting a large enough city. I've hailed them in Chicago, Los Angeles, and DC. (I was too young to use this superpower when I was last in NYC.) And by hail? I mean, literally, I will be in a street and an available taxi will come by and I will stick my hand out and yell, "TAXI!" and they stop for us. 

Naomi thinks I had a past life as a New Yorker. Because this skill is clearly fairly useless in the modern era. But it is the reason I do not have a Lyft or Uber app on my phone.

So, yeah, there's very little to say about Tuesday other than Naomi and I did discuss the possiblity our pilot getting raptured. Luckily, that did not happen. 

Now, I'm home, returned to the "real world" where dishes must be washed and food prepared. Alas, down to earth once again.