Not a Blog

A Railroad Reborn

August 12, 2020 at 9:05 am
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So, about our new train set…

The pandemic has slowed things down, needless to say, but my partners and I are moving ahead with our plans to restore the historic Santa Fe Southern Railway.   There’s a lot of work ahead, and no sure way of knowing whether how long it will all take before we are ready to roll… but at the end, we hope to have something truly unique, a railroad different for the city different.

I thought you guys might enjoy a little peak into the history of the line, and some of our plans for the future.

I think Bill Banowsky speaks for all of us involved in this project when he talks about giving back to the community.  These days I belong to two communities: the world of science fiction, fantasy, and fandom, and the city of Santa Fe and the state of New Mexico.   I love them both, and do what I can to contribute to them both… paying it forward.

It is our hope the our reborn railroad will be a real boost for Santa Fe and Lamy, preserving a wonderful piece of history while creating jobs, promoting tourism, and providing some fun for children of all ages.

Wish us luck.

 

Current Mood: excited excited

Thanks, New Zealand

May 21, 2019 at 8:20 pm
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I was surprised last night when Air New Zealand went to the internet to invite me down for a visit… to help me finish my book.

I cannot say I was not tempted.  New Zealand is a beautiful place.   As it happens, I have already visited there a number of times.   I’ve been to Auckland and Wellington and Christchurch and Rotoroa… and Hobbiton, of course.   I’ve gone whale watching (we never saw a whale, but there were hundreds of dusky dolphins), checked out the Te Papa, the Weta Workshop, the aquarium in Auckland, and a cool automobile museum somewhere near Wellington.   From Rotoroa I took a helicopter out to White Island, with its boiling mud pools and lovely lake of sulfuric acid.  (With Hobbiton and Mordor on the same island, you really ought to change your name to Middle Earth).   I’ve been to a few hangis too, and my minions have a video of me attempting to do a haka that they periodically use to blackmail me.

In short, I love New Zealand.  You don’t need to convince me.

And as it happens, I already have plans to return.   In the summer of 2020, Wellington is hosting the World Science Fiction Convention, the oldest and most important con in the SF/ fantasy calendar, and they’ve asked me to serve as Toastmaster for the Hugo Awards.   Writers, fans, and artists from all over the world will be headed down to check out all of your wonders.   I hope lots of you Kiwis will join us.

www.conzealand.nz

Of course, I was especially moved by your offer to bring me to New Zealand “on us.”  How wonderfully generous.   As it happens, I do have enough money to make it to New Zealand on my own… but there are many American writers, fans, and artists who do not.   If you’d care to fly, say, twenty or thirty or fifty of them to Wellington in place of me, I have no doubt they would instantly accept, and fall in love with Middle Earth.. er, New Zealand… just as I have.   And you have such big planes, I’m sure you could squeeze them in.

As for finishing my book… I fear that New Zealand would distract me entirely too much.   Best leave me here in Westeros for the nonce.   But I tell you this — if I don’t have THE WINDS OF WINTER in hand when I arrive in New Zealand for worldcon, you have here my formal written permission to imprison me in a small cabin on White Island, overlooking that lake of sulfuric acid, until I’m done.   Just so long as the acrid fumes do not screw up my old DOS word processor, I’ll be fine.

 

 

Current Mood: amused amused

Shame On You, United

April 11, 2017 at 1:03 pm
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I don’t often comment on current events, but the story about the passenger that United Airlines beat bloody and dragged off a flight — for no reason but to accomodate some of their own deadheading employees, and despite the fact that he had a ticket that he’d bought and paid for and was doing nothing but sitting peacefully in his assigned seat — has me seeing red.

Jimmy Kimmel said it better than I could.

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I stand with Jimmy, with Alan Grayson, and with millions of other ordinary Americans from coast to coast who were outraged by these videos, and by the mealy-mouthed corporate bullshit the United’s CEO chose to offer afterwards.

One point Jimmy did not raise: in what world does an airline employee’s need to get to his next flight take precedence over a doctor’s need to return to his hospital?

The “police” who dragged the man off the plane and beat him do not deserve the name of police officers, and should be fired immediately. “They were just following orders” is no excuse.

The United CEO should also resign. He’s a disgrace.

I am old enough to remember when airlines were regulated, and passengers had rights. But we deregulated the airlines, and now passengers are cattle. The present rule seems to be just what Kimmel says: do what we say, or else. You may have given us your money, but we owe you nothing.

And here’s the cherry for your (bloody) sundae: United has also announced plans to begin charging passengers for carry-on luggage.

Home Again… with Ick

June 8, 2016 at 1:24 pm
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I am back home again in Santa Fe, after two weeks on the road in Baltimore and New York City.

Great trip… but I seem to have brought the plague home with me.

Some kind of con crud was going around at Balticon. My assistant Jo was stricken with it, as was my friend Lezli Robyn, though in both cases it did not manifest until after the con. Coughing, fever, headache, congestion, more coughing.

I got it too, albeit a milder case. And then my assistant Lenore was stricken. (So far Parris has been spared, knock wood).

We’re all still under the weather, though recovering.

So I will keep this short. Lots to report on, lots to catch up on, but just now I don’t have the energy. More sleep and more fluids… I should be my old self shortly….

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A Few Quick Thoughts

May 24, 2016 at 12:59 pm
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I am off to Baltimore tomorrow for Balticon 50, which promises to be a real blast. In honor of half a century of great cons, the fans of Baltimore are bringing in lots and lots of their past GOHs, along with me, their current GOH, so we should have an amazing crowd on hand. Connie Willis, Joe Haldeman, John Varley… oh, the list goes on and on. Go to the Balticon website and see for your own self. And then come to the con. Panels, readings, parties… and there will be CRABS.

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On other fronts… we had an amazing time at the Jean Cocteau last night, when a sellout crowd assembled to hear Joe Hill. Joe gave a dynamite reading from his new novel THE FIREMAN, led the audience in a kazoo concert, told us about all his forthcoming television and film projects, and signed stacks and stacks of books. Most of which were promptly carried off by his eager fans. But we did lay in extra supplies, so if you’re looking for autographed copies of THE FIREMAN, or HEART-SHAPED BOX, or LOCKE & KEY, or any of Joe’s stuff, it’s available — while the supply lasts — from the Jean Cocteau Bookshop at http://www.jeancocteaubooks.com/ — along with signed books from Neil Gaiman, Stephen Graham Jones, Diana Gabaldon, Joe Lansdale, and many many more.

Heated discussions continue about this year’s Hugo ballot, and the various proposals being brought forth to reform the voting procedures to defend the integrity of the award against future attacks by Rabid Puppies and other varieties of fuggheads. Some of the proposals are worth considering. I have severe doubts about others. But I don’t have time to get into all of that now, so it will have to wait until I return.

Meanwhile, I am doing my Hugo reading, and I urge all of you who are members of Big MAC II to do the same. Read, consider, vote.

And if you’re not yet a member of Big MAC II… well, if there’s any chance at all that you can get to KC this August, you ought to join and attend. There’s nothing like a worldcon. And the original Big MAC in 1976 was, in my not-so-humble-opinion, the best worldcon that I’ve ever had the pleasure of attending, so I have high hopes for this year’s. The KC fans know how to party. And while they cannot match Baltimore for crabs, they do have BARBEQUE!

(I will keep comments open on this one only through tomorrow morning. I expect to be away from my computer while traveling, and don’t want hundreds of screened comments awaiting my return).

No Place Like Home

August 25, 2015 at 6:14 pm
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I am back in New Mexico, after an eventful week in Spokane.

Lots to report.

I will have more posts soon.

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Conventions and Cancellations

March 27, 2015 at 6:27 pm
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A couple of posts down, I announced that I had decided to cancel a couple of my planned appearances for 2015, namely the World Fantasy Convention in Saratoga and the San Diego Comicon.

As seems to happen with everything I post these days, this was immediately misinterperted and misreported.  The usual game of internet telephone took place, and suddenly it was being said that I had cancelled ALL my planned appearances for 2015.  This immediately triggered a flood of emails, and comments here on the blog, from fans who had bought memberships in Norwescon or Conquest or Sasquan in order to see me, and were now worried that I was not coming.

No.  Not so.  Listen, please.  I am skipping San Diego Comicon and World Fantasy Con… but as of this writing, I am still planning on making all of my other scheduled appearances.  Okay?  Clear?  That means, yes, I will be in Seattle for Norwescon next week, and yes, I will be going to Kansas City for Conquest over Memorial Day.  And so forth.  And so on.

Please note that at both of these cons, I am a guest of honor. They invited me years ago, and have been advertising my participation for many months.  Fans and readers have planned accordingly.  I would not feel right in pulling out of an obligation like this, except perhaps in cases of medical or family emergency, and that does not apply here.  At San Diego and Saratoga I was not a GOH, just a program participant, attending largely on my own hook.  Makes it much easier to withdraw.

It is possible that I may withdraw from some other announced appearances later in the year… most likely in the summer and fall… but if I do, it won't be from cons where I am the featured guest of honor.  I would prefer not to have to cancel anything, but that depends on how the work is going.

And by "work," I mean WINDS OF WINTER, of course… but not exclusively WINDS OF WINTER.   When I say, "my plate is full," I don't just mean with WINDS.  I am still editing the latest Wild Cards volume, HIGH STAKES.   I have an overall deal with HBO, and three new television concepts in various stages of development, with a variety of collaborators and partners.   I am consulting on a couple of videogames.   There's the Wild Cards movie at Universal, where I'm a producer.  And I've recently formed a new production company to make low budget short films based on a trio of classic short stories by… well, no, not yet, that would be telling.  Premature telling.

(Many of these other projects may come to nothing.  Such is the dance of development as they do it in Hollywood.  If anything ever actually comes to fruition, you will read about it here.  Till then, don't hold your breath).

Anyway, I'm busy.  But please note, most of these other projects involve me editing, producing, consulting, or financing.  The writing I'm doing is all on WINDS OF WINTER.

Speaking of which… after wrestling with it for a month or so, I've decided not to script an episode for season six of GAME OF THRONES.  Writing a script takes me three weeks, minimum, and longer when it is not a straight adaptation from the novels.  And really, it would cost me more time than that, since I have never been good at changing gears from one medium to another and back again. Writing a season six script would cost me a month's work on WINDS, and maybe as much as six weeks,  and I cannot afford that.   With David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, and Bryan Cogman on board, the scriptwriting chores for season six should be well covered.  My energies are best devoted to WINDS.

So… back to it.

My Night With Sibel

March 26, 2015 at 2:23 pm
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The lovely and talented SIBEL KEKILLI — best known to all you GAME OF THRONES fans out there for her amazing portrayal of Shae — came to Santa Fe last December.  We celebrated her visit by screening HEAD ON, the breakthrough German film that gave Sibel her first starring role and won her the Lola (the German Oscar) for Best Actress, but that was not the main purpose of her visit.  She was here to film a segment of a popular German travel show DURCH DIE NACHT (roughly, INTO THE NIGHT), for the French/ German TV network ARTE.

The premise is the show is that each week, a celebrity visits some place they have never been before, and a local shows them the town, with an emphasis on the nightlfife.  Sibel asked me to show her Santa Fe, and I was delighted to say yes ( though I did warn her that Santa Fe, for all its charms, does tend to roll up the sidewalks at 9:00 pm or so).    So after a rather adventurous series of flight, and a six-hour drive through the night with a stranger in a car full of fish, Sibel made it to the Land of Enchantment, and I had the honor of playing her host.  We took in my own lair, a local gallery, a comic book shop, two restaurants, two bars, and of course the Jean Cocteau.  (With a film crew trailing us everywhere we went).

I had a great time.  Got to introduce Sibel to margaritas and chile con queso, two of my favorite things.  All in all, she seemed to enjoy the experience.  And driving around through the night, we talked about all manner of things, which was fun as well.

The segment has now been edited and broadcast.  For those of you not in France and Germany who did not get to see it, here you go:

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I've met some wonderful people through GAME OF THRONES, and Sibel is one of them.  What an amazing, talented, courageous young woman.   And yes, I confess it: her Shae was better than my Shae.

Oh, and by the way, here's that song I had them sing for Sibel — Istanbul, Not Constantinople, by the Four Lads.

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36 Hours in Santa Fe

December 6, 2014 at 1:42 pm
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If you have the chance to visit Santa Fe, but have only thirty-six hours to spend here, what should you see and do?

The NEW YORK TIMES has some suggestions for you.

(And of course a visit to the Jean Cocteau is a MUST).

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/30/travel/things-to-do-in-36-hours-in-santa-fe.html

Go check it out.

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Home Again

August 28, 2014 at 5:50 pm
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Parris and I returned last night from LA, courtesy of Southwest Airlines Cattlecar in the Sky.

It is nice to be back.  We left August 7.  Scotland and the Edinburgh Book Festival, London and worldcon, the big Robin Hobb event at Freemason's Hall, a long (but very comfortable) flight direct from Heathrow to LAX on British Airlines, Hollywood, meetings, the Emmys, more meetings, parties and more parties.  Oh, and an Ice Bucket Challenge.  (Brrrrr).

Much of it was great.  All of it was tiring.

And this comes right on the heels of my trips to France and Switzerland (for the Dijon signing and the NIFFF film festival) and to San Diego (for comicon), with only brief visits home in between.

Way back when, it seemed like a good idea to concentrate most of my travel for the year into a single two-month period, leaving me the other ten months to stay at home and write.  Well, maybe not.  The trips, individually, were great, and I met some terrific people and had some amazing adventures, some of which I hope to tell you about here.  But taken as a whole, it was too much.  I need to face facts.  I am not thirty years old any more.  Airports, long flights, six-hour long signing sessions, and endless interviews take it out of me, in ways they never did before.  The spirit is willing, sometimes even eager, but…

I do have one more trip this year: a brief visit to NYC in late October to promote THE WORLD OF ICE AND FIRE and see editors, agents, and family.  Elsewise, I am home for the rest of the year… and well into next year, I hope.  Most of that time I plan to spend in Westeros.

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