What’s it like to write in a shared world, like the Wild Cards universe?
Wild Carders Melinda M. Snodgrass, David D. Levine, Kevin Andrew Murphy, Paul Cornell, and Mary Anne Mohanraj will tell us, in a new (virtual) panel discussion sponsored by the Jean Cocteau Cinema.
Check it out at:
Current Mood: 
thoughtful
IAIA — the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe — recently had its annual fundraising event.
Virtually, of course.
It seemed to be a great success.
There’s a video of the event. You can even catch a glimpse of yours truly at 1:58 minute mark, talking about the annual scholarships I sponsor there, through my foundation. There are brief statements from this year’s scholarship winners as well.
2020 IAIA Virtual Scholarship Event—Scholarships Shape Futures
Though the annual fund-raising event is over, the need for funds is not. IAIA does great work, so if any of you reading it have a few extra dollars, please do send them their way. It would be much appreciated.
Current Mood: 
pleased
I am back in my fortress of solitude again, my isolated mountain cabin. I’d returned to Santa Fe for a short visit, to spend some time with Parris, deal with some local business that had piled up during my months away, and of course fulfill my duties to CoNZealand, the virtual worldcon. But all that is behind me now, and I am back on the mountain again… which means I am back in Westeros again, once more moving ahead with WINDS OF WINTER.
It is curious how my life has evolved. I mean, once upon a time, I actually wrote my books and stories in the house where I lived, in a home office. But some decades ago, wanting more solitude, I bought the house across the street and made THAT my writer’s retreat. No longer would I write all day in my red flannel bathrobe; now I would have to dress and put on shoes and walk all the way across the street to write. But that worked for a while.
Things started getting busier, though. So busy that I needed a full-time assistant. Then the office house had someone else in it, not just me and my characters. And then I hired a second assistant, and a third, and… there was more mail, more email, more phone calls (we put in a new phone system), more people coming by. By now I am up to five assistants… and somewhere in there I also acquired a movie theatre, a bookstore, a charitable foundation, investments, a business manager… and…
Despite all the help, I was drowning till I found the mountain cabin.
My life up here is very boring, it must be said. Truth be told, I hardly can be said to have a life. I have one assistant with me at all times (minions, I call them). The assistants do two-week shifts, and have to stay in quarantine at home before starting a shift. Everyone morning I wake up and go straight to the computer, where my minion brings me coffee (I am utterly useless and incoherent without my morning coffee) and juice, and sometimes a light breakfast. Then I start to write. Sometimes I stay at it until dark. Other days I break off in late afternoon to answer emails or return urgent phone calls. My assistant brings me food and drink from time to time. When I finally break off for the day, usually around sunset, there’s dinner. Then we watch television or screen a movie. The wi-fi sucks up on the mountain, though, so the choices are limited. Some nights I read instead. I always read a bit before going to sleep; when a book really grabs hold of me, I may read half the night, but that’s rare.
I sleep. The next day, I wake up, and do the same. The next day, the next day, the next day. Before Covid, I would usually get out once a week or so to eat at a restaurant or go to the movies. That all ended in March. Since then, weeks and months go by when I never leave the cabin, or see another human being except whoever is on duty that week. I lose track of what day it is, what week it is, what month it is. The time seems to by very fast. It is now August, and I don’t know what happened to July.
But it is good for the writing.
And you know, now that I reflect on it, I am coming to realize that has always been my pattern. I moved to Santa Fe at the end of 1979, from Dubuque, Iowa. My first marriage broke up just before that move, so I arrived in my new house alone, in a town where I knew almost no one. Roger Zelazny was here, and he became a great friend and mentor, but Roger was married with small kids, so I really did not see him often. There was no fandom in Santa Fe; that was all down in Albuquerque, an hour away. I went to the club meetings every month, but that was only one night a month, and required two hours on the road. And I had no job to meet new people. My job was in the back room at the house on Declovina Street, so that was where I spent my days. At night, I watched television. Alone. Sometimes I went to the movies. Alone.
That was my life from December 1979 through September 1981, when Parris finally moved to Santa Fe, following Denvention. (Not quite so bleak, maybe, I did make some local friends by late 1980 and early 1981, but it was a slow process). When I think back on my life in 1980-1981, the memories seem to be made up entirely of conventions, interspersed with episodes of LOU GRANT and WKRP IN CINCINNATI.
Ah, but work wise, that same period was tremendously productive for me. Lisa and I finished WINDHAVEN during that time, Gardner and I did a lot of work on “Shadow Twin,” and then I went right on and wrote all of FEVRE DREAM. Some short stories as well. My life, such that it was, was lived in my head, and on the page.
I wonder if it is the same for other writers? Or is it just me? I wonder if I will ever figure out the secret of having a life and writing a book at the very same time.
I certainly have not figured it out to date.
For the nonce, it is what it is. My life is at home, on hold, and I am spending the days in Westeros with my pals Mel and Sam and Vic and Ty. And that girl with no name, over there in Braavos.
Current Mood: 
contemplative
There’s a wonderful writer’s workshop held every year in New Hampshire — the Odyssey Writers’ Workshop, headed up by Jeanne Cavelos, for aspiring authors of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. I taught one summer at Odyssey a decade or two back, and more recently, I sponsor an annual scholarship there, the MISKATONIC SCHOLARSHIP, for a promising new writer of Lovecraftian cosmic horror (for more details on Odyssey and the Miskatonic Scholarship, look back through my older posts here, until you hit one titled COSMIC HORROR COMES TO NEW HAMPSHIRE).
This year the winner of the Miskatonic Scholarship was SCOTT GRAY. Congratulations, Scott.
Unfortunately, thanks to Covid-19, Scott was not able to get together in New Hampshire to terrify his classmates with his tales. No one was able to get together. The pandemic forced a cancellation of this year’s gathering… but that did not stop Jeanne. Odyssey 2020 was still held — on line. As a virtual gathering.
Jeanne was kind enough to share these photos of her class of 2020.
Jeanne writes, “We had an absolutely wonderful Odyssey this year, despite having to hold it online. For 6 weeks, students in their own homes attended over 4 1/2 hours of class each day; worked long hours writing, critiquing, and doing writing exercises; participated in various discussion salons, check-in hours, guided writing hours, and writing games; had private meetings with me and our guest lecturers; and through it all, supported each other. For many of them, the time zone made this even more difficult, but they lived on “Odyssey Time” for six weeks, whether in the US, Ireland, or India. I think this class actually produced more words than any previous Odyssey class. Their engagement, passion, and discipline was truly amazing, as was their thoughtfulness toward each other. ”
She also reports, “Scott Gray, the Miskatonic recipient, was a linchpin, always looking out for students who might be struggling or who might need some extra outreach.”
Given the difficult times we are living through, it is great to hear that Odyssey was able to overcome and prevail. Looks like they had a great class as well. I hope to be seeing their bylines on many a book and story in the future.
Current Mood: pleased
This writing stuff is hard.
Even so, it has been going well of late. Three more chapters completed this past week. And good progress on several more.
Still a long long way to go, though. Do not get too excited.
In my copious spare time, have been doing some editorial groundwork on three new Wild Cards books as well: PAIRING UP and SLEEPER STRADDLES and the mosaic HOUSE RULES, where Agatha Christie, H.P. Lovecraft, and P.G. Wodehouse have a wild weekend. They should be fun… but we are in early early days, so you won’t be reading any of them until 2022, I would guess.
(But there is lots of other Wild Cards stuff already in the pipeline for 2020 and 2021, have no fear).
Anyway… be good, kids. Me and the Frog are headed back to Westeros.
Current Mood: 
busy
I have to confess, after half a year of pandemic, quarantine, and social distancing, I am showing signs of cabin fever… half of which is quite literal in my case. Yes, I am in an actual cabin in the mountains. No, I have no fever. Yay! For the present at least, I am healthy… for an out-of-shape guy of 71, at least … and doing all I can to stay that way.
If nothing else, the enforced isolation has helped me write. I am spending long hours every day on THE WINDS OF WINTER, and making steady progress. I finished a new chapter yesterday, another one three days ago, another one the previous week. But no, this does not mean that the book will be finished tomorrow or published next week. It’s going to be a huge book, and I still have a long way to go. Please do not give any credence to any of the click-bait websites that like to parse every word of my posts as if they were papal encyclicals to divine hidden meanings.
I was heartbroken when CoNZealand was forced to go virtual due to the pandemic and I had to cancel my plans (exciting plans) for a long trip down to Wellington with Parris and my minions… but there is definitely a silver lining in that cloud. The last thing I need right now is a long interruption that might cost me all the momentum I have built up. I can always visit Wellington next year, when I hope that both Covid-19 and THE WINDS OF WINTER will be done.
I still plan to host the Hugo Awards and fulfill all the rest of my toastmasterly duties for worldcon, and have started pre-recording some bits for the ceremony (a wise precaution, since I am hopeless with Zoom and Skype and like things), but that is a lot less time-consuming and distracting than flying to the other end of the world. In between tapings, I return to Westeros. Of late I have been visiting with Cersei, Asha, Tyrion, Ser Barristan, and Areo Hotah. I will be dropping back into Braavos next week. I have bad days, which get me down, and good days, which lift me up, but all in all I am pleased with the way things are doing.
I do wish they would go faster, of course. Way way back in 1999, when I was deep in the writing of A STORM OF SWORDS, I was averaging about 150 pages of manuscript a month. I fear I shall never recapture that pace again. Looking back, I am not sure how I did it then. A fever indeed.
Anyway… when I am not writing, or thinking about writing, I am watching television and reading. Publishers send me huge piles of books, so my “to be read” pile is always growing, no many how many books I consume. Of course, I also buy books as well. Cannot help it, I am a book junkie. The new Stephen King collection IF IT BLEEDS was one recent favorite. I love these novella collections that King comes out with from time to time between his novels. This one features a new Holly Gibney story, and it is always great to see that character again… but there’s also a story called “Rat” about a writer trying to finish a novel in an isolated cabin which… ah… resonated with me rather strongly for some reason. One bit, where the writer gets derailed trying to figure out how many rocking chairs a sheriff could fit on his porch, was a dead-on depiction of the kind of stuff I go through all the time. Steve’s protagonist gets some help when a dead rat turns up to be his muse. So far, no rats at my cabin. Sid did catch a couple of mice last year, but she made pets of them. And Timmy and TomTom were no help whatsoever with WINDS. (Please don’t send me long emails about the dangers of mice, we know all that stuff).
Another recent book that really knocked me out was THE GLASS HOTEL, the latest by Emily St. John Mandel. A few years back, she wrote a (ahem) post-pandemic SF novel called STATION ELEVEN which I loved at the time and now devoutly hope is not going to prove prophetic. It was my favorite novel of that year, and I thought it deserved to win the Hugo and the Nebula. Which it didn’t, alas. But I had Emily at my theatre for an author event, which was great, and snapped up her three earlier novels. I really liked those too. Now comes her latest, THE GLASS HOTEL. No, this one is not science fiction or fantasy. In fact, I would be hard pressed to say what it is except a damn fine novel. It is about a hotel in a remote location, the people who work there, the people who stay there, it is about a Ponzi scheme, and art, and music, and a dysfunctional family, and… oh, well, I don’t know what it is about, but I do know that once I started reading, I could not stop. When people describe a book as a “page turner,” usually they are talking about novels that have a lot of plot, which Mandel definitely does not, yet somehow she keeps me turning pages regardless. And she writes just beautifully. Her prose is not overblown or excessively ornate, as is the case with too many writers who are known as “stylists,” but… it is just lovely, haunting and evocative and immersive… I guess you can say I am a big Emily St. John Mandel fanboy. I look forward to whatever she writes next.
There are other things going on in my life as well. I bought a railroad… well, I bought a third of a railroad. See the post below. Hollywood has slowed to a crawl thanks to the pandemic, but THE HOUSE OF THE DRAGON is still flying along wonderfully, thanks to Ryan Condal and his writers, and the tireless Ti Mikkel. With my producer hat on, I am still involved in trying to bring Nnedi Okorafor’s brilliant WHO FEARS DEATH to the small screen, and relaunch the WILD CARDS tv project. We have feature films in development adapted from my stories “Sandkings” and “The Ice Dragon” and “The Lost Lands,” television shows in development based on works by Roger Zelazny and Tony Hillerman, there are the secret shorts we’re doing that… well, no, if I spilled that, it wouldn’t be secret.
But up here on the mountain, all of that that seems very distant, and much of it has stuttered to a halt in any case, until Covid goes away.
Mostly, it’s just me in Westeros, with occasional side trips to other places in the pages of a great book.
Now you will have to excuse me. Arya is calling. I think she means to kill someone.
Current Mood: contemplative
When astronauts look down on Earth from orbit, they don’t see borders, national boundaries, or linguistic groups; they see one world, a gorgeous blue globe spinning in space, streaked with clouds. I don’t know if humanity will ever reach the stars (though I hope we will), but if we do, it won’t be Americans who get there. It won’t be the Chinese or the Russians or the British or the French or the Brazilians or the Kiwis or the South Africans or Indians or the folk of any other nation either. It will be humanity; in the language of the SF of my youth, it will be Terrans or Earthlings or Earthmen. The future belongs to all the peoples of the world.
With that in mind, back in 2018 I established THE TERRAN PRIZE, to bring an aspiring SF writer from abroad to the Taos Toolbox, the graduate level writing workshop that Walter Jon Williams runs every summer in the mountains of northern New Mexico. The Prize is given annually and covers all tuition and fees to the Toolbox (but not travel).
Here’s the official announcement of this year’s winner:
The Terran Prize for 2020, consisting of a scholarship for the Taos Toolbox writing workshop, has been won by Maurice Haeems of Mumbai, India.
Taos Toolbox was forced by the Covid pandemic to move from its original June dates to September 6-19, in Angel Fire, New Mexico. The workshop will be taught by Nancy Kress and Walter Jon Williams, along with special lecturers George R.R. Martin and E.M. Tippetts.
Maurice was born in Mumbai and has a bachelor’s degree in Engineering from the University of Mumbai and an MBA in Finance from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Over the last 30 years, he has lived in Mumbai, London, Hong Kong, Taipei, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Dubai while pursuing professional careers in mechanical engineering, investment banking, and software entrepreneurship.
Recently, Maurice turned to his fourth career and first love – Writing, Storytelling, and Filmmaking. His first project, the multi-award-winning sci-fi feature film Chimera, which Maurice wrote and directed, was released in April 2019 and is now available on VOD and DVD. Maurice is delighted and honored to be a part of the 2020 class of the Taos Toolbox.
Maurice says, “My goal in reading and writing speculative fiction is simply to explore the hypothetical though, as a bonus, I am often rewarded with an improved comprehension of my reality. It is a privilege, as a writer, to gaze into crystal balls and magical devices, to contemplate their revelations, and to translate the resulting visions into words.”
Current Mood: 
creative
Hey, Wild Carders. There’s a cool new interview up on the Wild Cards website, wherein Brad Denton, one of the newest members of the consortium, talks with Howard Waldrop, one of the originals… author of the very first Wild Cards story, “Thirty Minutes Over Broadway.”
If you’ve ever wondered how Jetboy’s last adventure came to be, who actually wrote his final words, or how H’ard pissed off Roger Zelazny, the world’s nicest man, this is the interview for you.
Of course, it is all done on the telephone, so everyone can stay safely socially distant, donchaknow.
Check it out at:
Current Mood: 
amused
No big news here, but it has been a week or so since my last blog post, so I thought I would say hi. I am still up in the mountains, doing the social distancing rag, and writing WINDS OF WINTER. I have good days and bad days, but I am making progress.
Most of the world remains closed, including my theatre and bookshop, the Jean Cocteau Cinema and Beastly Books. I had originally announced that we would re-examine the situation come April 15. That date is now upon us, and it is obvious that I was wildly optimistic in hoping we might even consider re-opening then. No. Won’t work. We’re going to remain shut until JUNE 1. Then, once again, we will revisit the question, once we see what state the world is in.
I am continuing to pay my staff during this closure, something I wish more small businesses would do. Beastly Books is still selling signed books by mailorder. Every order helps keep us afloat, so please take a look at our offerings: https://jeancocteaucinema.com/product-category/signed-books/
Along the same lines, though we cannot of course open our theatre to the public while coronavirus still rages, the JCC has gone virtual, and is screening new and old movies that way. For details on our Virtual Feature of the Week, go to https://jeancocteaucinema.com/
Hollywood has largely closed down as well, at least as far as actual production is concerned. (If this pandemic goes on long enough, I wonder if the pipeline will go dry, and we will start to run out of new films and television shows. If so, sheltering in place is going to get an order of magnitude harder. Television right now is doing a lot to keep us all sane — and no, not the news, which has the opposite effect). But while nothing is being filmed right now, development is continuing apace, since writers can still write at home. The only thing I am writing myself is THE WINDS OF WINTER, as I have said many times… but with my producer’s hat on, I am still involved in a number of exciting new shows for HBO, and a few film projects as well. When and if any of these make it to the screen, well, that’s always the question… but I do know that Ryan Condal and his team are roaring ahead on the scripts for HOUSE OF THE DRAGON, and that one has a full season’s order from HBO. As for the other stuff I may or may not be involved in, I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you all.
Oh, of course, I am doing a lot of reading these days. Rereading too. Some of my favorite writers are Robert A. Heinlein, Roger Zelazny, Tony Hillerman, Nnedi Okorafor, Howard Waldrop. Oh, and that GRRM guy did some good stuff too, before he started that fantasy series. Some of his old stories might even make good movies, donchaknow. (No, seriously, you guys should check out DREAMSONGS. Signed copies available from Beastly Books).
I have also been trading emails with my friends down in New Zealand. CoNZealand, this year’s World Science Fiction Convention, has also gone virtual in response to the crisis. A prudent move, but a challenging one. As this year’s Virtual Toastmaster, I am still going to be hosting the Hugo Awards… virtually. That should be… interesting. Especially for me, since I am one of the least tech savvy guys in fandom. I still write my novels with WordStar 4.0 on a DOS computer, after all, and when I interface with the internet it is mainly through this blog. (Good thing Howard Waldrop isn’t going to be hosting. He still works on a manual typewriter).
Anyway, the Kiwis have some smart guys working for them, and they assure me everything will go fine. They are working out the tech now, and we hope to have several trial runs before The Big Night. We are all certainly going to try to do our best. I expect there will be glitches and mistakes, many of them doubtless mine, but I do hope all those looking in will be patient and understanding. In any case, the rockets will be handed out one way or t’other, though the actual delivery may have to be entrusted to DHL or Federal Express.
Some cool stuff happening with WILD CARDS that I should mention. Check out our Wild Cards website, if you haven’t seen it in a while. Lots of great content there for you to explore, including a new blog post every two weeks by a rotating cast of our amazing Wild Cards writers. You will find it at https://www.wildcardsworld.com/
We also have a brand new Wild Cards original coming out at the end of this month from Harper Collins Voyager in the UK. The title is THREE KINGS, and it’s a full mosaic, was edited by Melinda M. Snodgrass (yours truly assisting), and features contributions from Peter Newman, Peadar O’Guilin, Caroline Spector, Mary Anne Mohanraj, and Melinda herself. It’s a sequel to KNAVES OVER QUEENS, and like that volume it is set entirely in the British Isles and features an English and Irish cast. (More on that one in a later post).
There’s more, of course. There’s always more. But this post has grown long enough, and Westeros is calling.
Current Mood: busy
April is here, though up where I am there is still a lot more snow than flowers.
The weirdness continues, all around the world. Sometimes it is hard to recall how much has changed in just one month.
Regular readers of my Not A Blog and the Wild Cards website know that I usually do an April Fools post. We have had some great ones over the years, even fooled a few people. Not this year, though. None of the ideas we were playing with seemed quite appropriate, with everything that is going on. Or maybe I just wasn’t feeling very funny.
Science Fiction writers are supposed to be good at predicting the future (that’s a myth, actually, but never mind), but I have to confess, I have no notion where or when any of this is going to end. I can see half a dozen branching alternatives, some of which are very grim indeed, and some much less so. One does not want to be too alarmist, of course. But at the same time, it would be folly to be too dismissive of the dangers. All we can do is shelter in place, keep an eye on the news, and take this day by day.
The Jean Cocteau Cinema and Beastly Books remain closed. When I first shut them down a few weeks ago, it was only for a month… the idea being that we would re-evaluate on April 15 and see where things stood then. As I write this, on April 2, that April 15 date is looking wildly optimistic. If things change at all in the next two weeks, they are likely to be changing for the worse, not the better. Most likely, then, both cinema and bookstore will need to remain closed… for how long, I have no idea.
Our mail-order service at Beastly Books remains open, however. Unlike Amazon, we don’t sell toilet paper or medical equipment, so nothing will take priority over your book orders. Take a look at the selection at https://jeancocteaucinema.com/product-category/signed-books/
All our books are autographed, and reading is one of the best ways to pass the time while quarantined. (I know I am doing a lot of it). Also, truth be told, your book purchases will help us keep paying our staff at the cinema and bookstore, since there is no other source of income at present. And we have some great, great titles in stock.
In other virus-related news, conventions and festivals and sporting events continue to cancel or postpone all over the world. Including SF cons. Some of them, I fear, may never come back, since — in some cases, not all — venues and hotels are refusing to let the events out of their contracts, which means the sponsoring organizations could have huge debts with no income to help offset the costs. This year’s Nebula Weekend is going virtual. Some of the writer’s workshops at which I sponsor scholarships — Clarion, Clarion West, Odyssey, and the Taos Toolbox — may need to do the same. None of them have made that determination yet, since the workshops are still months away, but I know all of them are exploring their options.
The biggest news in that regard is that this year’s worldcon, CoNZealand, has also decided to go virtual. I know what a difficult decision that was for the Kiwis, who have worked so hard bidding and winning the con, and dreamed so long of bringing fandom to their magical island. New Zealand is one of my favorite places in the world, and Parris feels the same way. We have been there several times before, and I know we will visit again… just not this year, alas. I gather that pushing the con back to late 2020 or early 2021 was not feasible, for various logistical reasons, which meant that going online was the only real alternative to cancellation. How that will work, I have no idea. No one does, really. It has never been done before. The technical aspects are going to be daunting, no doubt… but I know that everyone concerned is going to do their best. Fingers crossed.
If there is a silver lining in these clouds, this will give me more time to finish WINDS OF WINTER. I continue to write every day, up here in my mountain fastness.
Want something to read while you’re waiting? This would be a good time to check out my Wild Cards series, if you haven’t done so already. There are twenty-nine of them (some still in the pipeline), which should keep you reading for a good long time. If it is more Westeros you want, and you just know A SONG OF ICE & FIRE, take a look at A KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS (the Dunk & Egg novellas) and FIRE & BLOOD (wherein you will find the source material for the new HBO series, HOUSE OF THE DRAGON). And there are some other wonderful writers out there as well. The QUILLIFER series by Walter Jon Williams is the best work WJW has ever done, and I am really enjoying the new AFTERSHOCKS series from Marko Kloos.
Need something to binge watch? The third season of OZARK is riveting, HBO’s recent Stephen King mini-series THE OUTSIDER is a faithful, engrossing adaptation of his novel, and the DOCTOR SLEEP film is very good as well. I am also really enjoying THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA, an adaptation of the Philip Roth novel that seems more timely than ever before. And WESTWORLD and BETTER CALL SAUL are must watch too.
However you spend your days, my friends, stay safe.
Current Mood: 
anxious
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