Over at The Electric Smack Shack, Marvin doesn’t post often, but when he does, there’salways at least one movie or book added to my must6-check-out pile. Marvin, how are ya? It’s been ages!
Month: April 2007
Classmate News
My classmates/mates (in the British/Australian sense of the word, mind you) have had some good news of late. I don’t remember whether I announced Guy making a sale to Postscripts, but he did. Tinatsu sold a Clarion West story — from the first week, I think — to Shimmer. Caroline‘s sold another story (a Clarion West story, in fact) to Fantasy. Now, go and read Tina‘s excellent poem “Rehydrated”, which is online at Strange Horizons. Here’s to many more stories in print. I’m hoping to have some news to add to that list, soon.
Dear Mr. Vonnegut,
Bye, and thanks for everything.
Mad Revisionism
I just sent out a few submissions, which means I now have ten stories pending at different magazines and zines: Upgraded Phrase List for Mil-Spec iTrans Phrase Translation Unit The Country of the Young (Clarion West Story, week 4, I think) The Wager Cai and her Ten Thousand Husbands Improperly Prepared Blowfish The Day I Lost My ‘Thulu Dyscrasia Ogallala On Punctuation The Egan Thief (Update: Those marked red are beyond not only the average response time, but also the estimated response time listed at Duotrope, which tends to be significantly longer. This could mean anything, of course; with the …
Me Me Me Redux
Jade asked me these five questions: 1. You are a sci fi genre writer. How have you experienced being a sci fi writer in the realm of the (sometimes very snobby) creative writing world? Well, you know, that’s an interesting question. I’ve had all kinds of reactions to that. Some people go, “Oh, you write SF!” and they’re suddenly more comfortable, like, they don’t have to act all smart and fake around you. Other people get snotty and dismissive. Still others kind of try to connect by mentioning the SF they’ve read and enjoyed or not enjoyed, and often it …
Night Music, With David Sanborn?
Remember that show? Man, I was so into that show, but I never saw Bill Frisell on it. Damn! You know, for all that the 80s were a sad, embarrassing joke of a decade, you couldn’t have a TV show like Night Music anymore… when it’s all just about having music shows on TV. Of course, you shouldn’t need it in a vibrant culture — there’d be interesting live music everywhere — but living in Saskatchewan, and being into this kind of stuff, being crazy about saxophone and creative music — different music! — and never getting to hear much …
Up, Down
On the up side, I realized what kind of a story “A Killing in Burma Incheon” really wants to be, except it might have a different title in which case I may someday be able to reuse “A Killing in Burma” since I just love it as a title, in a way that I’ll never love “A Killing in Incheon.” Including all kinds of craziness. It kind of dribbled into clarity on the train home from meeting someone this evening, and should I ever write it, I’ll be putting him high on the thank-yous list. The thank-yous being a list …
Perfume (the movie)
I finally saw Perfume today, and feel inspired to reread the book, and to start writing an essay about it. I actually read the book, on the recommendation of my friend Young Ja, a few years ago, but I can’t remember it all that clearly, and if I am to write on the subject, I’ll have to review it. In fact, I feel inspired to write a whole book of criticism of the kind I’d like to see, because I haven’t seen anything of the kind before. You see, I want to read a book of literary criticism which starts …
A Killing in Burma is Killing Me
The story isn’t ready yet, and trying to make it happen now is futile, because it’s just not ready to happen. I’ve plotted and re-plotted, thought and re-thought, and it’s going to take more time. That’s just how it is. I feel a little pressured since there have been a few people — such as his eminence Bruce Sterling, and the respectable Cory Doctorow — who’ve gone ahead and written decent or outstanding fabber stories in the last few years. I get the feeling like this is a vaguely new area that could get mined out, and I would like …
Flickr Update!
Better Prayer Tiles Shot, originally uploaded by mrgord. I’ve just uploaded the rest of my processed RAW images from my trip to China in January. There are now almost 200 pictures in the set, and I’m considering it a complete set now. (Though a couple of shots are weirdly out of order.) There’s a link to my flickr account in the sidebar, but clicking on this image will let you get to a page that has a link for the China set. Go check it out!