14 Jul 2008

Readercon: July 17 – 20

posted in: ebooks, personal news, science fiction, Sunborn, writing | 0

Readercon happens this coming weekend, just outside Boston. It’s one of my convention-going highlights of the year, being full of people who truly love reading and love science fiction! I’ll be on a few panels, and doing a reading. The full text of the Program Guide is online as a PDF. But here’s my schedule:

Friday 4:00 PM, Salon F:
If Free Electronic Texts Are Good Promotion, What’s Piracy? — Jeffrey A. Carver, James Patrick Kelly (L), Cat Rambo, Graham Sleight, Gordon Van Gelder

“Webscabs, who post their creations on the net for free . . . [are helping convert] the noble calling of Writer into the life of Pixel-stained Technopeasant Wretch.”–Howard V. Hendrix, former Vice-President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA). In a recent issue of _Locus_, Cory Doctorow summarized the evidence that giving away free electronic versions of books actually helps rather than hinders sales of the printed versions… What are the differences between giving away a text electronically yourself, and letting others disseminate it without your knowledge and/or permission? …If “piracy” is actually good for all except the best-selling authors, how do writers reconcile this reality with long-standing and deep-rooted feelings about intellectual property rights and getting paid for work?

Friday 7:00 PM, Salon F:
Waking Up Sober Next to a Story Idea — Paolo Bacigalupi, Jeffrey A. Carver (L), David Anthony Durham, Kay Kenyon, Barry B. Longyear, Jennifer Pelland

Really, it seemed absolutely beautiful once upon a time. Now that you’ve had intimate knowledge of it (say, midway through the novel), you can see all the less-than-flattering sides. You may even wonder, What the hell was I thinking? How do you recover enthusiasm for the work? Now that you see the flaws, how do you begin the process of fixing them?

Saturday 12:00 Noon, Vinyard: Kaffeeklatsch (meet the author)
Jeffrey A. Carver; David Anthony Durham

Saturday 2:00 PM, RI: Workshop
Writing Jujitsu: Turning Writer’s Block into Stories. — Barry B. Longyear with participation by Jeffrey A. Carver, Barbara Krasnoff, Sandra McDonald, et al.

You can’t sell it until it’s on paper and you can’t get it on paper if things keep eating up your time, nag at you, bully you, or you’re filled to the brim with illnesses, insecurities, or crushing doubts. Longyear presents a how-to workshop for beginning writers and those who have been there on how to turn what’s blocking your muse into stories.

Sunday 1:30 PM, VT: Reading (30 min.) — Jeffrey A. Carver reads from his forthcoming novel Sunborn.

If you’re going to be at Readercon, I hope you’ll come say hello. (I won’t have a designated autographing time. They had too many authors, and since I don’t currently have anything new out, they triaged me. But I’ll be around. Grab me after a panel, or come to the Kaffeeklatch.)

“First you’re an unknown, then you write a book and you move up to obscurity.” —Martin Myers

14 Jul 2008

Unusual Book Signing Planned

posted in: personal news, Sunborn, writing | 0

This weekend, I was at my usual early-Saturday-evening haunt, which is the free and very friendly wine tastings at my local beer and wine emporium, Menotomy Beer and Wine in Arlington, Massachusetts. I was looking around, and had a sudden inspiration: why not a combination wine tasting /book signing? A natural, no? (Could be a beer tasting, too; they do those on Friday evenings.)

I suggested it to the management (“I have a crazy idea…”), and they loved it. Turns out they’ve been *trying* to get local artists in there to display their work for free, just to liven things up even more. I believe their exact words were: “You’re here. It’s a done deal.”

So if you’re in the Boston area, mark that on your mental calendar for sometime in November, when Sunborn is published. I’ll post more later.

12 Jul 2008

More On Free E-Books

posted in: blogging, ebooks, personal news, science fiction, writing | 0

There’s been a lot of interesting stuff written in just the last few days, fortuitously (some of which was brought to my attention by Charlza in his comment to my last post). Simon Owens has a long article about the Tor free e-book program on his blog, bloggasm. He notes several authors’ impressions that book giveaways have helped sales, and quotes extensively from Tobias Buckell, a newer writer who seems to be doing very nicely. There are some provocative comments from readers, on both sides of the question.

Rob Sawyer responds on his own blog with a much more analytical approach to the question. Pointing out that there’s really no hard data for us to base judgments on, he does a nice job of extrapolating some likely ranges for increased sales (and earnings) for writers. In his view, the benefits are probably far more modest than suggested by anecdotal reports. A key point in his argument is that Cory Doctorow and John Scalzi, who have reported such apparent good results, are not necessarily typical cases. Both of these writers have huge online presences, and probably got way more downloads than the average writer would. (Certainly they have far more active blogs and web sites than I do.)

So where does this leave me? I learned from reader Pascal that a fair number of my earlier novels are already up on Bit Torrent networks in pirated PDF editions. He got copies to me so that I could look at them, and I see that they range from barely readable hack jobs to thoroughly professional-looking work. I must say it was a shock to see how many novels by how many SF writers are floating around in pirated editions. I’m of two minds about it: On the one hand, it’s clear copyright infringement, and to a significant degree badly done infringement. On the other hand, it’s free publicity.

One of my workshop students suggested, why not find the pirate scanners who did the good job and see if I can get them to scan in the first three Chaos books for me. Then I could put at the top of the PDFs:

“This electronic edition, and no other, has been distributed with my consent and co-operation. Those who approve of courtesy (at least) to living authors will download it, and no other.”

(If you don’t recognize the source, it’s from Tolkien’s note in the Ballantine Books edition of The Lord of the Rings, following the Ace pirated edition, many decades ago.)

So am I any closer to a decision on whether to post Sunborn for free when it’s published? Not really. But leaning now towards putting the first three up to introduce new readers to the series, then letting the book carry it from there.

But we’ll see.

“Advice from this elderly practitioner is to forget publishers and just roll a sheet of copy paper into your machine and get lost in your subject.” —E. B. White

28 Jun 2008

Speaking of Free Books

posted in: ebooks, personal news, science fiction, Sunborn, writing | 0

I’ve been considering the possibility of making Sunborn available for free download, perhaps in installments leading up to the actual pub date (end of October). A number of writers, including Cory Doctorow and John Scalzi, have offered their books for free download and discovered that it seemed to increase their audience and interest in the novels, and thus sales of their books. While there are no doubt some readers who will read only the free version and skip the hardcopy, it seems that many more decide they’d like to own the actual book once they’ve read the electronic version. At least, that’s what these writers have reported. Past experience is no guarantee of future performance, though, as the mutual funds tell us.

I’d be interested in knowing what you folks think. This is new territory for all of us in the fiction world, and I’m feeling my way in the dark just like everyone else.

(I’ve already used this quote, but it just seems to fit, so here’s an encore…)

“Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can see only as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” —E.L. Doctorow

20 May 2008

Bread Loaf Conference

posted in: personal news, science fiction, Sunborn, writing | 0

As I hoped and expected, the New England Young Writers Conference at Bread Loaf was a great time, and entirely too short. My daughter Julia attended the workshops led by another fiction writer, while I worked with a talented and extraordinarily open and enthusiastic group of fourteen high school students on their fiction writing. That was just the core of it; there were also readings (from the podium where Robert Frost used to hold forth—I did one myself), additional writing sessions open to all, conversations with writers of all stripes, good food and good company, and—wonder of wonders—sunshine on the mountain. I was sad to leave. But I’ll tell you this: there are some excellent writers coming up in the years ahead! Be warned. Be heartened.

The Sunborn galleys arrived for my inspection and correction just before the conference, and I didn’t have time to so much as glance at them over the weekend. Now I’m working on them, but I’m also getting ready to leave on another trip, this time to meet with another group that wants to pick the brains of SF writers.

I hope you’re all enjoying your spring.

“I love being a writer. What I can’t stand is the paperwork.” —Peter De Vries

8 May 2008

Sunborn Available for Preorder

posted in: personal news, science fiction, Sunborn, writing | 0

For years, readers have been sending me emails saying, “When is the next Chaos Chronicles book coming out?” or, “I’m not getting any younger—will there ever be another Chaos Chronicles book?” or even, “Thanks a lot for leaving me hanging, because it’s obvious there’s never going to be another book, you jerk.”

Readers of this blog have known for years that Sunborn, the new Chaos book, was coming—or at least it’s been my word against the doubters. (Sometimes, I’ve been among the doubters.) Well, you no longer have to take my word for it! It’s up on Amazon. And you can even preorder it. Now. Today. Go ahead, click the link! It won’t hurt.

I was surprised it was up this soon (the pub date is October of this year, from Tor Books). In fact, I didn’t even know it was up until a kind reader in Germany sent me a note telling me about it. I quickly discovered that they’d misspelled my first name on the dustjacket, at least as displayed on Amazon, but a note to my editor resulted in that being fixed pretty quickly. (I hope it stays fixed. I’m sure it will. Nothing can go wrongg.)

That’s the news from here. I might not get this written up before I go, so I’ll just mention that next week I’ll be heading up again to the Bread Loaf writing center near Middlebury, Vermont, to teach at the annual New England Young Writers Conference. If you are, or are the parent or teacher of, a young writer of high school age, you really should look into this for next year. It’s a terrific program. I’ll tell all about it, after I get back.

And did I mention? You can preorder Sunborn from Amazon.

“There’s nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.” —Red Smith

2 Apr 2008

Sunborn Copyedit Finished

posted in: personal news, Sunborn, writing | 0

For the last seven or eight days, I have been up to my ears in Sunborn again. The copyedited manuscript arrived for my review, and as usual, they wanted it done yesterday. In case you’re not familiar with the process, when a book manuscript goes into production, after it’s left the editor’s hands, it goes to a copy editor. This person does all the fine marking up for typesetting, plus proofing of all the fiddly little details, querying the author if something seems wrong or unclear, and checking spelling, hyphenations, commas, all the little stuff that can drive you crazy—and make the book look unprofessional if it’s missed or done wrong. Copy editors are absolutely essential to the bookmaking process, and a good copy editor is priceless to an author.

The problem is that the author then has to go over everything, approving or not approving of changes, and reconsidering every little comma and word choice, pulling his or her hair out over things that he thought (ha ha) had already been settled. It’s also a chance to make last-minute revisions if a passage doesn’t seem right. It’s my least favorite stage of writing a book, it’s excruciating, and it’s necessary to do it with great care. Usually by the time you get to this point, you’re sick to death of the book and the last thing you want to do is read it one more time. But you do. For one thing, even the best copy editor will make some changes you don’t like, and this is where you catch them and fix them.

Anyway, I did all that, and have just shipped it off to my editor. Now it goes back to the production department and off to typesetting. I’ll have to do it all one more time—when the page proofs come for checking. But for now, I can rest. Sleeeeeeep!

“You don’t know what it is to stay a whole day with your head in your hands trying to squeeze your unfortunate brain so as to find a word.” —Gustave Flaubert

21 Feb 2008

Sunborn in October 2008

posted in: personal news, science fiction, writing | 0

How could I forget this? I have word now that Sunborn (the continuation of the Chaos Chronicles) is firmly scheduled for October of this year, from Tor. That’s the hardcover. I don’t know yet when the paperback will be out, probably a year or so after.

Meanwhile, a reminder that you can read the beginning of the book online right now!

By the way, one of the many things I’m thinking about doing is getting some decent recording equipment and producing my own podcast or audiobook-style readings of some of my stuff. This is something that author James Patrick Kelly has been doing pretty successfully. What do you all think? Should I start with some short stories, or do Sunborn? Lemme know.

“I have written eleven books, but each time I think, ‘Uh oh, they’re going to find out now. I’ve run a game on everybody, and they’re going to find me out.'” —Maya Angelou

21 Feb 2008

If This is Tuesday, It Must Be…No, No, That Can’t Be Right

posted in: quirky, science, science fiction, writing | 0

So I don’t know what day it is, anymore. What else is new? Last weekend, I was at Boskone, which is an always-enjoyable Boston SF convention. In the art show, I was startled to see the cover painting to one of my older books, The Rapture Effect! Beautiful painting by David Mattingly. Besides that, it was good to catch up with people I haven’t seen in a while, and devote yet more time to the question of how to make a living at this racket. (The writing racket.) More and more, it seems, writers have to look for other gigs to bring in income—even writers who are well established, and who you might think have it made. (There’s a good chance that they don’t, that they do something else to pay the mortgage.)

This isn’t going to pay the mortgage, but I’ve started a new business-hobby: Roomba resurrection. It started with my fixing my own Roomba when it seemed dead, then thinking, well, if I could get some people to give me their old, dead Roombas, it would be a great home school project to take them apart with my daughter and her home-school buddies. But it turned out nobody wanted to give me their old Roombas, so I started looking for some cheap on Ebay. Turns out there’s a constant stream of them being sold there, and it started to seem like a good idea to buy a few as cheaply as I could, fix them up, and see if I could resell them for a profit. I’ll let you know how that works out. (I still want to do the home-school project, though. If you have an old Roomba you want to lend to the cause….)

Interesting news notes:

From the Washington Post comes this: Scientists “have created a paper-thin material that absorbs 99.955 percent of the light that hits it, making it by far the darkest substance ever made—about 30 times as dark as the government’s current standard for blackest black. The material, made of hollow fibers, is a Roach Motel for photons—light checks in, but it never checks out.” It involves carbon nanotubes (what else?) and has got people thinking ever deeper thoughts about invisibility cloaks.

Meanwhile, U.S. plans to shoot down a defective and falling satellite have the rest of the world wondering what else those military tech-types might be thinking about. I take no position on that question—sure, they could be viewing this as a great practice opportunity, and probably are—but does that mean they shouldn’t do it if it might reduce the risk of an accident on the ground? I don’t have enough information to form an educated opinion. But I do like what space.com has offered us—a chance to consider the question: “What Cosmic Duo Would You Trust to Destroy a Wayward Spy Satellite?” Look through the list. It’ll amuse you, and bring back some fond memories!

“A man who had to be punctually at a certain place at five o’clock has the whole afternoon from one to five ruined for him already.” —Lin Yutang

24 Jan 2008

Still Here, Still Tickin’ in the New Year

posted in: personal news, writing | 0

Good Lord, I haven’t posted in over a month! Yiiiee. Last time I checked in, I was about to head off with my family for extended holidays in London—and indeed, we had a great time there. We saw all of the usual famous buildings, the British Museum, the National (art) Galleries, the Tate Modern, the Greenwich Observatory, the London Tower, the Thames from a boat, and the insides of a good number of pubs. We also visited the famous Forbidden Planet bookstore, and saw some plays: Boeing, Boeing and Wicked. And my daughters saw Ian McKellan in King Lear! (We would all have gone, but tickets were sold out. Only by standing in line for people selling off unneeded tickets did we get two individual seats for the girls.) McKellan, they reported, was awesome as Lear. And Wicked was a stunning stage production. Oh, we also took a train to visit family friends in a real English village somewhere north of London.

Here are a few pix of us from London:

Here we are, straddling the Prime Meridian!

Julia, Lexi, and Allysen overlooking Greenwich and the Thames River.

Me, apparently looking very very serious,
in the darkness of a pub.

Immediately after our return, my brother and his girlfriend arrived for a 5-day visit. We tried turducken for the first time, as we had a belated Christmas dinner. An interesting experiment, but I think we’ll go back to regular turkey next time.

It was all great. But by the time we’d gotten back to normal and recovered from jet lag, our total “out of real life” experience was close to a month. Where did the time go?

I am now back at work on The Reefs of Time—struggling with the transition from where I thought the story was heading before to where I think it’s heading now. At the same time, I’m also looking for outside consulting work as a developmental editor. (That’s probably worth a post of its own: coming soon.) The reason, of course, is obvious: most of us can’t make a living from writing fiction alone, and sooner or later, we have to seek out gainful employment. One of those facts about writing that we wish were different.

But hey—I just resuscitated a dead Roomba! And I fixed our crippled Calypso washing machine without calling a technician! (I knew that voltmeter would come in handy one day.) And I replaced the battery in the iPod Mini I just inherited from my daughter! So I’m on a high!

“I have written a great many stories and I still don’t know how to go about it except to write it and take my chances.” —John Steinbeck

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