Just The Caffeine Talking

Boskone 60

This coming Friday I'll be at Boskone, the longest-running SF convention in New England, at the dear old Westin Seaport hotel in Boston. If you want to stop in and see me in person, my convention schedule is here:

FRIDAY, February 17

4:00 p.m.: Serving Up a Tasty World — There's more to fictional dining than Stew. I'll be moderating a panel of writers talking about food in fantastic fiction, how to make it appealing, and how to use food as a way to reveal things about settings and characters.

5:30 p.m.: Becoming a Space-Ready Society — I get to be on a panel with a bunch of genuine experts, all discussing what it's going to take to create a permanent and self-sustaining human population off Earth.

SATURDAY, February 18

11:30 a.m.: The Declining Readership Rate Among Children — I pitched this topic so they're making me moderate the panel. We've got several professional educators and experts to talk about the problem of declining readership among young people, how serious it is, what's causing it, and what we can do.

1:00 p.m.: Group Reading — I'll be reading a short selection from The Scarab Mission, if you want to hear what you're missing.

7:00 p.m.: Why Science Fiction Loves Getting Science Wrong — SF loves to break the rules, but what's the difference between speculation and just getting it wrong? This won't be just a litany of goofs, but an exploration of when you have to break from reality, and the role of accuracy in storytelling.

SUNDAY, February 19

11:30 a.m.: Autographing — I'll be signing books, anthologies, magazines, casts, bookplates, and anything you care to bring along.  

I've Got A Little List . . .

The nice people at Shepherd.com asked me to submit a list of five book recommendations. I chose "The Best Novels About Exploring Big Things In Space." It's kind of a funny coincidence that I chose that topic, right when I have a book out about people exploring a ruined space habitat. Their site has loads of other recommended-reading lists on a whole range of topics.

I'd love to hear if anyone has any suggestions for books on that same topic. Maybe you can come up with a better list than I did!

DiFilippo on Scarabs

Paul DiFilippo put up a very kind review of The Scarab Mission in his Locus column. You can read it here, at Locus Online.

The summary: he liked it. The review calls Scarab a "rousing, unstoppable, non-stop adventure," which is good to hear. That's what I wanted to write, but you never know if you hit the mark. I think that is the single most frustrating thing about writing: the lag time. I wrote Scarab in 2020-2021. The last revisions were done last summer. I've mentally moved on to the next book, and only now can I find out if anyone understands or likes what I was trying
to do three years ago. And of course some people won't find this book for months or years yet. 

Copies should now be hitting the mark in bookstores, so pick up yours today. Buy them all up so I can stop promoting and get back to the Worldbuilding series. 

 

FOUND!

Good news for everyone waiting to get a trade paperback copy of The Scarab Mission: the lost copies have been found! According to my publisher, "they should be going where they were supposed to this week." 

I'll send a signed bookplate to whoever comments first that they got their copy. (And to anyone else who requests one, but the first commenter gets bragging rights.)

The Big Idea: Writing For Games vs. Writing Fiction

I wrote a guest post for John Scalzi's Whatever blog, discussing my work writing roleplaying games and how that affected my fiction. You can find it here. For visual interest, check out the cover of Weird War I!

 

Scarab Mission World Exclusive!

If you want a copy of The Scarab Mission, make your way to the Westin Seaport Hotel in Boston and seek out the booth for Larry Smith Booksellers in the dealer area. They've got six signed, hand-delivered copies of The Scarab Mission, making them the only book dealer in the world right now capable of selling you one. Get them while the supply lasts!

Arisia 2023

This weekend Boston's biggest annual science fiction convention returns to the Westin Seaport hotel, January 13-16. I'll be there, promoting my rare and eagerly-sought new book The Scarab Mission. I'm also doing several panels and events.

Saturday, January 14

10:00 A.M.: Connecting With Your Kids Through Media — How liking the same nerdy stuff as your kids can draw you closer together.

4:00 P.M.: Overt and Covert Antagonists: Who's More Evil? — Which is worse, a bad guy you don't know about, or one who isn't afraid to make their villainy obvious?

8:30 P.M.: All Words Are Made Up — How to do alien or fantasy languages, what to avoid, and why it's important.

Sunday, January 15 

11:30 A.M.: Reading — I'll be reading some selections from The Scarab Mission.

2:30 P.M.: Gods Walk Among Us — Gods, both real and made-up, as characters in fantasy fiction.

When I'm not in these program events I'll be hanging around. If I can arrange it, there may be some copies of The Scarab Mission available (no guarantees). If that doesn't work out I can provide signed bookplates to paste into your copy when it finally arrives. And of course, I'll sign any of my older work, including games.

See you all at Arisia!

 

Scarab Mission Update

According to my publisher, The Scarab Mission was printed on time (and I have my comp copies as proof of that), they arrived at the Simon & Schuster warehouse on time, and at the proper moment they were shipped out . . . somewhere. Not to Amazon or bookstores. The good people at Simon & Schuster are trying to track them down and get them to where they need to go, and if the books have truly vanished into the Kuiper Belt then I guess they'll do a second printing. So to everyone who is waiting for a copy, please be patient. You will get your books, but it may be a little while.

This coming weekend, January 13-15, I will be at the Arisia convention in Boston, and I plan to bring some copies for booksellers in the dealer room. If you can get to the Westin Waterfront, you can get a copy before anyone else, and I'll be on hand to sign them.

Watch this space for news as I learn more.

Book Launch Party: Everyone On Earth is Invited!

This Saturday Baen Books is hosting a virtual Book Launch party for The Scarab Mission. At 8:00 p.m. Eastern US Time I'll be on a livestream — answering questions, talking about the book and future projects, and generally doing my best to be a funny dancing monkey.

You can see it on the Baen YouTube channel here: https://youtu.be/y8rIEevkgIY

Or via Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/events/709418230573342

Or go to the Baen Books Twitter feed to find the link:  https://twitter.com/baenbooks 

Since this is a virtual party there's no limit to how many people can attend. Bring your friends, bring your children, bring random strangers. Let's see if we can get every living human watching!

I Don't Know What's Going On With Amazon

A number of eager fans have reported that they can't order the print edition of The Scarab Mission from Amazon. I don't know why this is happening. I've notified Baen Books about it, and I'm sure they've been rattling Amazon's cage.

I am sure that the books really exist. I got my complimentary copies weeks ago. It's possible that there were delays in shipping the copies to Amazon  — though that sounds unlikely to me, as it was printed in the USA, and transport within the country seems to be humming along pretty well. They may have under-ordered, though again that seems odd given Amazon's reputation for inventory management. They're selling the Kindle version, so it's not as if they've decided to "deplatform" me for some reason. 

In short, I don't know, I'm doing my best to find out, and as soon as I learn anything I'll pass it along.