Tobias S. Buckell's Blog, page 36

Russia’s new New Arctic Command

Via Fred Kiesche:

“Russia is forming a new Northern Fleet-Unified Strategic Command dedicated to protecting its interests in the Arctic Circle before the end of 2014, RIA Novosti reported on Monday.

‘The new command will comprise the Northern Fleet, Arctic warfare brigades, air force and air defense units as well as additional administrative structures,’ a source on the Russian general staff told the state news agency.

The Northern Fleet-Unified Strategic Command will be responsible for protecti...

I’ve added a signed copy of The Apocalypse Ocean to the Con or Bust auction

I’ve put a copy of the Limited Edition of The Apocalypse Ocean, signed, up at Con or Bust. There aren’t many copies of TAO left, I hoard the only box left and am no longer selling them individually, just keeping it around for things like charity auctions, surprise gifts, and maybe a few copies to auction far down the road for generally evil capitalist gains. But mostly for things like this.

About Con or Bust:

Con or Bust helps people of color/non-white people attend SFF conventions (how to requ...

Invisible Universe fundraiser, help support post production on a trove of black science fiction creator interviews

Invisible Universe is seeking funding via crowd funding to go into post-production with years of footage of interviews with black science fiction across a variety of media:

For the past ten years, producer/director, M. Asli Dukan has been producing this original and groundbreaking, independent documentary project. During this time, she has interviewed a “Who’s Who” list of Black Speculative Fiction writers, filmmakers and artists, including creators like Samuel R. Delany, Octavia E. Butler, We...

THE END IS NIGH to feature a short story of mine

I have a short story that will be appearing in the anthology THE END IS NIGH, edited by John Joseph Adams and Hugh Howey. Deets:

“Famine. Death. War. Pestilence. These are the harbingers of the biblical apocalypse, of the End of the World. In science fiction, the end is triggered by less figurative means: nuclear holocaust, biological warfare/pandemic, ecological disaster, or cosmological cataclysm.

But before any catastrophe, there are people who see it coming. During, there are heroes who fig...

Does anyone remember this open driving simulator? And can we have one again?

So I found myself writing this to an old high school friend of mine recently:

There was a driving simulator I adored that I’d love to see replicated. There were roads, and other traffic. No racing, you just drove a sedan around, and you could see other cars in your mirrors. If you went over the speed limit you’d get pulled over if you passed a cop and ‘lose.’ Cross into traffic, you’d usually hit another car and ‘lose.’ Drive off the edge of the road and ‘lose.’

I’d wander all over in it.

Now I...

Chocolate and Vodka talks about Dunning-Kruger effect and publishing

There is so much wisdom at Chocolate and Vodka (both in pro-self publishing and in surveying why the quality of self publishing will always suffer due to the Dunning-Kruger effect) that I just want you to rush over and read, and then read all the other posts around there. I spent an hour poking around and then followed the author on twitter because I want to subscribe to the newsletter!

“So, according to Dunning and Kruger, in order to combat the massive shit volcano, we would need to train ev...

It’s all algebra… or something

C.E. Murphy talks some math about why she won’t be continuing a series:

“I have some things to report about the Inheritors’ Cycle.

Not irregularly, people ask me if I’ll be doing more of them. I’ve been seriously considering pursuing that, but I just got royalty statements on them, and it’s clear that unless I could be absolutely certain of getting the books into bookstores, it would be a waste of my time. THE QUEEN’S BASTARD has sold about 1800 copies in e-book and THE PRETENDER’S CROWN has so...

The Mammoth Book of Steampunk Adventures to reprint my story Love Comes to Abyssal City

This is cool:

“Contents

Introduction by Ann VanderMeer

‘Smoke City’ by Christopher Barzak

‘Memories in Bronze, Feathers, and Blood’ by Aliette de Bodard

‘Love Comes to Abyssal City’ by Tobias Buckell

‘Canary of Candletown’ by C.S.E Cooney

‘On the Lot and In the Air’ by Lisa L. Hannett

‘Beyond Calais’ by Samantha Henderson

‘La Valse’ by K.W. Jeter

‘The Colliers’ Venus (1893)’ by Caitlin R. Kiernan

‘Benedice Te’ by Jay Lake

‘Good Hunting’ by Ken Liu

‘Selin That Has Grown in the Desert’ by Alex Dally MacFarl...

Progress report: day… not really sure

I spent today working on freelance ebook conversion and editing for the blog I work for. Wrenching my back put me into a week and a half tail spin. When I lose days, I tend to get into a real frustrated mind set. But I muddled through everything and managed to get the copy edits done for Hurricane Fever by Monday. Though I have to admit, I was a bit exhausted (and sacrificed some sleep to achieve this, and that puts me in a bad spiral of odd hours, and not getting sleep affects me very strong...

North Carolina coal ash spill, another example of externalities

Again, a lot of this isn’t priced into your power bill as it engages the resource of government to clean up and manage whenever it happens:

“Coal ash – the residue left over from the burning of coal at power plants – reportedly contains a number of toxic heavy metals, including mercury and lead. And, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), coal ash is one of the largest industrial waste sources in the U.S., with more than 136 million tons generated in 2008 alone.

There have been...