Scott Westerfeld's Blog, page 13

My Doings in 2013

I don’t have a book out this year, so I won’t be on any sort of tour. But I will be traveling around a bit and doing a few live appearances (mostly in Australia) so it makes sense to list everything in one place for easy linkage. And this is that place.

Here are all my known appearances in 2013. I will update this page as things change.

Conflux

Canberra, Australia

April 26-28

I’ll be doing a presentation about Leviathan and the history of illustrated novels on Friday (May 26) at 5:00PM, Event Room One. (And otherwise hanging out, so come say hi.) Conference site.

INTERNET DEAD ZONE

May 3-10

I am turning off my internet for this whole week. Get off my lawn!

Aurealis Awards

Sydney, Australia

May 18, 7PM

I’ll be hosting the ceremony for these yearly awards for Australian fantasy, science fiction, and horror. Hopefully I will be funny. Click here for details.

Sydney Writer’s Festival

Saturday, May 25, 11:30AM

I’ll be on a panel with Lauren Beukes, David M. Henley, and James Bradley. What is speculative fiction, and where do the boundaries start to blur between genres and sub-genres? Have the classic genres changed now that we live in a world where technology has caught up?

This is free and no bookings required. Event details.

Alpha Teen Workshop

Pittsburgh, PA

July 13-16

I’ll be teaching at this week-long writing seminar for teenagers. Admissions for the workshop are closed, but there will probably be a bookstore appearance in Pittsburgh. Check back here for details about that, or at the Alpha site.

San Diego Comic-Con

July 18-12

I’ll be hanging out here and getting into trouble. They might make me do a panel or two. Check back here for details, or at the con site.

Melbourne Writer’s Festival

August 22-30

I’ll be here and doing stuff. Details not set yet, but you can always check back here or on the festival site.

Brisbane Writers Festival

September 4-8

I’ll be here too! Details following. Festival site

All in all that’s a fair amount of travel, but nothing like when I go on tour. I’m kind of glad to be mostly hanging out at home and writing.

But next year i’m planning to have a book out, so who knows . . .

Cool Hungarian Stuff

Two posts ago, a commenter called Hungarian Boy pointed us all to the site of Richard Vass, the artist for the Hungarian covers of the Leviathan series. His original paintings can be found there, and they are all full of bonus awesome.

So here they are:

Pretty cool.

Go check out the rest of his stuff.

Summer Prince

Usually when I blurb a YA book, I post about it here when it’s published. Alas, I was in the depths of non-blogging when Alaya Dawn Johnson’s Summer Prince came out a month ago. So now I’m making up for that, because it is a very good book indeed. Here’s what I said in my blurb:

A nimble, beautiful novel about risking everything for love and art, both otherworldly and magnificently real.

But now that I have some time, and more space than one gets for a blurb, I have a lot more to say.

Summer Prince is set four centuries in the future (roughly the same time frame as Ugies). It’s set mostly in a city-state called Palmares Três, which sits where Rio de Janeiro, Brazil does today. The city is post-scarcity futuristic, but technology is carefully controlled and wealth unequally distributed. It’s also a matriarchy, though one with a peculiar old tradition: every five years, the youngest citizens (under thirty) all vote to elect a Summer King.

Summer King is an honorary position, basically an official rock star of the city. He’s always super charismatic, beautiful, and artistically talented, and has an awesome time being king.

There’s only one drawback: at the end of one year the Summer King is ritually sacrificed.

Here’s something you might not know: The sacred king who reigns for a year and then dies can be found in lots of societies in history. It’s an old pagan tradition. But Johnson uses it to examine our current celebrity culture, in which we build up and tear down famous people, particularly young ones, even as we love them with all our hearts.

Which brings us to June Costas, the protagonist of Summer Prince. She’s eighteen, an artist, and a child of privilege. (Her mother is a high government official; her father was a famous singer who committed suicide.) Thanks to her POV, Summer Prince is all about art. Music, drawings, sculptures, nano-tattoos, large-scale high-tech media manipulations—all of these get deployed by June in her quest to be the best artist in Palmares Três. She’s in rebellion against her mother and the government, still angry at her father, and gloriously egotistical (as one might expect of the self-annointed best artist in Palmares Três).

She’s also gloriously in love with the just-elected Summer King, who’s not only fated to die in a year, but also happens to be in love with June’s best friend, Gil.

Anyway, it’s pretty awesome, and got starred reviews from Publisher’s Weekly, Kirkus, and Booklist. If you liked the way that the high tech in Uglies empowered its teen characters to do cool things, you will totally love this book. The art in it feels like real art, and the love, both celebrity-crushing and actual face-to-face connection, totally feels like real love.

You can read the opening here.

Hungarian Behemoth

And another non-US cover, the Hungarian version of Behemoth!

I just love these covers from Hungary. They have the same crazy energy as the propaganda poster in the endpapers of Behemoth, which is so totally from the period. There seems to be a steampunk thing happening in Hungary right now. (As you can see here.)

In case you missed it, I posted about the Hungarian cover for Leviathan last September, but here it is again, for reference:

Can’t wait to see the third one. Who will they choose for giant mechano-posterization?

Klopp? Volger? Barlow? Varlow? BOVRIL WITH MUSTACHE??? We can only wait and see.

As you can see, I am blogging SLIGHTLY more regularly now, despite having already written 994 words of my next novel today. Congratulate me.

More Midnighters Covers

Because Russia has to have new covers every year, or something.

Here they are:

I don’t have much to say about these covers, except that I love the darkling dragons in them. For the earlier versions, click here.

Insert here the usual apologies about not blogging lately. Yes, I have been taking rather a long break. But I assure you, it’s only because I’ve been writing loads. I’m at about 70,000 words in my current work in progress, currently titled Afterworlds.

Now, what does 70 kilowords this mean? That this book will be out soon?

Hah! I’m afraid not.Afterworlds is going to be a long piece of work, with two novels wrapped into one in a strange and mystical way. I’m maybe halfway done, so the novel isn’t going to be in anyone’s hands until late next year. (Or later, because art is no science.)

Anyway, thanks to those who continue to hang around my dusty windblown blog. I apologize for letting this space that we’ve all created together lie fallow. But rest assured that some day it will spark back to life, when I have more energy and time, or simply find something to rant about.

Till then, hope you’re all having fun.

Adelaide Writers’ Festival

I’m headed to the Adelaide Writers’ Festival in a few weeks, so I’m hoping to see some of you South Australian fans there.

Here’s my schedule:

SUNDAY MARCH 3, 5PM

WEST STAGE

Pioneer Women’s Memorial Garden

Leviathan: Scott Westerfeld (US/AUS)

This is me having a long chat with my old buddy Sean Williams. We will be talking about All Of The Stuff.

Click here for more.

MONDAY MARCH 4, 5PM

EAST STAGE

Pioneer Women’s Memorial Garden

Highways to a War: A Reading

War stories are among our oldest narratives and this session of readings will explore some of our more recent wars. Christopher Koch has taken us to Cambodia, Vietnam and Indonesia. Peter Robb has introduced us to the mean streets of Italy and Brazil. Tom Keneally has chronicled both the World Wars. Scott Westerfeld explores an alternative First World War and Ross McMullin chronicles the letters home.

It looks like I’ll be doing a reading for this second one, and with Tom Keneally! (AKA the guy who wrote Schindler’s Ark.) Click here for more.

For more details about the festival, click here. Note that these sessions are FREE, and at the Pioneer Women’s Memorial Garden.

Take a Writing Class with Me

Writing boot camps are workshops where you live for a week (or several) and focus completely on the written word. It’s a very intense experience, one that can change your writing style, your relationship to books, and even your life. Some famous camps like Clarion list many famous writers as their alums.

The most well-known SF and fantasy writing camp for teenagers is called Alpha, and takes place every July in Pittsburgh. It’s ten days altogether (July 10-19 this year) including eight days of workshops and two days of attending Confluence a literary sf convention nearby. You have to be age 14 to 19 to attend.

I’ve blogged about Alpha before, but this year, I willl be teaching there, along with Tamora Pierce and Theodora Goss. If you want to apply, submissions are open now.

To quote Alpha:

We’re looking for enthusiastic, talented young writers who have a strong interest in science fiction, fantasy and/or horror and a passion for writing. Students from anywhere in the world are welcome. In the past, students have attended Alpha from Canada, the United Kingdom, all over the United States, and even as far away as New Zealand.

Learn about writing and publishing. Meet other teens who share your interest in writing speculative fiction. Talk about short stories, novels, and films. Have your submission story critiqued. Brainstorm new story ideas, write a first draft, receive feedback, and rewrite. Attend readings by the authors. Do a public reading. Learn about submitting for publication, and send off your story at our manuscript mailing party.

2013 will be Alpha’s twelfth year. Previous attendees have placed in the Dell Magazines Award and Writers of the Future contests, and have sold stories to Clarkesworld, Strange Horizons, Fantasy Magazine, Daily Science Fiction, Cicada, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Nature Futures, Pseudopod and more.

Workshop tuition is $1100 and includes all workshop-related costs, but does not include transportation to and from Pittsburgh, or hotel/meals at the Confluence Convention. A limited pool of scholarship funding is available for students in need of financial aid.

Here are some testimonials from previous students.

Click here for more info and to apply.

Click here to donate to Alpha.

I hope I’ll be seeing some of you there! It’ll be great to meet you in person and talk about writing for a few days.

(Also: I will be more blogging soon, including some Uglies movie news.)

Russian (and Hungarian!) Cosplay Alert

Hey, I’ve been lazy again (in all things, not just blogging) but fortunately, I have lots of lovely photos from my travels to show you. Posting photos is a bit easier than writing actual words, after all.

First, however, here’s some cool Russian cosplay for you.

These folks are doing Leviathan, complete with a plush hydrogen sniffer!

Update:

This first set turn to be from Hungary! Couldn’t find your email when I was posting, possibly because I was searching my email box for “Russia.” Sorry about that, all concerned, and thanks for letting me know.

I like Deryn’s and Alek’s many leather accessories. Great boots, too.

They did this shoot in a cool old steampunk-ish warehouse, which you can see some of here:

I don’t know if there’s something going on in Russia, but around the same time, I also got some Russian Midnighters cosplay. Here’s Melissa:

And Dess:

And all three of the girls:

And a different Jessica (from a different group? This all came in on the same day. What’s going on in Russia? Some sort of Westerfeldian cosplay convention?):

Anyway, I love all these character interpretations. Well done, Ruskies. [And HUngarians!]

More photos soon. (See, Scott? That wasn’t so hard. You can DO this.)

Thunderbolts and Lightning

Long time, no see. Like, a lot longer than usual.

Turns out I didn’t post for our whole six weeks away in St Louis, Las Vegas, New York and South America. It was a very awesome and exhausting trip. But sorry to leave you hanging.

Luckily, good times were had by all, and were well documented, so there are a ton of cool pictures and videos to share with you. Spoiler alert: Brazilian fans are very awesome.

At this exact moment, however, I’m jetlagged to buggery, and will share with you just this one amazing thing.

On our flight from Rio, Brazil to Santiago, Chile, Justine tapped me on the shoulder and pointed out the window. (She is a window sitter and I am an aisle-ist. Is there any more perfect marriage?) Outside, somewhere over Argentina, was a huge anvil of clouds, its structure revealed by the lightning flickering and flailing within.

It was a very big and violent thing to witness, especially from the fragile vantage of a flying machine. But any nerviness was totally outweighed by old-fashioned awe.

My iPad camera I managed to capture a fraction of what it looked like:

Pretty intense, right? But go look at it bigger on YouTube.

More cool stuff soon. Promizes!

Brasil!

Clique aqui para grande.

Clique aqui para grande.

Clique aqui para grande.

Vejo vocês em breve, Rio e Sau Paulo!