J.K. Ullrich's Blog, page 8
October 6, 2019
Sexism IN SPACE (and how sci-fi can fight it)
“…The story of an astronaut as she struggles to adjust to life on Earth!” the radio ad promised. My car’s dashboard briefly transformed into the glowing cockpit of a space shuttle. Space, psychology, and a female protagonist? That sounded like a movie I’d see (or a book I’d write). But when I looked up which... Continue Reading →
September 29, 2019
Flash Fiction with VSS365: August 2019
Since I tend to fall off the daily flash fiction wagon after the first week of each new month, I set myself punitive parameters for August: every prompt missed would have to be used in the next piece I wrote. Some days I accumulated as many as four mandatory words. This challenge, unexpectedly, resulted in... Continue Reading →
September 15, 2019
PitMad Post-Mortem: What Type of Book Pitch Got the Most Attention?
Confession: I usually avoid Twitter during PitMad. The quarterly Twitter “Pitch Party” invites writers to post 280-character manuscript pitches, which agents and editors can request with a… Read more "PitMad Post-Mortem: What Type of Book Pitch Got the Most Attention?"
September 2, 2019
Literary Labor Day: Third Novel Complete!
Happy Labor Day weekend to my American friends! Summer’s last hurrah gave me a welcome break to go kayaking, watch some baseball, sink my teeth into a juicy cob of sweet corn…and finish revisions on my third novel. After seemingly endless edits, my cyberpunk mystery Binary Chop is done. I hammered out the first draft, … Continue reading Literary Labor Day: Third Novel Complete!
August 18, 2019
Last Chance To See Our Planet: 30 Years, 2 Reviews, 1 Earth
Despite his popularity as a science fiction writer, the late author Douglas Adams championed the value of planet Earth. In the late 1980s, he teamed up with zoologist Mark Cawardine for a BBC radio series called Last Chance to See, in which the pair tracks endangered species around the globe. Adams’ 1990 book chronicling the … Continue reading Last Chance To See Our Planet: 30 Years, 2 Reviews, 1 Earth
August 4, 2019
Flash Fiction with #VSS365: June 2019
July was a hurricane, friends. In addition to the usual demands of a full-time job by day and wrestling with final revisions on Binary Chop by night, my month included: A whirlwind international business trip; Publication of the fourth Brave New Girls science fiction anthology, featuring my short story “Armed for the Future”; Big projects and … Continue reading Flash Fiction with #VSS365: June 2019
July 20, 2019
Walk the Moon: A Sci-Fi Book Launch Honoring Apollo 11
Fifty years ago today, emissaries from Earth–riding in a command cabin the size of a car, and guided by a computer less powerful than a modern smartphone–landed on our Moon and left Homo sapiens’ first footprints on another world. In honor of the Apollo 11 anniversary, I chose this date to launch the print edition of my lunar-based … Continue reading Walk the Moon: A Sci-Fi Book Launch Honoring Apollo 11
July 9, 2019
“Brave New Girls”: A Sci-Fi STEM Anthology
If you or a kid in your life need some sci-fi summer reading, I’ve got a book for you! Brave New Girls: Adventures of Gals and Gizmos goes on sale today. The fourth in its series, this anthology features 26 science fiction short stories starring STEM-savvy girls. All proceeds support the Society of Women Engineers … Continue reading “Brave New Girls”: A Sci-Fi STEM Anthology
July 7, 2019
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Print Design: Three Book Formatting Flaws and How Indie Authors Can Avoid Them
My Sunday long runs often take me past the local Little Free Library (LFL), and I can never resist a peek inside the charming hutch. Two new additions the other weekend immediately caught my eye. Once was a phased-out library hardcover of Douglas Adams’ sci-fi classic The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, which I immediately snatched … Continue reading The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Print Design: Three Book Formatting Flaws and How Indie Authors Can Avoid Them
June 16, 2019
Movie Review: “The Wandering Earth”
If you keep up with science fiction cinema, you might have heard about Chinese blockbuster The Wandering Earth, which Netflix quietly slipped into its library a few weeks ago. Based on a story by the decorated author of The Three-Body Problem, Liu Cixin, the film hit it big with global audiences to become one of … Continue reading Movie Review: “The Wandering Earth”
