Michael Swanwick's Blog, page 220
July 10, 2011
APPEARANCES -- Sunday Update
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This coming weekend . . . your last chance to get a free signed, numbered, limited edition chapbook just for asking. I'll be at Readercon. Ask and thou shalt receive.
July 15-17 Readercon Burlington, MA
July 22 Philadelphia Fantastic (reading) Moonstone Arts, Philadelphia
July 23-24 Confluence Pittsburgh, PA
August 19-21 Renovation (Worldcon) Reno, NV
Sept. 10 The Spiral Bookcase (signing) Manayunk Philadelphia
Sept. 21 KGB Bar (reading) NYC
And in 2012 . . .
Aug. 31- Sept. 2 Chicon 7 Chicago
Above: Lilies. My backyard. Summer. I love this time of year.
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July 8, 2011
My First Dirty Martini
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I am, as all true drinkers should be, a martini snob. But one should -- nay, must! -- keep an open mind about all serious matters. So, at the Chestnut Grill the other day, while Marianne had one of their superb Grill gimlets, I tried, for the first time, a dirty martini. Here's my review:
my first dirty martini
At first sip, the dirty martini comes across as being distinctly . . . well, the word that comes to mind is martiniesque. It doesn't do a violence to the concept of martinis, the way that adding fruit juice or chocolate or Pepto Bismol and then sticking a little paper umbrella in the resulting abomination does. All the addition of olive juice actually achieves is to bring up the flavor of the olives too strongly. The same thing could be achieved more exuberantly by filling the glass with a handful of olives and pouring the martini over them -- and then you'd have a meal to go with your drink! It would almost be health food.
And yet . . . and yet. We are talking about a drink so finnicky that the mere substitution of a pickled onion for the canonical olive-or-lemon-peel turns it into a completely different drink -- the Gibson. By the eighth sip, I began to feel that the olive juice was just a bit much, a little, dare I say, gimmicky.
Hard drink scholars and cocktail rabbis will doubtless be arguing over this one for centuries to come. But for a martini-wallah such as myself, this sense of near-excess is the killer. The martini is a perfect drink, and it achives this perfection in part by not trying too hard. The dirty martini tries too hard. So it is merely an almost-martini, a martini-like drink.
Those pink things with celery stalks and multicolored sprinkles only wish they could achieve so much.
Above: There it is, the semi-distinguished thing, after the eighth sip.
*
I am, as all true drinkers should be, a martini snob. But one should -- nay, must! -- keep an open mind about all serious matters. So, at the Chestnut Grill the other day, while Marianne had one of their superb Grill gimlets, I tried, for the first time, a dirty martini. Here's my review:
my first dirty martini
At first sip, the dirty martini comes across as being distinctly . . . well, the word that comes to mind is martiniesque. It doesn't do a violence to the concept of martinis, the way that adding fruit juice or chocolate or Pepto Bismol and then sticking a little paper umbrella in the resulting abomination does. All the addition of olive juice actually achieves is to bring up the flavor of the olives too strongly. The same thing could be achieved more exuberantly by filling the glass with a handful of olives and pouring the martini over them -- and then you'd have a meal to go with your drink! It would almost be health food.
And yet . . . and yet. We are talking about a drink so finnicky that the mere substitution of a pickled onion for the canonical olive-or-lemon-peel turns it into a completely different drink -- the Gibson. By the eighth sip, I began to feel that the olive juice was just a bit much, a little, dare I say, gimmicky.
Hard drink scholars and cocktail rabbis will doubtless be arguing over this one for centuries to come. But for a martini-wallah such as myself, this sense of near-excess is the killer. The martini is a perfect drink, and it achives this perfection in part by not trying too hard. The dirty martini tries too hard. So it is merely an almost-martini, a martini-like drink.
Those pink things with celery stalks and multicolored sprinkles only wish they could achieve so much.
Above: There it is, the semi-distinguished thing, after the eighth sip.
*
Scribbledehobbledehoyden: The Magpie's Eye: Page 132
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I like this page. It begins with a cynical observation:
Then it moves on to a fantasy knife . labeled [not far removed from what you can waste money on today].
The knife is about equally inspired by a dragon's wing and maple seeds. Three of which are conveniently appended.
*
I like this page. It begins with a cynical observation:
Dear Lord, ...
Men always say that. But they never mean it.
Then it moves on to a fantasy knife . labeled [not far removed from what you can waste money on today].
The knife is about equally inspired by a dragon's wing and maple seeds. Three of which are conveniently appended.
*
July 7, 2011
Do Androids Dream of Comic Book Sheep?
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I just shipped off a review of the Pegana Press hardcover of Paris, a Poem by Hope Mirrlees , an essay about Murray Leinster: the Life and Works by Billee J. Stallings and Jo-An J. Evans, and three "Brief Lives" -- very short essays about Judith Merrill, Will F. Jenkins, and the all-too-mortal Edward Mott Woolley. So I think I'm going to give non-fiction a rest for a while. I've got a lot of unfinished short fiction to wrap up before I can get to work on my novels.
Therefore I won't be writing anything substantive -- as I half-planned to do -- about the just-completed experience of reading the Boom! Studios graphic version of Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Which is a very thing indeed, every word of the original novel in a densely illustrated graphic novel version. It took 24 issues to cover the novel.
I honestly don't think anybody has done the like before.
In a just world, there would be long, long essays about this project-of-love everywhere and, because in a just world somebody would throw enormous amounts of money at me to write it, one of those essays would be mine.
But, as I say, there's just not enough time. So, very quickly, here's what I learned:
1. The experience of reading the novel in installments, one a month, really breaks up the reading experience to the detriment of continuity. I suspect I missed picking up an issue or two but, since I'd read the book before, there aren't any logical gaps in my understanding to indicate so.
2. Reading the text a sentence or two per panel slows reading time waaaay down.
3. This in turn forces you to read more carefully and to think over what you're reading more thoroughly than the relatively frictionless experience of reading unillustrated prose does.
4. Mostly this works to Dick's advantage. Every line he wrote is meaningful. Reading it slowly forces you to recognize this.
5. It also brings up the inherent oddness of Dick's understanding of human relationships. Rick Deckard, the protagonist, is a good family man. He's also ready to run off with the first chrome femme fatale who comes along. PKD didn't seem to think that needed explaining.
6. Not being able to easily gauge, as one does with a (physical) book, when the end is coming, the conclusion of the novel comes as a sudden surprise. The life you've been following could have gone on and on beyond the point where the book ends . . . Which is a good reminder of exactly how arbitrary a form the novel is.
7. This is a splendid way of making reading more expensive. I probably paid twenty-five cents for my paperback copy of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? in a used book store. At four bucks a pop, plus tax, this reading cost me a C-note.
Above: The graphics are of good quality, I should note, and there's an essay in each book by various celebrities and notables. This is, as I said, a labor of love.
*
I just shipped off a review of the Pegana Press hardcover of Paris, a Poem by Hope Mirrlees , an essay about Murray Leinster: the Life and Works by Billee J. Stallings and Jo-An J. Evans, and three "Brief Lives" -- very short essays about Judith Merrill, Will F. Jenkins, and the all-too-mortal Edward Mott Woolley. So I think I'm going to give non-fiction a rest for a while. I've got a lot of unfinished short fiction to wrap up before I can get to work on my novels.
Therefore I won't be writing anything substantive -- as I half-planned to do -- about the just-completed experience of reading the Boom! Studios graphic version of Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Which is a very thing indeed, every word of the original novel in a densely illustrated graphic novel version. It took 24 issues to cover the novel.
I honestly don't think anybody has done the like before.
In a just world, there would be long, long essays about this project-of-love everywhere and, because in a just world somebody would throw enormous amounts of money at me to write it, one of those essays would be mine.
But, as I say, there's just not enough time. So, very quickly, here's what I learned:
1. The experience of reading the novel in installments, one a month, really breaks up the reading experience to the detriment of continuity. I suspect I missed picking up an issue or two but, since I'd read the book before, there aren't any logical gaps in my understanding to indicate so.
2. Reading the text a sentence or two per panel slows reading time waaaay down.
3. This in turn forces you to read more carefully and to think over what you're reading more thoroughly than the relatively frictionless experience of reading unillustrated prose does.
4. Mostly this works to Dick's advantage. Every line he wrote is meaningful. Reading it slowly forces you to recognize this.
5. It also brings up the inherent oddness of Dick's understanding of human relationships. Rick Deckard, the protagonist, is a good family man. He's also ready to run off with the first chrome femme fatale who comes along. PKD didn't seem to think that needed explaining.
6. Not being able to easily gauge, as one does with a (physical) book, when the end is coming, the conclusion of the novel comes as a sudden surprise. The life you've been following could have gone on and on beyond the point where the book ends . . . Which is a good reminder of exactly how arbitrary a form the novel is.
7. This is a splendid way of making reading more expensive. I probably paid twenty-five cents for my paperback copy of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? in a used book store. At four bucks a pop, plus tax, this reading cost me a C-note.
Above: The graphics are of good quality, I should note, and there's an essay in each book by various celebrities and notables. This is, as I said, a labor of love.
*
Scribbledehobbledehoyden: The Magpie's Eye: Page 131
.
poodle puddle
I refuse to apologize for this.
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poodle puddle
I refuse to apologize for this.
*
July 6, 2011
Winter Is Coming -- and Readercon Too!
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I'll be at Readercon the weekend after next. Which means I'll be handing out free signed-and-numbered limited edition chapbooks!
Those who have been reading this blog for a while know that, as a promotional item for Dancing With Bears, Marianne's nano-imprint Dragonstairs Press created a set of four matched chapbooks, each one containing one short-short originally published as a part of "Smoke and Mirrors: Four Scenes from the Postutopian Future." I handed out most of the copies of the first three chapbooks at the last three conventions I attended and, rather to my surprise, so far as I can tell not a one of them has hit eBay yet.
So these suckers are going to be collectable.
All you have to do is come up to me at Readercon and ask.
*
I'll be at Readercon the weekend after next. Which means I'll be handing out free signed-and-numbered limited edition chapbooks!
Those who have been reading this blog for a while know that, as a promotional item for Dancing With Bears, Marianne's nano-imprint Dragonstairs Press created a set of four matched chapbooks, each one containing one short-short originally published as a part of "Smoke and Mirrors: Four Scenes from the Postutopian Future." I handed out most of the copies of the first three chapbooks at the last three conventions I attended and, rather to my surprise, so far as I can tell not a one of them has hit eBay yet.
So these suckers are going to be collectable.
All you have to do is come up to me at Readercon and ask.
*
Scribbledehobbledehoyden: The Magpie's Eye: Page 130
.
That may be a new record . . . I got tired of the idea immediately after the title and the first line. At least I wrapped it up quickly.
If you can identify the two quotes embedded in that paragraph, you are a true child of the Sixties. Answers provided if anyone asks.
*
Blank Page Theater Presents . . .
The theater of the mind with ad hoc extemporized dialog. -- Do we have time to bring on the dead bear? -- No? Then good night, God bless, and if you're going home tonight on your bike -- wear white.
That may be a new record . . . I got tired of the idea immediately after the title and the first line. At least I wrapped it up quickly.
If you can identify the two quotes embedded in that paragraph, you are a true child of the Sixties. Answers provided if anyone asks.
*
July 5, 2011
Yet Another Reason Why Michael Dirda is America's Favorite Critic
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A few weeks ago, I had the honor of introducing Michael Dirda when he spoke at the Nebula Awards banquet. That has no particular relevance to this post. I'm just boasting.
Dirda is technically, I suppose, a critic. I personally think of him as someone who reads a lot of books, thinks about them very carefully, and then shares what he's learned with the rest of us. Which is to say, he's a very valuable individual indeed.
Now, over at Bookforum , Dirda has written an essay explaining why the Best Seller List is a disaster for people who love to read books. Here's an excerpt:
You can read the entire essay here.
And if you're going to Readercon . . .
I'll be there, of course, and flogging the heck out of my brilliantly entertaining Dancing With Bears . But, more remarkably, Billee Stallings will be there! Yes. You'd be very excited about this if only you knew who Stallings is. So I'll tell you.
Billee Stallings is one of Will F. Jenkins's four daughters and, along with her sister, Jo-an Evans, has written a memoir of the great man. You may better remember him under his pseudonym of Murray Leinster, one of the founding fathers of modern science fiction and the man who, long before Asimov or Heinlein or Clarke, was known as "the Dean of Science Fiction."
Alas, Murray Leinster: His Life and Times will be published just a week or so too late for you to get her autograph. But you'll get to meet the daughter of Murray Leinster! She's not planning to go to any more science fiction conventions ever, which means this is your best and only chance to meet her.
Plus she's a very likable lady.
I met Billee's father once, almost forty years ago, and I've never forgotten the experience. He was an amazing guy. If you're going to be at Readercon, you'll want to chat with her about her father. Luckily, she'll be happy to chat with you.
Above: Michael Dirda. I hardly ever run into him. But I always enjoy our conversations when I do.
*
A few weeks ago, I had the honor of introducing Michael Dirda when he spoke at the Nebula Awards banquet. That has no particular relevance to this post. I'm just boasting.
Dirda is technically, I suppose, a critic. I personally think of him as someone who reads a lot of books, thinks about them very carefully, and then shares what he's learned with the rest of us. Which is to say, he's a very valuable individual indeed.
Now, over at Bookforum , Dirda has written an essay explaining why the Best Seller List is a disaster for people who love to read books. Here's an excerpt:
The best books of a genre seldom make the list. The finest all-around American crime writer of the past forty years—I speak of Donald E. Westlake—never matched the sales of Elmore Leonard, let alone Patterson. Reviewers praised his comic Dortmunder capers, readers ecstasized over his lean Richard Stark noirs. A novel like The Ax—as brilliant a black comedy as the film Kind Hearts and Coronets—should be famous. These days, people will line up for hours to get their Neil Gaiman books signed, but whom does Gaiman admire among living authors? Gene Wolfe. You've never heard of Wolfe, right? (Try the majestic multivolume Book of the New Sun.) Go to this year's World Fantasy Convention, ask its attendees to name the greatest contemporary work in their genre, and the answer will likely be Little, Big by John Crowley. You could have read this instead of the latest installment of Twilight.
You can read the entire essay here.
And if you're going to Readercon . . .
I'll be there, of course, and flogging the heck out of my brilliantly entertaining Dancing With Bears . But, more remarkably, Billee Stallings will be there! Yes. You'd be very excited about this if only you knew who Stallings is. So I'll tell you.
Billee Stallings is one of Will F. Jenkins's four daughters and, along with her sister, Jo-an Evans, has written a memoir of the great man. You may better remember him under his pseudonym of Murray Leinster, one of the founding fathers of modern science fiction and the man who, long before Asimov or Heinlein or Clarke, was known as "the Dean of Science Fiction."
Alas, Murray Leinster: His Life and Times will be published just a week or so too late for you to get her autograph. But you'll get to meet the daughter of Murray Leinster! She's not planning to go to any more science fiction conventions ever, which means this is your best and only chance to meet her.
Plus she's a very likable lady.
I met Billee's father once, almost forty years ago, and I've never forgotten the experience. He was an amazing guy. If you're going to be at Readercon, you'll want to chat with her about her father. Luckily, she'll be happy to chat with you.
Above: Michael Dirda. I hardly ever run into him. But I always enjoy our conversations when I do.
*
Scribbledehobbledehoyden: The Magpie's Eye: Page 129
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Fluffy Bird Panic No. 1
Creating the conscience of your race in the smithy of your soul is not pretty.
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Fluffy Bird Panic No. 1
Creating the conscience of your race in the smithy of your soul is not pretty.
*
July 4, 2011
Happy Fourth of July!
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Hereabouts, the Fourth is an excuse for easy patriotism, barbecue, and illegal fireworks.
In Canada, it's an opportunity to be American for one day. Click here to see what I'm talking about.
And in my house, it's an excuse to be a lazy blogger. Happy Fourth, everybody!
Above: Our porch flag. It's flown over our nation's capital. They have people whose job it is to hoist the flag on the flagpole, run it down, and then hoist up the next one, so that congressmen can give them away. Yet, strangely enough, knowing all this, we still treasure it.
*
Hereabouts, the Fourth is an excuse for easy patriotism, barbecue, and illegal fireworks.
In Canada, it's an opportunity to be American for one day. Click here to see what I'm talking about.
And in my house, it's an excuse to be a lazy blogger. Happy Fourth, everybody!
Above: Our porch flag. It's flown over our nation's capital. They have people whose job it is to hoist the flag on the flagpole, run it down, and then hoist up the next one, so that congressmen can give them away. Yet, strangely enough, knowing all this, we still treasure it.
*
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