E.C. Myers's Blog, page 14
March 18, 2013
2013 Teen Author Festival!
It’s here! This week is the annual Teen Author Festival in NYC, consisting of author panels, readings, signings, and performances. I’m thrilled to be participating in one panel this year, on a topic I know a little something about:
“Alternate World vs. Imaginary World”:
Of these authors, some have written stories involving alternate or parallel versions of our world, some have made up imaginary worlds for their characters, and still others have written books that do each. We’ll discuss the deci...
March 13, 2013
alternate wednesday: the time traveler’s watch
We always pay a lot of attention to the mechanisms of time travel–a DeLorean, the Millenium Shortcut, slingshotting around the sun at warp speed–but every time traveler has another important tool: a watch. Sometimes it’s just there for symbolism, like the paradoxical pocket watch in Somewhere in Time, but often it serves a more practical purpose, what it was made for–to keep track of time.
Clocks are everywhere in Back to the Future, andMarty McFly’s digital watch is more than just a gag; ther...
March 7, 2013
think younger
*climbs onto soapbox* *teeters*
I don’t usually get on soapboxes. I have poor balance and I don’t like it when everyone looks at me like that… Yeah, like that. But I just noticed that the deadline for voting for the Hugo Awards is approaching–March 10th!
If you attended Worldcon last year or have a membership for this or next year’s Worldcon, you are eligible to vote for the Hugo Awards. Please do! The good news is that even if you can’t make it to the convention, anyone can buy a non-attending...
March 6, 2013
a year ago today
Wow, has it really been a whole year since my first novel was published? The official release date for Fair Coin was March 6, 2012; sometimes it seemed like that day would never come, and now it’s hard to believe my debut year is over :)
It was an amazing year though. In some ways, being an author was exactly the way I imagined it, and in other ways, it was very surprising. Fortunately, the unexpected things were mostly good! It has been wonderful meeting so many people who love books and youn...
February 27, 2013
alternate wednesday: my favorite time machine
“Might solve a mystery / Or rewrite history…”
Most people would probably guess that my favorite time machine in fiction is the DeLorean from the Back to the Future films. That’s a pretty good guess, and I would definitely like to own one someday! Preferably one that runs on a garbage-fueled fusion reactor and can fly. But the time machine I like the most is the Millennium Shortcut.
Never heard of it? The Millennium Shortcut, likely a riff on Han Solo’s Millennium Falcon, was the time machine us...
February 20, 2013
andre norton award nom!
Am I the only one who likes the shortened form of “nomination” because it reminds me of food? Nom nom nom.
Anyway.
I’ve been sitting on this news for a while, but now that it’s public and I can talk about it, it’s finally sinking in, and I’m even more excited: Fair Coin was nominated for the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy!
Deep breaths.
Just like the Nebula Awards, the Norton Award is voted on by members of SFWA, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America....
February 19, 2013
helping fans of color attend SFF cons
It’s Con or Bust time again! This auction raises funds to help fans of color attend science fiction and fantasy conventions. Naturally, I think this is a terrific cause, and I’m happy to support it and the Carl Brandon Society, the non-profit that runs it with the mission “to increase racial and ethnic diversity in the production of and audience for speculative fiction.” Good mission, right?
Last year, I was thrilled to contribute a signed ARC of my first novel, Fair Coin, which raised $25 for...
February 14, 2013
for your consideration
I’m comfortable enough with the fact that authors have to promote themselves, but I like some aspects of that reality better than others. I don’t like doing the “hard sell,” and I don’t like awards season. But I would also feel remiss if I didn’t mention my award-eligible works, because hey, I’m proud of them, and this is the first time I have an actual novel as a contender.
So I humbly submit my first novel, FAIR COIN (Pyr, 2012), for your 2012 awards consideration. There is plenty of informa...
February 13, 2013
alternate wednesday: an alternate groundhog day
The U.S. celebrated Groundhog Day a couple of weeks ago (is there an international, or even fictional equivalent, I wonder?), and as usual, it was an opportunity for geeks everywhere to show our appreciation for one of the greatest time travel films ever made: Groundhog Day, starring Bill Murray and Andy MacDowell. Like I need an excuse to re-watch it! But this year the occasion reminded me of another film that is not nearly as well known…
Before the Syfy Channel (née Sci-Fi Channel)built its...
January 30, 2013
alternate wednesday: “Impossible Dreams”
Somebody described the experience of reading great fiction as being caught up in a vivid continuous dream, and I think movies do that better than any other kind of story. Some people say the best movie isn’t as good as the best book, and I say they’re not watching the right movies, or else they’re not watching them the rightway.
One of my favorite alternate universe stories–indeed, one of my favorite short stories in general–is “Impossible Dreams” by Tim Pratt. I first read it in the July 2006...
