Matt Ruff's Blog, page 12
March 22, 2021
Join me in the Dungeons of Drakkenheim tomorrow, 3/23, at 3 PM Pacific
Tomorrow at 3 PM Pacific / 6 PM Eastern I will be joining Kelly McLaughlin and Montgomery Martin, aka the Dungeon Dudes, in their livestreamed D&D campaign, the Untold Tales of Drakkenheim. I’ll be playing the character Alvin Peaseblossom, aka “Mr. Big,” a 4th-level gnome rogue with a giant brain. This is my first D&D session since college, thirty-five years ago, so it promises to be extra chaotic, and a lot of fun.
You can watch us live on Twitch, here, or catch the video replay afterwards on either Twitch or the Dungeon Dudes’ YouTube channel. You’ll also want to check out this week’s , where Kelly and Monty will be our special guests.
March 18, 2021
88 Names: the Big Idea
This morning I have an essay up on John Scalzi’s Whatever blog, talking about the Big Idea behind 88 Names. You can read it here. (While you’re visiting Whatever, you can also check out my two previous Big Idea essays, about Lovecraft Country and The Mirage.)
And speaking of big things (he segued flawlessly), next Tuesday I’ll be playing the character of Mr. Big, aka Alvin Peaseblossom, a 4th level gnome rogue adventuring in the cursed city of Drakkenheim on the Dungeon Dudes’ Twitch stream. The fun starts at 3 PM Pacific / 6 PM Eastern.
March 17, 2021
88 Names podcast season 2, episode 2: Sasha Samochina
On of the 88 Names podcast, we talk to Sasha Samochina, an award-winning technologist at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
You can learn more about Sasha’s work at her website. This YouTube playlist contains 360 and VR videos that Sasha has produced for NASA JPL. This video gives a brief overview of the OnSight mixed-reality software, developed by JPL, that lets scientists take virtual walks on Mars. And the Access Mars WebVR experience lets you use your browser to make your own virtual visit to Mars.
March 16, 2021
On sale today
The trade paperback edition of goes on sale today! You can pick up a copy at your favorite indie bookstore or order online, here:
• Amazon • • •
If you’d like a signed copy, Secret Garden Bookshop has some in stock, and they ship internationally. I’ll be signing stock at other Seattle-area bookstores in the next few days, and will post updates here as I do.
Because we are still in a pandemic, I won’t be going on book tour, but you can listen to me on or catch me on Twitch next Tuesday, March 23, starting at 3 PM Pacific/6 PM Eastern, when I will be a guest of the Dungeon Dudes, playing in their Untold Tales of Drakkenheim campaign.
March 10, 2021
The return of the 88 Names podcast: Mike Pondsmith
The trade paperback edition of will be published next Tuesday, March 16, and to celebrate, my friend Blake Collier and I have recorded some new episodes of .
To kick off this second season of the pod, we talk to legendary game designer Mike Pondsmith, founder of R. Talisorian Games and the creator of the Cyberpunk roleplaying franchise, which includes the recently released Cyberpunk RED and the video game Cyberpunk 2077. You can listen to our conversation .
February 28, 2021
Lovecraft Country at the Golden Globes tonight
The Golden Globe Awards ceremony starts this evening at 5 PM Pacific, and Lovecraft Country is nominated in the Best Television Series — Drama category. I’m told it’s a long shot — we’re up against The Crown, and the lack of individual actor nominations is also a bad sign — but for me personally, it’s thrilling to even have a horse in this race.
And while we’re on the subject of horse races, there are still a few hours left to vote for Lovecraft Country in the Polish Readers’ Choice Book Awards. Details here.
February 26, 2021
Lovecraft Country nominated for the Readers’ Choice Book Awards in Poland
In another bit of translation related news, the Polish edition of Lovecraft Country has been nominated as Best Horror Book of 2020 for the Readers’ Choice Book Awards in Poland (which, as I understand it, is their equivalent of the Goodreads Choice Awards).
Voting is open to the general public on the awards website through midnight Central European Standard Time this Sunday, February 28. (If you don’t read Polish, I’d recommend using a browser like Google Chrome that has a built-in translator.)
If you do decide to vote, be sure to check out the other award categories. My friend Ted Chiang’s book Exhalation is nominated in science fiction.
Winners will be announced on March 8.
Hello, South Korea!
Just arrived in the mail, my complimentary author copies of the Korean-language edition of Lovecraft Country. The publisher is EunHaeng NaMu Publishing and the translator is Seulgi So (소슬기).
There are a number of other recent translations that have not yet arrived at my door. This is the Serbian-language edition, published by Čarobna Knjiga with translation by Vesna Stojković:
The Greek edition is published by Kaktos Publications with translation by Ourania Toutountzi:
And the Turkish edition is published by Eksik Parça Yayinevi with translation by Serdar Yüce:
February 16, 2021
In one month…
The trade paperback edition of will be published on March 16. The paperback is available for , but if you’d rather not wait, you can get the , , , or right now.
To celebrate the trade paperback release, we’re putting the pod back together. The will drop new episodes starting on March 9. Confirmed guests include role-playing game design legend Mike Pondsmith (aka “the guy who killed your Cyberpunk character”), NASA/JPL star Sasha Samochina, medical education technology researcher Dr. Todd Chang, and the “Dungeon Dudes,” Montgomery Martin and Kelly McLaughlin.
And speaking of the Dungeon Dudes, I will be a guest on their Twitch channel, making a two-part run through the Dungeons of Drakenheim, on March 23 and March 30, starting at 3 PM Pacific/6 PM Eastern. This will be my first time playing a live D&D session since Ronald Reagan was president, so I’ll be boning up on the new 5th edition rules before the show (I’m told negative armor classes are bad, now).
One other bit of news: the Blu-ray edition of the first season of HBO’s Lovecraft Country is out today.
February 1, 2021
Call of the Dreamlands
Back in the Before Time, when booksellers and authors could hang out in enclosed spaces without wearing masks, Phil Bevis of Chatwin Books asked if I’d write an introduction to an H.P. Lovecraft collection he was planning on publishing.
The book, Call of the Dreamlands, is out now. In addition to my intro, it contains seven stories drawn primarily from Lovecraft’s Dream Cycle: “The White Ship,” “Beyond the Wall of Sleep,” “Polaris,” “What the Moon Brings,” “Hypnos,” “Ex Oblivione,” and “The Strange High House in the Mist.”
Call of the Dreamlands is available in two formats: a paperback edition for $8.95, and a limited, numbered hardcover edition, signed by me and illustrator Dean Kelly, for $85. You can order from the Chatwin Books website, or pick up a copy from Chatwin’s retail store, Arundel Books, in Seattle’s Pioneer Square.
Signing books in the plaguelands.
