Matt Ruff's Blog, page 35
November 28, 2012
Italian edition of The Mirage on sale 29/11
A note to my Italian fans, the Italian edition of The Mirage (translated by Lisa Maldera and retitled False Verità) goes on sale tomorrow, November 29.
November 22, 2012
November 9, 2012
Yesterday I was over at the Google campus in Kirkland to give a reading and talk about The Mirage. It’s been seven months since the book tour ended and my head’s been in a very different fictional universe lately (Jim Crow-era U.S. rather than alt-world Iraq) so I was a little nervous I’d be rusty, but it was a really friendly crowd and the Q&A went well. Big thanks to my hosts David Levin and Jeremiah Spradlin for showing me such a good time.
Meanwhile:
* Want your own Google-style logo? Go here.
* I celebrated the end of election season by buying Nate Silver’s book, The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail — but Some Don’t. I’ve just started it, but it’s pretty good so far.
* In case you missed it, here’s the most entertaining comedy bit from election night, Karl Rove arguing with FOX News over their decision to call Ohio for Obama.
* Hey, it’s official: Washington state has legalized gay marriage! Mazel tov to all the soon-to-be-newlyweds!
November 6, 2012
Election Day
“We must redraw the line somewhere.”
Given all the stories about voter suppression and other ongoing political shenanigans, it seems appropriate to note that this is the 200th anniversary of the election of Vice President Elbridge Gerry (pictured at right), the man from whose name we get the term “gerrymandering.” If you are voting today in a bizarrely shaped electoral district that overwhelmingly favors one of the two main parties, spare a thought for dear old Elbridge. And if you find yourself waiting six or seven hours to get to the polling booth, know that the American tradition of screwing with the voters goes all the way back to the days when Democrats and Republicans were the same party. Hang in there.
Other random Election Day notes:
* Still working on the new novel. Still really liking it.
* Yes, I did take time to vote. Washington state uses the incredibly convenient mail-in ballot system, so it took me all of twenty minutes, plus a stroll to the post office. You folks in Ohio and Florida should try it!
* If you are seeking 21st amendment remedies to help you get through the election returns, the band Train now has its own wine label, offering a California Red called “Drops of Jupiter” and a Chardonnay, “Calling All Angels.”
* The Coptic Church just had an election, too — for Pope!
* Have you seen the puggle yet?
October 23, 2012
Queen Anne Books needs a new owner, stat
Upsetting news: Beloved local indie bookstore Queen Anne Books is looking for a new owner, and will close on October 31st if they don’t find one. Their latest news update confirms that they are still actively seeking a buyer, but it’s a really short window, so if you’re interested, or know someone who might be, act now!
October 16, 2012
I get the coolest door prizes
Last weekend I attended the Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair at Seattle Center. One of the exhibitors, my friend Ed Smith, surprised me with this awesome custom-bound copy of The Mirage:
The binding and original decoration are the work of Richard Smart and Alanna Simenson. Richard, a third-generation bookbinder and restorer who runs the Old English Bindery in Vancouver, also did a custom-bound Bad Monkeys several years ago:
You can see more of Richard’s work here and on Facebook. And you can see Alanna at work in this video pitch for a crowdfunded letterpress edition of Pride and Prejudice:
Although Richard and Alanna’s Mirage was by far the coolest thing I saw at the fair (and the only cool thing I got to take home), there were as always lots of other nifty items I wish I could afford. Among my imaginary purchases this year:
* A advance review copy of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House.
* A 1911 report by Seattle’s Municipal Plans Commission on hoped-for changes and improvements to the city’s infrastructure. I’m curious how much of this survived contact with reality:
* A set of Analog magazines containing the first publication of Frank Herbert’s Dune, signed by the author.
* And in the Bauman Rare Books booth, David Collins’ 1804 Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, with hand-colored engravings:
I don’t think there’ll be much call for quadruped illustrations in my next novel, but I’m already thinking about how I might justify their inclusion in the special-bound edition of book #7.
October 11, 2012
Foul matter
“Foul matter” is the term of art for the big hunk of paper your publisher ships back to you after your book goes to press: your copyedited manuscript, one or more galley proofs, plus whatever other messy raw material is left over from the editing process.
This is the foul matter for The Mirage, which UPS delivered a couple months ago and which has been sitting on a cabinet in the living room ever since, waiting for me to decide on a more permanent storage solution. Unfortunately for my retirement fund, this stuff isn’t as collectible as it once was. Not long ago, the copyedited manuscript would have been a unique physical object with handwritten corrections. Now, thanks to the evolution of publishing, it’s a printout of a Word file with my responses to the copyeditor typed in comments.
If you’re wondering, “Why even bother to keep the foul matter, when you’ve obviously got an electronic copy of the files on your computer?”, the answer is a combination of inertia, sentimentality, and a compulsive hoarding instinct. It’s also nice to have a record of the editing that won’t need to be updated to Word 2037 format. Or so I tell myself.
Other quick notes:
* Speaking of compulsive hoarding instincts, the Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair is this weekend. Tickets are just $5 at the door.
* This week’s PSA, courtesy of @GlennF: Don’t drink liquid nitrogen, even if a professional bartender serves it to you. A teenager in England had to have her stomach removed after doing this. The danger is not just that liquid nitro can freeze and kill living tissue, but that when placed inside a warm container (like your stomach) it expands rapidly, as in this video demonstration.
* “A well-meaning civil rights organization creates a new CAPTCHA system that tests for ‘fitting’ emotional responses. How does that make you feel?” (Via @cstross)
September 24, 2012
Fool on the Hill now available on Kobo and iTunes
I announced last month that my first novel, Fool on the Hill, was finally available as an ebook. It showed up initially on Kindle and Nook, and has since appeared on Kobo. This weekend Lisa noticed it was available on Apple’s iTunes store—so if, like us, you prefer the native iPad reader, your wait is over.
Also this month, my current publisher, HarperCollins, renegotiated its ebook contracts with retailers, which means they can now discount the ebook editions of The Mirage, Bad Monkeys, and Set This House in Order. There’s already been a mini-price war as a result—as of this writing, The Mirage is available for just $9.99 on Kindle and iTunes, and Bad Monkeys and Set This House are both around $8.
In other news:
* I’m still hard at work on Book #6, hence the light blogging. I’m somewhat more active on Twitter (as @bymattruff), though I suspect a lot of my tweets over the next few weeks will take the form of cheap jokes about the election, so, fair warning.
* Lisa and I saw The Cabin in the Woods and loved it. Lisa was leery at first, because she’s not a slasher-movie fan, but Cabin is not a typical slasher movie—it’s Joss Whedon channeling the Aaron Sorkin version of The Evil Dead. Worth a look if you missed it in the theater.
* Last night I started watching (alone) La Casa Muda, a more typical horror film about a father and daughter who take a job cleaning up a house in some remote region of Uruguay where they still use scythes to cut grass. The film’s gimmick is that it’s done in one continuous tracking shot, which sounds very Hitchcockian but in practice means that the pacing is slow, and I’ve already taken to livening it up with Cabin in the Woods references, like, “I see Dad just got a whiff of the Let’s Be Stupid gas.”
* Season one of Homeland, now out on DVD, is awesome. It really deserves its own post. When I have time.
* Standing cat stands for you. (via @anamariecox)
September 13, 2012
In which I am interviewed by Chuck Wendig
The formidable penmonkey Chuck Wendig, author of Double Dead, Blackbirds, and Mockingbird, was kind enough to interview me for his Terribleminds blog, and our Q&A was posted this morning. I talk about my writing, my favorite curse words, the time I almost got impaled, and various other subjects. You can read it here.
Thanks, Chuck!
September 11, 2012
In which I have no plans to watch MSNBC today
Woke up to the gang on Morning Joe saying…stuff…about the September 11 attacks and now they are running that “9/11 as it happened” video. Think I’m going to spend the day in 1954, writing about an imaginary road trip, and later I will go for a walk in the sunshine.
Stay safe and sane, all of you, whatever you are up to.
