Walter Jon Williams's Blog, page 134

Let Toolbox be Toolbox

Time for a reminder/brief rant reminding you that Taos Toolbox, the master class for SF & Fantasy, will be accepting applications starting December 1.
If you’re serious about building your career as a writer, you might want to start putting your application together.

Reviews Too Late: Solemnity

While I was traveling, I caught up with some recent pop-culture blockbusters (by watching them on airplanes), and now I have a question:Where did all the damn solemnity come from?
When you watch a genre film, there are certain things you have a right to expect from that genre. And when you find that these things are not only missing, but replaced with a lot of tedious claptrap presented with the solemnity of a state funeral, I think you’ve got a right to complain.
Let’s look atGodzilla 2014. Th...

Meanwhile, in an Alternate Present

While I was abroad I had a story published and didn’t know it. My story “Road Kill” is now available in the the latest Wild Cards collection,Lowball,edited by George RR Martin and Melinda Snodgrass.
Pretty nifty cover, ne?
If you’re unfamiliar with the Wild Cards universe, I’d suggest that you not start with this one, but withWild Cards, the first volume, now available from Tor. It also has a story by me, “Witness,” which was nominated for a Nebula Award, so you won’t be missing out on any of t...

Listen to Me Talk For A Whole Hour, Nearly

This week I was on the John Mac Radio Show, and I talked for nearly an hour. If this is of interest, I urge you to check it out.
I was late in turning up for my own interview, so there’s a certain amount of vamping at the start, for which I apologize.

Invasions

I’ve been back in New Mexico for several days, slowly recovering from jet lag and the fact I moved from sea level to 5000 feet in mere hours. The Williams Invasion of France and the Middle East is definitely over.
Kathy had to turn right around and fly to the East Coast, because her Aunt Dolores passed away a day before we left Paris, and now Kathy and her sister Alice are in Greenport dealing with that matter, which involves cleaning out the apartment, and that alone should take a month. If a...

Autumn

Our last day in France, so perhaps it’s appropriate we visit a cemetery. (Or maybe we’re celebrating Day of the Dead a little late this year.)
This is the rather odd cenotaph of Charles Baudelaire, whose actual grave is elsewhere in the Montparnasse cemetery. He’s got two effigies: squatting all scowly up top, and wrapped up like a mummy down below, and in the middle there’s this dog, or maybe an insect, with its head just below Beaudelaire’s elbows— it’s so eroded it’s hard to tell what it wa...

In Flight

The heron takes flight, atLes Machines de l’île.

In Nantes

I am in lovely Nantes, the hometown of Jules Verne, for Utopiales, France’s largest SF convention.
I’m heavily programmed, but then I got a free trip to France so I can hardly complain. In any case, I’ll either be working or having fun, and unlikely to be composing any thoughtful essays in this space.
Have a Happy Halloween, and carry on.

City of Corsairs

We are in Saint-Malo, a Breton walled city completely rebuilt after being destroyed by George Patton in 1944. (They named a street after him anyway.)
Saint-Malo was famous for Duguay-Trouin and other privateers who made fortunes by plundering the British merchant marine, and also as the home of Jacques Cartier, who left here to “discover” Canada (when he wasn’t designing expensive jewelry). The modern city is picturesque and has more restaurants per inhabitant than anyplace else in France. (Un...

So Here It Is

You really can’t take a bad picture of it. No bad angles at all.