Walter Jon Williams's Blog, page 146

WTF, Turkey?

Crikey, the news out of Turkey is justinsaaaaane!
For one thing, two major forces for modern Islam are trying to destroy one another. Prime Minister Erdogan— who leads the “moderately Islamic” AK Party— is now doing his best to destroy his former allies, the organization of Islamic scholar Fethullah Gulen (who I fictionalized inDeep State as “Riza Tek.”)
The Gulen organization (informally called “Hizmet”) is a significant voice in progressive Islam, and runs charter and prep schools, clinics, r...

For Your Downloading Pleasure

My longish novelette,The Tang Dynasty Underwater Pyramid, is now available for download via Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords.
Kobo seems to have some kind of complicated problem with the file, and despite my turning the air blue with curses, this is not at present resolved.
I’ve been trying to get serious about uploading the short fiction, and with mixed success. I figured I could get a couple stories up each week, but then I was overestimating the intelligence of the various softwares in...

I Have An Owie

So I’ve been hors de combat for a few days due to a cut finger. Which is sort of embarrassing, but still . . .
A few nights ago I was cutting up some lemongrass, which as I’m sure you know is a tough, fibrous plant. The knife slipped and took a big slice out of my left index finger. The knife was serrated and carved a wavy line so irregular that it never did close up properly. (And hasn’t still. I’m just generating new flesh in the gaps.)
The blood came out in rivers. (Small rivers, admittedly....

Superman With a Go-Pro

What else need be said?

I Work On My Stuff A Long Time

It takes meagesto finish one of my projects.
For instance, here’s an early draft of the High City battle fromConventions of War.

(Via the Bayeux Tapestry Generator.)

Time For St. Urho!

Since I seem to be concentrating on posts about Finnish matters these days, it’s worth reminding you that Sunday is St. Urho’s Day.I trust you will all be clad in green and purple, and prepared to drink up all the liquor before the Irish hit the bars on Monday.
And feel free, as you imbibe, to chant with St. Urho:
“Heinäsirkka, heinäsirkka, mene täältä hiiteen“
It’s never too late to save those wine grapes!

Reserve Your June For Reading

I’m pleased to report that the publication date forRogues, the new blockbuster collection from George RR Martin and Gardner Dozois, has been advanced to June 17.
Pleased because, after all, I’m in it. I’ve contributed a story featuring Sean Makin, the protagonist of The Fourth Wall. It’s a complex, knotty little near-future novellawith a solid science fiction heart.


And as if my illustrious name isn’t enough to get you to buy it, consider that Connie Willis, Neil Gaiman, Patrick Rothfuss, and G...

Taos Toolbox: the IRS Edition

I haven’t been posting much, because for the last week or so I’ve been wrangling all my tax information, all the cheeks and the stubs and the little receipts, into a form coherent enough for my accountant to make sense of. It’s the kind of repetitious detail work that I’m not at all good at, and it leaves me with a backache from bending over the table sorting out little bits of paper, and I get short-tempered and I curse a lot when I can’t find the receipt I know I had just a minute ago, and...

Struttin’ With Some Barbecue

Hey, it’s Fat Tuesday, y’all! Why are you looking at the dumb ol’ Internet instead of dancing?

These scenes of Sidney Bechet, Louis Armstrong, and Django Reinhart are from the French filmLa Route du Bonheur.

Epic

Clearly you were all so completely entranced by the Finnish music video I posted a couple days ago that, by now, you’re totally slavering for the Finnish national epic, theKalevala.
Which, thanks to Australian performance artist Scott Sandwich, you can now experience in eight minutes.
Eight minutes for a national epic! How can you resist?
(And by the way, while I enjoyed the performance, it has to be admitted that Sandwich can’t pronounce Finnish words for shit.)