Walter Jon Williams's Blog, page 188

Wall Street— Gone Dark?

Just days ago I was mocking the Dodd-Frank financial reforms as overly complex and ineffectual.  But now an article in New York suggests that they have, in fact, had a considerable effect on the banking industry.  And for the good, if you ask me . . .To comply with the looming regulations, banks have begun stripping themselves of the pistons that powered their profits: leverage and proprietary trading. In the wake of the crash, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs converted to bank holding...

Madonna . . . HIGH PRIESTESS OF SATAN!!!

Enjoyed the Super Bowl halftime show, did you?  Bet you didn't know you were WORSHIPING THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS!According to this guy anyway.  He starts with the fact that one of Madonna's dancers had angel wings and a harp, and goes right to the obvious conclusion that this is totally Satanic— because Lucifer was an angel and liked music!  And then the exposé develops from there, using strict Cartesian reasoning to demonstrate its thesis.The previous post is about Hillary Clinton's satanic...

Here. Now. (Or Soon)

I don't believe my new novel was actually supposed to be available just yet, but I'm hearing that it's been seen on shelves . . . so hey!  If others can jump the gun, so can I!Ta-daaa!  Here you have it, The Fourth Wall!You may have seen me refer to this book by its original title,  Mister Baby Head.  For some reason the publisher thought that title was not commercial.This is the third of the Dagmar Shaw books, in which Dagmar faces her greatest challenge yet,  infiltrating the most...

Sizing Up the Super-PACs

The New York Times has been tracking the donors to the "super-PACS," the grossly-funded organizations which, thanks to our Supreme Court, usually boast more money than the candidates they choose to support.Let's find out who's behind the nation's race to oligarchy, shall we?I'm shocked— shocked!— to discover that Wall Street seems to be backing Mitt Romney this year.    You'd almost think he was, I dunno, a rich investment banker or something.This is a switch from 2008, when Wall Street was b...

Another Workshop (with Me in It)

After my last post about the workshops I'll be teaching this year, I've been reminded that there was one workshop I failed to mention.  I had thought the membership was more restricted than it was, and so I reckoned a general audience wouldn't be interested.I will be teaching a workshop in structure and plotting on the Friday morning of the Nebula Weekend, May 17-20, 2012, in Arlington, VA.The workshop is open to anyone with a membership for the weekend.  You do not have to be a SFWA...

Reviews in the Nick of Time: Red Tails

I was intrigued when I'd heard that George Lucas believed in this movie so much that he financed it himself.  Apparently the Hollywood studios— staffed of course by all those Hollywood liberals we hear so much about— declined to finance a war epic about black people.I was very impressed that Lucas was so committed to this movie.  And then I remembered that the last movie he believed in this much was Howard the Duck.Well, Red Tails is no Howard the Duck.  Unfortunately it's not Saving Private...

Watching the Newtster

During the time that Newt Gingrich has been out of office, I've completely forgotten what a special joy it is to listen to the guy.  He's like the Creature from the Id.  He absolutely can't suppress himself, and sees no reason why he should.  I'm almost as fascinated by Newt as Newt himself.So now he wants to wage a campaign of assassination against Iran (assassination not only being an act of war, but the sort of thing we criticize when Iran does it).  He also says he'll do this with "full d...

Jeff Dunteman on Taos Toolbox

2011 Toolbox grad (and computer legend) Jeff Dunteman has written a totally unsolicited (by me, anyway) description of Taos Toolbox over on Inkpunks.Walter and Nancy are both superb teachers and are not to be missed. I was startled, though, at how much I learned from my thirteen student colleagues, not solely through their critique of my own work, but also by seeing how they themselves create and manage the many moving parts in a novel-length story . . . I might describe my colleagues as...

Le Carré, Of The Previous Century

I've always thought of John le Carré as a role model.  He writes genre for a large non-genre audience, and pleases the critics as well.  (Of course it helps that he wrote the single best book, till that time anyway, in his chosen field.)I've just finished listening to David Oyelowo read the audio book version of le Carré's 2006 novel Mission Song, a book set against the terrifying background of the present-day eastern Congo.  The book's protagonist is an interpreter— someone who, by...

A New Platform Comes to Town . . .

Just last week I was complaining about the exclusivity and the egregious contract connected with with Apple's iBooks Author.Now I hear that Atavist, better known for long-form journalism for for producing original fiction to be read on hand-held devices, is on the cusp of releasing their new software, which (they say) will do everything that iBooks Author will do, only on damn near every platform known to humankind.Here's the scoop, according to Atavist's own page:Anyone can use it: Assemble...