Walter Jon Williams's Blog, page 31

Mermaid in the Family

We have Mom’s Day this coming Sunday. I don’t know if there’s a Grandma’s Day anywhere in the calendar, but after looking through some of Kathy’s old family photos the other day, I thought this might be an opportune time to celebrate her grandmother Estelle Fenn, who sometimes used the stage name Estelle du Pres.

She appeared regularly at the New York Hippodrome, which claimed to be the largest theater in the world— so large that it had its own troupe of performing elephants. People ...

Running Wild

Marvel will be presenting a graphic novel adaptation of the Wild Cards books by writer Paul Cornell and artist Mike Hawthorne. The narrative will start in 1947, just like the first of the books, and carry on through history.

The first volume will adapt stories by Roger Zelazny, George R.R. Martin, and Howard Waldrop. I expect my Nebula-nominated story “Witness” will be adapted in a later volume.

The last day for ordering Volume I in comic stores will be May 14.

Don’t be a deuce...

Save Yourself Some Bucks

From April 20 to April 22, Barnes & Noble will be discounting preordered books by 25%.

Guess who’s got a book available for preorder?

Sympathetic

James Davis Nicoll has made a favorable mention of Metropolitan in his Tor.com article “5 Sympathetic Science Fiction Bureaucrats.” My ambitious button-pushing heroine Aiah has finally got a bit of respect.

The article mentions only five bureaucrats, but the comments offer many more. It seems that SF might be more sympathetic to bureaucracy than you might think.

New Views

Very pleased with my new canvases, cover art by Elizabeth Leggett.

Now to find space on my already-crowded walls.

LOTR Rap

You’ve probably seen this by now, but if that’s the case, now you can see it again.

Stephen Colbert, who has praised Lord of the Rings to the skies for decades now, celebrates the 20th anniversary of the film’s release by breaking into song— or anyway rap.

He’s aided by a surpassing pack of guest stars, but I won’t spoil your fun by naming them. (Except— wait?— Anna Kendrick?)

Enjoy.

The Schedule of Me

I am in Portales. The Jack Williamson Lectureship has already started, with Connie Willis interviewing me, and will continue tomorrow, with five hours of programming featuring, well, me.

You can watch live over Youtube. Here are the links.

The schedule is as follows. Remember that we’re in Mountain Daylight Time.

Friday, April 8th:  

10:00 am: Guest of Honor Reading, GSSC Presentation area 

12:00 pm: Williamson Lectureship Lunch and Main Event, CUB Ballroom 

1:30 pm: Gaming...

Eyeworthy

The world’s only Gothic Western science fiction police procedural will shortly have new cover art, courtesy of the fantastic Elizabeth Leggett.

Days of Atonement has a long, sad history with cover art, starting with the atrocity on the original hardback, then graduating to my own poor attempts to put something together by merging various pieces of stock art. (In my defense, there is no stock art available that says “Gothic Western science fiction police procedural.”)

But now than...

Arise, Arise!

The first of my historical novels, To Glory Arise, is now available as an audio book from Audible, narrated by Bronson Pinchot.

And speaking of audio books, The Praxis, The Sundering, and Conventions of War are now available in their new, revised editions, narrated by the fantastic Stefan Rudnicki. Go forth and give your ears a treat.

Goalworthy

The Shaper of Worlds Kickstarter is within a few hundred bucks of making its goal.

There are still three spaces left in my kaffeeklatsch, and each will set you back a mere $400 CDN. (None of the money goes to me, it goes to publishing costs and to the authors— oh wait, I guess I am an author, so I’ll make a few pennies on the deal.)

Writers writing, and in my case talking. Check it out.