Walter Jon Williams's Blog, page 89

Solar Dragon

So we had a three-day turnaround between returning from Helsinki and starting our drive to Wyoming to see the eclipse.  It was a two-day drive to our guest ranch near Dubois (rhymes with Royce).  A two-day drive to watch a two-minute event seemed a little out of balance, so we’re staying for the rest of the week in order to enjoy nearby Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. It is somewhat of a contrast with Finland. We watched the eclipse from the front porch of our rented cabin, which makes it a...

MP

So here I am at Worldcon, signing a book for Finnish MP Jyrki Kasvi, who reads SF, can speak Klingon, wears a cowboy hat, and presented the Best Novel Hugo. Honestly, why can’t we get legislators like this? The photo is by my hard-working minder, Pekka Rantasaari.

Stand By for Greatness

So while I was in Finland, Orbit reverted the rights to all three of the Dagmar Shaw books. I’ll try to make those available as soon as I can.  I can hardly do a worse job of promoting them than the original publisher.

Native Speaker

I am interviewed in Aamulehti, the second-largest newspaper in Finland. You will be amazed at how well I speak Finnish.

 

At the Worldcon

 

I am at the 75th Worldcon, and it is perfectly glorious. Also, the headline says I’m a “sci-fi great.”  I won’t disagree.

Founder

Walking around Stockholm, I saw this statue, which I believe is that of Jean-Charles Bernadotte, the Gascon sergeant who rose to the rank of general during the French Revolution, and who then married Napoleon’s old girlfriend Desiree and went on to become King Karl XIV Johan of Sweden, founder of the present line of Swedish kings. He is the only monarch known to have borne a “Death to Kings” tattoo. I also noticed the statue is being crated up, as if it’s being shuttled out of sight somewhere...

Me, On Finnish Radio

I am interviewed on a Swedish-language station on Finnish state radio!  The analysis is in Swedish, but I’m speaking English.  (No surprise there.) Just hit the Avsnitt for 5.8.2017.  I think. And here’s a transcript of the interview, entirely in Swedish for those of you who want to puzzle it out.

Gustaf Slept Here

We are in lovely Stockholm.  This involved 13 miserable hours on a ferry from Turku, though the misery was mitigated by glorious views of first the Finnish, and then the Swedish, archipelago.  By the end I didn’t care about the archipelago, I just wanted to get off the damn boat. Stockholm’s series of islands is a beautiful setting for a city, though there are some disturbing elements, for instance a fountain that seems to be dedicated to the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

 

 

Archipalego

So a military attaché, a philosopher, and a couple writers went out on a boat . . . Sounds like the beginning of a joke, and maybe it was, but I assure you it actually happened. Friend of the blog Marcus Prest (author of Android, etc.) has been playing host to us in Turku for the last several days, and the other day I was taken out into Finland’s gorgeous Archipalego Sea in a boat belonging to Marcus’ rather piratical friend Bjorn. This is Bjorn.  He’s just a little bit outgoing. After a cru...

Lakeland

This week we’ve been looked after by my Finnish friend Kari Salo, who I’ve known since he came to stay with my family when we were both fifteen. Kari and his lovely wife Anneli invited us to her lakeside summer cottage, where we enjoyed kicking back with a beer and a sauna after our busy week in St. Petersburg. The water was too cold for swimming, and the weather too wet for much else, but it was still great being on the water. And the sauna was what I like to think of as a real sauna, which...