A.C. Buchanan's Blog, page 5

On Empathy and Building Spaceships

Two things happened in my life yesterday (three if you count the fact I had an excellent halloumi pizza, but that's of limited relevance to this post). One, I finished my first week of a two month intensive web development bootcamp. Two, my twitter timeline* exploded in reaction in reaction to a (since deleted, with an apology**) post at SF Signal titled "We Are All Disabled". A titlethat, frankly, wasn't a good start, and it got considerably worse from there.

So I'm an autistic person studyi...

2016 Plans and Goals

2016 is a tough year to plan for. I'm leaving my job at the end of January, to spend two months at DevAcademy, studying web development bootcamp-style. After that is a bit unpredictable really - though hopefully I'll get a job before my money runs out, because not starving is nice.

I'm really excited about this - I love learning, I love fiddling round with technical stuff, and I've been with my current employer essentially all my adult life so it's very much time for a change. But even the be...

2015 Year in Review

I don’t think I can say much about 2015 without touchingon 2014. Without going into detail, that yearwas terribleon many fronts, and the further I get from it, the worseit looks. I spent a large chunk of itthinking I would never write again, and that wasn’t melodrama or self-indulgence, butthe clear trajectory things were taking.

I did write again, of course, and I even wrote a couple of things that year that I was very proud of, but my workreally suffered. My routine was shot. My focus was a...

Award-eligible Work 2015

Sir Julius Vogel Award nominations are open, so I’ve started procrastinating at all the other things I have to do by firing off some nominations. There’s been some amazing publications by local authors this year, so looking forward to some tough voting decisions.

I have four eligible works this year. They’re detailed below for your information, and if you’d like to nominate any of them simply copy and paste the details, add in your own email address, and email tosjv_awards@sffanz.org.nz(cheer...

Capricious launches!

Lastweek I launched the first issue of Capricious. It was a long (and at time stressful) road to get there, but I’m so pleased with how it turned out. (And telling myself that the formatting will be so much easier next time!)

Issue 1 is available for free and includes writing byA.J. Fitzwater, Sean Monaghan, Sabrina Amaya Hoke andBogiTakács. Subscriptions are available for Issue 2 onwards, starting at $8 for 1 year (4 issues).

Meanwhile I’m hard at work on the accidentally-themed Issue 2, due...

At the Edge

Sale!

I’m delighted to have a story in the forthcoming At the Edge anthology from Paper Road Press.

“And Still the Forests Grow though We are Gone” is an exploration of what happens when a floral-apocalypse story is set not in mid 20th-century England, but early 21st century Aotearoa. It’s about the stories we tell and the stories we bring with us when we travel, about land and sea and immigration and belonging, about decisions and survival.

I’m very happy the editors liked it, and that I’ll...

News and Reviews

A few things:

SHORTCUTS Track 1 is going to print! The series of six novellas on the themestrange tales of Aotearoa New Zealandwere released earlier this year and they’re now being released as a paperback collection. This includesBree’s Dinosaur, my magic-realist-ish story about trauma, belonging, and dinosaurs in the Wellington suburbs. The cover *points* surprised and delighted me, and I’m very much looking forward to addingthe final version to my author shelf. There’s also a competition to...

Monday Update

Maybe I should get back into the habit of Monday updates again? Here goes.

My critique group started up again last week, after a break while some of us were travelling or otherwise occupied. I’m hoping to get into a pattern of a new story every fortnight – I feel that’s achievable and I’m not exactly short on ideas (or… uh… half-finished drafts for that matter). So I’m back to regular writing and googling suspicious things like “what kills healthy teenagers”. I sold a story a few days ago (!)...

Capricious is open to submissions!

I’ve been hinting at a new project for a while, and I’m really excited to be able to share it with you. I’ve co-edited a few anthologiesand really enjoyed the process, the stories I got to read, the people I met – and often became friends with – along the way. It’s become increasingly clear to me that I wanted my next editing venture to be ongoing.I know now that I have the ability to put together a publication and I always found the profile of energy expenditure that comes with anthology edi...

Home!

Everyone, I had an amazing time! I hung out in aquariums and saw spaceships. I spent hours in art galleries. I met people I’d known online for years, and made heaps of new friends. I read from Accessing the Future andattended some of the best convention panels I’ve ever been to and sat on trains buzzing with story ideas. I ate new cheeses and lots of pizza and got addicted to iced tea lemonade. I visited four new cities (and a lot of smaller locations) and I sat on beaches. I walked along Chr...