Martha Wells's Blog, page 193

Still. Sick. I don't know how I look, but I sound horrib...

Still. Sick. I don't know how I look, but I sound horrible.

Hoping to get the work started on the house this week. I'm afraid the toilet is trying to leave the upstairs bathroom for the warmth and comfort of the kitchen directly below, and I really don't want this to happen.



Of Blood and Honey Giveaway There's a giveaway contest on The Night Bazaar this week to win a free copy of Stina Leicht's new fantasy novel Of Blood and Honey


If you're a Texas resident, please take this Texas Library Association Survey It will help libraries fight for their budgets.


Link from Kameron Hurley: The Chosen Jerk Sam Sykes and N.K. Jemisin talk about the trope of the "chosen one" and what it means. I hadn't thought this out before, but it explains a lot about why I've never particularly gravitated to stories that are heavily "chosen one" oriented.

Dark Roasted Blend: The Last Victorian Leviathan Steam Ship

Cynsations: Guest Post: Renée Watson on Writing About Serious Topics in Children's Books This is the activity I do when I start off my author visits for A Place Where Hurricanes Happen, illustrated by Shadra Strickland (Random House, 2010). Before I share the book, I give an opportunity for students to see how they have something in common with the characters, even if they haven't personally experienced a natural disaster.

Guest Post on the Night Bazaar

I've got another guest post up on The Night Bazaar: Avoiding Writing Scams, about a new writer who was actually trapped by a writing scam, back before Writer Beware and Preditors and Editors and all those other sites that warn about those kind of traps existed.

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Texas writer Melissa Mia Hall has passed away. She was a short story writer, poet, critic, and interviewer, and editor of the anthology Wild Women, which featured stories by Margaret Atwood, Erica Jong, Ursula Le Guin, Alice Walker, Kate Wilhelm, Takeo Tomioko, Joe Lansdale, and others. She was only 55.

I got the estimate from the contractor and we're going to...

I got the estimate from the contractor and we're going to go ahead with the work, so the house's inevitable collapse is postponed. Yay! I'm still sick, but not too sick. Mostly sore throat, no fever or anything else. :knock on wood:

I mentioned Chesterton in this post because there is a Father Brown story I read ages ago that had an old decomposing house on the edge of a beach cliff, crumbling away, and all the people inside are terribly oppressed by the atmosphere of the house. They invite Father Brown to dinner, and explain about the psychic oppression, doom-filled miasma, etc, and ask Father Brown what he thinks. And he tells them (paraphrased) "Get out of the freaking house! What is WRONG with you people?" At least that's how I remember it and I like my version better.


Scott Cupp said very nice things about me on a forgotten book post on Missions Unknown: The Element of Fire by Martha Wells


NPR: Astronaut's Brother Recalls A Man Who Dreamed Big about Ron McNair. I was in college when this happened, at Texas A&M. I vividly remember walking into Rumors, a little lunch place under the back stairs of the Memorial Student Center, and seeing everyone just staring silently at the TV and knowing something really bad had happened.

Thanks to everybody who commented on my previous post!Tod...

Thanks to everybody who commented on my previous post!

Today I have the sick, apparently. I've got a sore throat and some sinus symptoms, not too bad right now, so I hope it doesn't get any worse. I had a doctor's appointment Monday for a check-up and was in a crowded waiting room with a baby who had pretty much these symptoms, so I'm not hopeful. I have to go to the grocery store today and hope I can remember what all I need when I get there. I'll try not to spread this through the store like the plague.

I have been having anxiety issues lately and had a little switch back to depression last night. Anxiety usually equals getting tons of stuff done, because I have too much energy; depression not so much. Anyway, I hope I can hit a more even keel today.

I did make it to aerobics yesterday despite not feeling really well (see: anxiety). It was mostly weights and cardio, but we did use the Pilates balls for a while. They look soft and friendly and fun, but there are some really painful things you can do with them.

I think I'm going to be doing a giveaway contest for at least three free copies of The Cloud Roads next week, probably on Tuesday. It'll be a thing where you enter with a comment on the post, then I'll draw random winners. If there's a large amount of entries, I'll add more books. Anyway, that's on Tuesday.


Link: WebUrbanist on Effective Advertisements Just so you know, there is one on the first screen that shows a guy having sex with a giant scorpion. Probably not work safe, depending on where you work.

What I just posted on Facebook and Twitter: The book is ...

What I just posted on Facebook and Twitter: The book is here! The actual book is here! HERE! Two boxes of The Cloud Roads arrived via Fed Express just now. WOOHOO!





ETA: yes, there will be an ebook version, available a couple of weeks or so after the official release date. I'll post about it when it's available.

I had a meeting with a contractor yesterday to get some e...

I had a meeting with a contractor yesterday to get some estimates on fixing the worst of our house issues. We've had a slow but persistent leak in the bathroom ceiling for a while and the bases of the pillars holding up the front porch roof are disintegrating. (Which sounds a little like we're living in a decomposing yet glamorous Tennessee Williams style house, but really not. It is sinking slowly into the ground, thus the cracks in the walls and the uneven porch, so it's more like something out of Chesterton's Father Brown stories or Poe, by way of 1970s suburbia.) And there's the leaking upstairs windows.

But the thing that really did it, was that in the past year I have had two friends, two, who had two story houses with leaks in the upstairs bathrooms. And in both cases those leaks caused the kitchen ceilings to suddenly collapse without warning. In one case, it pretty much hollowed out the entire downstairs. So when I walked into my upstairs bathroom (which is above the kitchen) and felt a small spot where the linoleum floor was bubbled up and not attached to the subfloor anymore, I decided we really needed to do something now. (Instead of ignoring it and hoping it would just get tired of it and stop, like the house's other problems.) There have also been some other telltale signs of water in the wrong spots, like disintegrating caulk and orangish mold that won't go away.

Anyway, the contractor found other places where the subfloor feels mushy, and there are some very subtle signs in the kitchen ceiling that all is not well. He actually doesn't think it's going to be a very big deal compared to say, the kitchen ceiling collapsing and taking all the drywall throughout the lower part of the house with it. Hopefully we'll be able to afford that plus getting all the other stuff taken care of too.


Does anybody know when the new season of Eureka is going to start up again?


Books I'm about to start reading when I get time:

Kraken by China Mieville

The Broken Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin

And Blessed by Cynthia Leitich Smith is now out.

I made beef stew last night and it turned out really well...

I made beef stew last night and it turned out really well. I use a variation on this Food Network recipe, which is a variant of Julia Child's famous boeuf bourguinon recipe. I use shallots instead of onions, added sweet red wine to the stock, and didn't use the flour or the whole tomatoes.


The con_or_bust fundraising auction is about to get started up again in February, and people are starting to post items for auction. My item is an autographed copy of The Cloud Roads. Bidding will open on February 21.


The posts on The Night Bazaar this week are about finding an agent.


Weird Tales has a new web site. Several exciting developments mark the start of 2011 for Weird Tales. In addition to launching this new website, editor-in-chief Ann VanderMeer and publisher John Betancourt have raised the pay rate to 5 cents per word and implemented a new submissions portal for potential contributors.

These changes come on the heels of the news last year that VanderMeer would be taking over as editor-in-chief, with Paula Guran retained as nonfiction editor and Mary Robinette Kowal named as art director. This is the first time in the magazine's 88-year history that Weird Tales has had an all-female editorial/management staff.

I worked all day yesterday on a short story, and may be a...

I worked all day yesterday on a short story, and may be at the point where I can finish it today. I don't have the best luck with short stories (in fact I have crappy luck with short stories) so hopefully I can find a place that wants it.

I'm watching a forensic special re-investigating the Lizzie Borden murders. Somehow I don't think they're going to solve it. I go back and forth on whether she was guilty myself. I think she could have done it, but there were also cases where a stranger walked into a house in the middle of the day and killed everybody in it, so who knows.

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Carol Berg has a guest post on The Night Bazaar: On Book Releases

I agree with her. A card or bookmark with the book cover and a description on it is really helpful at cons, for people who ask about your book or want something to pick up after a panel or during a signing. Pens, toys, buttons, etc may be fun but aren't going to convince anybody to buy a book. There aren't a lot of promotional things a writer can do to convince people to buy a book they haven't already decided to buy; you just have to hope the publisher is getting it into bookstores so people can see it and decide if they want it, whether they buy it there or order it later or get it as an ebook.

And the best promotion is still word of mouth by people who read the book and like it and tell friends or leave reviews or post about it somewhere.


A few links for Sunday: TutZone: 30 Hot Shots That Are Sure to Inspire You and Marvelous Portrait Photography by Evan Kafka

Coupon Sherpa: 55 Green Uses for Yellow Lemons

It's been up in the 60s here, but it's supposed to freeze...

It's been up in the 60s here, but it's supposed to freeze tonight. I'm ready for summer.

It's hard to type with a small cat wrapped around your left arm, I'm just sayin'.


Interesting article: Anonymous Was a Woman

Someone posted this link and I can't remember who it was: Abandoned Men's Club Becomes Home

Couple of CoolVibe pictures: Calm and Cold Taoist Fairy, Encounter at Green Spindle

Book I am looking forward to:

The Desert of Souls by Howard Andrew Jones
Publishers Weekly said As richly textured as an antique rug, this fantasy-mystery sweeps readers into ancient Baghdad. Asim, captain of Master Jaffar's guard, and the wily scholar Dabir, who is hopelessly in love with Jaffar's niece Sabirah, track stolen golden artifacts into the shifting sands that hide the ruins of legendary Ubar, entry to the land of the djinn. Asim's dazzling swordplay, his Muslim piety, and his unwavering loyalty to his friend balance Dabir's bittersweet devotion to Sabirah as the pair battle forbidden magic that forces them to slice away layers of their own spirits. Their antagonist, evil Zarathustrian sorcerer Firouz, poses moral questions that deepen this multicolored Arabian-nights tale, as does the plight of pretty, quick-witted Sabirah, who prizes scholarship and lives for the moment while facing the fate of a political marriage. A captivating setting and well-realized characters make this a splendid flying-carpet ride.

You can still enter the contest to win a free copy of Kameron Hurley's God's War by making a comment about your favorite women protagonists on any of the Night Bazaar posts this week, including mine here: My Favorite Women.

This is the week where I need to get a bunch of stuff don...

This is the week where I need to get a bunch of stuff done. Take Tasha for her vet check-up, take the Prius for its car check-up, make doctor appointments for me. I've pretty much broken down and decided to go ahead and get an eye exam for new glasses, even though I can't afford new glasses. (I got some last year, but the eye doctor I'm not going to anymore changed my prescription and I can't see, and it's getting worse, and our insurance won't cover a new pair until next year.) I'm getting really tired of not being able to see. I think if I can just get new lenses and have them put into the old frames, that will be cheaper.

There's a quote from Without Lying Down, where one of women writer/directors was talking about Rudolph Valentino, and his trademark intense stare. She said he had terrible eyesight and he wasn't trying to seduce you, he was just trying to see who you were. That's how I've felt lately.


Kameron Hurley linked to: Lilith Saintcrow: REVIEW: The Gift of Fear, Or, Figure Out Who's REALLY Going To Kill You I've heard about this book before and seen the author talk about it, and his experiences with helping stalking victims.

These are female problems. As de Becker himself points out, there's a basic rift in our society: at bottom men are afraid women will laugh at them, women are afraid men will kill them. Women are also socialized to make us good victims, another thing de Becker deconstructs. We're taught to play nice, get along, make someone feel better, let someone down easy. Even if we do feel uneasy, or if our intuition tells us something is off, we'll play along just to be nice.

Writer Beware: A Warning about First One Publishing's Writing Contest