David Lee Summers's Blog, page 122

Musings About the "Day" Job

In the last few weeks, I've had several questions and comments from people wondering how long I feel I need to stay with my "day" job as opposed to writing and editing full time. Day is in quotes because in addition to writing and editing, I operate telescopes at Kitt Peak National Observatory outside Tucson, Arizona. It's hard to think of something I do almost entirely at night as a day job!

Before I address that subject, I should back up and point out that I was a full-time writer and editor for seven years before I returned to Kitt Peak in 2008. The observatory management came to me and asked if I would return because there was a shortfall of qualified applicants to operate telescopes. I wasn't looking for a job. The job came looking for me.

The reason I took the job and the reason I stay at the observatory is because I enjoy it. I like my co-workers and I feel I'm doing important work. Although space-based observatories get a lot of press, ground based observatories are essential for follow-up work and confirmation of those discoveries. The Kepler probe wouldn't be credited for as many planet discoveries if it wasn't for facilities like Kitt Peak following up. We provide the only 4-meter-class telescopes that some small university professors and students have access to. I help those professors and students make the most of their time on these telescopes.

In addition to work on exoplanets, we have been involved in looking at supernovae, which tell us a lot about the distance scales and acceleration of the universe (i.e. dark energy). We also look at things like gravitational lenses, where a distant galaxy re-images even more distant objects and tells us about the early universe. We also look at nearby objects such as planets and asteroids in our own solar system.

Sadly, working at Kitt Peak has meant that I have had to turn down some event appearances. It breaks my heart every time I have to do that. However, the extra money from the job has allowed me to make some other events that I might have had to turn down otherwise.

Looking at the big picture, there are some projects I'd like to pursue that are difficult to do with the time-constraints of the job. Because of that, I don't envision remaining at the observatory until I retire (presuming retirement is even an option for my generation anymore). Even so, as long as the job remains amicable, my supervisors remain content with my performance, and I'm allowed to pursue my writing career as well, I don't envision leaving in the immediate future, either.

I write because it's something I have to do. I'm blessed that there are readers who enjoy my writing and follow it. I'm also blessed to have played a small role in the exploration of the universe and hope to continue to do so — at least for a little while longer.

Zombie Writing!

I'm just back from Her Royal Majesty's Steampunk Symposium in Long Beach, California plus a book signing at Mysterious Galaxy in Redondo Beach, California. Both were amazing events and I've promised to write about the events for Dark Cargo. During the Queen's Couture at the Steampunk Symposium, I read a short story called "The Zombie Shortage" that was well received. That story appears in the anthology Zombiefied: An Anthology of All Things Zombie.

Appropriately enough, when I returned from my trip to California, I learned that a brand new non-fiction book about writing zombie fiction is now available. The book includes my essay "Expect the Unexpected: Embracing the Cliché to Add Surprises to Your Zombie Fiction." Also in the book are essays by Keith Gouveia, Lee Pletzers, Lou Antonelli, Eric S. Brown, Armand Rosamilia and many more. There are forty-four essays in all. If you want to breathe new life into your zombie fiction, this is the book for you!

What's more, the ebook edition is absolutely free through Saturday, January 21. You can pick up the free edition for your Kindle at: http://www.amazon.com/Zombie-Writing-ebook/dp/B006YZDIE0/. If you prefer the paper edition, that's available for the low price of $9.99 at: https://www.createspace.com/3774170.

Hope you'll check out this new book and try your own hand at reanimating some corpses!

2011 Blog Stats

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here's an excerpt:

A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 3,100 times in 2011. If it were a cable car, it would take about 52 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

A Few Updates for December

Starting with the week of Thanksgiving, I've been scheduled for three longer-than-normal work shifts at Kitt Peak National Observatory. I worked a nine-night shift the week of Thanksgiving. I'm in the middle of a seven-night shift now. Fortunately I get one night off in the middle so I can participate in the Yuletide Universe Book Signing at the Poisoned Pen Bookstore in Scottsdale, Arizona — more about that in a bit. Finally, I wrap up December with a seven-night shift at the observatory that spans Christmas. As usual, the work is interesting, but the nights this time of year are long. Typically, I get a nine-hour break from about 7am till about 4pm to sleep and check in with my family. The rest of the time I'm at the telescope working. My work nights range from rapid-fire sessions moving the telescope from one bright star to another to more sedate nights where we spend hours on one target trying to gather as many photons as we can from some distant object.

During my most recent days off, I put the finishing touches on my novel Dragon's Fall. This is a prequel to Vampires of the Scarlet Order. If you visit David's Library, you'll notice there are two books with "Dragon's Fall" down the left-hand edge. Those are parts one and two of the novel. The whole book has five parts and they were originally going to be released as standalone novellas. However, my publisher has decided to cut to the chase and release the entire novel in one shot. It'll be available both in print and ebook editions. I'll be sure to keep you posted about those. You can also get more details at my vampire site: dlsummers.wordpress.com.

Finally, I wanted let people know about three exciting events coming up.

December 11, 2011.

I'll be signing copies of Owl Dance, The Solar Sea, and anything else they have on hand at The Poisoned Pen Bookstore in Scottsdale, Arizona from 2-5pm as part of the Yuletide Universe Celebration. Also on hand will be Michael Stackpole, Kevin Hearne, Sam Sykes, Lisa McMann, Janni Lee Simner, and Joseph Nassise.

January 13-16, 2012.

I will be a guest at Her Royal Majesty's Steampunk Symposium aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach, California. This promises to be an amazing event. There will be ghost tours, dances, readings, games and more! Other guests include Unwoman, Jon Magnificent, Steam Powered Giraffe, O.M. Grey, the folks behind Mantecoza and more.

January 17, 2012.

I will be signing copies of Owl Dance at Mysterious Galaxy in Redondo Beach, California from 7:30pm to 8:30pm.

I hope you'll join me at one or more of these events! In the meantime, I hope you have a wonderful and safe holiday season!

David's TusCon 38 Schedule

I'll be attending TusCon 38 in Tucson, Arizona the weekend of November 11-13, 2011. The convention will be held at the Hotel Tucson City Center. You can find more information about the convention at: http://home.earthlink.net/~basfa/t38main.html.

My schedule for the weekend is as follows:

Friday, 11pm-12am, Reading. Location: Garden.
Friday, 12am-1am, Things That Go Bump in the Night – Sexy. Location: St. Augustine.
Saturday, 3pm-4pm, Serial Numbers or Plagiarism. Location: Silver.
Saturday, 4pm-5pm, Happily Ever After – Until Next Time. Writing the Sequel. Location: Silver.
Saturday, 10pm-11pm, Twitter vs. Blog. Location: Copper.
Sunday, 9am-10am, Will the Disappearance of Bookstores Weaken Genre Boundaries? Location: Copper.

When I'm not at a panel, there's a good chance you can find me at the Hadrosaur Productions table in the dealer's room. Also, we're planning a birthday party for Marty Massoglia and me on Saturday night. The room and time should be posted, or ask the person manning the Hadrosaur Productions table. As always, convention schedules have a way of changing with little notice. Make sure to check your program guide at the event. If you're in Tucson, hope to see you at TusCon 38!

The Clockwork Legion Rides Forth

Over the course of the novel Owl Dance, a group of people come together to solve a crisis. There's Ramon Morales, former sheriff of Socorro with his sharp eye and fast draw. There's Fatemeh Karimi, a healer who seems to have the uncanny ability to talk to owls. There's the inventor, M.K. Maravilla, who uses his clockwork creations to understand the natural world. There's the engineer turned pirate, Onofre Cisneros, and the bounty hunter, Larissa Crimson. I've come to think of these people collectively as the Clockwork Legion.

When I wrote Owl Dance, I envisioned it as a standalone novel. Even so, there are threads that could be followed for more stories in this world. To me, this isn't sequel baiting, it's just the way life is. Episodes in life don't always come to a nice, neat close. Aspects have a way of coming back in new and different ways. It's one of the things I really enjoy about life.

Although open to a sequel, I wasn't really prepared for something that happened at MileHiCon in Denver. My friend Maggie Bonham, who owns Skywarrior Publishing, picked up a copy of Owl Dance. (OK, I led her over to the dealer's table where they were selling it and practically begged her to buy a copy…) The next day, after reading a portion of the book, she came up to me and told me how good she thought it was. Moreover, she asked if I'd considered writing a series of books in this world. I told her it wasn't out of the question.

Fast forward to the weekend before Halloween. A contract arrives in my email for three books in the Clockwork Legion series. After some emails and some time on the phone, it looks like we have ourselves a deal and a series of books featuring the Clockwork Legion will be forthcoming. I have a rough plan and will be outlining like mad in the coming weeks. That'll be followed by a busy year of writing in 2012.

In the meantime, there's still plenty of time to read Owl Dance and learn about the Clockwork Legion for yourself. You can find a list of retailers on the book page of my website at davidleesummers.com/books.html. Also, I'm giving away a copy of Owl Dance on Goodreads. The winner will be selected on November 15. You can enter to win at: www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/16515-owl-dance.

What's more, while I was on the phone with Maggie, my wife handed me an envelope. Inside was a signed contract from Cemetery Dance magazine for my story "The Vrykolakas and the Cobbler's Wife." Last I'd spoken to Brian Freeman, the story was scheduled for issue 66 of the magazine. From the Cemetery Dance website, I see they're just about to release issue 65, so it sounds promising that my story should be in the next issue out of the chute.

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SFPA Seeking Volunteers

The Science Fiction Poetry Association is looking for volunteers to fill some key positions within the organization. President David Kopaska-Merkel has posted a list of the volunteer positions that I drafted at: dreamsandnightmaresmagazine.blogspot.com/2011/10/science-fiction-poetry-association.html. If you're a member of the SFPA, please drop by and take a look. If a job says "vacant" or doesn't have a person listed and it sounds like something you'd like to do, drop a note to David and let him know you're interested in the job. Even if there is a person listed and it sounds interesting, please go ahead and let us know. People can always use help and life commitments occasionally come up causing people to leave positions behind. It's always good to know when someone is "waiting in the wings" to take on a job.

You can find David's email address — along with the contact info for all the officers — at sfpoetry.com/officers.

If you're not a member of the Science Fiction Poetry Association, why not take a little time to learn more? The website is: sfpoetry.com. The organization promotes science fiction, fantasy, and horror poetry and we encourage involvement by fans as well as writers.

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Atole for an Autumn Morning

About midway through Chapter 2 of my novel Owl Dance, you'll come across the following passage:

The dip in the hot spring after a long day of riding let Ramon sleep very well, but he still woke up sore the next morning. He dragged himself out of bed, washed his face in the basin of water that was in the room and dressed. Ramon could smell coffee and something else, a blending of chocolate and cinnamon he hadn't smelled in many years. He followed the smells and sat down at the kitchen table. Alicia placed a bowl of chocolate- and cinnamon-spiced atole in front of Ramon along with a cup of coffee. "I haven't had atole since I was a kid," he said as he dug in. "I'm not going to want to leave."

One comment and question I've already received about the book is that atole sounds really good. What exactly is it? Well, depending on how you look at it, atole is a thin porridge or a thick drink made from masa (the corn flour used to make tortillas or tamales). The atole that Ramon has is "atole de chocolate" or "champurrado".

I was first introduced to atole about ten years ago by a wonderful storyteller named Greg Pedroza. One of his specialties is telling alliterative stories and many of them are inspired by his family traditions. You can learn more about Greg here: http://gpedroza.com.

Here are the ingredients I use when making atole de chocolate:

What you'll need is about a half cup of dried masa, a 3-ounce tablet of Mexican chocolate, about half a 3-ounce piloncillo cone and some water. All of these are readily available in my local grocery store in Las Cruces. Outside of New Mexico, you may have to go to the "international aisle" or whatever they call it to find the masa and the Mexican chocolate. The piloncillo cone may be the hardest thing to find. If you can't find it, you can substitute a scant quarter cup packed dark brown sugar and a teaspoon of molasses. Mexican hot chocolate tablets are already cinnamon spiced, so if you use some other chocolate, you'll need to add about a quarter teaspoon of cinnamon.

To make the atole, break up the chocolate tablet and the piloncillo cone and place them in a blender along with the masa and about two cups of water (for a thicker, more porridge-like atole) or about four cups of water (for a thinner, more hot-chocolate like atole). Blend until will mixed. Pour the mixture into a saucepan and bring to a simmer for five minutes. Once done, pour into bowls or cups and serve. I like to add a little milk when I serve the atole.

This is a good way to start a day. Also, atole is a great accompaniment to fresh tamales for supper.

Owl Dance is available at Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com, and direct from the publisher at: http://flyingpenpress.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=49

Science Fiction Trails #7

Fittingly, my seventh story published this year is in issue 7 of Science Fiction Trails Magazine.

Set in October 1876, my story is called "Day of the Dead." An ancient and highly intelligent alien called Legion is exploring Earth and gets curious about the Day of the Dead ceremonies taking place in Mesilla, New Mexico. Legion is a lifeform that uploaded himself to a computer many centuries before and exists as a swarm of nanites. When he enters the brain of a reporter, the townsfolk think he's possessed by demons. However, a healer named Fatemeh Karimi risks the ire of the townspeople to help the reporter.

Also in the issue are stories by Jennifer Brozek, C.J. Killmer, David B. Riley and more. I have enjoyed every issue of Science Fiction Trails I've read, and I look forward to reading all the stories in this one, too.

If you want to lay your hands on a copy of the magazine, editor David B. Riley has allowed me to share a special 20% discount code. Buy the issue at https://www.createspace.com/3691701 and enter the code Q4RTJNX4.

Happy Trails!

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Two New Anthologies from WolfSinger

Tonight, I learned that two anthologies, each containing one of my stories, have been released from WolfSinger Publications. They are WolfSongs – Volume 2 edited by M.H. Bonham and A Taste of Armageddon edited by Carol Hightshoe.

A little about WolfSongs – Volume 2: The wolf has long been a source of folklore and mystery. Sometimes reviled and feared. Sometimes revered and loved. The wolf's fate has intertwined with our own. Follow the latest myths and legends of the wolf as written by Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror authors. Edited by M.H. Bonham, Science Fiction and Fantasy author and editor, you'll discover that as the dusk fades in the night, you'll hear the wolfsong calling you into stories of the imagination. Within the anthology's pages, you find stories by Diana Pharoah Francis, Irene Radford, Laura J. Underwood, Keith Gouveia, Carol Hightshoe and more.

WolfSongs – Volume 2 contains my story "The Clockwork Lobo." Set in 1876, this is the story of Ramon Morales and Fatemeh Karimi when they arrive in Mesilla, New Mexico. With little money in their pockets, Ramon sees that there's a bounty on wolf carcasses. Fatemeh doesn't believe that killing the wolves is right. Ramon decides to go hunting anyway. The wolf he finds is unlike any he has ever encountered. Readers of this web journal may notice that the plot sounds a lot like a chapter from my novel Owl Dance. There's a good reason for that. The chapter was originally written as a standalone story for this anthology. That noted, the story and the chapter aren't identical. There are quite a few differences in the two versions of the tale.

A Taste of Armageddon explores the fact that advances in modern war techniques have led many to "cleaner" and "cleaner" weapons. Countries have created missiles that can pinpoint a room within a building – greatly reducing the risks to non-combatants in a war zone. In the Star Trek episode "A Taste of Armegeddon" Captain Kirk challenged that war had to be messy so that people had a reason to avoid it. In this collection 11 authors including J Alan Erwine, Frank Tavares, Dana Bell and many others look at ways that warfare will advance in the future. Whether you agree with war or not, these stories will cause you to pause and think about the ways in which war is waged.

My story in A Taste of Armageddon is called "War Zone". In the story, pirate captain Ellison Firebrandt takes his star cruiser, the Legacy into a solar system where war has been waged for many decades. He hopes to find salvage that he can sell. Instead, he finds two remarkably peaceful worlds. He decides to investigate. All seems well until his shuttle — and the woman he loves — mysteriously vanish.

If you love short stories like I do, I hope you'll check out these fine books.

WolfSongs – Volume 2 is available at Amazon:

In Trade Paperback: http://www.amazon.com/WolfSongs-2-M-H-Bonham/dp/1936099292/

For your Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/WolfSongs-Volume-2-ebook/dp/B005HISYYO/

A Taste of Armageddon is also available at Amazon:

In Trade Paperback: http://www.amazon.com/Taste-Armageddon-Carol-Hightshoe/dp/1936099306/

For your Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/A-Taste-of-Armageddon-ebook/dp/B005JFBCN0/