Harry Connolly's Blog, page 159

Randomness for 12/4

1) Every Star Trek episode explained in four panels.

2) "Speedflying" a new extreme sport that freaks me out just watching a clip on YouTube. . If I prayed, I'd pray for those dudes.

3) Fictional characters in need of a book deal. With covers!

4) This is why I'm a capitalist at heart.

5) Can't remember what movie I certain line of dialog comes from? Do a search.

6) "Furthermore, only non-Christians can curse."

7) If this is what it will take to be a successful writer, I'll go back to answering phones.

Let me astonish and amaze you!

… with my posts in other places on the web!

Over on Black Gate, I've posted a bit about the process of making the trailer (not "So we decided to use a key light" stuff, but the decision-making and such). Here's part one. Here's part two.

I think they're pretty interesting, but I would, wouldn't I? They're also full of the sort of writer-thinking I never talk about in my own blog, mainly because I don't feel comfortable being an instructor in this space (or most anywhere, really). I know other writers feel differently.

Over on the Official Kindle Blog, the five co-authors of Suvudu.com's "A Glimpse of Darkness" novella (available for Kindle on 12/6 for only 99 cents, you can pre-order here) are doing a tag-team series of blog posts, just like as we did with the story. You can see the first one, by Lara Adrian here, and here's mine. Read them all, I say. It's interesting.

My son really enjoyed yesterday's Minecraft survivor's log. He's already pressing me to write more. Me, I'm just trying to get these pages edited and the Christmas shopping done.

Tonight, we hang the tree. That's right, we're going to try to suspend it upside down from the ceiling. We're like the Satanists of holidays.

I know. All that has you astonished and amazed, yeah?

Survivor's Log, Day 112-120

It is day… 112, I think? It's hard to tell. The days are so short here, I know I miss some cycles while I'm underground searching for the coal, iron and other minerals I need to survive.

Yesterday I found some reeds beside a lake. After some time at my crafting table, I figured out how to make them into paper, then how to turn the paper into a book. So… this journal. I hope that when I am killed for the last time, this record will be of use to some other lost soul.

This place… It's hard to know where to begin describing this strange land I've appeared in. The physics doesn't make any more sense than the biosphere. There are no birds here except chickens, no mammals except cow, pigs and sheep. No reptiles. Nothing lives in the water, as far as I can tell.

There are no insects here, either. How do the trees and grasses survive without insects? The only bugs of any kind are the giant spiders, each one larger than me. They're dangerous, too, once the square sun has gone down; their feeding frenzies begin at night.

I have to be careful of the spiders. They can kill me, and did so once–I'll talk more about that later, when I'm ready. I'm not… I'm not ready yet–but I don't hate them. The zombies and skeletons are less dangerous. They are easy to kill and immolate in the sunlight anyway.

It's the creatures I've begun to call "creepers" I hate most of all. They're ugly and silent hunters. They emerge at night and persist unharmed in the daylight, jumping at the edge of my fenceline as soon as they see me. I know what they want, too. If they can get close enough to me, they explode.

They're suicide bombers, like the antibodies of this world, sacrificing themselves to destroy me. What manner of beast sacrifices itself in the destruction of its prey, I dare not ponder. Three times have they destroyed me, but after each death I reappear again in the same spot on the beach, naked…

More later. The square moon is setting and a glow in the "east" tells me the square sun is about to rise. I need to venture past the fenceline to collect more wood to extend the fence and find feathers for my arrows.

Day 113

I've decided to stick with this numbering system for the days. I have no way of knowing if it is accurate, but it doesn't matter, I don't think. God, I hope it doesn't matter.

I found a giant spider on top of my High House this morning. Can't understand how it got past the fence line. I know they appear in very dark places, like unlit caverns and hilltops, but I have seeded my whole property with the strange, unquenchable torches I make–it shouldn't have been dark enough for that. Maybe the trees are too overgrown?

No matter. At least it wasn't another creeper. I shot it with arrows until if fell over and vanished in a puff of smoke, the way all the living things here die. All it left behind was a couple lengths of string. Even my arrows have been transported away.

As stated, all living things here expire in the same manner: they vanish in a puff of smoke and leave some small object to fall to the ground. The chickens and zombies leave behind feathers. The skeletons, arrows. The creepers, gunpowder (which I have plans for, oh yes).

The farm animals are the same. The first time I killed a cow, I was shocked to discover that the entire carcass vanished except for a strip of leather suitable for protective clothing. Nothing else, nothing else that could be called a comestible–an entire cow! The sheep leave wool (without dying, unless attacked repeatedly) and the pigs vanish, leaving behind nothing but a large chop. So far, that's the only food I've found here. Good thing I'm not a devout Jew or Muslim.

Not that I've ever been hungry (or sleepy, but never mind that now). The only use I've found for the steaks is that, once cooked, they will heal me of the wounds inflicted by my enemies, or the damage I take falling in treacherous places.

Which means it is not food I am eating. I am replacing damaged parts of myself with the meat from these weird ghostly pigs. What am I becoming? What has happened to me?

I have not yet seen a calf, piglet, chick or lamb. The chicken lay unbreakable eggs which I collect but are nothing more than paperweights. I strongly suspect that, each time I am killed, I vanish and reappear just like these creepers, cows and spiders.

I live as a dead thing, but without burning in the rays of the square sun as the zombies do. If these creatures vanish and reappear when killed, as I do, how am I to win my war of survival? All is futile.

Yet I dig, and chop, and build. Somehow I will find a way back to my own world and my own body. I will be reunited with my wife and children. I will.

Day 119

After several days of planning and work, I have constructed a house out in the bay. It is made of glass and barely extends above the water, and the glass-covered walkway that connects it to my fenced compound is well below the water, and even deeper once it reaches land.

It is a simple, humble structure, but I felt I needed it. I was feeling too like a prisoner and needed a place beyond the fence where I could stand and look at the stars. I needed a place of my own that was beautiful and defiant of this abominable situation.

Still, while I was digging the walkway through this strange rock, a zombie wandered about on the glass roof of my Water Room. The creature's moaning filled me with dread; I knew it could do nothing from the other side of the thick glass, but if it had been a creeper, I suspect my house would have been exploded and the weird, viscous water of the bay would have flooded in on me.

Thus, while I am proud of my low glass room, I can find no peace there when the stars are out, nor when they are not. My defiance was perhaps ill-advised.

Still, at night, when I stand in the doorway of High House, the torchlight flickers prettily beneath the waveless water. Perhaps I should learn to be content with this.

Day 120

Attempted parlay with a zombie this morning, just before the sun came up. It is, after all, a man, is it not? In reduced capacity, I'm sure, but active, aware, and perhaps not immune to reason?

I spoke to the fellow in as frank and unthreatening a manner as I could devise, but it was no use. It could only moan and attack me, so I slew it.

I am truly alone here.

The rest of the day was spent in furious physical labor to forestall such morose thoughts.

Oppressmas shopping list

Here are a few gift suggestions for the season, just in case you need inspiration.

* For Americans: Fourth Amendment underwear. It's printed in metallic ink so it will show up in a backscatter machine image.

* Caution: This is Sparta

* The Union of Superlative Heroes (explanation)

* Minecraft Alpha — The beta version hasn't come out yet, but the video makes it look like a roller coaster building game. It isn't.

* SMILE by Raina Telgemeier

* A year's worth of Mozy or upgraded Dropbox.

* HOGFATHER, the miniseries.

* For people with mobility issues who have trouble putting on socks: The Sock Aid.

* Young Wizards Handbook: How to Trap A Zombie, Track A Vampire by Rotruck, A.R.

* Game of Cages and Child of Fire. Why not?

* The USB typewriter, perfect for old-time writers who don't know what to do with the iPad their grandkids gave them.

* Sudoku toilet paper.

* Beautiful food.

Because I'm a complete bastard…

I just emailed this picture to a former co-worker, declaring it's my new office dress code.

Facebook users, you may have to click through.

I wish umbrella hats were more acceptable, fashion-wise. They're extraordinarily practical.

Christmas shopping list

1) For Americans: Fourth Amendment underwear. It's printed in metallic ink so it will show up in a backscatter machine image.

2) Caution: This is Sparta

The turkey-and-stuffing sandwich diet: or, how I lost 18 lbs over the Thanksgiving holiday

Actually, there's no reason in the world for me to have put "how" in the subject header, because I have no idea how it happened. My random snacks have been largely meat-based–is this a pseudo-Atkins? I've just returned to the gym, but only three times a week and not last week because of the holiday and the flight to L.A. for the book trailer. Or maybe it was the three-day (near-)fast of my L.A. trip itself.

Then again, maybe it's because I quit my day job and my body is flushing out all that artery-clogging sorrow.

More likely, despite being at 280+ for so long, my body was never comfortable there and has seized on what little activity I'm giving it to shed some unwanted me. I should never have let my various pains drive me to a sedentary life; instead of easing the strain on my legs and back, it only made them worse.

I still hurt, of course–that's never going to stop–but it's not as bad as it was. Also, I'm less concerned with the actual number on the scale (which is why I only get on it once a month or so) than with how I feel. I feel better. And thank Pikachu for that.

Who doesn't love the TSA?

Well, most people at the moment. My experience passing through on my recent book trailer jaunt was fine, but others have had painful and humiliating searches or been faced with the petty indignities of low-level bureaucrats anxious to exercise their power.

The media mostly brushes off these complaints. A large number of the public doesn't care or is contemptuous of people's complaints–one NPR caller responded to a question about backscatter machines by saying "Go to the gym and give them something worth looking at." And the government has no plans to stop.

It's because we, as a nation, expect politicians to protect us from terrorism.

When the guy who torched his underwear on the plane was arrested, the media and the public was boiling over with questions about how he got through security, who let this happen, what precautions were in place? Can the Obama administration protect us? Geo. Bush never allowed a terrorist attack on U.S. soil (except for that one)

Truth is, no politician is going to care about complaints of intrusive searches when the alternative (in their minds, at least) is an election season attack of being "soft on terror." No politician wants to face those questions.

Randomness for 11/27

1) The 30 most amazingly terrible VHS boxes of all time. Like Chris Sims, the only one of these I've seen is HAWK THE SLAYER, and my god it was awful. Still, I'd think anyone could take two of these boxes and come up with a pretty awesome story idea.

2) And as a palate-cleanser, check this huge, beautiful artwork.

3) Reasoning with vampires: Annotated excerpts from the Twilight novels.

4) Archetizer on the top ten libraries in the world. Seattle's downtown branch makes the list, as well it should. via email from my sister-in-law.

5) Also from my s-i-l, Nathan Sawaya makes art from Legos. More here.

6) TSA agents do not know their own rules. Video. And this description of the event from the victim's point of view.

7) In the libertarian paradise, "justice" can be hired down at the local bar.

Book advances in convenient graph form

Over at SFNovelists.com, Jim C. Hines makes a graph of his advances to show how they've grown. I say good for him that they have grown, especially in this difficult economy; the man must be doing something right.

And it reminded me of a section in one of Donald Maass's books (this one, I believe, which he's offering online for free) in which he goes through his own client list to see which writers are earning six-figure incomes. This was back in the nineties (and the numbers need to be updated) but to make six figures through royalties on their backlist, one of the things the writers had to do was be writing for at least ten years already.

Instead of an overnight success, it's an overdecade success.