Tag: Science Fiction
All Jon Sullivan Covers to Date
Book Marks Competition
Right, the book marks competition is on. I want someone to design me book marks, using Jon Sullivan cover pictures and ensuring my blog address appears on them. The top three best designs get signed copies of any of my books they don’t have (though not a specific version of said book and excluding the ones they’ve won if first or second). The top two get the spatterjay series, whilst the winner also gets the Cormac series (both of these with the new covers).
Incidentally, I’ll be printing up and using the winners versions to hand over to book shops or people who might turn up at any signing I might do, so if you have a problem with that, don’t send anything.
You can email your efforts to me at ndotasheratvirgindotnet put a link in comments here or go find me on FaceBook, which isn’t difficult. And just to show you what you’re up against, here’s some first from Andy Plumbly and second from Brent Wise.
Have fun!
Waterstones
Writing Update
You might think, what with the quantity of stuff I’ve been sticking up on this blog lately, that I haven’t been working hard enough on my next book. That’s not the case. The more lengthy and considered blogs here (some might call them ill-considered) I draft in a paper journal in the evening, when I’ve finished work, and take very little time typing up the next morning. The shorter ones I just do in a few minutes.
So, after having to stop writing Zero Point while in Crete to look at some copy editing on The Departure, then having to do the same again back here, I had to read through the entire thing again to get myself back on track. The book is now at 94,301words and, in the story, some serious shit is heading towards the fan.
Other news? Jon Sullivan is continuing to replace all my old covers, but at present is working on something a bit different for The Departure. Hopefully, this year, I’ll be popping in to London for a meeting with Julie Crisp and co and getting to meet this guy. I must make a selection of covers I want as prints and get him to bring them along.
Ah, incidentally, if you want to buy posters of those cover pictures, head over to Jon Sullivan Art and talk to the guy. I would like every one of them as prints but, despite being a step up on the property front, I don’t have enough walls to hang them on.
Right, I’ve done my 2,000 words today, and I’ve stopped to play for a little while, but now it’s time to get back to it and start planning out some future scenes (shock horror!). Mmmm, did you know that an Alcubierre space-time bubble will produce massive tidal forces at the periphery of ? I thought not.
Polity Timeline.
The Empathy Effect — Bob Lock
First let me get a disclaimer out of the way. I’ve chatted to Bob Lock over the Internet for years, so you could take this as ‘what his mates say’. However, I didn’t much like his previous book so said nothing about that one at all.
I just have to wonder if Bob first rejected agoraphobic steeplejack and claustrophobic miner to then settle on the most unlikely of heroes: an empathic traffic warden. He stuck this character in the somewhat precarious position of being cling-filmed to one of the supports of Mumbles Pier, then took it from there. This is a short chaotic romp swiftly including a couple of psychopaths, a superdog, kidnapping, murder, paedophiles and dog fighting. My one complaint would be too much dwelling on what I will call ‘the carrot effect’, which is a tad hackneyed (you know what I mean Bob).
I’ll say no more about it other than that I read through it quite rapidly and simply enjoyed it. Maybe some would consider £6.99 for a 135 page book a bit steep, especially when we’re getting 3 for the price of 2 at Waterstones right now. But this is small press, so to be expected. Writing humour is a difficult thing, one of the most difficult, and I’ll venture that no one below the age of forty is capable of it. Bob Lock can make us laugh, and that’s a rare and precious thing.
Waterstones Chelmsford.
Art and Stuff
Last year, or early this year, I started an art competition, and there was a website (subminds) displayed down at the side of this blog where people could submit their pictures. Now I’m in the embarrassing position of having thrown a party no one came to. Well, I know for certain that at least one person sent something in so, if you could send me an email Vaude (I think you’ve got my eddress).
Moving on. Today, we’re heading into Chelmsford where I’ll be popping into Waterstones there to see if they would like me to sign some of their stock (they usually do). Prior to this, on my excellent new Samsung laser colour printer (more about that in the future) I printed up some of my bookmarks. However, it’s noticeable that none of them have the new Jon Sullivan covers on them. I considered sitting down and mucking about designing some more. However, now I’m thinking about doing another competition.
Anyway … another competition. If you fancy having a crack at designing some bookmarks based on the Jon Sullivan covers (obviously with my blog address on there too), please let me know in the comments section here. Prizes will be maybe signed copies, maybe a Jon Sullivan poster or two — I’ll decide if it turns out that this is a party people will turn up at.
Black Hole at Centre of Galaxy
I picked up on this quite some time ago but was again reminded of it by this article. It’s one of those cases where an SF writer got it right before the astrophysicists proved it. I’m guessing that some of you have read Larry Niven’s book? Remember why the Pierson’s Puppeteers were moving their entire solar system out of the galaxy?
I was sure I first read about it as a serious scientific theory about six years ago, and this National Geographic article seems to confirm that, whereas I’m fairly sure (correct me if I’m wrong) Niven was writing about this sort of stuff back in the early 70s. Quite likely he took the idea from some speculative articles knocking round at the time, but still…