Some Zomburbia and Zombified news

As a way to generate interest for Zombified, the second of my Zombie Apocalypse novels, my publisher, Kensington, have made the first book in the series, Zomburbia, a $2.99 purchase for all e-readers. That's one penny less than $3.00, which can't even buy you a latte, right? Unless my time in the land of overpriced coffee has skewed my perceptions. Anyway, here are all links to all the places where you might buy the e-book:

• Amazon
• Apple
• Barnes&Noble
• Google
• Kobo

It will be this price all through January, so you can pick up a (virtual) copy and be ready when the sequel, Zombified comes out later this month.

Speaking of Zombified, you may now pre-order it if you feel so inclined. The book will ship on January 27, and it's available from a number of online retailers.

• Amazon
• Barnes&Noble
• Books a Million

If you'd like to find a brick and mortar store in your area where you can order a copy, you can go to IndieBound and enter your zip code.

Speaking of brick and mortar stores, The Book Bin in Salem, Oregon, is currently taking pre-orders for Zombified. I'd encourage everyone in Salem to get one there. And if you'd like to order a signed copy, they're the folks to contact. I'll be happy to sign and personalize any of my books that you order through them. Here's their information:

The Book Bin

(503) 361-1235

It's probably best to call, but you may also contact them via email.

I also have an ARC of Zombified that I'm trying to figure out how to give away. I'll keep you all posted. 

I hope you're all having a good New Year so far, and I'll keep in touch!

Book talk: Distrust That Particular Flavor

Gibson reading at Powell's in 2010.
Photo by Adam Gallardo

In his last three novels, William Gibson has written about the everyday world as if it were science fiction. He exposes the strange incongruity of life in the early 21st century. He's always done this, he claims, he just used to say that his stories were set in the future. So it should come as no surprise that the essays collected in this book sometimes come off like SF vignettes.

Gibson claims to have no talent for non-fiction. His toolbox is that of the novelist he says, but it's that eye for narrative and telling detail that makes these pieces so readable. And so recognizable as Gibson's creations.

The pieces here are culled mainly from magazine articles and talks. Most deal with the author's vision of the future (as a SF writer he gets asked to talk about the future a lot), or with his somewhat uneasy relationship with technology. It's somewhat disconcerting to read about the man who coined the term "cyberspace" slowly coming to grips with the Internet via an addiction to ebay.

At all times, Gibson's humanity and sly sense of humor shines through in these essays, as when he describes Singapore in the essay "Disneyland with the Death Penalty."

"Singapore is a relentlessly G-rated experience, micromanaged by a state that has the look and feel of a very large corporation. If IBM had ever bothered to actually possess a physical country, that country might have had a lot in common with Singapore." (72)

Some of the stronger pieces in the book feature Gibson turning the novelist's observant eye inward. He writes with a sense of wistfulness about his own past and his development as both a reader and writer in essays like "Rocket Radio," "Since 1948" and "Time Machine Cuba."

If there's a complaint to be leveled here, it's that many of the essays are too short. Just as the reader begins to truly engage with a piece, it's over. But I don't know that being left with wanting more is necessarily a bad thing.

I'd definitely recommend this book to any fans of Gibson's fiction, but those unfamiliar with his work might find these nonfiction pieces the perfect gateway to his fictional worlds.

Guest Grok: Dana Haynes

I've known Dana Haynes since he was a wee reporter, toddling up to the Oregon State Capitol to grill some politician or other. And now he's all grown up and writing thrillers! He's an excellent and passionate writer  and a hell of a nice guy. Dana was nice enough to write the first ever guest post in a (I think) monthly series of same. I'll let Dana take it from here and come back at the end to wrap up.

Adam Gallardo asked me to be today’s designated hitter for this blog, and the timing was perfect. I’m working on a lecture for the Portland chapter of Sisters in Crime and this will give me an opportunity to mull some of the thoughts I want to share with the “Sissies” (as the members call themselves). 
First, some brief background. I am, by training, a journalist. Twenty years in Oregon newspaper newsrooms, split evenly between weeklies and dailies. I am very proud of this background. 


Second, I published three mystery novels from Bantam Books and Severn House in the 1980s and early 1990s, then experienced a … shall we say, “dry spell.” A really, really dry spell. I couldn’t get any traction on anything, either novels or screenplays, for close to 15 years. Then Minotaur, the mystery and thriller arm of St. Martin’s Press, picked up my novel “Crashers.” That was published in 2010. The sequel, “Breaking Point,” hit stands this month. Minotaur has asked for two more thrillers, the first due in early 2012. 


OK, that’s me. 


So: topic. 


Here’s one of the things I’m going to tell the Sissies: When thinking about the characters in a scene, remember that “important” is not the same as “essential.”


Always ask yourself: “who should be in this scene?” And keep in mind The Embassy Rule. 


Which is this: 


During most times, the most important person in a foreign embassy is the ambassador. The ambassador is charged with speaking for his or her country, and for the head of state. The ambassador reaches out to indigenous leaders. The ambassador paves the way for the business community back home, and for tourists. The ambassador serves as a mini head-of-state for a tiny, often walled-off bit of real estate that serves as a slim slice of his or her sovereign country. 


In your novel, your protagonist is your ambassador: the most important person, and the one who is charged with carrying the message (the story). 


But if there is a suspected bomb in an embassy, or if there is a maddened mob tearing at the gate, or if the military is about to knock down the walls, then the U.S. State Department can make the decision to evacuate all non-essential personnel. 


And that usually includes the ambassador. 


The ambassador is the most important person in an embassy but, in an emergency, also is a non-essential person. It’s not his or her job to defuse the military or the mob or the bomb. A chargé d’affaires might have that task, or a representative of the State Department, or a military expeditionary force, or the CIA. But not the ambassador. 


When writing your novel, there is a tendency to put your protagonist in ever scene. She is your most important person, right? But if you’ve written a scene and something seems wrong, or “fat” or somehow crowded, ask yourself: Do I need my protagonist in this scene? Could the scene move the plot forward, or serve to develop character, without her? 


If the answer is “yes,” get her out of there. 


Same for other characters. If you have a scene with five characters, ask yourself: Would it have worked with four? With three? 


If they don’t serve a person, think about nixing them. 


(This, obviously, assumes you write in the third-person and not in the first-person. If you do write first-person … well, you’re screwed, mate. We the readers cannot know anything your protagonist doesn’t know. And any scene in which she’s told about something that happened in her absence, that’s just crap writing. That’s telling-not-showing. David Mamet rightly reminds us that any time you write a scene in which Character A and Character B are talking about Character C, that’s bullshit. Rewrite it.) 


OK, that’s my thought for today. Thank you to Adam for this opportunity to test drive one of my themes for the Sisters in Crime speech. 


Cheers.


You should check out Dana's web site here, and then go here to look at and buy his books -- Crashers is now out in paperback and his new novel, Breaking Point is out in hard cover today!

Vintage print porn

Anyone who's visited this blog a time or two probably knows that I have a fetish fascination with the printing process. I found this video today on BoingBoing and my heart just melted. This is an old instructional film released by The Encyclopedia Britannica Films, Inc. It shows all the steps of book production in the pre-digital age. Great stuff. It makes me wish that my (theoretical) novel could be set in Linotype.

Neil Gaiman speaks wise words about Internet piracy

On even stranger tides...

Found today on BoingBoing is this interview with SF authors Tim Powers, James Blaylock and K. W. Jeter. These three wrote the earliest recognized Steampunk novels (Jeter coined the term),and all three were friends at Cal State Fulerton. Where they all met and befriended Philip K. Dick. Um, wow. In the interview, they talk about PKD and what led them to write those early Steampunk works, and what they think of the genre's current incarnation.

Leading the article, however, is the news that Powers sold one of his novels, On Stranger Tides, to Disney and that it serves as the basis for the newest Pirates of the Caribbean movie which I believe is titled, Pirates of the Caribbean: I Saw the First One and Sort of Liked It, But Didn't See Any of the Others. Awkward title. Having read and loved the source novel, I'm a bit horrified to see it Disney-fied, but I'm glad to see Powers earning a paycheck for his wonderful work. (Like Whitman, I contradict myself.) The best case scenario here is that people will seek out the original novel and be exposed to one of the best writers of SF out there.

And here are today's numbers.

Daily word count: 1,708 (1,323 novel, 385 story)

Monthly word count: 14,583 (13,061, 1,522 story)

Novel word count: 84,562

Writing watch, day 9

This image, which I like a lot and will try and incorporate into my working ethos, was found here.

And now, here is the usual blather about my writing:

I decided I needed another day to work on the rewrites for my short story. These rewrites are kicking my ass, quite frankly. My goal as a writer is to get to the point where every story is golden in the first draft. That's possible, right? Anywho, I told myself that if I was going to take a day to rework a story, then I had to double up on the my word goal for the novel. That makes sense, right?

I did it, believe it or not. It felt good. I wonder if I could do it every day. I suspect I could, but I think it would require abandoning my family and all worldly concerns such as eating and bathing. I doubt that it would be worth it.

Here are the numbers.

Daily word count: 2,065

Monthly word count: 10,613

Novel word count: 82,114

More inspiration coming soon

I read today on his blog that Warren Ellis is working on, as he calls it, "a short booklet about writing comics." This is exciting news. When Ellis writes about comics, I pay attention. I may not love every comic he does, but they are all worth looking at and dissecting. He seems to be one of the few people working in the field who really thinks about the medium. I think most people, myself included, operate from a sort of gut-level, but Ellis is a formalist. That's my take on it anyway.

The last book of his about comics that I read was 2001's Come In Alone which collected the columns he wrote for Comic Book Resources. I've read it several times and have been thinking recently that it's time to read it again. A new book on the subject from the same author makes me happy. Maybe I'll finally be able to figure out how these comics things work. Though that is asking a lot.

And, before I forget, here are today's numbers.

Words for the day: 1,249

Words for the month: 4,533

Also, I should note that I love writing scary, prophetic dream sequences. That is all.

All Hallow's Read

Writer Neil Gaiman is trying to start a new tradition that I really want to get behind: All Hallow's Read. The idea is a simple one, on Halloween, or during the week of Halloween, give someone a scary book. That's it. Any chance to give and receive books is okay by me. Here's a link to the All Hallow's Read FAQ.

This reminds me of some conversations I've had with my Gear School partner, Nuria Peris. Apparently in Barcelona, their version of Valentine's day, The Day of Saint George, is observed by men giving women flowers and women giving men books. As soon as I heard that, I started looking into how to move to Spain.

For a number of reasons, I'd love to see this tradition catch on. Chief among them is my love of books. And I have a vested interest in passing that love onto others. For instance, my son, and other future readers.

Okay, who has some good scary book recommendations?

William Gibson speaks clever

I found this this morning on BoingBoing.net, an interview with one of my favorite living writers, William Gibson. Hell, he may be my very favorite living writer. In this lengthy interview, he talks about his newest book, Zero History, the importance of objects in his fiction, and lots lots more. Anyone interested in SF specifically, or writing in general should read this one.

The Myspace comics book

Ganked from the Gear School blog:

I was just reminded that the tongue-breakingly titled, MySpace Dark Horse Presents Vol. 1 TPB, will be out on book store shelves later this month. September 24, the year of our Lord, 2008, to be exact. Included in it's many beautiful pages is an eight-page Gear School story. There are a slew of really nice comics collected here. If you like anthology titles like I do, you should be reserving this from your local retailer even as we speak.

Also, unrelated in every way from the main topic of this post: I wish that along with the buttons for managing comments, there was also an "immolate all spammers" button. I could really get behind that.

Neal Stephenson speaks clever

Not sure how many of you will care about this, but since this blog is really for me anyway...

This is a video of SF writer Neal Stephenson giving a talk last May at Gresham College in London. His subject is whether or not genre distinctions really matter anymore, or if the conventions of genre fiction have been embraced by the mainstream (or "mundane" as Stephenson calls it) and rendered the distinction mute. This is a subject near and dear to my heart and, while I find his delivery a bit plodding, to topic and ideas discussed are fantastic.

By the way, Stephenson's next novel, Anathem, will be out in September. It's already on my must-read list.

Bad business

This has been making the rounds on the Internet for the last couple of days, but I wanted to do my part to spread the word.

Turns out that a publisher in China has scraped the entire contents of a web site and published it in book form without securing any rights and without paying any royalties. The book, Colorful Illustrations 93˚C, sells for $100 and, apparently, those already selling the book refuse to pull it from the shelves. Darren Di Lieto has the full story on his website.

A lot of artists, including my friend, the talented Josh Ellingson, have been effected. Suing a publisher in China (where copyright law seems like only a vague notion) isn't really practical. Unfortunately, it seems like the best things to do is spread the word about the situation and NOT BUY THE BOOK. And, if you know anyone involved, to kick them in the junk.

"Self-involved" doesn't quite capture it all

I assume that the Internets are full of amateur etymologists.

I need a word that means "The act of an author compulsively checking the sales rankings of his works on Amazon.com."

Don't let me down my cyber brethren!

And just so you know, Star Wars is doing pretty well, Gear School not so much.

Merry Christmas to me!

Last night was the Fox Blue year-end dinner. We made out pretty well as far as bonuses go. Melissa told me that I should take a certain amount and do with it whatever I wanted. So today I went on line and ordered a crap-ton of books and one CD set from Amazon: Absolute Sandman volume 1 by Neil Gaiman; Thunderbolts by Warren Ellis; Scott Pilgrim volume 4 by Brain O'Malley; and "Orphans" from Tom Waits.

Honestly, if you were thinking about it, no one should get me anything for Christmas 'cause I just took care of it myself.

Oh, Lord, I think I want this, too...

This omnibus edition, The Dark Horse Heroes Omnibus, collects the ill-fated Comics Greatest World and Will to Power series. If you were into comics in the early '90s, you may remember these.

I was working at Dark Horse when these originally came out and I remember that quite a few of us were very excited by what these comics could have been. We apparently didn't understand either the comics market or what the company's strengths were. Not that I could have swayed any opinions if I'd had an inkling; I was a lowly production employee at the time.

There's a perverse part of me that wants this collection. I remember some of these books were cringe-worthy, but I also remember there were some truly inspired bits here. And the talent they got to work on these is pretty amazing: Doug Mahnke, Paul Chadwick, Eric Shanower and Adam Hughes to name a few.

I'm sure I will get this, and when I do, I hope it's more than just a curiosity piece.

I am so pre-ordering this

I'm having a hard time containing my excitement over this one:

Kick-ass astrophysicist and guest star on both The Simpsons and Futurama, Stephen Hawking has penned a novel along with his daughter, Lucy, and the French astrophysicist Christophe Galfard. The novel, George's Secret Key to the Universe, is the first in a planned trilogy. It's a sci-fi story that will explain astrophysics to kids, using a group of children as its main characters.

One hopes that this will sell as well as Hawking's previous book, A Brief History of Time, but that it will actually be read by those that buy it.

I ganked this from boingboing.net. Here's a link to the original article on the Cosmos Magazine site.

Crooked Little Vein

This is a nasty little book. Anyone who has read the comics of Warren Ellis will find themselves on familiar ground with this, his first prose novel. The story is simple enough: Mike McGill, our hero, must search through the sordid underbelly of America to find, well, a McGuffin, really. The true highlight of the book isn't the plot, it's watching Ellis debate with himself, using the voice of the book's main characters, about whether or not the future is headed toward hell in a handbasket. Ellis has interesting ideas about the future of our culture and watching that debate can be a heady experience.

Reading this novel brought home a point that I'd always suspected but never quite grasped before: like the best mystery writers, and despite the cynicism and bravado on display in his prose, Ellis is a Romantic. One can see evidence of this is his best comics series, Planetary, Transmetropolitan, et al.

If I have any complaints, it's that this very brief book is paced too quickly. Ellis is writing about the great expanse of America, but the pacing barely gives any sense of the country's size. And the pacing also makes the climax of the book slide by almost unrecognized. But this is a minor quibble and wouldn't keep me from recommending it. This book is not for the faint of heart, but for those who can stomach it, it is well worth the read.