Bluejo's Journal

9:54am: Thud: ILE
Words: 1226
Total words: 58600
Files: 3
Tea: Lady Grey, and then water with frozen lemon
Music: NMPA
RSI: feels absolutely fine. Time for some exercises then!
Reason for stopping: people waking up and wanting breakfast.

Getting on with it.

Boreal yesterday was even better. Boreal has a small English-language programme, which is sensible as it's essentially a Francophone convention. But because the English language programme is small and has a limited number of participants, the serendipitous potential for cross-fertilization of ideas from panel to panel and for the entire programme and associated corridor and bar conversations to become a continuing connected communication is high. This is lovely.

One of the things that came up yesterday which I thought I might noodle about a bit here was the idea of scaffolding. On the worldbuilding panel Karl was saying that the reader does lots of the work of worldbuilding, of putting the clues together, of having things in the head that the words evoke, the whole Delany purple-shadows thing. And I talked about the people on the Trollope list who didn't have SF reading protocols and wanted footnotes for everything like Carriage (1) horse-drawn conveyance. Then on the "why aren't we bestsellers" panel I mentioned that I write for people who have the SF reading protocols, and that if I were to write for a percieved mainstream-reading audience, I'd have to build more scaffolding to get them to the place where they could start doing their part of the work of building the story.

That scaffolding is mode-level stuff, for me. It's how much you explain and where you explain it, it's what you can take for granted, it's tiny stuff you do in among everything else. When it comes down to it, what you're really doing is telling a story, and there are expectations and artifices and givens that come just because of the conventions of it being a story. And how broad your strokes or how tiny your gestures, the level of strangeness of world and character and plot, all of that is determined to some degree by the fact of comprehensibility.

The reader is standing where they are standing, and they bring themselves to the text. And the writer is standing on the other side of a space. The text is leaning out into that space, like a bas relief. The reader, who they are, their life and experience and expectations, is leaning into the space from the other side. The story is the three dimensional space. If there isn't a reader, if it isn't comprehensible, then it isn't alive as a text. And other people write footnotes and apparatus everything to assist (or sometimes the opposite, see my rants about footnotes) the reader to stand in a good place to make the story come out of the text.

8:55am: Thud: ILE
Words: 1248
Total words: 57352
Files: 3
Tea: Jasmine
Music: NMPA
RSI: a bit dodgy
Reason for stopping: end of bit.

I'm sure I put a title on the post yesterday, but my hands were shaking, so who knows.

I'm so glad I'm grown up.

Probably won't get to write any more today as it is Boreal -- I had a great time last night on a panel about genre movements and then great conversation in the pub with Claude Lalumiere, James Morrow, Katherine Cramer, Michael Swanwick, rysmiel and grimmwire. But I came home fairly early so I could get up this morning to write. I'll be there most of today and tomorrow.

3:56pm: ETA "Thud: ILE"
Words: 1830
Total words: 55997
Files: 3
Tea: Spring tea
Music: There Double Concertos
RSI: feels fine, do exercises!
Reason for stopping: End of bit.

That was a very stressful bit. I'm having a cup of tea to calm down. It's a while since I've written something like that.

There's only one excuse for doing something this peculiar, and that's doing it really well.

9:16am: Thud: ILE
Words: 1718
Total words: 54157
Files: 3
Tea: Jasmine
Music: NMPA
RSI: feels fine. But do exercises!
Reason for stopping: next bit is a long bit, better to have a break and get to it later.

You know how some people say The Lathe of Heaven is like Philip Dick? Which Dick in particular would you compare it to?

2:12pm: Thud: ILE
Words: 1031
Total words: 52424
Files: 3
Tea: Pacific Sun
Music: Three Double Concertos
RSI: been better
Reason for stopping: end of bit.

If you were going to buy a Christmas present for a fifteen year old in 1979 and for some reason you had decided against a paperback SF novel, what else might you get them?

9:05am: Thud: ILE
Words: 1303
Total words: 51393
Files: 4
Tea: Jasmine
Music: NMPA
RSI: well, I had a 5000 word day yesterday and my hands know about it, despite lots of exercises and making shortbread
Reason for stopping: wanted to check some stuff before doing the next bit.

Still going well.

4:27pm: Thud: ILE
Words: 1643
Total Words: 50092
Files: 3
Tea: No tea.
Music: Three Double Concertos
RSI: feels fine. Probably should do exercises.
Reason for stopping: end of this next bit.

Still going well. I do like writing so much better than not-writing.

My character is Christmas shopping.

Does anyone remember when Thorntons started spreading to smaller places? I remember what a sudden revolutionary improvement they made to one's chocolate options when one lived in a small town, but I can't remember when exactly that was. Is it plausible there was one in Oswestry in 1979?

(Note for people who don't know, and don't know what Thorntons is -- it's a chain of small British chocolate shops, providing by my current standards pretty good toffee and fudge, acceptable ice-cream and OK chocolates, except for the Viennese truffles, which are world class. But in 1979, or 1981 or whenever it actually was, when your normal choice of chocolates was Dairy Milk or Black Magic, Thorntons was ambrosia.)

1:22pm: Thud: ILE
Words: 1131
Total words: 48338
Files: 3
Tea: Spring tea
Music: Three Double Concertos
RSI: Do exercises!
Reason for stopping: don't know what comes immediately next.

If you were going to buy an SF paperback for someone for Christmas in 1979, what would it have been?

9:28am: Thud: ILE
Words: 2190
Total words: 47130
Files: 3
Tea: Jasmine
Music: NMPA
RSI: Do Exercises!
Reason for stopping: end of bit.

Still going pretty well.

Farthing review. Actually, I haven't read The Plot Against America either.

3:33pm: Good News about Lifelode.
NESFA Press will be publishing my fantasy novel Lifelode next February when I am GoH at Boskone. It'll be a splendid hardback, like all their books, with a possible trade paper edition later if it seems like a good idea at the time. It'll be edited by Peter Olson.

Lifelode is a weird book. It's probably the most difficult book I've written, and it's certainly the thing that's been through the most versions. It's very peculiar, but I'm kind of fond of it, so I'm glad it's going to be out there where other people can read it.

What I was trying to do was write a small scale story about everyday life in a high magic medieval village. What actually happened was that Hanethe came back from the East and took over the plot, because she had the plot nature, and nobody else did. I certainly learned a lot writing it. Stories are journeys, are exploration. It's therefore really hard to write a story about staying still.

Things it's a bit like -- The Dubious Hills, Spindle's End, China Court. Things it's not much like -- most things labelled fantasy. It is undoubtedly fantasy though. Some people are going to love it and some people are going to hate it and copyediting it is going to be... challenging.

In further good news, NESFA, who rock more than a cavalry regiment on rocking horses, are also going to be doing a chapbook of my poetry, edited by the amazing Hugo Award winning gerisullivan.

8:22am: Thud: ILE
Words: 1572
Total words: 44938
Files: 3
Tea: Jasmine
Music: NMPA
RSI: actually my right index finger is a little grouchy. Do exercises!
Reason for stopping: that would be that bit.

Because of the journal format, the bits tend to be relatively short.

I'm pleased with that bit. Some of the stuff I was writing while I had the migraine and while I was getting migraine after-effects is going to need fixing, because it's a bit drifty, but this is right on track and what I want to be doing with this, which is a nice feeling.

Yesterday I took a risk (because it's not Victoria Day yet and we could still have frost) and planted some seeds in one of the boxes that had herbs in last year. I have planted a selection of blue seeds -- actually, the seeds weren't the least bit blue, but there you go. I have planted: blue flax, sweet peas, forget-me-nots, shepherd's scabiosa and baby blue eyes. I've kept the packets so I can have some idea of what things are when (if) they come up. I won't get any herbs yet, partly because of the frost risk and partly because it'll be a lot easier to do when janetmk is here. I need to get one more box, too, because last year's flower box fell off during a storm in February and broke.

Also yesterday was my lucky tisane day -- a packet of Twining's Raspberry and Rose teabags arrived from AM, and I went on a quest for more Taylors of Harrogate blackberry and elderflower. It was a quest, too, as I had to go right up to Ahuntsic to find some, venturing into parts of Montreal I'd never been before, on previously unexplored bus routes. It was great! I did the entire trip without using the metro at all. The sun shone, I only saw one remaining snowbank, and I managed to find not only Fouvrac's other location but my tea as well.

8:58am: Fast and Dirty Fantasy Names
I'm expanding this from a comment in naomikritzer's journal. I thought I'd put it over here so I could save a link to it so I wouldn't have to write it all out again next time I wanted it, because I'm pretty sure I've done this before but I couldn't find it.

You don't have to make up languages the way Tolkien did, you have to make up words and names and the illusion of languages. But those names and words have to be right, because names are threads in the tapestry, names need to work with the picture, or at least be neutral and not pull against it. Names are part of incluing.

If you make them all up, they sound bland and generic (or stupid) and it's hard to distinguish different cultures by naming.

In a book like Melusine or Fires of the Faithful where the author has done names by the Runcorn Method of taking them from real world maps, you get names that look like real names from different cultures, but you also pose the question of how they got them. The first time I read Melusine (before it was published) I came up with (and emailed to truepenny) a ton of different theories about how they got them. You do not usually want your reader to be solving non-mysteries instead of concentrating on the story.

There is a simple way of getting round this.

What you want is the random fantasy name generating program. You set it going and it generated fantasy names until you have ones you like. You can do it without the program (fortunately, because it doesn't run on modern computers) -- it's also how to fake a language.

First vowels -- eliminate one, and decide which of the others is the favourite.

Then consonants -- decide between:

B-V
V-W
W-R
M-N
B-M
C-K
C-G
C-S
S-Sh
Ch-Sh
TT-Th

When you've decided, write down the alphabet without the ones you don't want, with the favourite vowel twice and with "Ch" or "Sh" or "Th" if you want them. (If you chose to have two Ms and no B at all, that's fine, put two.) Then randomly (roll dice?) select consonants (no more than two together) and vowels, stopping when you have stuff that feels nice.

If you want, add "ia" or "land" to the end for country names.

Also, if you want to have two fantasy countries that are different from each other, make all the different choices for the other language. (Excluded vowel becomes favoured vowel, etc.) That way their names and words sound different from each other, even if the reader can't tell exactly how, but the patterns will be consistent for each one.

The Gonovians and the Camavese really will seem like different people.

( I had a real program that did this once, in Basic on the Amstrad )

3:30pm: Thud: ILE
Words: 1814
Total words: 43368
Files: 3
Tea: Long Jing
Music: Three double concertos
RSI: a bit hurty
Reason for stopping: end of book club bit.

This remains a very odd thing to be writing.

Farthing review.

Happy Birthday pegkerr!

3:57pm: Ha'Penny nominated for Sidewise Award!
The Sidewise Award is for best alternate history. I'm naturally delighted to be nominated -- and I'll be able to go to the ceremony too, because it's also at Denvention!

Here are all the nominees.

Best Short Form:

Elizabeth Bear, Les Innocents/Lumiere (in New Amsterdam, Subterranean Press)
Michael Flynn, Quaestiones Super Caelo Et Mundo (in Analog, 7/07)
Matthew Johnson, Public Safety (in Asimov’s, 3/07)
Jess Nevins, An Alternate History of Chinese Science Fiction (in No Fear of the Future, May 17, 2007)
Chris Roberson, Metal Dragon Year (in Interzone, 12/07)
Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Recovering Apollo 8 (in Asimov’s, 2/07)
John Scalzi, Missives from Possible Futures #1: Alternate History Search Results (in Subterranean Magazine, Winter 2007)

Best Long Form:

Michael Chabon, The Yiddish Policemen's Union (HarperCollins)
Robert Conroy, 1945: A Novel (Ballantine Books)
Mary Gentle, Ilario (The Lion's Eye and The Stone Golem) (Eos)
Jay Lake, Mainspring (Tor Books)
Sophia McDougall, Rome Burning (Orion)
Jo Walton, Ha'penny (Tor Books)

12:48pm: Jo's Ridiculously Successful Cakes with jam in
We dithered for a while about what to call these. Cookery Year, where I got the original recipe, calls them "raspberry buns", which they would be, if made with raspberry jam. The first batch I made with Saskatoon jam, so we wondered about calling them "Sirens" after "The sweet siren song of Saskatoon". But since then I've been making them with redcurrant jam.

What they really are is ridiculously successful. Everyone loves them. They disappear in no time.

( recipe )

8:55am: Scalzi meme: Amazon 1 star reviews
I'm pretty sure I've linked to some of these before.

The weird thing is, that only two of my books have got any 1 star reviews, but they've both got loads. I wonder why this is? Oh well, here you go.

( Five people truly hate The King's Peace )
( Three people totally fail to get Farthing )

3:03pm: Japanese Garden, Jardin Botanique, 24th April 2008
Spring is a blossom
on a bare branch, a willow
beaming in new green.

Insistent flowers,
spring out, gold, purple, white, blue,
where the snow lay thick.

Oh, Magnolia!
I saw you from far off and
rushed to smell your blooms

(To say nothing of
the patterns white buds make of
bare branch and blue sky.)

(People waste money
on drugs when they could in-
-hale magnolia?)

Warm enough to sit
writing poems in shirtsleeves:
snow left under firs.

"Speedwell, should they let
you be bluer than Spring skies?"
"Well, they let you, Jo."

12:07pm: ( Those Who Favor Fire 3 )

12:06pm: ( Those Who Favor Fire 2 )

11:59am: Technopeasant Contribution: Those Who Favor Fire 1
This is the sequel to Tooth and Claw, I'm going to be posting the first three chapters which is pretty much all there is of it.

( Those Who Favor Fire, Chapter 1 )

11:47am: International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day
It's Shakespeare's Birthday, it's St Jordi's Day, and it's the Second Annual International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day, when we give things away for free online just because we want to.

If people want to post links as comments, that'll be a list, and I'll add some links here.

Hanne Blank Sympathy

Marie Brennan Silence, Before the Horn

Stephanie Burgis Foxwoman

Charles Butler Timon's Tide, Chapter 1 and Dragon

Pamela Dean This Green Plot, Chapter 1

Keith diCandido Crime of Passion

Debra Doyle Mageworlds story: A Death in the Working

Marissa Lingen Goats' Gold

Sarah Monette Sundered

Robert Reed (My favourite working short story writer): Hidden paradise and Man for the Job

Michelle Sagara First first chapter of The Broken Crown

Brandon Sanderson Centrifugal

Ryk E. Spoor "Trial Run" 1 and 2

Sonya Taafe Drink Down

Jo Walton "Those Who Favor Fire" 1, 2, 3

Lawrence Watt Evans Fragments

8:26am: Thud: ILE
Words: 923
Total words: 41554
Files: 2
Tea: Jasmine
Music: NMPA
RSI: I swear, typing "rsi" here reminds me to do my exercises. It really helps. OK.
Reason for stopping: That's the magic bit fixed, and the librarian bit done. Next is the book club bit.

In other news, Z and his girlfriend and I saw a marmot on Sunday afternoon, in the little park at the top of the ravine. I recognised it as a marmot, after thinking it was a funny looking cat or a big squirrel, from the picture of a marmot in urielyr's animal picture book. Z's girlfriend, who is a local, had never seen one before and thought it might be a kind of dry beaver. It ran from us, and hid in a burrow, where we could see it peeking out. It then climbed out of the burrow and ambled slowly off through the trees. I confirmed what it was with a google image search when we got home.

And this year's Farthing Party is happening Labor Day weekend. If you want information about it, if you want to come (if you're reading this, you're welcome), join the farthingparty community. It's a sort of mini-convention, with just program and hanging out.

11:12am: IPSTD
Do we want to do International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day this year?

I can see good arguments both ways.

On the one hand, it was a specific response to provocation, which hasn't been repeated.

On the other hand, it was kind of fun, and could become an annual carnival.

I'm not sure. Thoughts?

10:55am: Thud: ILE
Words: 966
Total words: 40622
Files: 2
Tea: Spring tea
Music: Brandenburg Concertos
RSI: Do exercises! Seems fine, though.
Reason for stopping: breakfast.

"Her passport shows a face from
Another time and place:
She looks nothing like that.
And all of the remnants of her reasoned past
Are scattered on the wild wind."

Bob Dylan, Black Diamond Bay

I have a box containing 162 notebooks I wrote between 1978 and 1988. I haven't looked at them for a long time. I got them out to check the thing I used to write on the inside cover. It was my name and the date, and then "Very Private. This is not a vocab. book!" "Very Private". You couldn't make it up.

Looking at them now, I'm surprised at how much of all of them is first drafts of stories. I'd have said I wrote three or four "novels" before I was twenty-one, but those are just the ones I remembered. In fact I wrote parts of dozens. Lots of what isn't writing is meta-writing, just like this in fact, talking about writing. This is when I was making up my vocabulary for talking (to myself!) about writing. But I only had a notebook -- I'd stop a story in breathless mid-gallop for a page and a half about technique, or about what was going to happen later, or a comment on the characters. I hadn't invented the plan file. I hadn't invented files. I didn't even have a typewriter yet, but my method is still recognisably my method.

The stories are incredibly bad. I didn't know how to do anything. They don't even have paragraphs. But there the stories were turning up in my head and flowing out of my fingers. There are characters and settings I'd completely forgotten. They're total crap, but I was passionate about them in exactly the same way I still get.

As well as the stories and meta-writing, there are awful poems. Words can not describe how awful they are.

And there's the angsty bit -- diary, essentially, writing to myself about myself. There's less of that than I remember. Maybe I got to doing more of it later when I'd be writing rough drafts somewhere else. I haven't looked at any later ones. But what's weird is reading it in the context of everything else -- I mean there I was in the children's home writing that nobody loves me and life sucks but Heinlein is EPIC, all in caps, and on the next page there's this story about people finding magical paths, and a note about it, and the word "incluing". "I have got to get better at incluing! Is this working? What if I introduce M in Chap 2?"

It wasn't working. I had to get better at incluing, and other things too. But I was right to keep putting the effort in.

3:15pm: Meta-logrolling post, because the thought of this amuses me
Hey guys, if you hate people asking you to nominate or vote for their book, go and vote in this poll!