With the new Nebula Awards rules in place, nominating season is upon us. I thought I'd mention my works this year, highlighting my own favorites, for those interested in considering them. My favorite picks are in bold.

2009 Published Science Fiction:

* "On the Human Plan"; Lone Star Stories; February, 2009 [short story]
* "Rolling Steel: A Pre-Apocalyptic Love Story" (with Shannon Page); Clarkesworld; April, 2009 [short story]
* "To Raise a Mutiny Betwixt Yourselves"; The New Space Opera 2, ed. Gardner Dozois and Jonathan Strahan, Eos, April, 2009 [novelette] [in Sunspin continuity</em>]
"Leopard"; Jim Baen's Universe, June, 2009 [short story]
"Black Heart, White Mourning"; Grant's Pass, ed. Jennifer Brozek and Amanda Pillar, Morrigan Books; August, 2009 [short story]
* "Chain of Stars"; Subterranean, October, 2009 - [novella] [In Mainspring continuity]
"Last Drink Bird Head"; Last Drink Bird Head, ed. Jeff vanderMeer; Ministry of Whimsy Press, October, 2009 [flash]
* Death of a Starship; MonkeyBrain Books, November, 2009 [novel]

2009 Forthcoming Science Fiction:

"Bringing the Future Home"; Global Warming Aftermaths, ed. Eric T. Reynolds, Hadley Rille Books; Fall, 2009 [short story]
"Looking for Truth in a Wild Blue Yonder" (with Ken Scholes); Tor.com, Fall, 2009 [short story]
"The Starship Mechanic" (with Ken Scholes); Tor.com, Fall, 2009 [short story]

2009 Published Fantasy:

* "Golden Pepper"; Flash Fiction Online; February, 2009 [flash]
"The True Secret of Magic", as Joe Edwards; Crime Spells, ed. Martin H. Greenberg and Loren Coleman, DAW; February, 2009 [short story]
"Witness to the Fall"; Crime Spells, ed. Martin H. Greenberg and Loren Coleman, DAW; February, 2009 [short story]
"To Stone" (with Shannon Page); Morrigan eZine, May, 2009 [short story]
* Green; Tor Books, June, 2009 [novel]
"People of Leaf and Branch"; Fantasy; June, 2009 [short story] [in Green continuity]
"Tale of the Poet and the Dog"; Japanese Dreams, ed. Sean Wallace, Prime Books; Summer, 2009 [short story]
"An Elderly Pirate Recalls the Death of Love"; Electric Velocipede Issue 17/18 [short story]
* "Red Dirt Kingdoms"; Realms of Fantasy, October, 2009 [short story]
Madness of Flowers; Night Shade Books, November, 2009 [novel]

2009 Forthcoming Fantasy:

"Bone Island" (with Shannon Page); Interzone, Fall, 2009 [novelette]
"In the Emperor's Garden" (with Shannon Page); Fantasy, Fall, 2009 [short story]
"The Passion of Mother Vajpai" (with Shannon Page); Subterranean, Fall, 2009 [novelette] [in GREEN continuity]
"Shedding Skin; Or How the World Came to Be"; Shimmer (Clockwork Jungle Issue), Fall, 2009 [short story]

OK, Dreamwidth polls don't transfer over here. Le sigh.

Feel free to vote twice.

( Hiding inside )

Feel free to give additional answers in comments. Or complain. Or suggest new queries.

( a poll, a poll, my kingdom for a poll )

I've posted it in the next entry.

OP announces Axis Leader has ragequit WWII in anger at Allied Forces tankspam.

OP holds hand up to forehead making capital L sign. Childish taunting.

calendula_witch had her friend Notorious G, and NG's swain, over for lunch today, in connection with orientation on care and feeding of the extensive Witchnest orchid collection whilst she is up in Oregon for my surgery and recovery. I volunteered to cook. Apparently, madness descended, because I seemed to think that everybody needed about 7,000 calories for lunch.

I made lasagna, for some value of the term "lasagna". This originated with a meal I had somewhere in my recent travels (possibly in San Jose) where I was served a deconstructed lasagna. Ie, big flat pasta in layers with sauce and whatnot, but simply built loose upon the plate rather than laid down in a pan and baked. This seemed kind of neat, so I went for it, using no particular recipe but random inspiration.

My sins:

Chopped and lightly sauteed in butter an entire head of garlic, which I mixed with about a tablespoon of finely chopped fresh oregano, then with a stick of butter to make garlic butter for the baguette and pugliese I bought fresh this morning.

Made a salad of arugula, mixed greens, onions, tomatoes, cheese, and chow mein noodles. (This was not particularly heinous, but did serve as a grace note of plausible deniability for the nutritional blast crater that was the lasagna.)

Chopped and lightly sauteed in butter another entire head of garlic, which I split into two portions. Cooked down a pound of sliced cremini mushrooms in butter. Lightly sauteed in olive oil a red bell pepper and half a purple onion. Combined all of the above in a plain storebought red sauce base with the garlic set aside from before, along with about four tablespoons of minced cilantro and two tablespoons of finely chopped fresh oregano. Let that sit and steep for a few hours.

Meanwhile, I sauteed in olive oil eight green onions chopped down, and four serranos. I melted a pound and a half of fontina cheese in heavy cream, added the onions and serranos, the balance of my garlic, a quarter cup of green olives sliced in half, a tablespoon of truffle oil, heavy black pepper and moderate paprika.

Also for giggles I pan fried a pound of chopped prosciutto.

I then boiled a large pack of lasagna noodles, laid them down flat on four plates, spooned out a generous helping of red sauce, a couple of tablespoons of ricotta, and a portion of the prosciutto. Another layer of noodles, a generous portion of white sauce, more ricotta, and more prosciutto. Another layer of noodles, an artistic mix of red and white sauces, then topped with grated parmesan.

Served hot with garlic bread from the oven and the salad on the side. I'm not sure why all four of us didn't wind up in the cardiac ward, but zomg was it good. Deeply heinous, but stupid tasty. Pretty sure I should be banned from kitchens for life, or at least for a while.

But I ain't sorry. Nuh uh.

The baseball season is over, but baseball stories are all year round. Especially when it's Dock Ellis talking about his no-hitter on acid.

I had a great time getting out of the house where I've been semi-quarantined this past week. In light of petrea_mitchell's concerns, I should point out that it has been at least seven days since my first symptoms and more than two days after I stopped running a fever, so I felt fairly confident that I'm no longer contagious. I will probably be coughing for weeks, given how colds and the like take up residence in my lungs and induce chronic bronchitis.

Anyway, I was happy to get up to the City, meeting friends for dinner before the SF in SF reading (and having a good, filling, and remarkably affordable meal at Henry's Hunan), the reading itself, and then going on to the Marriott for after-meeting drinks in The View. I hadn't been in the Marriott for several years -- they've remodeled the lobby and got rid of the water sculpture that I'd always thought of the lobby's centerpiece. (If we'd actually been able to hold a Worldcon there, I anticipated lots of people saying, "Meet me at the water sculpture" before heading out to dinner.) Drinks in The View are overpriced, of course ($6 for a small glass of Diet Pepsi), but you're paying for the view.

Enjoying the conversations so much, I nearly missed the fact that it was past 11:30 and those of us with BART trains to catch needed to get a move on. I caught the 11:49 out of Powell Street, which is cutting it closer than I would have liked, although I think there's at least two more trains after that at that hour from that station that could still get me back to Fremont. As it was, I didn't get to bed until around 1:30 or closer to 2, and I was in no hurry to get up today. Indeed, I'd easily have slept all day, except I do have a few errands that need doing this weekend -- some grocery shopping, and also I need to go get the oil changed in my van. I should have done it last week, but I was obviously limiting my public exposure. (And you hardly need an oil change if the vehicle isn't turning a wheel.)

Plea to couch-surf with random Bostonian for upcoming American holiday about Giving Thanks.

OP whistles innocently, gives puppy-dog eyes

NaNoWriMo par: 1,667 words/day
NaNoWriMo total: 25,000 words
Personal par: 2,000 words/day
Personal total: 33,612 words

This was another tough morning of writing. It started out slowly and I struggled through the scenes, but I knew where they were going better than yesterday and ultimately I think it will turn out good. So despite struggling, I feel pretty good about things. The characters continue to come alive an new facets of them are surprising me from time-to-time. We still have friends in town and I slept in a little late (like last Sunday), but I wrote from 7:30 to 9:30 this morning and managed to knock of 2,062 words during that time.

NaNoWriMo is 30 days long and that means that after 15 days, I have made it halfway through the challenge. Par at this point is 25,000 words. When I finished today, I had 33,612 words. That's 8,612 words ahead of par, and puts me more than 5 days ahead of schedule. I could write nothing for 5 days and still be on track to hit 50,000 words by November 30. Of course, I plan to continue at my present pace, which would put me at 50,000 words on November 23, a week from Monday. It would put me at 67,224 words by November 30 which is 3/4ths of the way done with the entire 90,000 word novel.

Despite some struggles over the last couple of days, I am happy with my overall progress. I know that there are plenty of improvements to be made, continuity issues to fix, characters problems to hash out, but that can all be worked out in the second draft. For now, my goal is to complete the challenge and then the novel, and at the halfway point, things are looking really good

Yesterday was pleasantly uneventful. Weather almost springlike, so I got out a bit on my walker. Went to a nice Indian restaurant for lunch, the New Krishna.

I read a couple more chapters to Gay and Judith, and then they went off in search of a ready-broiled chicken for dinner. None to be had, so they got a raw one and handed it to me.

Not much work at all. I did it country French style, slathering it in butter and then squeezing lemon juice all over it. Put it in the oven and then Judith did the rest of the work while I rested.

My energy level seems to hit a maximum around midday, and then I wear out slowly until after dinner about all I can do is sit in the recliner and enjoy painkillers and television -- a nice anachronism last night, a Jack Benny TV show.

I lie awake until one or two in the morning, and then sleep till about seven. (I tried sleeping pills in the hospital, and they just make me groggy.) I'll probably straighten out once I can get more exercise. Right now I do a set of simple PT moves, about 10-15 minutes, that hits me like running a mile used to.

Give it time, I know. But time is all we have.

Joe

Yesterday was a good day. calendula_witch and I got in a terrific walk up some mondo hills, spent some good quality couple time together, both got writing and reading done, then eventually went out. Our itinerary included Good Vibrations, Borderlands Books, Tacqueria Cancun (one of my favorite Mexican restaurants on the West Coast), and of course, The Make-Out Room for Writers With Drinks. Borderlands Books produced some unexpected bonus in running into Greg and Astrid Bear. I also got a phone call on the store phone, from sdn, which was surprising but fun.

We ran into Kat Richardson on the sidewalk, who was killing time before reading at Writers With Drinks, so we pulled her along. Once there we met up with maryrobinette (another reader) and Mr. maryrobinette, along with two friends of calendula_witch's. Afterwards, out with the WWD crew for crepes and fries at Frjtz. Whoever thought of putting truffle oil on french fries ought to be sanctified.

After WWD, we wound up talking to blakecharlton and therinth quite a bit. Blake's a medical student with both a personal and professional interest in cancer, Erin is a nurse. They had a lot to say, especially Blake, which was very helpful to me in my ongoing process of sorting my perspectives on my cancer, its recurrence, and my fears both rational and irrational. One thing Blake talked about was the survivorship community. The point he made, in reference to a close family member who'd survived a very bad experience with cancer (much worse than mine looks to be, frankly), was that there were conversations that Blake could not have with his loved one. There's a shared experience and an emotional vernacular which cancer survivors only find in other cancer survivors.

This of course made all kinds of sense. You see the same phenomenon in veterans, law enforcement, survivors of a disaster, or people who've shared any complex, high stress experience.

Which made me realize that one reason I'd written "The Specific Gravity of Grief" was to try to frame that cancer experience, that cancer mindset, for people who haven't taken that particular journey. To some degree, it's why I blog so extensively and thoroughly about my cancer journey, but the story (just finished, now in revision, due out from Fairwood Press next year) is a way of communicating the essentially incommunicable. Or so I hope.

A lot of streams crossed last night, and it wasn't dangerous so much as enlightening. It reminded me that while I stumble a lot, I also continue to progress. Sometimes I remember to be proud of myself, and the people around me.

Your Sunday moment of zen.



Flower along Williams Lake trail, about 11,000 feet, Taos Ski Valley, NM. © 2006, 2009 Joseph E. Lake, Jr.



This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

jaborwhalky with Jay Lake Dorito noodle doom mac and cheese — A recipe in honor of my cancers.

Charles A. Tan with a takedown of International Science Fiction Reshelving day — What he said. (Via Andrew Wheeler.)

Superconductors to Wire a Smarter Grid — More than you probably wanted to know about the US power infrastructure. Still, cool stuff.

Bad Science on the Iraqi bomb detection wands — This is as insane, and in its way deadly, as Thabo Mbeki's AIDS denialism. US conservatism have their global warming denial and evolution psychoses, liberals have their antivaxers, but it's nice to know that antiscience lunacy is not just for Americans.

China's fear of a black president

?otD: Which way to Pismo Beach?

---

11/15/2009
Body movement: Not yet, but upcoming 60 minute urban walk (San Francisco hills!)
Hours slept: 5.75
This morning's weigh-in: 236.5 (!?)
Currently reading: Finch by Jeff VanderMeer

 

[Via Percy Trout] 

Blinded by the light,

This is dF

http://www.cartoonlabs.com/comics/index.php?date=2009-11-15&show=sinfest

Sinfest
Tatsuya Ishida

Spotted outside the village supermarket, recently.



Don’t blink,

This is dF

Anyone know how to reach Shelby Vick? And what to do as far as letting Yahoo.com know that his e-mail account has been hacked? Someone's trying to run the Spanish Prisoner scam, claiming he's stranded in the UK without a phone and needs money. Which is absurd, because there's any number of Brits he'd contact if it were real...

Here's the text of what I received.

Hope you get this on time ? Sorry I didn't inform you about my trip UK for a program and am having some difficulties here because i misplaced my wallet on my way to the hotel where my money and other valuable things were.. presently my passport and my things are been held down by the hotel management pending when i make payment.

I will like you to assist me with a loan of $1,500 Dollars to sort-out my hotel bills and to get myself back home. I will appreciate whatever you can afford to assist me with, I'll Refund the money back to you as soon as i return, let me know if you can be of any help? ASAP.
I don't have a phone where i can be reached.
please let me know immediately

Soup weather has arrived here in SoCal (yes, yes, you Canuckers can laugh your frozen asses off at me). We had a roast chicken carcass to dispose of, so Himself made chicken stock and then tossed in a bean mix, some Mexican noodles and veggies.

Dinner for the week.

Now I want to unearth the crockpot.

• 07:36 reading and critting, with coffee. and a rose. #
• 07:38 @ragnarwalton dude. thank you. you dind't have to; I was just joking about christmas, as I am wont to do. but greaty pleased. #
• 07:38 @ragnarwalton also, great way to keep me stuck in my room and away from your tv :) #
• 10:55 please retweet: Send a coathanger to pro-choice Dems who voted for #Stupak Amendment: www.sendacoathanger.com #

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