1. Send “short” bios to anthology editor, as soon as clarity is achieved on what “short” means in this case.
2. Turn in novel proposals (3) to Madame the Editor — April 23
3. Close SRM books for FY 2011 and Forever (due at accountant April 25)
4. Clean office, includes moving 2011 files to basement and opening 2012 files
5. ConQuesT — May 25-27
6. Word lists first two books — June 10 (approx)
7. Interview at WERU Writers Forum with Joan Clemens & Ellie O’Leary, June 14, 10 a.m.
8. Turn in short story to Baen — July 1
9. Turn in Trade Secret — July 15
10. Compile short stories into collections, and write forwards for each volume — due May 15, and August 15, 2013, but sooner is prolly better, just to get them off the desk.
11. Prep and write Carousel Tides sequels due early and mid 2013
12. Figure out the Liaden audible lexicon
13. Feasibility study: remodel bathroom
14. Pie in the Sky: Vacation — Septemberish

No sooner on the list, than off again: Read galleys for “Skyblaze” to appear in Fantastic Stories of the Imagination; email correx to editor

Things to be done in-between the things to be done:
1. Autograph 1,000 pages
2. Proofread galleys: Ghost Ship and Dragon Ship
3. Write new stories for Splinter Universe

When last we saw our plucky heroine, she had sworn a return to the discussion of compiling a Weird Word List, RSN.

Since swearing that awful vow, she has, with her husband-coauthor gone to the Rockland Public Library, where they talked about subjects Divers and Various to a small, but appreciative audience.

She then returned home and commenced in with her bit of Dragon Ship revisions.  This entailed a good deal of picking out of stitches, setting new stitches, bringing Stuff up, deleting other stuff, rewriting a couple scenes from a different POV  — in general, all possible, needful work, but fiddly and time-consuming.

The revisions were emailed back to Madame the Editor early this afternoon, just in time for the galleys for a short story which is part of an upcoming anthology to arrive, the editor citing a short turnaround.  Steve’s reading those now; I’ll make my pass tomorrow morning, over — all together now! — coffee!  Sadly, but in all likelihood, my third or fourth cup of coffee.

Steve and I are determined to watch a movie tonight; we have Hugo in from Netflix.  Tomorrow, after my pass over the story, I must and shall begin the end of year/end of game bookkeeping for SRM Publisher.

I will also, honest, contrive to get back to the word list, ’cause that deadline’s not getting any longer.  Funny how they never do.

Also on the table for blog discussion is a request to describe how I learned to write in a particular voice, and! another post about Voice, and how Science Fiction isn’t only Stories of the Far Future, and why extrapolating from our own world into the future is a mug’s game, anyway.

So!  Lots to look forward to, but right now?

I am going to watch that movie.

 

Sylvester / OR, The Wicked Uncle, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Death and Resurrection, R. A. MacAvoy
The Unknown Ajax, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Black Sheep, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Stealing the Elf-King’s Roses, Diane Duane (e)
The Reluctant Widow, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Friday’s Child, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Dragon Ship manuscript, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (e)
Kim, Rudyard Kipling (e)
Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Pollyanna, Eleanor H. Porter (e)
Chimera, Rob Thurman (e)

Apologies…today became disorderly, and I did not get back to the discussion of harvesting Weird Words.  I thought I might make it back this evening, but some paperwork has landed, and it needs to be dealt with, um, now; and I still need to sort out our readings and anchor lines for the talk at Rockland Library tomorrow evening, so!  Discussion resumes Friday.

I am bummed — rather ridiculously so — to find that I have missed seeing “John Carter” on the big screen. *saves it on Netflix*

Socks continues to accommodate the household.  He has a quiet and unassuming disposition, and what’s looking like a whim of steel.  Mozart objects to his presence, periodically, by growling, and occasionally bopping him on the head.  This morning, in fact, Mozart was on the co-pilot’s chair, and Socks entered the room, strolling up to the chair to see what was doin’.  Mo growled and bopped.  Socks retreated exactly two cat steps, sat down on the rug facing Mozart, closed his eyes, and continued to sit there — just drowsing, you know, and Completely Unconcerned™ —  until it was time for us all to troop down the hall in search of caffeine and multigrain bagels.

Overall, the occasions of bopping and hissing are very low.  I’m thinking that the half-house refurb  in November gave Scrabble and Mozart a new benchmark:  “How bad is it?”  “Well, they haven’t torn up the floor yet.”

I have, for those who may be interested. uploaded eBook editions of  my mysteries, Barnburner and Gunshy to the Kindle Store and the Nook Store (the Smashwords editions are going to be a loooong time coming, I fear).  As of this writing, both books are available in the Kindle Store; they’re still “processing” at BN.

And now?  Paperwork calls.

 

1.  Prepare for talk at Rockland Library
2.  Talk at Rockland, Maine Public Library — April 5 (6:30 p.m.)
3.  Clean office, includes moving 2011 files to basement and opening 2012 files
4.  Dragon Ship revisions due at Baen — April 15
5.  Turn in novel proposals (3) to Madame the Editor — April 23
6.  Close SRM books for FY 2011 and Forever (due at accountant April 25)
7.  ConQuesT — May 25-27
8.  Word lists first two books — June 10 (approx)
9.  Interview at WERU Writers Forum with Joan Clemens & Ellie O’Leary, June 14, 10 a.m.
10.  Turn in short story to Baen — July 1
11.  Turn in Trade Secret — July 15
12.  Figure out the Liaden audible lexicon
13.  Feasibility study:  remodel bathroom
14. Pie in the Sky: Vacation — Septemberish

Note:  The above list does not include incoming tasks that will have to be adjusted for when they manifest, such as signing tip-in sheets or reading galleys.  Also not included, compiling stories for submission for short story collections; prep time, plotting, and writing of “Carousel” books under contract. Or going to see “John Carter.”  Have I mentioned that I really, really want to see “John Carter?”

I’ve been thinking about the various suggestions on how to manage this project, and I want to thank everyone who participated in the discussion.  My thoughts follow.

1.  What I really, truly need a is a list of Weird Words (including all “foreign” words, be they Liaden, Terran, Delgadan, Vandese, or etc.), and  Names (including ship names, planet names, city names) for each book.  One book = One list.  It does, after thought, seem best that the WW and Names be combined into one, very long list.

2.  Ideally, the words should be in the order they appear in the book in question — which was the idea behind the page numbers.

3. We do have to work within the constraints of my abilities.  I am not a database whiz — not even close. I can keep the dern things, but multi-level/multi-directional sorts are beyond my skill level.  Telling me that database wrangling is simple has in the past produced. . .no discernible improvement in my ability to do advanced sorts of any kind.  In fact, my ability to deal actually plummets.

3A.  The commodity I’m very short on for the foreseeable future is time.  I cannot myself accept bits of databases to chain onto a master database or anything of that sort.  Even if it *is* dead easy (which, believe me, it’s not), it will still take time.  This project has a deadline associated with it; I’m not entirely sure when, but I don’t think it impossible that the lists for at least the first two books would be needed by early June.

4.  It seems to me that, if the word harvesting process is completely automated, someone is going to have to check the lists against the books anyway, to make sure the automagic didn’t miss something. (Why, yes, I have had programs fail me. Why do you ask?)  That said, it seems like it would be very useful to run a script as a check, in case the humans missed something.

5.  In terms of volunteers, I think we’re going to need:

*At least one Word Wrangler for each book, to receive the information from volunteers, or to tend the database/wiki, check the list against a software-produced list (if any), and to compile the final list that will be forwarded to me

*At least two Word Harvesters for each book, who will compile the words and the page numbers and either forward them to the Wrangler, or enter them in a database/wiki/form

*An Automagician to automagically generate a list from each book to be checked against the list produced by the Word Harvesters.  This is a luxury.

Note:  I don’t really care about the process used to produce the lists.  All I really care about is having accurate lists.  That means that if three or four folks want to pool resources as the Gathering Team on Book A, I don’t care how they bag the words, only that all the words are bagged, and that I receive them in a simple, and understandable, format.

Does all of the above make sense (or is, at least, clear; I don’t actually expect anybody to enter into the Database-Free Zone that is my brain)?

Discussion open until tomorrow, Wednesday, mid-morning.

Thanks!

 

. . .pictured here in my Mozart’s rocking chair, since Mozart is holding down the co-pilot’s chair. . .

Ahem.

Well, since Locus has sort of broken the news, though they got the author wrong and published it in…a rather peculiar place, I guess that It Can Now Be Told.

Sharon Lee has, through agent Jennifer Jackson, sold
two sequels to Carousel Tides to Toni Weisskopf at Baen.
The manuscripts are due in 2013

Let’s see, what else? Um…

Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, have, through agent Jennifer Jackson, sold two short story collections to Toni Weisskopf at Baen.  The collections, as yet untitled, will include all of the Adventures in the Liaden Universe® stories through Skyblaze (Number 17).  No publication dates as yet.

And!

Ghost Ship is Number One in the
SFSite’s Readers’ Choice Best Book of 2011!

Ahem.  If you missed Ghost Ship, Don Blyly at Uncle Hugo’s SF Bookstore in Minneapolis, still has 50 autographed hard cover editions in hand (as of this writing, the hardcover run has otherwise sold out).  Here’s a link to the Lee and Miller catalog page.

ALSO, if you want a signed copy of Dragon Ship, the sequel to Ghost Ship, coming out in September, you can pre-order from the same page.

Oh!  There’s a nice reader review of Agent of Change here — useful for those of you who have been trying to get friends hooked to try the Liaden Universe®.

If you’re close to Maine, Lee and Miller will be speaking at the Rockland Public Library on April 5 (that’s Thursday!) from 6:30 p.m.  Our topic will be Where Authors Get Their Ideas, with illustrative readings from their published work.

If you’re thirsty, remember Fanboy Glass for Tree-and-Dragon wine glasses, beer mugs, and stout glasses.  Note:  Fanboy Glass ships to the US and Canada only.

…I think that’s all the news that’s fit to print.  Onward!  to, err, more coffee.

Quick catch-up post, here.

When last we saw our intrepid protagonists, they had just turned the sixteenth novel in the Liaden Universe®, their nineteenth collaborative novel, and her twenty-second (or her twelfth-and-a-half) to Madame the Editor at Baen.

This would have been 10 p.m.-ish on Friday, March 30.

Saturday morning we slept in, then headed south in a leisurely frame of mind.  We stopped in South Portland for a couple hours so Steve could research guitars at The Guitar Center, then continued on to beautiful Wallingford, Connecticut, where we checked into our reserved room, and went in search of dinner.

Now, a couple of neat things.  First, as we were leaving the hotel, we noticed in the parking lot an SUV with Maine tags MUSIKL.  This?  Is a truck that we often see in and around the big city of Waterville, and it was nice to know that we were in the company of a neighbor, sorta.

Next, we headed to town center, in search of dinner.  Our first choice, from the list provided by the hotel, had a line.  A Really. Long. Line.  We moved on, turning down in quick succession Sonic, Applegeeks, Chilis — and Steve said, “Here.  Neptune Diner. Baking done on premises.”

And I geeked out, because we were in Wallingford to pick up Socks, a Maine Coon Cat, from Blueblaze Cattery.  And the last time we picked up a Maine Coon Cat,  in Oneonta, New York, we met Elektra, from Blueblaze Cattery, at?

The Neptune Diner.

We asked the owner if his establishment was connected to the other one, he said no, but was amused by the story.  As I am, and Steve is, because?  We’re easily amused.

Dinner was, by the way, very good.  I can speak in for the mousaka, and Steve was very favorably impressed by the roast turkey with dressing and gravy.  Neither one of us had room for dessert.

This morning, we met Mike from Blueblaze at the hotel, took on Socks and headed north to the Cat Farm and Confusion Factory.

…and so we’re home, and about to have dinner, and a glass of wine.  Tomorrow, we have errands, and need to catch up on various things we let slide while the book was being finished.

We’ll post pictures of Socks as time permits.  In the meantime, I can assure his fans that he’s been doing a thorough exploration of the house, has located the cat boxes, been bopped on the head by Scrabble and cursed at by Mozart, so things are, yanno, proceeding with all due propriety.

I hope y’all had as pleasant a weekend as we did.

 

 

Please note:  By reason of the previous posting, combined with  Number 1, below, I will not be able to re-open the discussion of the word lists until Monday.  Which I will do.  Thanks to everyone who has participated thus far, and. . .

Party!

*splat*

To-Do List

1.   Go to Meriden for Socks — April 1
2.  Talk at Rockland, Maine Public Library — April 5 (6:30 p.m.)
3.  Dragon Ship revisions due at Baen — April 15
4.  Turn in novel proposals (3) to Madame the Editor — April 23
5.  ConQuesT — May 25-27
6.  Interview at WERU Writers Forum with Joan Clemens & Ellie O’Leary, June 14, 10 a.m.
7.  Turn in short story to Baen — July 1
8.  Turn in Trade Secret — July 15
9.  Figure out the Liaden audible lexicon
10.  Feasibility study:  remodel bathroom
11. Pie in the Sky: Vacation — Septemberish