Inquiring Minds – Page 2 – Sharon Lee, Writer

. . .for a hamburger today

Nope, still no checks.

No books, either.

Preliminary numbers on the Roll Call, adjusting for those who have written private emails, or checked in from Goodreads, LiveJournal, or other venues where this blog mirrors — and also adjusting for those people who are amusing themselves. . .

I presently have 500 answers.

My thanks to everyone who took this request seriously. If you do read here and have not checked in, you still have time. The post will remain at the top of this blog through June 30.

Set to be even hotter today than yesterday. The cats are cat-footing about, trying to get all their important work done before the heat hammers down. I will be shortly following their example.

More words added to the manuscript last night. Rough drafty words, those, which have allowed me to think more deeply on the scene, and locate places where I can deepen characterization and the chemistry between the two characters. This is why we are such “slow” writers. We keep going back and layering stuff in. I wish I, at least, could be a bright and breezy writer, who gets it right the first time, but…alas. Thank you all for your patience.

Progress on Book the Next
35,492/100,000 OR 35.49% complete

Am I being managed?” he asked mildly.

Today’s blog title brought to you by J. Wellington Wimpy.

The root of all your problems is that you don’t look like me

Well, let’s see. . .

Several questions from the depths of the Roll Call, so! Answers.

*Book tours happen at the whim and/or planning of the publisher. If we have helpers on the ground, Steve and I will occasionally do a book tour, or visit a bookstore local to the vicinity of an SF convention or WorldCon. We were in Colorado some years back — 2006, I think — as GoHs at CoSine; and in Denver Itself for the WorldCon in 2008. We did not do a bookstore tour at either of those cons; the local bookstores being largely uninterested in having second-string scifi writers come to their stores. We are Further Constrained by the fact that we don’t fly, which limits the venues to which the publisher can economically send us. Which is to say: Unless we’re in Denver for Another Reason, and one or two or three of the local stores are willing to host a signing, our book tours, at least, will probably not reach Denver.

*I’m not certain I understand either the need or the desirability for a Collected Liaden Works for Kindle. That being said…to the best of my knowledge, Baen is selling two bundles of novels — Korval’s Legacy and Phase Change, but I think that only gets you ten or twelve. Surely, if one has a Kindle, there’s a way to make a category, say, LIADEN, and stick all your Liaden books under that category? Just a thought.

*The reason we have not Mentioned the Rest of the Geography, Fauna, and Population (if any) of Planet Surebleak is because! all the stories thus far have happened in the Port and the City, and neither Steve nor I feel like writing a Forbes Guide to the Surebleak Outback.

As reported elsewhere, you may now pre-order the Audible version of Alliance of Equals. Here’s the link.

Yes, we are aware that Audible has the book listed as AN Alliance of Equals; we have written to them on the topic.

It’s a warm and pleasant day here at the Confusion Factory. I have vacuumed, and done a blankie run, the latter no doubt being the reason why I have three Large Cats asleep on my desk, all within the reach of my hand. The coffeepot is hissing through its cleaning cycle; and I need to sort laundry. After lunch, I will make a Sincere Effort to actually add words to the working manuscript.

I hope everyone is having a fine and relaxing day.

Today’s blog title is brought to you by Julie Brown, “Brand New Girl.” Here’s your link.

The hurrier I go…

. . .the behinder I get.

Yeah.

So! Book the Next has shrunk again, as last night I Officially Removed that questionable 5,652 words, and placed it in a file named “Five of 5.”

This brings the word count for Book the Next right down to 32,777. As a colleague said, “It would be so much easier, if writing a novel were only about stringing words together until you have enough.”

So, that.

One more question from the Roll Call: Will there be a Jethri and Tan Sim story?

…one assumes that this is not a request for slash, but for a novel, and the answer is — Don’t know. It’s not on the current list, but we’re pretty sure to have another list, sometime in future. What we chose to write about is predicated on a number of factors, the most important of which is — What do we feel like writing? As people frequently mention, it takes us a long time to write a book — far too long, in fact, to live with characters we dislike or a story we didn’t really want to write.

Several people in a number of venues have asked where they can find more of Tolly Jones. This is pursuant to yesterday’s posting of “Wise Child” (which is here, if you missed it). Tolly, of course, makes an appearance in Dragon in Exile, and is also present in Alliance of Equals and! Book the Next.

There is some curiosity about Where Disian Came From. First I heard of her was in Book the Next, when Tolly casually said something, and I was like, “Wait, what?”

Folks also want to know the “rest” of Disian’s story — which, she having arrived fully formed, so to speak, I happen to know! Sorta. What I don’t know yet is where that story belongs. And, no (to forestall a frequent variation on a theme) I won’t just tell you. Just telling you is not a story, but it very well may ruin the story, in that, having just told you, I’ll be bored, and won’t write it.

Writers are twisty wights, no getting around it.

Steve and I have had a go at putting together a blog tour for Alliance, and our first stop was at YA Authors You Never Heard Of.

He’d asked Disian, once, how moving through Jump looked to her. And she’d waxed rhapsodic enough that he’d decided right then and there that a man might have no better use of his time than to seek out the Uncle and offer to do whatever it took, so long as he ended up downloaded as the main brain of a spaceship.

Be chivalrous to strangers you meet along the road

In which we prove that writing is a science.

Or not.

Astute readers will recall that I reported having broken 40,000 words on Book the Next on Monday evening.

Yesterday, I had what we’ll call A Better Idea, ripped out about 6,000 words, wrote 4,000 new ones, cut/pasted/re-worked a few existing bits, and! Realized a net loss of only 1,800 words.

Result: Book is stronger (I think), but 40,000 is once again ahead of me.

Answers to more questions received in Roll Call.

*I can probably Reveal the raw number of Roll Call answers at the end of June

*Roll Call is pinned to the top of Blog Without a Name until the end of June in order to give everyone who reads a chance to see it and respond, if they so desire. Some folks only check in once a week or twice a month, and we are at summer (for some of us), and people are on vacation

*The Roll Call was not mirrored on LJ because LJ has ongoing problems with spam, and I have had to sternly restrict the list of people who can post there. And, yanno, I wanted all the answers in one place. Thank you for your patience and understanding

*Nope, you are in no way obligated to read Blog Without a Name instead of Eagles Over the Kennebec. In most cases, content appears on both sites

*Returning for a signing at the Uncle’s in Minneapolis is, perhaps, in the future. Steve and I will be guests of honor at Marscon in Bloomington, next March and have been talking with Don about when would be best for us to come visit him while we’re in the area

In theory, yes, the new story goes live on Baen.com today. I stress that this is Only A Theory; I have not have confirmation of this from the folks who would know best. Also! I am scheduled to vanish into my volunteer gig for most of the day, so will be out of pinbeam range. So — you’re kinda on your own, here. Happy hunting.

Progress on Book the Next
38,191/100,000 OR 38% complete

The delmae, like Liadens had it. Smart woman, as far as he’d ever heard. Haz had a high opinion, but then, Captain Robertson, as she’d once been, was twice a hero in battle, and that was the kind of thing that would count for somebody with Haz’s bringing up.

Today’s blog title brought to you by Warren Zevon, “Ourselves to Know,” because, really, who can resist a rock song about the Crusades? Here’s your link

Roll Call

I’m going to pin this to the top of the blog until the end of June. That means that any new posts will appear under this note. Thanks for your patience and understanding.

Why a roll call, you ask?

Good question.

As Steve and I go to and fro on the earth, I often meet people who tell me that they read my blog. Some read it for the cats, some for writing/publishing news, some because they feel a connection and like to check in with what Sharon and Steve are doing — all fine reasons to read, and thank you. (The cats would thank you, too, if they were, say, dogs.)

But here’s the thing: Apparently not everyone feels comfortable commenting on various blog posts. And that leaves me in something of a pickle. About the only way I can tell if this blog is reaching anyone is through reader engagement (yes, I have a stats page, and can read the hits, but that’s. . .not as satisfactory as it could be).

So, here’s what I would like you — yes, you — to do for me.

If you read here, would you just post a message in reply to this note? You don’t have to introduce yourself, or say anything at all beyond, Hi, or Yo, or Present. . .

I will keep the replies private so as not to embarrass or endanger anyone. I do reserve the right to use the raw number of replies in relevant discussions with publicist, and/or editor, type people.

Thank you very much for your help, your interest, and your care.

Oh, Romeo — yeah; you know, I used to have a scene with him

Being a writer is a lot like being a Liaden Scout, in the sense that both involve long stretches of boredom punctuated by brief moments of terror. The Scouts have it over writers in the mucking about in the mud part; and in general writers have the advantage in felines. But, otherwise, almost exactly the same.

We here at the Cat Farm have just entered a period of High Energy, if not outright terror. Of course, we have a book due on April 15, and into that already charged situation was introduced the page proofs for the mass market edition of Dragon in Exile, with a return deadline (originally) of Monday, March 21, which, because Central Maine and FedEx, would have given us 2.5 days to proof-and-mark-up because the last FedEx pickup of the week is Friday at 4:00 pm. We did negotiate a one-day delivery delay, which gained us the weekend to work, so! Deadline now Tuesday, March 22.

Steve is taking the lead on the page proofs, and I’ll do spot checks after he’s done, so it only seemed fair, when the copy edits for our Alien Artifacts short story, “Shame the Devil,” came in, on the evening of March 15, for me to take them.

We’re still expecting the page proofs for Alliance of Equals to land between now and the hand-in date for The Gathering Edge. That will be a more intense experience than going over the proofs now in hand.

Into the roil of sudden busyness, was tossed the info (like chum to the sharks, says the backbrain. O, backbrain.) that Baen will be destroying the remaining hardcover copies of Duainfey and Longeye still in their warehouse, which is sad, but inevitable, and also! that we should keep a Sharp Eye Out for paper ARCS of Alliance of Equals.

And, I have a call in to my doctor because of this stupid knee injury, which, despite being pampered ridiculously, still doesn’t seem to be healing like it should.

Wheee….

So, anyway, that. We may be just a tad thin on the internet for the next few weeks.

I have a question for my colleagues who read here, based on a tweet I saw this morning, and I’m. . .intrigued and/or baffled.

How many of you count speaking roles in your latest WiP, to make sure you have gender parity? (Full disclosure: It would never have occurred to me to do this. I don’t even count the cats in the story.)

And now — work awaits!

Everybody have a good Wednesday.

Here, have a picture of Sprite atop Mount Page Proofs.

Oops! Today’s blog title brought to you by Dire Straits, “Romeo and Juliet.” Here’s your link.

Soliciting statements of interest

An Alert Reader has noticed that February 2018 marks the 30th Anniversary of the Liaden Universe® in print. This is derived from the fact that Agent of Change was published as a paperback original by Del Rey, in February 1988.

Said Alert Reader has put out a call for celebratory Limited Edition Hardcovers in honor of this anniversary. Clearly, this is not something that we, the authors, can do. We can, however, take the idea to Madame the Publisher, if there seems to be sufficient interest.

This is where you come in.

If Limited Edition Liaden Universe® Hardcovers were published, would you purchase it/them?

I realize that price is very often an object for you, as it is for me, so if you have a price in mind, let me know that, too.

Thanks for your help.

. . .Sprite also thanks you for your help.

Interactive Play

If you read this, please leave a comment. Tell me, oh, how long you’ve been reading — the blog and/or our work — and what brings you here, and what the weather’s like today.

Thanks!

Inquiring minds want to know

So, here’s the thing.

I have An Idea, and I need your — yes, all of you! — help.

As writers, Steve and I are fairly frequently called upon to read from our own work in front of an audience. This is fairly often an enjoyable thing to do, and, when we have a new book out, we just start from the first page and read for our allotted time, feeling that this is Fairest.

However! Sometimes we are called upon to read from our own work in front of an audience, and — we have no new book or story to read from.

And it has been in my mind for a while now that we should read the — or at least some of the — Favorite Passages of members of the audience.

This, however, has never proved practicable, since we don’t always have all of our books with us at conventions or on book tour. With the advent of tablets and ereaders and other technologies, though, the thing perhaps becomes doable.

And here’s the part where I need your help.

If you could ask Steve, or me, or us to read ONE favorite scene from one of our novels or stories. . .

What would it be?

Be as specific as possible — page numbers and edition with a short description of the scene will be best, I think — and remember! Only ONE.

Choose well.

Let the games begin.

Now I’ve finally found someone to stand by me

Inquiring Minds Want To Know. . .

At the beginning of “Dirty Dancing,” Baby sets us into the story-frame with a voice-over as we watch the family car driving up the turnpike there in Maine. She says:

That was the summer of 1963 – when everybody called me Baby, and it didn’t occur to me to mind. That was before President Kennedy was shot, before the Beatles came, when I couldn’t wait to join the Peace Corps, and I thought I’d never find a guy as great as my dad. That was the summer we went to Kellerman’s.

So my question is — what do Frances and Johnny do, now that they’ve defied just about everyone? Does Johnny join the housepainters union? Does Frances go on to Mount Holyoke? More important — does she join the Peace Corps?

What logically proceeds from the ending of “Dirty Dancing?” and! — bonus question — what’s the happy ending?

Go.

Oh. Today’s blog title is “The Time of My Life,” Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes. Here’s your link.