Apex has my short story Scenting the Dark up in their new online issue. For those who aren’t familiar with Apex, they do SF Horror.

Here’s the teaser on mine.

Lifting the stopper from the vial to his nose, Penn inhaled slowly. Against the neutral backdrop of his ship’s cleanroom, he picked out aromas of quince, elderberry, and bright Martian soil that hinted of blood, with undercurrents of cinnamon and Zeta Epsilon’s fragrantly sweet longgrass. He sighed, blowing the scents out again. The perfume was still out of balance.

Marshall Payne of The Fix interviewed me before the Campbell. We agreed to do a follow-up question post-Campbell. I have to say this was a great process. We chatted on the phone first and then he came up with a series of questions based on what we talked about. It was fun.

I’ve enjoyed his reviews and am pleased to report that he makes the whole interview process quite painless.

I love, love, love Subterranean Press and am so delighted to have finally landed a sale there. This actually happened a couple of weeks ago, right before Launchpad, but I was sitting on the news until I finished revisions.¹ Which I just did and had accepted today. Hurrah!

Here’s the opening bit as a teaser. I’ll let you know when the story is up.

Mundari Vineyard 2045, Nashik (India), Shiraz
Black cherry, plum, and currant flavors mingle with aromas of sweet tobacco and sage in this dependable offering from India.

The sun peeking through the grapevines felt hotter on Bharat Mundari’s neck than twenty-four degrees. Another perfect day. Bharat scowled and worked his way down the row of vines, thinning the grapes so the remaining Shiraz crop would become fuller and riper.

Not that there was a point in having healthy vines when he couldn’t pay his weather bill. Without rain, the grapevines would weaken under the stress, and stressed grapes made poor wine. No one bought flawed wine.

Just to keep things in balance though, I should tell you that the night I got home from the Campbells, I had a rejection note waiting in my inbox. Doesn’t matter. My life is very, very good right now.

1. There’s a funny story here, which I’ll tell later. [↩]

One of the other participants, Laura J. Mixon-Gould, just shared this great little online star-gazing tutorial. It’s fun and only takes a few minutes. Give it a try.

Raw notes:

You go in and sit down in front of a computer and do stuff on it. Maybe you write something down in a notebook. Has students and postdocs doing most of the practical stuff. Spend time designing a program, send it to someone, they implement it and send the data back to him. Not so much time doing astronomy these days. Writing things for journals.

100s of page in journals. Write grants for $100 - $150 per page which goes to the journal, not the writer. Electronic publishing is changing this some by making things cheaper. Physics Pre-print Server, which isn’t a publication of record, but a place to archive these things. 10 - 20 new articles go up every day. It’s totally public and free.
If you’re looking for story ideas, this is a great place to go. For instance:
Power spectra of fossil biodiversity time series: a connection to Galactic dynamics? Its the idea that extinction events might be related to passing through a galactic arms.

This is where physicists put up their papers while waiting for acceptance to a journal. In the old days, they’d print up 100 copies and send them out to people on their mailing list.

Mike pointed us to the Astronomy Picture of the day. As he says, surfing through the archives provides amazing ideas for astronomy or space based stories. Make sure you check out the square nebula.

He also recommends Bad Astronomy. Phil Plait blogs through Discover magazine.

Wheatgrass juice serves as a good example for how people believe story over facts. Science shows that wheatgrass doesn’t have any effect, but people tell each other stories about how they feel better or have positive results. Phil does a good job of debunking claims but also at pointing out really spectacular things.

Mike Brotherton our glorious host at Launch Pad is collecting links from the various participants and posting them on his website. So if you want to get a wider sense of the experience than just my raw notes, then click on over there and explore the other participants’ blogs.

For some reason, I’m having a hard time sleeping here. I’ve woken around 4:30 the last two mornings, still feeling dead-tired. But, the bonus is that I’m getting some writing done in the morning and then going for a walk with Jay Lake. Deanna Hoak joined us this morning and we wandered around the campus.

On one side of the quad there’s this fascinating art installation that I’d noticed yesterday. The artist had woven together branches into twisting, organic structures. You could wander into these little rooms of dense branches but beyond the appearance, the smell was astonishing. As Jay said, it was as much a scent installation as anything else. Sage and other herbs wove between the branches and perfumed the air. Deanna wants to go back there tonight to look at the stars through the top of them.

Once again, these are my raw notes. No promises about coherence.

When dealing with conceptual change theory, you can’t say, “This is wrong” or “This is the right answer” you have to change their conception.

Jim told about how he was asked why the moon looks big when it comes up. He answered wrong, based on his own misconception. Later apologized to the class and corrected his statement. But there was a cartoon, FRAZZ,¹ in which the janitor was asked the same question and got it right. Getting it right in the cartoon probably reached more people than his classroom. And that is part of why it’s important to get the science right in fiction.

Watched: “A Private Universe. Misconceptions in Learning”²
In the film, they interviewed randomly selected Harvard graduates, faculty and staff. 21 of 23 thought that the seasons were caused by the distance of the earth from the sun.³

Also the phases of moon are not caused by the earth blocking the suns rays.

Jim says imagine what impact you could have if you have good science in your fiction.

Must discover the misconception. Confront the misconception. Before you can change the misconception.

My misconception. The moon is not over the equator. It’s 5 degrees off the ecliptic plane.

There’s a surprisingly good animation on wikipedia, which shows the libration of the moon. I’d never heard of libration.

Kinesthetic astronomy. Using your body to understand astronomy. Check out the packet, developed by Cheryl Lynn Marrow, which is really cool. http://education.sdsc.edu/teachertech/downloads/k_astronomy.pdf

The primary thing that Jim was talking about was that, because our stories will reach a wide audience we have a certain responsibility to make sure the science is right and that we are not introducing the new misconceptions.

1. This isn’t the specific strip Jim was referencing [↩]
2. Definitely watch this film [↩]
3. It’s caused by axial tilt. [↩]

These are my raw notes. I don’t promise they make sense.

—

Mike Brotherton:
The goal is not to learn all of astronomy in a week, but to learn enough that we can intelligently research questions for stories.

People learn through story, more easily than in the classroom. If he can get us to use more and better quality science then through our works we can reach a wider audience and raise the awareness of science. Which is what NASA wants.

Jim Verley:
Started out as running the cultural association on campus. Always read SF. Noticed misconceptions as he proceeded on the educational track. As a science educator, he knows that we can reach an audience that he can’t. More than facts it is important to be a clear thinker. If we can learn to be clear thinkers and to ask appropriate questions then that will allow us to be educators to the general public through our stories.

Jerry Oltion:
Started as SF writer with casual interest in astronomy. Burned out on writing in 2003. Got bit by the astronomy bug. Builds telescopes and grinds his own mirrors. Designed new type of telescope mount.

The Scale of the Cosmos: Mike Brotherton.
From Seeds, Chapter 1

Astronomy deals with objects on a vast range of sizes, speeds, and times.

Most of these scales aare way beyond everyday experience.

Humans the Earth and even the solar system are tiny on a cosmic scale.

Space is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind- bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.
– Douglas Adams

You don’t want to go to Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy for science, but Douglas Adams gets this thing totally right. This is the kind of thing that sticks in the general public’s mind.

Showed us slides stepping up by factor of 100.

Metric system is the language of science. Jay says that he uses metric with SF and english (usually) with Fantasy.

When the numbers get astronomically large, it becomes meaningless, so Mike prefers to explain things via relative scale. (It took the Apollo astronauts a few days to get to the moon.)

Science world-building: In order to avoid large numbers beyond our imagination, we introduce new units: Distance Sun to Moon = 150,000,000 km = 1 AU (astronomical unit) Scientist still like numbers between 1 and 10, because we like to count on our fingers, so we make new units in order to keep the numbers small. Even up to 100 is fine and 100 AU gets us all the way out to the edge of the planetary disc.

Solar system use AU. Outside solar system, use light year. Mike explains what a parsec is. Yoiks. When an object moves one arc second, we say that’s 1 parsec.

1 light year (ly) = distance traveled by light in 1 year = 63,000 AU = 1013

You can go 1000 LY in any direction and you are still in the Milky Way.

Figuring out that we are in a galaxy and where the center is was hard stuff. Not exactly sure what the galaxy looks like because we can’t take a picture (see the 1000 ly issue) from the outside. Diameter of the Milky Way ~ 75,000 ly But there’s a dark matter halo that’s like the Ort Cloud.

Galaxies not universally distributed through space, and they are are also large in comparison to the distances between them. Stars are very far apart compared to their sizes. If two galaxies collided there would be no stellar collisions.

Distance to the nearest large galaxies: several million light years.

Galaxies not universally distributed through space, something called Large Scale Structure. Clusters of galaxies are grouped into superclusters. Superclusters form filaments and walls around voids. Astronomers start using mega-parsecs and giga-parsecs when talking on this scale. Again, this is to try to keep the numbers between 1 & 10 or 1 & 100.

We stop here because stepping up another scale of 100 would take us larger than the observable universe. We can see 14 billion ly.

Other approaches to Sizes
Powers of Ten movie(s)
Cosmic Voyages
Contact Opening
When looking to reach readers, relate to everyday exerience whenever possible, if only to boggle with the truth.
Examples? How long to walk to the moon if you could? The sun? Another star? How about at jet airplane speeds?

Re-emphasizes the importance of trying to get numbers down to 1-10 or 1-100 because those are numbers that we can wrap our heads around.

I got in to the airport in Denver with no problems and no random editor sightings. I was on a plane with fellow attendee Paul Witcover and didn’t see him until we met up with the rest of the group. It’s a two-hour drive from Denver to Laramie and we talked pretty much non-stop on the way here. Conversations ranged from Alaskan survivalism to writing tics to prairie dogs. We are going to have a fun week.

When we got out at the restaurant to have dinner the sun had dipped below the horizon, but the sky still held some residual light. Even so, even standing under a parking lot light, the stars were so much more present here than in NYC. Now, I’ll grant that part of my amazement at seeing them might be due to having finished Spin on the way here. If you’ve read it, you’ll know what I mean.

What it reminded me of most was the time I went to London from Iceland during the height of the summer. I got on the Tube and when I came up it was dark outside and there was a moon. It had stopped doing that in Iceland and so darkness felt strangely magical.

Seeing the stars was a little like that. I’d forgotten that I had gotten used to not seeing them. And that’s not even with a telescope. As I said, this will be a fun week.

.
.
I’m heading for Laramie, WY today for LaunchPad Astronomy workshop. Mike Brotherton has posted our schedule.

Here’s what’s happening on day one. You can pop by his site to see what the rest of the week holds for me.

Thursday, July 31

9:30 AM Coffee, Juice, Continental Breakfast
10:00 AM Welcome and introductory remarks from the instructors (MB, JV, JO), Astronomy pre-test and pre-workshop questionnaire, Lecture/discussion: Scales of the Universe (Brotherton)
12:30 PM Lunch
1:30 PM Activity/Discussion: Seasons and Lunar Phases, Public Misconceptions (Verley)
3:45 PM Afternoon break/snacks
4:00 PM Lecture/Discussion: Solar System Tour (Oltion)
6:00 PM Dinner break
8:00 PM Bad Astronomy Movie Night (Armageddon tentatively scheduled)

Um… pre-workshop questionnaire? Yoicks!

Jon Armstrong has an interview up with David Anthony Durham¹ at his podcast, If You’re Just Joining Us. It’s  really wonderful.  David talks about his journey to being a writer, being naked in the desert, and fiction.

I’m reading his book, Acacia, right now.  Listen to him and then check out his books.

1. both gentlemen are finalists for this year’s Campbell for Best New Writer [↩]

.
.
I have my official schedule for World Con now.

Launch Pad: Astronomy for Writers
Wednesday, 11:30 a.m.
Launch Pad is a week-long crash course in modern astronomy for writers founded by Mike Brotherton and held each summer at the University of Wyoming. NASA foots the bill with the goald of increasing the quality and quantity of astronomy reaching the public. Come hear instructors and participants discuss the experience.

Schmoozing 101
Wednesday, 1:00 p.m.
Conventions offer a chance to meet some of the top names in the field. How can you take advantage of that without coming off like a weasel? Learn about the etiquette of talking to editors and how to effectively ‘work a room.’

Survival Tips for the Beginning Writer
Wednesday, 4:00 p.m.
Once the story is written, what happens next? Panelists talk about cover letters, manuscript tracking, rejectomancy and other blunders that they learned about the hard way.

Signing
Thursday, 1:00 pm

Reading
Thursday, 4:00 pm
A sampler-platter of short stories from me and John Scalzi

How to Give an Effective Reading - Workshop
Friday, 10:00 a.m.
You may be a good writer, but reading aloud is a separate skill. Learn to make your words sound as great out loud as they do on the page. Using both demonstration and audience participation, we will explore voicing, narration and pacing.

Strolling with the Stars
Sunday, 9:00 a.m.
To encourage a healthier, more active environment at Denvention 3 we are scheduling a 9AM walk every morning. We’ll leave from under the Big Blue Bear at the Colorado Convention Center, and we’ll stroll for a leisurely mile through downtown Denver. Each day’s walk will be led by a Famous AuthorTM, Artist, Editor or Scientist who will not only lead the walk but will interact with the participants. Join luminaries like Frank Wu, David Brin, Jay Lake, Ellen Datlow, John Picacio, Lou Anders, Paul Cornell, Scott Edelman, Mary Robinette Kowal and Stephen H. Segal for a gentle, friendly stroll to get the day started on an upbeat note.

Help me spread the word.

To raise money for the KGB Fantastic Fiction reading series, we’re holding a raffle. The prizes are unbelievable. Original art from Thomas Canty, Neil Gaiman’s keyboard (autographed), short story critiques by Ellen Datlow, Gardner Dozois… The list goes on and on. Seriously, one of the items is your own wormhole.

Between July 14th and July 28th, you can buy raffle tickets for only a dollar each. 1 buck. That’s nothing. And you can buy as many as you want.

At midnight (EST) on July 28th, we’ll randomly select the raffle winners. Prizes will be mailed to the lucky winners. (See a more detailed explanation in Raffle Rules).

Just to whet your appetite, here’s a partial list of prizes (a full list is available at the website)

· Story in a bottle by Michael Swanwick
· Tuckerization (your name in a story) by Lucius Shepard
· Tuckerization by Elizabeth Hand
· Tuckerization by Jeffrey Ford
· Pen & Ink drawing of an animal-your choice- by Gahan Wilson
· Original art for a George R. R. Martin novel by Tom Canty
· John Picacio signed print of art for Michael Moorcock novel
· Naomi Novik signed TEMERAIRE first edition
· Your very own wormhole from physicist Michio Kaku
· Peter Straub excerpt of a short story, “Mallon the Guru,” deleted from novel-in-progress, THE SKYLARK
· Holly Black signed advance copy of GOOD NEIGHBORS
· Original art by Terri Windling
· Carol Emshwiller signed manuscript of THE ABOMINABLE CHILD’S TALE
· Complete set of back issues and lifetime subscription to PARADOX MAGAZINE
· Critique of a short story by Ellen Datlow
· Critique of a short story by Gardner Dozois
· Critique of a short story by Nancy Kress
· Two year subscription to SYBIL’S GARAGE MAGAZINE
· Ray Bradbury limited edition worth $900
· And dozens more prizes on the website…

Continue reading KGB FANTASTIC FICTION ONLINE RAFFLE

.
.
Friday 12:00 Noon
Vinyard: Kaffeeklatsch
Mary Robinette Kowal and Barry B. Longyear
This is my first kaffeeklatsch. Here’s your chance to ask me questions about writing, puppets, SFWA, Iceland… Come chat with me!

Friday 1:00 PM
VT: Tabula Rasa Group Reading
Readings by members of the New York-based Tabula Rasa writer’s group, including Saladin Ahmed, Christopher M. Cevasco, Barbara Krasnoff, and me. I’ll be reading “The Deacon of Dark River” a retelling of an Icelandic ghost story.

Friday 5:00 PM
ME/ CT: Steampunk and Beyond: What Would a “Gibson Chair” Look Like?
Holly Black, Paul Di Filippo, Liz Gorinsky, Mary Robinette Kowal (L) , Sarah Micklem

Steampunk, originally just an sf subgenre, is now also a burgeoning underground design movement. There’s precedent for this: modernism was not only a literary movement, but had artistic, musical, architectural, and design wings as well. Is the steampunk design movement an essentially fluky outgrowth of our fascination with all things retro? Or could other f&sf subgenres sprout their own design branches as well? Could the creation of actual, useful, physical objects lead to better-imagined literary art? How close is the relationship between the visually striking artifacts of steampunk and the literature that spawned them, anyway?

Sunday 12:00 Noon
RI: Podcasts of Mars.
Jim Freund (L), Liz Gorinsky, James Patrick Kelly, Mary Robinette Kowal, Cat Rambo

Podcasts like Escape Pod and Free Reads from James Patrick Kelly are presenting audio discussions, short stories, and even entire books in a free portable format. We’ll take a critical survey of what’s out there and discuss the future of this new medium. Is it possible to model the podcast on the science fiction convention, which also includes discussions and readings? Could new technological approaches allow the podcast to go places that earthbound discussions can’t?

Rob and I are embarking on a four-hour motorcycle trip. I’ve got my cellphone, but coverage is spotty.
I will be without internet access until Monday. So, while I’m gone, here’s a question for you.

If you could have your ideal retreat, what would it include?

Me? Clean, cool, quiet. Wi-fi, plenty of outlets, good food and a massage therapist.