Misc. midweek update
Harbinger has stalled, mainly because I wrote myself into a corner and now need to get out of it. The solution I had in mind turned out to involve something I expressely mentioned as impossible in Servant, so it’s back to the writing board… I have found a new toy: a Starbucks thermos mug (brought back from Moscow by my father), which is suprisingly handy to have–you never know when someone is going to interrupt you, and the water at work is lukewarm at best. Having the mug helps to get extra minutes of hot tea, which is cool. This will probably be the last post before the blog goes dark, as I’m going to Dublin to visit my sister. Inte

Sale: “The Church of Accelerated Redemption” to Shine Anthology
I’ve been sitting on this one for a loooong while, but I’ve finally been allowed to make it public: the collaboration I wrote with Gareth L. Powell, “The Church of Accelerated Redemption”, has sold to Jetse de Vries’ Shine Anthology, due out 2010 from Solaris. This one was one heck of a hard one. Many many thanks to Marshall Payne and the BF for reading it at least two or three times, and to Jetse for having such awesome rewrite suggestions. And to Gareth for being such fun to work with. No snippet, as Jetse has a competition planned. Watch the

Battlestar Galactica, the ending
We finished watching the final episode of Battlestar Galactica a few days ago, and… (cut for spoilers) And, well, I’m not too sure where to start. There were some things I liked a lot–BSG’s willingness to take risks is perhaps less pronounced than in the previous seasons, but it was still nice to see them gear up for drastic changes, like the whole Gaeta and Zarek rebellion. And the whole Kara Thrace subplot was pretty neat (if a little too easily solved, but more on that later). For someone who hated Gaius like the plague in season 1, I actualy liked his change of heart, even though I don’t buy the way he founds his

Monday monday
Erk. Tonight’s activity consisted of transcribing my handwritten notes on the proofs into a big email to AR towers. My fingers, they hurt… Tonight’s secondary activity is trying to transfer a homemade video from a Mac to a PC, and getting a big headache (the video is a Quicktime movie file, and I want it to be readable in Windows Media Player). So far, not so good. Will poke around some more. And, while I was out there researching my mythology, I found this awesome resource on the Aztecs. Theoretically, it’s educational activities for kids, but i

Lessons learnt today…
…about the writing of sequels. When naming a minor character in a book, don’t give him a long and complicated name on the assumption we’ll never see him again anyway. Because, you know, he might turn out to be a major player in the sequel and thefore need his name mentioned on a regular basis… From now on, the only people getting long and complicated names are those earmarked for death. (yes, I know. It’s occurred to me the dead can come back unexpectedly, but we’ll cross that bridge when it presents itself)