Day: July 8, 2008

T.M. Wagner of SFReviews.net weighs in on Zoe’s Tale and has some really nice things to say, among them:

Zoe’s Tale comes the closest any writer has come to writing an honest-to-God Heinlein juvenile. Scalzi’s Heinlein influence has been made much of before. But here, the fidelity to the aesthetic of those classic books is so tangible you can be excused for wondering if Scalzi has perfected some kind of occult ritual to allow the spirit of the late Grand Master to possess his body.

I have. It involves a buxom redhead who is good with math and guns. More I should not say (but, oh, you can imagine).

And this is kind of neat: a review of ZT at the interestingly named FlamingNet.com, at which actual teenagers review books aimed at them. The 14-year-old who reviewed it gave the book a 10 out of 10. Which, you know, seems positive. And look! I get this ginchy graphic now:

More importantly, given that we’re hoping teens might try out the book, it’s nice that an actual 14-year-old read it and seems to think highly of it.

Now, I’m still hoping adults read it too, mind you. Pretty sure people over the age of 18 will like it as well. One can hope.

Via my friend Craig Salonen: The Flying Chocolate Pig. Which doesn’t really fly (unless you modify it heavily), but which does, in fact, include bacon under its chocolately exterior. Not to live up to my own press, but, yeah, I’d eat this.

Now that I’ve posted about it, none of the rest of you need to tell me about it. Thanks, though.

Well, that was quick. From e-mail:

Voting for the Hugos is over, so now you can tell us: Do you think you’ll win?

Honestly? Nah. I mean, I could win, either for Best Novel or Best Fan Writer, and I’d be happy either way. Awards are fun, and it’s nice to stand on stage and have people applaud in your general direction. I have an ego; it likes to be gratified. Please feel free to do so. Also, you know: I think The Last Colony is pretty good, and I think I’m an excellent representative of a genre fanboy. Both are reasonable choices for a Hugo. At the same time, I’m not stupid or delusional, nor will I just die if I don’t win. I have what I think is a reasonably good estimation of my chances among the respective field of nominees in each category I’m nominated in. My expectation: Eh. Entirely possible I could win, but best not to clear off space on the mantelpiece just yet.

My position on it all is that I like being nominated. It’s nice to have written a book and have science fiction fandom say that it’s one of the five best examples of the genre that year; it’s nice to have people look at what I’m doing here at Whatever and say, hey, that’s some good fandom. I like being in the company of Charlie Stross and Robert J Sawyer and Michael Chabon and Ian McDonald, and in the company of Chris Garcia and Steven Silver and Cheryl Morgan and Dave Langford. One could do worse. It’s fun, and you get to feel pretty for a few months, and then it goes away and hopefully you’ve enjoyed it. Ruining that enjoyment through undue neurosis about winning the thing seems silly.

So, I’m looking at my August schedule and I’m apparently spending at least two weeks of that month traveling and/or promoting Zoe’s Tale, and somewhere in there I’m actually supposed to be finished with The High Castle (which at the moment appears, um, optimistic). So while I don’t expect to disappear completely in August — that doesn’t seem like a smart thing to do when I’ll have a new novel to promote — it does seem likely that my posting frequency here will dial back quite a bit, say, to maybe once a day or once every other day.

I may fill some slots with reruns from the vast, silent archives, or through doing some audience participation, or by having some guest bloggers* — or I may just, you know, do nothing and just post once a day or every other day or whatever. I haven’t decided yet. I’ll be sure to let you know. But I wanted to give you all fair warning that this dog days lull is on its way.

(* — incidentally, a great way to absolutely make sure you will not be a guest blogger here is to send me an e-mail or comment volunteering to be one. Really, just don’t. Thanks.)