Category Archives: Writing

The Ungodly Pace of Technological Change

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Patience is a VirtueIt may seem odd for a science-fiction author to complain about technological change (though I remember Ray Bradbury before he died, complaining about ebooks), but that’s what I’m thinking about today.  Sometimes I love technological change, like when I want a new iPad and I need an improved model to convince my wife that I need to upgrade.  Other times it’s a pain, like when I’m trying to write.

Somewhere I have a sheet of German Postage Stamps printed in the early thirties.  They were 1 Mark stamps, but as soon as they came off the presses, they had to be sent back in to be printed over with 100 Marks, because of the horrible inflation that Germany was experiencing at the time.  It was changing so fast that they literally couldn’t print stamps or money fast enough to keep up with it.

I kind of have that feeling today.  Some of the technology I describe in His Robot Girlfriend and His Robot Wife seems quaint now, and some of the stuff in the new book is already sounding antiquated.  I’m going back and making some changes, particularly to how processes are processes.  I already know I’m not going to get too far in front of the change, but I at least want my story to be up-to-date with present technology.

Specifically in this case, Mike pays with a cash card.  Credit cards and debit cards are already facing extinction.  It won’t be long before apps on telephones replace making a purchase at a cash register or a store counter.  Think of it– scan your item, press pay, authenticate (probably with a thumbprint) and walk out of the store.  No more standing in line, no more waiting, no more identity theft.  It’s a lot closer than you think– much closer than 2037, when my story takes place.

 

Whew!

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I’m writing this on the 7th.  I’m a bit ahead.  Today is the first full day of summer vacation.  I checked out of school yesterday.  For those of you who don’t know, this involves me sitting around waiting for an administrator to come and check my room and sign a paper.  Some teachers needed the morning to finish cleaning and packing, but I didn’t.  I was all done.  So I sat there from 7 to 11 and watched Brave on my iPad, played “Liar’s Dice” with my son, and waited.

Once I was checked out though, we celebrated.  I took the whole family out for Ice Cream. Then we went to the movies and saw Iron Man 3 (really good).  And finally went to Famous Dave’s for Barbecue.

Today, I slept in… till 8!  Got up and did some writing, did some chores, and feel really good about not having to work for a while, at least on anything buy my books.  I’ve been writing as much as possible this past month and I’ve gone from being 336 pages behind to just 300 pages behind.  😀  And I’m just getting started.

The Pile

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Work in Progress: Nova Dancer and CosmosSo, I’ve just published my 17th book.  I’m hard at work on the next ones.  Yes, “ones.”  As you know if you’ve read more than one post here, I have several projects in the works at any one time and often flip from working on one to another.  If I had a robot double of myself who could write, while I just thought up ideas… well, I don’t know if that would be great or not.  After all, I like thinking up new stories, but I like writing them too.

As I said, I’ve published 17 books.  I have 10 books that I’ve started and have at least a bit of written– in some cases about half the book, in others a chapter or two.  I have 11 other books plotted out, but not started.  Then I’ve got a pile of story ideas– 53 books worth.  Many of them will not ever be written, I imagine.  Some are ideas for sequels and some of them are completely new ideas.  Some of them may be incorporated into other books.

The great thing is, they are all written down.  Some of them I look at and think “When did I think up that idea?”  I know if I hadn’t written it down, it would be long lost by now.  There’s a lesson in there somewhere.

What Needs to Get Done

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Patience is a VirtueOne of my main goals is to be at least partially supported by my writing by the time I retire from teaching.  Last year, my wrinting was responsible for about 5% of my net income.  In some ways that’s more than I ever could have hoped for, and I can’t help but be very happy.  But I’m going to have to drastically grow that amount within the next six to seven years.

I’m going to do that by building my name as my brand,  following simple but effective marketing, and most of all by getting some writing done.  When people read a book and they like it, they need to be able to find another book by that author.  They also need to find one that they like as much as the first.  For that reason, I have to get writing.  I’ve gotten really good at getting caught up on the extra stuff that comes with writing– researching, edition, designing, promotion, this blog.  Now that I have some real time, I need to get writing.

So what are the dates I’m shooting for?  If I follow my current speed:

His Robot Wife: Patience is a Virtue — August 5, 2013

82 Eridani: Voyage — November 25, 2013

The Sorceress and her Lovers — April 14, 2014

That’s not good enough.  Not only was I expecting to finish The Sorceress and her Lovers in 2013, I was expecting to finish Blood Moon too.  I got to kick it into gear.  The writing is the thing.

The Amathar Sequel

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Princess of AmatharPrincess of Amathar was my first book and it took a long time to write.  It’s not my best work probably, but it gets more positive reviews than negative.  I’ve had a sequel in the works forever.  There are about five or six chapters done.  I decided to look them over today and found them in a mess.  The formatting is all crazy and the text is scrambled in some places.  I guess it’s been so long since I worked on it, that it’s moved across several different word processing programs and computer formats.  If and when I get back to it, it’s going to take quite a bit of work to get it into any kind of shape at all.

Originally, I had planned a whole series of Amathar books, patterned format wise after Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars series, for which Amathar is an homage.  This first sequel would be Knights of Amathar.  I don’t know what the others might be… Priests of Amathar?  Swords of Amathar?  Something like that.

The Rewritten Chapter

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Patience is a VirtueI told you the other day how I lost (or wrote over) a chapter of my book in progress The Sorceress and her Lovers.  I felt like I had to rewrite that piece before I could go on to anything else, so I sat down and over the past three days, I’ve finished it.

The problem is, it’s not as good as it was.  I don’t have the original with which to compare, but I remember it as being better.  The new version is longer and has more characters.  It did what I wanted the scene to do.  But I just can’t help feeling it was much better before.

Well, I’m not going to work on it more now.  It’s set aside at least until I finish the His Robot Wife: Patience is a Virtue, and possibly until 82: Eridani– Voyage is done.  By then I’ll have enough perspective hopefully to rewrite it and make it as good as the original.

Dealing with Stress

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It’s been a very stressful week.  It was so stressful that I thought I was having a heart attack and spent my weekend in the hospital… and then they told me I wasn’t.  And the worst part was that it was the weekend!  Just about everybody was surprised that I was back at work Monday, but the teachers out there know how it is.  I had a heart attack once (technically it wasn’t a heart attack, but I did have an angioplasty) and I missed one day of school.  You teach through the pain, through the tornado, through the gunfire.  You’ve probably heard many people talking with wonder at what teachers have done.  But you haven’t heard teachers talk about it much.  It’s just what they (we) do.

Anyway, back to the stress.  My last big duty as Yearbook Advisor is tomorrow: The Yearbook Signing Party.  Once that is over, I have just one more day of teaching and then three days of Exams.  Fortunately for me, that pressure is over– I’ve already had my exams approved weeks ago.  Some others aren’t so fortunate.  Now the stress is for the kids.  A group of them was taking it far too easy, not studying.  I told them that in four years they were going to wonder how come their GPA was so low, and that they should remember this day.  I said I wouldn’t remember, because by then I would be on an island beach somewhere eating pineapple off the brown skin of a mostly naked woman.  One smart alec asked “What about your wife?” I told him that she was welcome to come too.

That little story should tell you that I’m just a wee bit off the rails, but by this time next week, I’ll be relaxing (alas, no beach, no mostly naked woman– maybe some pineapple).  I’ll be relaxed enough and have free time enough to get some writing done.

Which of your children do you love the most?

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I’m getting ready to count up book sales for the month so far.  Some books will have high sales numbers and some low numbers, but I don’t necessarily love my best-seller(s) the most.  I have strong feelings for all of my books.  After all, I wrote them because I wanted to write books that I would like to read.  When some books that usually sell very few copies suddenly do well, even if it’s only a little bit, I feel a bit of pride.

Tesla’s Stepdaughters is one of those books.  It’s really different from any other books I’ve written.  Science fiction and fantasy are easy for me, but a mystery (such as it is) seems much harder, and I’m just proud to have come up with it.

When Eaglethorpe Buxton sells well, I’m similarly pleased.  I suppose its a validation of myself as a humorist.  I probably had more sheer fun writing EB than any other book.

I feel good when somebody buys (and reads) Princess of Amathar.  It was my first book and took the longest to write (years and years).

Picking my favorite book or my favorite character really would be like picking my favorite child.  I love them all.  And just like my children, there is a little bit of me in each of them.  Even the evil ones.

Summer is Coming

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Whoop!  Whoop!  I have just 13 days of work left for the year and then the summertime is here.  Just 11 of those are days with kids and 3 of them are half days for Exams.  I still have a ton of stuff to do of course.  We still have a yearbook party I have to plan.  I still have to write semester exams.  I still have to teach for about five more days.  But then, I’m a full-time author.

I’ve been trying to catch up on my backlog and was doing pretty good at it for the past week or so, but then yesterday, I didn’t get anything written.  Yesterday was the when we were supposed to reenact the Battle of Gettysburg at school and there was a ton of stuff to do for that.  Then it ended up getting cancelled due to unhealthy air– smoke from California wild fires mostly.  Anyway, I’m going to get back on track again this weekend.

I’m still shooting for the end of June for His Robot Wife: Patience is a Virtue.  I’ll keep you updated here of course.

Tired

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I don’t think I have ever been so tired in my entire life.  I can barely drag myself home at the end of the day.  Then I type a few words, sit down and watch some TV, climb into bed.  Then I’m back up in the morning and it all starts over again.

I have a little post-it note on my monitor at school that tells me how many school days left.  Twenty days as I write this.  God, I hope I can make it.

I’ve also had a terrible misfortune.  Having managed to avoid it for the past 19 years, I somehow let myself be made Social Studies Department Chair next year.  I’m too old for more work!  I’ll do my best of course, but…  Hey, at least I’m not doing the Yearbook next year.  Always look on the bright side of life.

Also I’ve been having “lubricant” injected into my knee over the past few weeks and my last injection is tomorrow.  Hopefully it will make walking a bit easier.  It’s pretty painful right now.  If you think it’s a coincidence that Mike has knee problems in the next His Robot Wife book… it’s not.