Things have been mad busy in the last couple weeks, which accounts for my not posting much here. This is almost purely the result of my COVID vaccinations, which are allowing me to take care of all the business I’ve been postponing for, well, a year.
I’ve dealt with a lot of my backlist, and I’m actually kind of proud of myself for accomplishing so much once it was finally safe for me to go out into the world. But the things that got done were the things I could do on my own, and the rest of the list depends on other people— doctors, other professionals, people with whom I have business relationships— who can’t be arsed to do their jobs. (Or maybe it’s their assistants who can’t be arsed. Who knows?) Maybe they’ll get back to me eventually, but I have to say that I’m very tired of leaving messages and sending emails that don’t get a reply.
But in the meantime, I’m finding myself with a social life again! My game night is back on, because everyone’s vaccinated now. I’m visiting back and forth with my vaccinated friends, and meeting other vaccinated friends in restaurants for food and drinks, and otherwise planning events in which I see vaccinated people in person and maybe even exchange hugs!
It’s a new world a-dawnin’. Thank you, Mr. Pfizer.
The Best of Walter Jon Williams has received a fine appreciation in SFRevu. Your takeaway:
Some writers become superstars from their first book. Others quietly produce book after book of excellent, sometimes even superior, work without gaining the same attention. The latter is true of Walter Jon Williams . . . as the Introduction by Daniel Abraham makes clear, Williams’ novels have a wide range, to the detriment of his branding . . .
Fans of Walter Jon Williams will want the deluxe illustrated hardcover The Best of Walter Jon Williams at $45. People who enjoy novella-length fiction or who want to read some high-quality science fiction with great characterization and literary craftsmanship will find the $5.99 ebook a bargain. Williams may not be the hot new thing, but he is a highly reliable writer who does not keep doing the same thing over and over again. Highly recommended.
If you hung on through the second paragraph, you’ll have noticed that Best of is now available as an ebook! This was news to me, but I searched long and hard and found the links you’re so desperately needing.
Hardback and Ebook
Barnes & Noble, Amazon
Ebook only:
Kobo, Apple Books, Direct from Publisher
Happy reading!
A couple weekends ago I gamemastered a Wild Cards RPG at Wondercon, an event connected with a charity auction for the Stagecoach Foundation. This event was recorded and is available at LegionM’s Twitch website, so if you’ve have a hankering to watch me run a game with four other writers as players (Carrie Vaughn, Caroline Spector, Max Gladstone, and Melinda Snodgrass), here’s your chance. We had a blast, and I hope that shows.
There are commercials. Sorry about that.
Lately I’ve been watching a lot of French television, particularly the last season of Call My Agent! (Dix Per Cent), a submarine thriller called The Wolf’s Call (Le Chant du Loup), plus episodes of Capitaine Marleau, a whodunit series featuring a kind of gender-flipped Columbo.
All this viewing and listening has encouraged a dangerous illusion, which is that I speak a foreign language.
While it’s true I took French in school (and Greek in college), any fluency has faded in the decades since. Yet French TV has encouraged me to the contrary, because I can understand so much of it: after all, the French for okay is “okay.” The French for super is “super!” The French for sexy is “sexy.” The French for email is “email,” brainstorming is “brainstorming,” burn-out is “burn-out,” smartphone is “smartphone,” motherfucker is “motherfucker,” and “oui” is “weh.” (That’s a joke for you Francophone types.)
I end every episode of French television with the delusion that I’m fluent in the language, but the truth is that I’m unable to compose any sentence that doesn’t involve curse words and terms derived from l’informatique.
This was made absolutely clear when I viewed the classic five-star noir Pepe le Moko last night, dating from 1938 before any of these Anglecismes entered the language. I left the film with no illusions, least of all the notion that life is worth living.
Film noir will do that to you.
Since having my second COVID shot, I’ve engaged in multiple reckless behaviors!
I had a haircut for the first time since June, and as a result no longer look like someone whose primary residence is a cardboard box!
I’ve twice dined in restaurants! Indoors! (The restaurants were allowed to seat at half capacity, but I was the only customer, so it hardly mattered.)
Tomorrow we have tickets for a museum exhibit! Oh man, I am livin’ la vida loca!
New Mexico COVID numbers have been hovering for several weeks at around 200 new cases per day. Last week there were a couple days without fatalities! But in the rest of the country the numbers are creeping upward again, 17% in the last two weeks, and now stand at 68,000 per day, with over 1100 deaths each and every day. Clearly the vaccinations can’t come soon enough.
