Best wishes to everyone at the beginning of February. My next book, A Familiar Problem, was originally scheduled for January but has been delayed until later this spring. In the meantime, I'll be presenting at Boskone on Valentine's Day weekend (you can find my schedule at the end of the newsletter). I hope to see you there!
Toward a Successful New Year
One of the writing prompts on Mastodon got me thinking about goals for the new year. Mostly, I’m just going to keep having fun. I also want to work on promoting my work and trying harder to get my work out there. And I’ve got a bunch of current writing projects to work on. Finally, I’m going to keep working to give back to my writing communities.
My primary goal with my writing has always been to have fun. That’s why I’m doing this at all! Early on as I began trying to become a published author, I wrote a post about how to measure success as a writer. Writing — and all of its associated activities — is satisfying to me. And if it became less fun, I’d probably look for something else to do.
I want to work on improving my efforts toward publicity. You can write all you want, but if you don’t publicize your work, it doesn’t get read. I’ve been disgusted that getting people to sign up for a mailing is seemingly still the best way to build an audience. If you look at the upper right-hand corner of the window, you can sign up for my mailing list.
I also want to do a better job of keeping my manuscripts working for me. And that means re-submitting them when they get rejected. It’s tedious to keep sending them out, but that’s the only way you get stuff published. It’s one of my least favorite things to do as a writer.
Of course, I have a number of current works-in-progress that I’m going to keep working on. I’m getting close to a first draft of The Ground Never Lies. This is a sapphic romantasy about a geomancer with an anger problem. I also want to finish the third novella of the sequel to Revin’s Heart: the first two, Devishire! and Campshire! are done, but I think a third will round out a book. And I have another half-dozen things to work on: a sequel to A Familiar Problem, a book about Curtains (a character in the Revin’s Heart universe), and a handful of other on-going projects. It’s not impossible that I might write some more Better Angels adventures.
I will continue to try to support and give back to my writing communities. I’ve become Secretary of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association (SFWA). I continue on the program committee of the Straw Dog Writers’ Guild and run the writing group Straw Dog Writes on Wednesdays. I support (and participate in) the Wandering Shop Stories groups on Mastodon and Bluesky.
In spite of all that’s going well for my writing life, I can’t say it’s going to be a good year. In fact, I’m sure with the coming change in the Federal administration, a lot of the coming year is going to be horrible to watch. But I’ll keep doing what I can to push back.
Running for Re-election as Secretary of SFWA
I am running for re-election as Secretary of SFWA. I have been serving in this role since the special election in November 2024.
My overriding goal as Secretary is to make sure that decisions of the Board are communicated to the membership clearly and in good time. Beyond that, I hope to continue to serve the organization while it navigates a complex transition to new leadership and a more solid foundation during a period of extreme political instability.
When the previous Secretary changed positions last year, another candidate initially stepped forward and I thought, “Great! Someone else wants to do the work!” When that candidate withdrew after the deadline for announcing oneself as candidate, I proposed myself as a write-in candidate and was elected.
I am familiar with the role of Secretary in a non-profit, having served multiple other non-profits in various roles including as Secretary, Vice-President, and President. I believe I am generally effective at working within organizations for positive change.
The most important thing the volunteer Board needs to accomplish first is simply to restore the normal functioning of a member-led organization that has been riven by change, with nearly a complete turnover in staff and leadership over the past year. Restoring and then maintaining normal functioning is a necessary precondition for restoring trust of the membership. I share the frustrations of those who want us to move faster, and I want us to do that effectively by working from a solid foundation.
I am always an advocate for greater transparency, and have proposed the Board consider open meetings. I live in a state that requires open public meetings and I am very familiar with the trade-offs.. At minimum, there need to be clear definitions of what must be discussed in Executive Session and what must be discussed openly. Whether those definitions continue to be done by policy, or via bylaw changes, is important for the membership to consider.
I have already suggested we undertake a bylaws review. This is often a dull, tedious task that may seem to consume a vast amount of time for relatively little direct benefit, but our bylaws are out of date and at variance with how the organization now operates and should operate.
At the same time, SFWA needs strategic planning. We need to assess the current state of the organization, make decisions about what we want to see as a future state, and then develop a plan to move from where we are to where we want to go. By restoring normal functioning and reviewing the bylaws, we can develop an assessment of current state. Then we must engage in the long-range thinking necessary to envision the future state for the organization. Only then can we develop a plan for how to get there.
I would be honored to receive your vote to continue as Secretary of SFWA. I will do my best to work in the best interests of the organization.
There and Back Again: An Arisia Story
I’ve only been attending Arisia for a few years and every year I’ve attended, it’s been at the Westin Seaport in Boston. But this year, they switched to the Hyatt Regency in Cambridge. Evidently, it had been here in the past.
It’s a lot smaller. It filled up so quickly that I wasn’t able to get lodging. And my publisher wasn’t able to get a spot in the dealer room.
I was was able to get on the program. I was scheduled for six panels and a reading. Unfortunately, since I wasn’t able to get lodging, I decided to drive over only for a single day. So I declined the two panels and the reading on Saturday and planned to drive over just for Sunday.
A couple of days before, the forecast changed to predict a serious winter storm for Sunday night. Great, I thought. But I have a four-wheel drive car, so I decided to just go for it.
They had warned the parking might not be available, so I got up at 4:30am and drove into Boston, arriving around 7am. As it turned out, parking wasn’t a problem and I had plenty of time to walk around and find everything before registration opened at 9am. Not that it took long to find things, because the venue was quite small.
I hung out in the cafe for a while and then ran into a writer friend who was setting up to volunteer in registration. We chatted amiably and then, once registration opened, I was able to get my badge, go to Program Nexus to get my presenter packet, get the QR code to get the parking discount, and get set up for my first panel.
It felt crowded and cramped having to squeeze through the hallway that was jammed with people. Arisia requires masks, but I found being in crowds to be nearly panic-inducing even before COVID.
My first panel was The Good, the Bad and the Cringe: Science in Social Media about how misinformation and disinformation has made social media into disaster even worse than journalism was before. All of the participants brought useful information. I was able to offer some unique perspectives about how people use social media, not just for information, but for “lulz” where engagement is more important than veracity. At the same time, I asked the audience to consider which was more important when they were a teenager trying to learn about sex: the sex-ed class or the locker-room? Both perspectives are incomplete: the sex-ex class generally offers only a curated and white-washed view of the truth while the locker room is more authentic, but full of misinformation and distortions. But both perspectives add value.
I had a short break before my next panel Athleticism in Fantasy and Science Fiction. I had wanted to be on the panel because physical fitness and training are essential elements in both Revin’s Heart and A Familiar Problem. I was able to plug my books and contribute several good bits that seemed appreciated by the audience and other participants.
I had a long break until my next presentation. It was so crowded in the hotel, I finally just went out to my car in the freezing parking garage, covered up with my coat, and snoozled for an hour until the cold finally drove me back in.
My favorite session was probably Writing With The Rainbow. This was the only one that was really about authorship. And had all the queer vibes I love. I was able to talk about my books and short stories I’ve written and the goals I’ve been trying to accomplish. I was glad to meet all of other participants and we had a great conversation about the topics.
Immediately after was my last panel, Makerspaces – For When You Can’t Own All The Tools, where I was the moderator. One of the participants had dropped out, so there were only four of on the panel and, so I promoted myself to be a participant as well as moderator. It was a nicely diverse group with another academic makerspace user, someone from a huge independent makerspace, and someone who runs a small makerspace out of their home. I was pleased with how well the questions I’d crafted elicited good conversation and information. I told a couple of stories that resonated with the participants and audience, about making a shimenawa and a story I’d heard about AS220.
As soon as the last panel wrapped up, I hurried out to my car and started driving home. The winter storm was moving in, and I had to drive straight through it to get home. The road signs all said, “Winter Storm Warning! Plan ahead!” Gee, thanks.
Visibility was low in a few spots and the MassPike was snow-covered, so it was sometimes difficult to see lane markings. I averaged about 40mph and took a longer route which avoided the backroads. It increased the travel time by only about 1/3, so was well worth it. It was nice to get home and go to sleep before midnight in my own bed after a very long day.
Now today, I’m back to work, waiting to see if I caught COVID, and dreading the change in administration. But, for a cold snowy day, I’ve made a big pot of clam chowder and am staying in where it’s warm.
I think Arisia is going to be in the same venue again next year, so I’ll plan to make my reservations earlier and recommend my publisher get the request for space in the dealer room as early as possible.
Poŝtmarkoj el Esperantujo: My First Book of Haiku
When I was in grad school, circa 1994, I started writing haiku in Esperanto and exchanged them with my brother Phil. It was a way to practice Esperanto and have “a moment of zen” each day during a time when I was very busy.
At first, most of my haiku were “joke haiku”. I eventually learned that there is a name for joke haiku: senryu. But some of the haiku I wrote, even in those early days, were actually not bad. And doing something creative, however small, was meaningful to me.
A few years later, after I had secured a faculty appointment and moved to the Pioneer Valley, the Haiku Society of America met in Northampton. I attended out of curiosity, and was intrigued when my haiku were taken seriously. I realized that I didn’t have to treat writing haiku as a joke. And that there was a long history of haiku, going back hundreds of years. And a larger world of practice that included tanka, renga, haibun, and more.
Ten years later, I decided to self-publish a book of haiku in Esperanto with English translation: Poŝtmarkoj el Esperantujo. I decided to include artwork along with the haiku and developed a theme of imaginary postage stamps from Esperantujo — Esperanto Land, a fabled country that springs into existence around people when they speak together in Esperanto. I used photographs I’d taken, combined them with a frame that looked like perforations, and added a monetary symbol that used the unicode glyph for spesmiloj, a proposed universal currency.
It was my first attempt to lay out a book. It was a lot of work and it didn’t turn out quite perfectly. But it was pretty good. It was incredibly gratifying to receive the proof in the mail and actually hold it in my hands.
Due to the full color illustrations, it was pretty expensive. But I had a great time showing it to people and giving copies to family and friends. Since it was so expensive, I set the price to be effectively at cost. As costs increased, Amazon became unwilling to sell it (since they don’t make enough profit). So I eventually decided to make it available via Google Books for free. I can still order author’s copies, however, so if anyone really wants printed and signed copy on paper, let me know.
I published three more books of haiku. Premitaj Floroj (Pressed Flowers) used images from the UMass Herbarium. My best work, I think, was senokulvitre (without eyeglasses) for which I created a series of black-and-white illustrations with a narrow range of focus. I still use these images frequently to illustrate blog posts. In 2016, I published the last one, Ideoj Ĝermas (Ideas Germinate) that used creative-commons licensed imagery of seeds from a French museum. These are all still available for purchase.
I’ve written hundreds of haiku in the intervening ten years, but I haven’t published another book. I came up with a great idea for one. But collecting the imagery would be a lot of work and so I haven’t done it. I’m not sure the world needs another book of haiku in Esperanto. I’m not sure it ever did, honestly. It certainly didn’t appreciate them. But I had fun making them and that’s what really counts in the end.
Boskone 2025 Schedule
I’ve gotten my final schedule for Boskone, Feb 14-16! I’m moderating one panel, serving on three others, and offering a reading on Saturday afternoon.
Start Time Title
Fri 2:30 PM Biology in SF/F
Sat 10:00 AM SF and Totalitarianism
Sat 11:30 AM Genetic Engineering (mod)
Sat 5:30 PM Reading: Steven D. Brewer
Sun 10:00 AM Fantasy Beyond Swords and Sorcery
There are a lot of great people on the panels with me. It should be a lot of fun!
We didn’t get a table in the dealer room this year and so, since I’ll otherwise be at liberty, I’ve decided to organize a fan table for SFWA. It will be in the Galleria (along with the dealer room) so stop by to say hi!
