editing

How am I doing?

~ ianrandalstrock ~ Leave a comment

Last night, I was at Readercon for about 25 minutes. I went to the hotel just to drop off the boxes of books which I’ll be setting up today. Then I returned the luggage cart, and in the forty feet I had to walk from leaving the luggage cart to exiting the hotel door to get back to the car, I stopped and talked with five people I know. (In other words, a standard convention: can’t walk down a hall without stopping to talk.)

Each of them asked how I was doing, and to each, I gave the same flippant answer I’ve been using for years: “I’m properly insane.” With those three words, I usually intend to convey the fact that I’m busy, doing many things, but they’re the things I should be doing.

But last night, getting ready for bed, I had something of an epiphany. Sure, I’m busy, but actually the answer to “how am I doing?” is “pretty damn good!”

RESISTANCE (the anthology I edited to help support the ACLU and Pro Publica) is doing well, and people are appreciating it.

Last week, I got a fan letter about PUNCTILIOUS PUNCTUATION.

I’m excited to be publishing Allen Steele’s newest novel, LEMURIA 7, on Tuesday.

I’m just about finished editing a really great book about film that I’ve been enjoying.

I’m excited to be working with a brand-new author on a two-book science fiction tale that I think a lot of people are going to like as much as I do.

I’ve got several more authors waiting for my close attention, most of them waiting patiently.

And in the few brief moments I give myself to do my own writing, it feels like I’m improving. And when I finish the stories I’m working on, I have some confidence I’ll be able to find an editor who agrees that they’re good, and wants to publish them.

I’m doing a job I want to be doing. My friends seem to value and like me, and I’m very glad to have them in my life.

And now I have to leave to go set up those books at the convention, because selling books and talking on panels to appreciative audiences is my day job.

Sure, I’m busy, trying to think in several different directions at once. But you know what? I’m doing pretty damn good!

Science Fictionally Productive

~ ianrandalstrock ~ 3 Comments

In the days of LiveJournal, it was “three things make a blog post.” Well, today it was more than three, but it was very productive science fictionally, and felt quite good.

First, there was a productive session of editing a novel Fantastic Books will soon be publishing.

Then I took a very nice walk in the woods. Found an interesting group of green acorns on a fallen piece of branch, and saw a rabbit on the way back.

Then I looked at my email, and found a contract! It’s a story the editor had told me he was buying three months ago, but it didn’t feel “official.” Now, reading the contract, it feels much better, almost official. My next appearance in Analog will be a short-short story called “On the Rocks”!

Then I checked the other email account, and found two messages. One, telling me the panel I’d recorded for ConTinual way back when will finally be posted tomorrow morning, about 9:30. You can access ConTinual at Facebook.com/groups/ConTinual, and I’ll add in a link to the panel when it’s available. The panel was about the enduring and growing legacy of “The Eye of Argon,” with Keith R.A. DeCandido, Hildy Silverman, and Michael A. Ventrella. [Edited: here’s the link for the Facebook-hosted video: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ConTinual/permalink/690968394849069/ ]

The other message gave me my schedule for virtual Capclave (online on October 17). At 3:00pm Eastern time, I’ll be talking about “Writing Time Travel and Paradoxes” with Iver P. Cooper, A.T. Greenblatt, and James Morrow. And then, at 4:30, it will be “Centennial Superstars” with Walter H. Hunt and Barbara Krasnoff.

So, yes, it was a pretty good day.

P.S. – I still hate this new “blocks” editor for blog posts. I’ve read several articles, but still can’t figure out how to put the image in a paragraph of text and run the text around it (like I used to be able to). Instead (as you can see above), all I’ve been able to figure out is to post the picture as its own paragraph (“block”), which is just ugly.