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I should not have done it.
I have a manuscript due on the editor’s desk in January. I took a week off to write a short story set in my background of Metachronopolis, the golden city beyond the end of time. My previous two Metachronopolis stories, CHOOSERS OF THE SLAIN and MURDER IN METACHRONOPOLIS both appeared in Mike Allen’s CLOCKWORK PHOENIX anthology. The last time I wrote him, he said he would look at another Metachronopolis story, and I was so eager to continue the tradition, that I sent him story written just for him for CLOCKWORK PHOENIX 4.
Why am I telling you this? Because I would like all of you who are superstitious to cross your fingers, and all who believe in divine intervention to cross yourselves for me, and if you are an atheist, you are useless to me, because I would really like to sell this story, and it will take some sort of miracle.
It is one of the few tales I wrote with a specific editor in mind (well, the book I wrote for John W Campbell Jr, THE CONCUBINE VECTOR does not really count) and I am as shy as a girl at a Sadie Hawkins dance asking a guy out. (And if you are too young to catch the reference, you should talk to your parents more often. Or their parents.)
For those of you unfamiliar with his work, Mike Allen set out to collect stories (if I may quote his guidelines) “that sidestep expectations in beautiful and unsettling ways, that surprise with their settings and startle with the ways they cross genre boundaries, that aren’t afraid to experiment with storytelling techniques.”
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This weekend is my birthday, and it will mark the last 30 days of operation of the online massive multiplayer superhero game CITY OF HEROES. It is being shut down by NC Soft, and, as best we startled and woebegone players can tell, not due to lack of money.
That this is the best superhero computer game available. No other game has anything near the range of options for power sets and costume design. You can write up a short backstory or bio if you wish, and give your cape a “It’s Clobbering Time” style battlecry, and you can even design your own batcave or secret base. More ambitious players can design and run their own adventures in something like a holodeck, and invite other players to join.
I have roughly one hundred and fifty characters on the fifteen servers in this game. As you can tell from that number, the making up of new characters is my favorite part of the game.
All my characters are going to die in thirty days, evaporate, retire to oblivion, when Paragon City and all its environs and nearby parallel dimension go into oblivion.
Here are a few of my favorites. I include a screen shot and a copy of the bio. See if you recognize anyone.
If you want to sign the petition to keep any of my favorite characters alive, go here: http://www.change.org/petitions/ncsoft-keep-ncsoft-from-shutting-down-city-of-heroes
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I want to have one of my characters in AD 11055 discovering that the only language he has in common with the posthuman self-aware machinery covering the earth from pole to pole is Latin say to himself “All roads lead men forever to Rome.”
What is the correct grammatical way to say this? My untutored guess is
Omnes via ducunt homines per saecula Romam
— but if any of ya’ll Latin scholars out there can help me not embarrass myself before I go to press, I’d be grateful.
My local bookstores are neither carrying my latest COUNT TO A TRILLION, nor the paperback of my beautiful and talented wife’s latest masterpiece, PROSPERO IN HELL. So I would like to conduct a completely nonscientific poll and ask anyone willing to leave a note here on my blog: Did you see either book in your local bookstore?
Congress shall make no law regarding the establishment of religion or the free exercise thereof, except in regard to appointing an unelected Bureaucrat to arbitrarily misdirect private medical insurance funds for non-medical use, such as providing free condoms, free sterilization, and free abortion-enduing drugs to kill unborn children, in which case, Congress shall have no limits on its total power to whatever the hell it damned well pleases. Whereupon the Stamp Act, the Tea Act and the Townshend Acts and the Intolerable Acts will look quite tolerable in comparison.
Next up: reading the Bible declared a hate crime, and Menino, Emanuel and Lee announce this “hatebook” is not welcome in Boston, or San Francisco, and Biblical values are part of Chicago values.
What is offering just a small pinch of incense to divine Caesar worth?
Please read this article, register, and leave a comment in support:
Unfortunately, I spent my lunch money for this week going to Chik-Fil-A yesterday. So if you want me to go to eat anti-bullying-thug chicken sandwich today, you will have to put seven dollars into my my tip jar (see the tip button to the right).
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Okay. Here is the anecdote that John C Wright, innumerate, found in MEN OF MATHEMATICS:
here’s a popular story that Gauss, mathematician extraordinaire, had a lazy teacher. The so-called educator wanted to keep the kids busy so he could take a nap; he asked the class to add the numbers 1 to 100.
Gauss approached with his answer: 5050. So soon? The teacher suspected a cheat, but no. Manual addition was for suckers, and Gauss found a formula to sidestep the problem:
Sum from 1 to n = {n(n+1)}/2
Sum from 1 to 100 = {100(100+1)}/2 = (50)(101) = 5050
Shamelessly stealing the anecdote from real life, and assuming my hero could figure out the same trick, here is the way I describe it in my book:
Menelaus had simply folded the number line in half in his mind, noticed that every one of the fifty pairs added up to one hundred one, and multiplied one hundred one by fifty.
But a reader said
Found mistake in sum 1-100. I’m probably the 5050′th person to mention that. The correct answer is 101×50 not 101×50 – 50.
So … is he simply wrong here? From the balance of his comments, I don’t have much faith in the gentleman’s reading comprehension, but I also know I am the worst student of mathematics the human race has ever produced, so I’d like a second opinion.
Some kind reader set me straight, please.
I received this note this day in my mail.
“Mr. Wright, I find myself and my compatriots in need of assistance.I am a member in Northern Kentucky University’s pro-life group, Northern Right to Life. Since our conception, every year when we put up our displays, which are obviously anti-abortion, they are vandalized and torn down.
The year we were founded, Professor Sally Jacobson took her class outside to tear down our Cemetery of Innocents (the one with the hundreds of white crosses representing the murdered children). She was let go, but the damage continues.
It has happened again this year.
Our “Onesie Display”, some clotheslines with baby clothes hung and every fourth garment marked with a red X in tape for the one out of four children murdered, has been torn down twice in as many days. The cops have been notified, and are taking measures to stop this. However, I am tired of it, and with the approval of my President have decided to start as much of a Publicity Firestorm as I can.
I have already been interviewed by the Campus Paper, though I am not sure if this will be used for article fodder. I would go to the local news, but this seems like something they would consider to small to mention.
This is where you may be able to help. If you could make some sort of mention of this on your blog, and if possible contact Marc Barnes of bad Catholic and any other bloggers sympathetic to the cause, all of us would be immensely grateful.
At your service, Mr. Nathaniel Thomas Hall
Since the display is only up until Easter, I thought I should simply post his letter and ask anyone interested in free speech and saving babies and all the things the PC-niks hate to gin up some publicity for this guy.
Read the remainder of this entry »
The novel by my lovely and talented wife, PROSPERO REGAINED, is in a book tournament today. Various books are being put up against other books to compete for Best Book of 2011.
PROSPERO REGAINED is, sadly, up against A DANCE WITH DRAGONS by George R. R. Martin. Her only chance for success is if you, dear reader, immediately vote for her book before the great Mr Martin becomes aware of the contest, and with a wave of his hand dispatches his many hordes of fans his talents have won him to flood the ballot box.
Today is the last day! Vote right away!
http://www.bookspotcentral.com/2012/03/13/6th-annual-book-tournament-round-1-westeros-bracket/
Since this is Advent, and all my good Protestant friends and bad Catholic friends are spending extra time in prayer as the days grow darker, I thought I would pass this along from the friend of mine, an ex-witch now practicing Catholic named Mrs Furby.
We are asking everyone to say a prayer for “Darkhorse” 3rd Battalion 5th Marines and their families They are fighting it out in Afghanistan & they have lost 9 marines in 4 days.
Pass it along and Semper Fi.
This is what SCOPES.COM says about this particular chain letter:
The U.S. 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines (Darkhorse) suffered heavy personnel losses in Afghanistan between October 2010 and its return to Camp Pendleton in April 2011. According to the San Diego Union-Tribune, thirteen members of the battalion were killed in the Oct./Nov. timeframe:
An infantryman from Camp Pendleton’s 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment was killed in action in Afghanistan, the Pentagon announced [on 8 November 2010].
Lance Cpl. Randy R. Braggs, 21, of Sierra Vista, Ariz., died Nov. 6 while conducting combat operations in Helmand province, the Department of Defense said.
Braggs was the 13th member of 3/5 killed since the battalion moved into the Sangin area of northeastern Helmand province in October, including four felled in a single bomb attack on their mine-resistant all terrain vehicle.
Two other Marines were fatally shot at a patrol base last week in Sangin, the Marines said. Initial reports indicate they were attacked by a rogue Afghan soldier who then fled, according to U.S. and NATO officials in Afghanistan. An investigation into the incident is continuing.
As noted in an Associated Press account, the area of Afghanistan in which the 3/5 operated is regarded as a particularly key (and violent) area of that country:
U.S. Marines who recently inherited this lush river valley in southern Helmand province from British forces have tossed aside their predecessor’s playbook in favor of a more aggressive strategy to tame one of the most violent places in Afghanistan.
U.S. commanders say success is critical in Sangin district — where British forces suffered nearly one-third of their deaths in the war — because it is the last remaining sanctuary in Helmand where the Taliban can freely process the opium and heroin that largely fund the insurgency.
The district also serves as a key crossroads to funnel drugs, weapons and fighters throughout Helmand and into neighboring Kandahar province, the spiritual heartland of the Taliban and the most important battleground for coalition forces. The U.S.-led coalition hopes its offensive in the south will kill or capture key Taliban commanders, rout militants from their strongholds and break the insurgency’s back. That will allow the coalition and the Afghans to improve government services, bring new development and a sense of security.
Another Associated Press report from November 2010 described the difficulty (and heavy casualties) the Marines were encountering during operations in that region of Afghanistan:
The Marines patrolling through the green fields and tall mud compounds of Helmand province’s Sangin district say they are literally in a race for their lives. They are trying to adjust their tactics to outwit Taliban fighters, who have killed more coalition troops here than in any other Afghan district this year.
“As a new unit coming in, you are at a distinct disadvantage because the Taliban have been fighting here for years, have established fighting positions and have laid the ground with a ton of IEDs,” said Lt. Col. Jason Morris, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment. “You have to evolve quickly because you have no other choice.”
Many of the younger Marines also have had to cope for the first time with seeing their best friends die or suffer grievous wounds. Fifteen Marines have been killed and about 50 wounded since the battalion arrived in October [2010] — many by improvised explosive devices or IEDs.
Between 8 October 2010 and its April 2011 return home, the 3/5 lost 24 Marines while conducting Operation Enduring Freedom combat operations in Helmand province:
Dark Horse Battalion was rotated back to the U.S. in April 2011. Its place in Afghanistan was taken by the 1st Battalion, 5th Regiment, also from Camp Pendleton.
Are any of you scholars out there willing to help a poor student with his Latin? Here is text from my current manuscript:
His voice was so horse and cracked that it made me wince and wish I had a canteen to lend him. He sounded like he’s swallowed sand. “Ego sum, ego sum, sicut vinum sanguis tuus bibiturus sum usque ad ebrietatem.”
It was Latin. The magic was that allowed me to understand languages was not helping me out, but I did catch the gist of what he’d just said. It is I, even I, who shall drink your blood like wine even unto drunkenness.
What world was he from? This one? Another?
He spoke again in his voice of dry creaking: “Ducunt volentem fata, nolentem trahunt.”
The tone of voice was clear: sardonic, contemptuous, deadly. The Fates lead the willing, the unwilling they drag.
Your humble author is afraid he has butchered the language. Courtroom Latin is about the extent of my knowledge.
I came across a website where Poul Anderson’s copyright protected books can be downloaded freely. I told them that the material was under copyright. This is the response I received:
Dear John,
Thank you very much for bringing the Poul Anderson book to our attention. Unfortunately, the law requires us to wait from notice from the copyright holder for us to take action which is why the DMCA letter is required. If Mr. Anderson contacts us, we will promptly remove the offending document.
Thanks again for your cooperation in this matter.
Best regards,
The docstoc Team
This sound screwy to me. Why can’t they take something down that they know to be under copyright? Nonetheless, If anyone reading this can tell me who represents the estate of Poul Anderson or who his agent is, please tell me. (My SFWA handbook was carried away by giant bugs.) Anyone have their handbook at hand?
