Reading Recommendation: Imagine How Creativity Works, by Jonah Lehrer
I promised some more reviews of non-fiction. There was a bit of serendipity to me reading this book: one of my co-workers, Christian Knight, came up and told me about the book by telling me the first story in the book (which is about how mops were improved). Christian is a creative guy who writes video scripts for us at the City (as
well as doing other communications work), and so I filed away his story about the mop. He didn’t remember the title of the book.
So two days later, I download this book and start listening to it while walking Nixie around the block, and what do I hear but the mop story?
At any rate, the writer in me was quite happy with this. Not only does it describe the actual creative process through example (not new to me, but interestingly told), but it then pairs the stories about how the process feels with the neuroscience of how it works.
Pretty perfect for a geeky gal.
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Reading Recommendation: Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman
One of my goals this year is a bit more non-fiction reading. What the heck…good non-fiction is free education, right? Anyway, Thinking Fast and Slow turned out to be a surprisingly good book for the writer in me…as it discusses interesting topics like how readers (and writers) might think. Not directly, not really. But one of the smartest things any of my writing teachers ever told me was that a good author knows how his prose affects the reader…and controls that. A good writer knows how and when to make his reader anxious, to surprise his reader, and to delight them (This advice came from Dean Wesley Smith).
I felt like I learned something.
Note that this is a dense and rich read. I found myself reading a chapter and then thinking about it, and then reading another one. The book works well that way. But don’t expect to finish it quickly!
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Reading Recommendation: After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall, by Nancy Kress
Nancy Kress’s new novella, After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall is out now from Tachyon. It’s a good read. I got an advance peek at it, and I heard her read from it at a local reading earlier this year. I’ve been waiting for it to be available so that I could blog about it.
This novella is good. As in “I will remember it next award season” good.
Nancy uses a unique narrative structure that spans timelines. As usual, the writing is impeccable, the characters interesting, and the story compelling and a bit haunting.
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Reading Recommendation: Fragmentation, or Ten Thousand Goodbyes, by Tom Crosshill
The best science fiction stories shed light on both the future and the present, and the very best make the reader both think and feel. My dog-walking story today was “Fragmentation, or Ten Thousand Goodbyes,” by Tom Crosshill from Clarkesworld, read by the terribly talented Kate Baker. I have no idea why I have never heard of Tom Crosshill before, but now I will watch for his work. I really, really loved this story. It was awesome. I highly suggest you go off and listen to it!
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Reading Recommendation: The Games by Ted Kosmatka
Last night I stayed up late to finish Ted Kosmatka’s new book “The Games.”
It’s really quite good – it reminded me in turn of Michael Chricton’s better work or a Dean Koontz. Yes, I’m comparing it to thriller writers. The Games is solid near-future science fiction but it reads much more like a thriller than a classic sf-book.
I don’t want to give much away, but imagine a future where genetic engineering is allowed in order to create creatures that fight each other to the death. Then introduce a very different designer of such creatures….
I picked this up because Ted has recently moved here and he’ll be a reader at our SFWA reading series on April 17th. The Games is intense, and I enjoyed it very much. In spite of the thriller pacing, I often stopped to admire bits of really nice prose.
Expect to hear more about Ted in the coming years!
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In which I appear at Do the Future and Futurismic
Talking in a rather up-beat fashion about the future. Early last week I got to attend Microsoft’s tech-fest Day 0 and to chat with people there. I wrote a post pretty specifically about that for Do the Future, and incorporated it into my monthly column over at Futurismic. I am feeling a bit more upbeat and positive these days, and I think that showed through in these posts. How do you feel about the future?
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Do The Future Now Online!
My good friend and professional pacific northwest futurist, Glen Hiemstra, has started a new web-based venture at www.dothefuture.com. It’s a pretty website, and quite well done. Of more interest to me, it’s a good antidote for the negative language I often hear about the future. It’s about action, choice, and the people working to make a better world.
Drop by and take a look, leave a comment if you have time, and encourage the effort! Also, there’s a spot on the site where you can comment on how you do the future.
Nice way to think about something besides the difficult campaign rhetoric and nastiness…..
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Reading Recommendation: Huntress, by Malinda Lo
This came to me as an ARC from the World Fantasy convention late last year. I brought it home and stuck it on Toni’s to-read pile since my own pile was too big with books I’d promised various people to read and a few new ones from favorite authors. Toni finished it in days, at the most. She stayed up late in bed, reading it, keeping me awake with the light on. Since I often like the books that she likes, I picked it up the first chance I got to add something un-required to my list.
I loved it.
Malinda has confident and easy voice, and stuffs you right into her world without so much as a by-the-by. I like this technique when it’s executed well, and reading Malinda’s prose was quite close to experience reading Neil Gaiman’s prose. She simply brings a magical world fully to life.
I also liked that this is unapologetically a YA with a central love relationship between two girls. We do live in a world that’s changing, and its good to see same-sex relationships treated with respect and delight and yet not in-your-face. The relationship is part of the plot, important, but not the central story. Huntress is a book about a magical quest and about growing up that includes a same-sex relationship and treats it as normal like air or water. Well done.
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New Economic Model Needed
My column over at Futurismic this month explores the idea that we may need a new economic model. This came to me as I was helping the household fifteen-year-old with her middle ages homework, and looked into the class society and the general model of feudalism. We have changed what we value and how we value it in the past. In fact, we’ve done with with most revolutionary changes such as the industrial revolution, the information revolution, the probably-coming biological revolution (yes, I know Monsanto exists now). Someday we may call the current roiling of political and possibly economic models the social revolution. But I’m wandering a bit – maybe because it’s early. Drop by my column on New Economies and take a look at a few forces shaping our future economic life. Add your own ideas if you have time.
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Pleased! Pyr to publish two of my books
Writing is lots of work, a lot of rejections, a lot of work, a lot of learning, and – once more – a lot of work. Occasionally there’s a reward. I recently received a really great reward that I can finally talk about (translate that as the contracts are signed and in hand at my agent’s office). Really, I’ve been wanting to squeal for a few weeks now. I get to work with Lou Anders!
Lou is truly one of my favorite editors. I like who he is as a person (creative, smart, driven) and how he supports and promotes his authors. And now I get to be one of them. I’m quite pleased to report that Lou has acquired a duology from me.
A little about the books: I’ve always been fascinated with how single individuals can make a big difference. Churchill. Lincoln. Hitler. And for this series, Eva Peron. Yes, the story is told in space and it’s adventure fiction. And no, I don’t have a character named Evita. But I did steal ideas from her real life, and from the musical, and mixed them all up with a generation ship story.
I can’t say any more lest I give out spoilers.
The first book, The Creative Fire, is done. I’m excited to start the second one shortly.
So watch for The Creative Fire from Pyr books late this year…
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