Jay Lake: Writer

[links] Link salad takes a right at the light, heads on until night

Don’t forget to vote in the Flash Fiction Open contest: [ jlake.com | LiveJournal ]

Shaun Farrell comments on my recent podcast interview with Mur Lafferty

Google’s Schmidt on Google Books settlement — Basically, “tough shit”, is how I read this. (Via @LAGilman.)

20 most bizarre Craigslist adverts of all time

Centauri Dreams with more on light craft

Dreams of a Lunar Observatory — If you could build an observatory on the Moon, what would you look for? Cheese?

One, Two, Three, Many — Scrivener’s Error asks some smart questions about electoral districting, does not supply answers.

Conservative Politics Disguised As Religion — Ah, the Presidential Prayer Team. Hey, conservative America, those religious convictions not so strong when you find yourself praying for a black man? Racism much?

?otD: Who made Go-Kart Mozart’s weather charts, anyway?

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9/16/2009
Body movement: 60 minute suburban walk
Hours slept: 5.5
This morning’s weigh-in: 231.8
Currently reading: The Real Wizard of Oz by Rebecca Loncraine

Tags: audio, contest, Culture, Funny, interviews, Links, Personal, podcasts, Politics, Polls, Publishing, Religion, Science, stories, weird

Posted: 5:32 am Thu September 17 2009 | Comments(0) |

[sale] Audible.com acquires audio rights to Green

In the good news for the day department, I am pleased to announce that my good friends at Audible.com have acquired the audio rights to Green. [ Powell's | Amazon | Kindle | Barnes & Noble | Borders ] Don’t have a release date yet, but watch this space for more details.

Tags: audio, Books, Green, Sale

Posted: 3:03 pm Wed September 16 2009 | Comments(2) |

[photos] Your Wednesday moment of zen

Your Wednesday moment of zen.

Old boat, photographed by me in southern Taiwan, around 1973. Apparently even then I had an eye for industrial decay.

© 1973, 2009 by Joseph E. Lake, Jr.

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Tags: Personal, Photos, Taiwan, zen

Posted: 4:43 am Wed September 16 2009 | Comments(0) |

[links] Link salad legs it into hump day, reconsiders choice of headlines

Don’t forget to vote in the Flash Fiction Open contest: [ jlake.com | LiveJournal ]

Best Quote of the Day (and it’s only 2PM) — In which I am quoted. Hee.

The Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award — Check this out, if you’ve been published in the UK. (Via .)

busts a cap on genres

Cthulhu is Bullshit — Hilarious rant on the Great Old Ones.

Is This A Good Idea? Preparedness for Zombie Attacks? — The academic value of zombie studies. (Via io9.com.)

Reagan Was a Leninist — Hahaha.

Fed up with deficits or Democrats? — But I doubt that the tens of thousands who marched on Washington on Saturday would have been there if John McCain had been elected and the deficit was the same. I can’t believe those conservatives/libertarians would have mounted the same demonstration against a Republican president. Are they aware that the largest two-year tax cut in U.S. history — 282 billion — was enacted as part of Obama’s stimulus package?

No compassion — Is that, in the end, what defines modern conservatism? An almost sociopathic indifference to the thoughts and feelings of others? That’s one way to interpret the “I’ve got mine, and you can’t have it” ethos of conservatism. The Tragedy of the Commons might as well be the GOP manifesto.

?otD: The king is gone, but is he forgotten?

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9/16/2009
Body movement: 15 minutes of stretching and meditation, 60 minute suburban walk
Hours slept: 5.75
This morning’s weigh-in: 230.8
Currently reading: The Real Wizard of Oz by Rebecca Loncraine

Tags: Contests, Cool, Culture, Funny, Links, Personal, Politics, Polls, Publishing, stories, weird, Writing

Posted: 4:37 am Wed September 16 2009 | Comments(1) |

[photos] Portrait of the author as a young man

Me and , circa 1973 or so, I believe in Tainan, Taiwan. I was about 9, my sister was about 7.

© 1973, 2009 by Joseph E. Lake, Sr.

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Sr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Tags: family, Personal, Photos, Taiwan

Posted: 8:01 pm Tue September 15 2009 | Comments(0) |

[writing] The Sekrit Projekt progresses

An hour and three quarters (roughly) on the Sekrit Projeckt today. Progressing apace.

WIP…

He could hardly contain his excitement as he waited for Pai-mei in his small compound on an alley off Jen Ai Road. The place appeared nondescript from the outside, surrounded by a gray brick wall topped with shards of shattered glass to discourage acrobatic thieves. The roof was kept in a careful state of disrepair as well, to reduce the attention he might draw from criminals or taxmen.

Within was another matter entirely. The place was most pleasantly luxurious, a combination of the best of American technology and Chinese ingenuity. He’d even managed some Persian rugs, and the humidor in the parlor was almost always stocked with Cuban cigars brought over from Hong Kong. Real Cuban, not “Cuban” fakes from Guangzhou.

The contrast between appearance and reality was fine with him. Precisely according to plan, in fact. It kept curious neighbors away and gave him a safe, comfortable place to work.

Tags: wip, Writing

Posted: 5:19 pm Tue September 15 2009 | Comments(2) |

[contests] Flash Fiction Open voting round is here

Photographed at the Whatcom Creek Estuary, in Washington State, by .

© 2009. All rights reserved. Reproduced with permission.

Per a suggestion from , and with agreement from whose photo this is, I held a flash fiction open round. Using ‘s photo as their inspiration, twenty people wrote a piece of flash (500 words or less).

All of the stories can be read here: [ jlake.com | LiveJournal ]

I had four celebrity judges read all twenty stories, and give me preliminary rankings. My thanks go out to , , and . Also, thanks and congratulations to everyone who played along. This was so much fun that I’ll do another one of these before too long, I’m sure.

Now it’s time to vote, in the poll here. The five finalist stories are all linked from the poll post, so it’s easy to click through and peruse them. Check it out, and support your favorite.

Tags: Calendula, Contests, Photos, Polls, stories

Posted: 2:04 pm Tue September 15 2009 | Comments(8) |

[polls] Flash Fiction Open voting poll

This is the voting poll for the Flash Fiction Open [ jlake.com | LiveJournal ].

Tags: Contests, Fiction, Polls

Posted: 1:12 pm Tue September 15 2009 | Comments(3) |

[personal] A glimpse inside my mind

In case you were wondering how my mind works, here’s a partial list of the things that I thought about on my pre-dawn walk this morning, in semirandom order as I can recall them an hour later:

• Why the local police have switched from Crown Vics to Dodge Chargers
• The value of a passive predation strategy that relies on stupid prey (ie, spiders in their webs)
• World building and character elements in Sunspin
• Whatever happened to wooden wheels on cars?
• some more
• The question of artifactual intelligence vs nonartifactual intelligence, and whether the human race as a whole is missing the point
• That I need to go to the grocery store today or tomorrow
• Where the hell the moon was, since I’d seen it in the sky yesterday morning
• ‘s new school year
• What was the animal in the bushes that sounded like a wounded howler monkey
• Oregon weather
• The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction

Tags: Books, Calendula, cars, Child, Northwest, Personal, Sunspin, Writing

Posted: 4:52 am Tue September 15 2009 | Comments(5) |

[photos] Your Tuesday moment of zen

Your Tuesday moment of zen.

Cathedral Park, under the St. John’s Bridge in North Portland, photographed by me.

© 2006, 2009 by Joseph E. Lake, Jr.

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Tags: Photos, Portland, zen

Posted: 4:44 am Tue September 15 2009 | Comments(5) |