Jay Lake: Writer

[writing|photos] Rio Hondo continues

I awoke this morning from dreams of loss, conflict and Walter Jon Williams. This may have something to do with the excellent gumbo he cooked last night, followed by bananas Foster.

Donnie Reynolds (@dratz of Waterloo Productions) left yesterday. He was kind enough to finish cooking my momos Wednesday night when my feet gave out, but more importantly, interviewed me yesterday morning, then filmed the critique session for “Rock of Ages”. It was good critique, a combination of solid criticism and some important story points, along with validation that the story was doing enough of what I wanted it to do.

My two regrets here at Rio Hondo are that my feet continue to be troublesome, and that my trailing sun sensitivity issues courtesy of my friend Vectibix have not only prevented me from hiking (which given the state of my feet is probably a bad idea anyway) but even from going outdoors at all. I continue to wrestle with the emotional fallout from the recent diagnosis, but being here at the world’s greatest Writer Camp is allowing me to parse it in small bits while immensely enjoying my days.

Oddly, I’m not getting much writing or WRPA done. This done not bother me. I am on vacation, after all. I’m spending hours each day immersed in manuscripts and critique, and hours more in fascinating conversations about everything from Age of Sail combat to social media personae for authors. Not to mention publishing gossip, convention horror stories, plotting sessions and all the other things writers get to talking about when you cram us alone together in a few small rooms for a week.

Meanwhile, a few more photos of the faces of Rio Hondo:

The marmot what hangs out in the lower parking lot — I did not have my 300mm lens on the camera body at the time, unfortunately

Donnie Reynolds prepping the critique shoot

David Levine, of whom I finally got several good shots

Rick Wilbur pretending he doesn’t notice the camera

Kim Zimring, reading

Daniel Abraham, reading

Diana Rowland and her Girl Power t-shirt

Jim Kelly going for the high angle shot

Oz Drummond, thoughtful

The entire Rio Hondo crew, thanks to Donnie Reynolds piloting the camera

Photos © 2013 Joseph E. Lake, Jr. and Donnie Reynolds

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

Tags: documentary, events, friends, New Mexico, Photos, stories, Writing

Posted: 6:17 am Fri May 24 2013 | Comments(2) |

[photos] Your Friday moment of zen

Your Friday moment of zen.

Berries, Washington state. Photo © 2008, 2013, 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, zen

Posted: 6:00 am Fri May 24 2013 | Comments(2) |

[photos] Some more of the faces of Rio Hondo

The workshop at work

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: events, Family, friends, New Mexico, Photos

Posted: 5:55 am Thu May 23 2013 | Comments(7) |

[photos] Your Thursday moment of zen

Your Thursday moment of zen.

Barbed wire, Washington state. Photo © 2008, 2013, 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, zen

Posted: 5:41 am Thu May 23 2013 | Comments(2) |

[photos] Your Wednesday moment of zen

Your Wednesday moment of zen.

Washington state woods. Photo © 2008, 2013, 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, zen

Posted: 5:39 am Wed May 22 2013 | Comments(1) |

[photos] Some of the faces of Rio Hondo

Oz Drummond

Daniel Abraham

Diana Rowland

Rick Wilber

Walter Jon Williams

Carrie Vaughn

David Levine

Jim Kelly

Not shown: K.J. Zimring, Michaela Roessner

Photos © 2013, 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: events, friends, Photos

Posted: 10:57 am Tue May 21 2013 | Comments(7) |

[photos] Your Tuesday moment of zen

Your Tuesday moment of zen.

Jeff VanderMeer at the 2008 South Carolina Book Festivak. Photo © 2008, 2013, 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, zen

Posted: 7:34 am Tue May 21 2013 | Comments(10) |

[photos] Your Monday moment of zen

Your Monday moment of zen.

Test tank exterior at Hanford Site, 2008. Photo © 2008, 2013, 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, zen

Posted: 6:25 am Mon May 20 2013 | Comments(1) |

[conventions|photos] My day two of the Nebula Awards Weekend

Yesterday was my second and final day at the Nebula Awards weekend. Not to bury the lede, the award in my ballot category of Best Novella went to the excellent Nancy Kress for After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall.

My parents and the_child were there, along with my Aunt B— and Uncle L— from Texas.

Dad and Mom

Jersey Girl, Dad, Me, Mom

There was a comic convention going on next door, so some crossover happened.

These are not the SF writers you are looking for

Still we had fun.

Me and Jersey Girl, who’d never attended an SF event before

And though I did not win, I got to give away the Best Short Story Nebula to a charmingly shocked Aliette de Bodard.

I’ll post more later about the emotional experience of this weekend, and how it has intersected with my illness. For now, suffice to say I had an amazingly good time. My family was pretty happy to be there. My thanks to chair Dave Gallaher, SFWA President John Scalzi, and everyone who worked so hard to make this all come together as fantastically well as it did.

Photos © 2013 N. Schaadt and others. All rights reserved, reproduced with permission. As usual, more at the Flickr set.

Tags: Awards, California, Conventions, Family, friends, jerseygirl, Photos

Posted: 5:31 am Sun May 19 2013 | Comments(19) |

[photos] Your Sunday moment of zen

Your Sunday moment of zen.

Test tank exterior at Hanford Site, 2008. Photo © 2008, 2013, 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, zen

Posted: 5:22 am Sun May 19 2013 | Comments(1) |