[links] Link salad seeks out the Chaplin
You Can’t Tell Authors You Love Them — jimvanpelt on, well, me. (Among other things.) He’s just read my book The Specific Gravity of Grief.
Do pink ribbon campaigns against breast cancer do any good? — I will also observe that while colo-rectal cancer (my own particular affliction) kills more people every year than breast cancer, I’ve never seen a brown ribbon campaign.
Degrees of Consent — Bad Science on the sociology of pharmacuetical testing.
Sources: Fox Management Slanting D.C. Bureau’s News Coverage — But…they’re Fair and Balanced! Also, this just in, water is wet. Amazing!
Bill O’Reilly e-mail bombs Mike Thompson — What it all boils down to for people who behave like this isn’t defending the concept of free speech, rather defending free speech that agrees with their partisan point of view. Many of them decry Williams losing his job because, in their view, he was too conservative. But then want to defund NPR and cause everyone else at the broadcasting company to lose their jobs because, in their view, NPR employees are too liberal. Once again the justly famed principled consistency and intellectual honesty of the American right triumphs.
Former O’Donnell manager doubles down on the stupid — Christine O’Donnell’s 2008 campaign manager, Jonathon Moseley, is doubling down on her ignorance and making himself a buffoon by offering a $1000 reward to anyone who can find the phrase “separation of church and state” in the constitution. Okay Jonathon, I’ll give you a million dollars if you can find the phrases “separation of powers” or “checks and balances” anywhere in the constitution.
?otD: Charlie or Oona?
10/30/2010
Writing time yesterday: 0.0 hours (medical follies)
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 8.25 hours (interrupted)
This morning’s weigh-in: n/a
Yesterday’s chemo/post-op stress index: 4/10 (fatigue, peripheral neuropathy, emotional distress)
Currently reading: I Wonder by Marian Bantjes
Tags: Books, Cancer, Grief, health, healthcare, Links, media, Personal, Politics, Publishing, Religion
Posted: 7:17 am Sat October 30 2010 | Comments(0) |
[links] Link salad drives home in the misty dark
Midwest Book Review covers small presse releases, including the Fairwood Press release of my single-title novella, The Specific Gravity of Grief — Cancer is a vile mistress for many in life. “The Specific Gravity of Grief” is a combination of novel and memoir from Jay Lake as he combines his own experience with cancer into a novel which he relays as a life not quite his own, but telling his story. “The Specific Gravity of Grief” is a thoughtful take on the cancer story and the grief that follows the loss to the disease, highly recommended. (Via tbclone47.)
AUDIO REVIEW: The Year’s Top Ten Tales of Science Fiction 2 Edited by Allan Kaster — SF Signal, with a lukewarm mention of my short story, “On the Human Plan”.
Best SF reviews my short story “Human Error”
yuki_onna with a great question about male sexuality — She asks men to objectively describe their experiences of orgasm. All kinds of interesting things in comments. And to state the obvious, this link is NSFW, in that it will trigger keyword filters.
Rare Roman helmet goes to auction — An amazing find in Britain. (Via corwynofamber.)
Clouds, Birds, Moon, Venus — APOD channels Maxfield Parrish.
The Fool’s Cap Map of the World — A mighty strange late 16th century map from Strange Maps.
The Bomb Chroniclers — Secret corps of filmmakers documented nuclear tests. (Snurched from here.)
Geocentrism? Seriously? — For those times in your life when Creationism and Intelligent Design just aren’t stupid enough. Although Bad Astronomy says a number of interesting things about geocentrism in this post.
Hybrids May Thrive Where Parents Fear to Tread — (Thanks to Dad.)
[GOP Senate candidate] Angle on why she pulled out of debate she asked for: “We wanted an informed electorate” — The sad part is that statement probably makes sense to her voting base.
?otD: What’s your favorite city?
9/15/2010
Writing time yesterday: 1.5 hours (Sekrit Projekt, 1,800 words)
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 6.5 (interrupted)
This morning’s weigh-in: 251.2
Yesterday’s chemo stress index: 2/10 (fatigue, peripheral neuropathy)
Currently reading: Worldshaker by Richard Harland
Tags: audio, Books, Cool, Culture, Grief, history, Links, Personal, Photos, Politics, Religion, reviews, Science, sex, stories
Posted: 5:03 am Wed September 15 2010 | Comments(1) |
[links] Link salad sees a city in its mind
Criada reacts to The Specific Gravity of Grief — I was very touched by this one.
A reader reacts to Green — They really, really didn’t like it. My favorite part of the review: I should have bought an IT book or something. Best book diss EVAR.
Some thoughts on uniformity — Paul Jessup on story telling.
Engendering Utopia: From Amazons to Androgyny — A reprint of an old IROSF article by specficrider and me.
Okay, kids, play on my lawn — Roger Ebert on video games as art (again), with reference to Shakespeare and Clive Barker.
Science Historian Cracks the ‘Plato Code’ — This is cool. (Thanks to e_bourne.)
Get Fuzzy on kosher dolphins
The fanciful vehicular concept art of 1930s Japan — Very cool stuff from io9.com. The future that never was ours.
Inspiring vintage science fiction art — (Via Dark Roasted Blend.)
The First Photo of a Planet Outside Our Solar System — Wow. More from Centauri Dreams.
More on Research 2000 — Daily Kos on the invalidity of their own polling. This is a serious problem with process, accountability and accuracy. Probably not so much with underlying trending, as this piece points out. For example, Harris says: 45 percent of Republicans (25 percent overall) agree with the Birthers in their belief that Obama was “not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president” (Thanks to ericjamesstone for the nudge.)
Montana GOP seeks to ‘keep homosexual acts illegal.’ — As has the Texas GOP. This is keeping government out of private life, which was all the rage for conservatives during the HCR debate? Tell me again how the conservative movement isn’t grounded in bigotry.
?otD: Are you on the road to nowhere?
7/1/2010
Writing time yesterday: n/a
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 8.5 (solid)
This morning’s weigh-in: 226.6
Yesterday’s chemo stress index: 2/10
Currently (re)reading:
Children of Dune by Frank Herbert
Tags: Art, Books, Culture, Funny, games, gay, Green, Grief, Links, Personal, Photos, Politics, Process, reviews, Science
Posted: 4:51 am Thu July 01 2010 | Comments(8) |
[links] Link salad walks narrow streets of cobblestone
with a review of The Specific Gravity of Grief
Book bloggers catch on with publishers — (Via a mailing list I’m on.)
Nimoy Sunset Pie — Hahah. (Via a mailing list I’m on.)
We are not time travelers — As said in sending this to me, “Today is yesterday’s tomorrow.” Some great retro thinking here. Modern gadgets packaged for 1977.
The Stringer and the Snake-eater — A journalistic view of the McChrystal affair. (Thanks to .)
Newspapers Retract ‘Climategate’ Claims, but Damage Still Done — This is fundamental to the Republican and movement conservative media strategies. Get the outrageous claims into circulation, then use the “liberal media” meme to discredit any walkback or retraction. Really, it’s a brilliant cycle pioneered in the current form by Reagan strategists Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes. (The same Ailes who is News Director at FOX, in case you were wondering about such little details as objectivity — much of the dispute in the 2000 elections arose from a similar strategy of aggressive distortion involving VNS, John Ellis and Roger Ailes. Go look it up, very illuminating reading.) That such brilliance should be put to uses so destructive of American civility, power and potential is a shame. (Via .)
Oil spill hits Mississippi shore — Mississippi’s Republican governor Haley Barbour has assured us all the oil spill will have ‘minimal impact”, ao I’m certain this is no big deal. For more on Barbour’s remarks about the oil spill, see here. This really reminds me of the GOP position on climate change, except in the oil spill the counterfactuals move fast enough to be noticeable by the press cycle and public opinion. They’ve been getting away with ideological-driven lies about the environment for years simply because of the slow pace of change. Must be very puzzling to guys like Barbour that it’s not working now.
?otD: What’s your favorite city?
6/27/2010
Writing time yesterday: n/a
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 8.5 (solid)
This morning’s weigh-in: 225.2
Yesterday’s chemo stress index: 8/10 (GI follies)
Currently (re)reading:
Children of Dune by Frank Herbert
Tags: Books, Culture, Funny, Grief, Links, media, Personal, Politics, Publishing, reviews
Posted: 5:04 am Mon June 28 2010 | Comments(0) |
[cancer] Going in for the last infusion of this cycle
This morning is the last time I go in for my chemo infusion. Session twelve of twelve. We’re bringing cake for the staff (made by and the Niece, with help from their grandmother), a card, two copies of The Specific Gravity of Grief, one for my oncologist and one for the infusion center’s reading library.
Emotional log jam inside my chemo-addled brain. I’ll have intelligent things to say about this later.
Tags: Books, Cancer, Child, Food, Grief, heath
Posted: 6:51 am Fri June 18 2010 | Comments(1) |
[links] Link salad hopes there is still room up on the hill
Reading Recommendation: The Specific Gravity of Grief — Brenda Cooper with a review.
Spring thaw on the North Slope — I have seen these Arctic meltwater lakes from the air and from the ground when I visited Barrow a few years ago, and they are very curious. The land looked like a gaming board.
Banished by the FBI — American citizen trapped overseas on the no-fly list. Civil liberties ‘r us. (Via .)
How to Prevent Language Extinction — Offer not valid in Arizona or within 1,000 yards of Sarah Palin.
Sea creatures flee oil spill, gather near shore — To quote Mississippi’s Republican governor Haley Barbour, “[T]he coast is clear. Come on down!”
Are the Ten Commandments really the basis for our laws? — Some analysis of a cherished Republican talking point. (Thanks to .)
Psychoanalysis of a Republican — Political humor. He, to list but a few examples, rails against government while lauding the Medicare that pays for his sessions; believes the government to be simultaneously incapable of any competent action and yet skilled enough to remake a foreign country or stop a gushing oil well a mile beneath the ocean’s surface; insists that the President is alternately the dupe of foreign countries and the mastermind of a vast globalist conspiracy. When these contradictions are brought to his attention, patient reverts to hostile accusations of bias directed against the therapist or he changes the subject.
Rand Paul’s ideas crash into reality — The Lexington Herald-Leader editorializes on home boy Rand Paul. At the the junction of principle and pragmatism, Paul denounces big government and its costs and intrusiveness, but depends on the little things that big government does for him.
?otD: Does the paper holds your folded face to the floor?
6/17/2010
Writing time yesterday: n/a
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 9.0 (decent)
This morning’s weigh-in: 230.6
Yesterday’s chemo stress index: 4/10 (exhaustion)
Currently (re)reading:
A Hat Full of Sky by Terry Pratchett
Tags: Books, Funny, Grief, Language, Links, Personal, Photos, Politics, Religion, reviews, Science
Posted: 5:32 am Thu June 17 2010 | Comments(1) |
[books] A bit more on The Specific Gravity of Grief, and where I’d like see it go
As I said in Link Salad this morning, The Specific Gravity of Grief was reviewed by GeekDad at Wired.com. It’s a thoughtful, interesting take on the book, which I’m always grateful for.
I have a long term ambition for this book, which is to have copies make their way into oncologist’s offices and infusion centers around the country. I don’t feel a need to make any money off that process, which will push the price down, or possibly lead to some fund-raising as well to place copies very cheaply.
However, for any of that to happen, we need to sell through the 250-unit limited edition printing that Fairwood Press has put out. The wired.com review will help, as will forthcoming reviews. But one of the best things you could do for me and my cancer is spread the word, so people who are interested know about the book and can consider purchasing it. If we can sell through this printing, Fairwood Press will do a cheaper trade paperback edition, which I will work to drive the price down as far as possible on.
Take a minute and go read GeekDad’s review. If you’re interested, or know people who might be, spread the word. The book is available here from Fairwood Press. If you’ve already done so, thank you for supporting this project.
Tags: Books, Cancer, Grief, health, Publishing
Posted: 10:42 am Sat June 05 2010 | Comments(6) |
[links] Link salad is offended by Surfing Samurai Robots
On Measuring The Specific Gravity of Grief — GeekDad reviews my new single-title novella at Wired.com. A thoughtful, interesting review. If you’re interested, you can buy the book here from Fairwood Press.
Zombies, Steampunk, or Historical Fantasy – Help Me Pick the Next Novel to Read — This may be the funniest pre-review of one of my books I’ve ever received. Pinion is the conclusion of a trilogy that sounds fantastic to me. But I don’t want to read the first two books; their existence offends me. Huh?
Ozymandias — Art guru James Gurney with a very cool post about one of his Dinotopia paintings.
Complex Reactions on Titan — Centauri Dreams on the increasingly real possibilities of life on Titan.
A Softer World on honesty, empathy and tact — Ah, the marvels of Internet discourse.
SMBC explains the Prisoner’s Dilemma
Non Sequitur is hilariously political
It Will Happen Again — Bush admits torturing KSM and says he’d do it again. Gee, what a shock.
Hatch’s Partisan Military Service Bill — This just in: Republican senator caught out in mendacious hypocrisy. But I repeat myself. (Source is Rachel Maddow, in case you think she’s a liberal hack not worth watching. A well-sourced liberal hack, admittedly.)
?otD: Does the existence of any particular book offend you?
6/5/2010
Writing time yesterday: n/a (chemo exhaustion)
Body movement: Short suburban walk later (on the pump)
Hours slept: 8.5 (badly interrupted)
This morning’s weigh-in: n/a (forgot)
Yesterday’s chemo stress index: 9/10 (on the pump)
Currently (re)reading:
The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett
Tags: Art, Books, Cool, Culture, Grief, Links, Personal, Pinion, Politics, reviews, Science
Posted: 8:28 am Sat June 05 2010 | Comments(5) |
[books|cancer] The Specific Gravity of Grief
If you’re interested in my single-title novella “The Specific Gravity of Grief” (early review here), it can be pre-ordered from Fairwood Press here.
The initial release is a numbered, limited edition. If it sells through quickly, we’ll probably do a general release. Fairwood Press and I have not yet discussed ebook or online possibilities, but that’s much on my mind.
I’m not generally in the habit of explaining my fiction, but this is a special piece. What I was trying to achieve with it was to communicate the internal emotional experience of cancer, to give a healthy reader a real understanding of what it feels like to go down this road. If I had my way, there would be a copy in every oncologist’s office in America, not for the patients but for the families and caregivers.
It’s not genre fiction, except in the loosest possible sense, but it touches on genre a lot, as I used myself as a character. “The Specific Gravity of Grief” isn’t exactly fiction at all, though it is fictional autobiography without being a roman a clef.
I’ll certainly write more about cancer, both in fiction and outside of it, for the rest of my life, but I suspect this will be my most raw, most honest, unfiltered take. A book to be experienced but not enjoyed, perhaps.
Please excuse my hubris in speaking for the book.
Tags: Books, Cancer, Grief, health, Personal, Publishing
Posted: 5:55 am Mon May 17 2010 | Comments(3) |
[links] Link salad wants to go on the Ed Sullivan show
A first review of The Specific Gravity of Grief — THe reader likes it.
The Future is Written in Fat-Bellied Red Across Every Morning Sky — A positive review of the Escape Pod version of “On the Human Plan”.
Reviews of the DAW anthology Is Anybody Out There? — Including my story “Permanent Fatal Errors”.
SMBC on why there are so few female engineers
A Hidden History of Evil — Why doesn’t anyone care about the unread Soviet archives? (Thanks to .)
Palin pushes abortion foes to form ‘conservative, feminist identity’ — I’m confused. Isn’t this what the Right calls “feminazis”?
Rachel Maddow on GOP reactions to Elena Kagan versus GOP reactions to Harriet Miers — Bald-faced hypocrisy in their own words. Ah, the justly famed principled consistency of the Republican party, for which so many hopefully vote in order to avoid those nasty situationalists on the other side.
?otD: Does anyone even have blue suede shoes anymore?
5/16/2010
Writing time yesterday: 2 hours (editing and WRPA)
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 11.5 (interrupted once; yes, not a typo)
This morning’s weigh-in: 232.0
Yesterday’s chemo stress index: 7/10 (fatigue, peripheral neuropathy)
Currently (re)reading:
The Warrior’s Apprenctice by Lois McMaster Bujold
Tags: Books, Culture, Funny, Grief, Links, Personal, Politics, reviews, stories
Posted: 8:04 am Sun May 16 2010 | Comments(3) |
« Older Posts | Newer Posts »