Books Read in 2007

Sigh.  Slowed down on my novel-reading considerably since the beginning of September.  Can't read and write at the same time, me...

Carnival, Elizabeth Bear
Thunderbird Falls, C.E. Murphy
Miss Melville Regrets, Evelyn E. Smith
Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al Madinah and Meccah, Sir Richard Burton
Changeling, Delia Sherman
Girl Genius, Omnibus Volume I, Phil and Kaja Foglio
An Assembly Such As This, Pamela Aidan
Definitely Dead, Charlaine Harris
To Ride a Rathorn, P.C. Hodgell
Deliverer, C J Cherryh
Agatha Heterodyne and the Circus of Dreams, Phil and Kaja Foglio
Agatha Heterodyne and the Clockwork Princess, Phil and Kaja Foglio
Tam Lin, Pamela Dean
Duty and Desire, Pamela Aiden
Unshapely Things, Mark Del Franco
Narbonic, Volume 4, Shaenon K. Garrity
Grey, Jon Armstrong
Time's Child, Rebecca Ore
The Margarets, Sheri S. Tepper
All Together Dead, Charlaine Harris
The Golden Compass, Philip Pullman (re-read)
Ilario: The Lion's Eye, Mary Gentle
Ilario: The Stone Golem, Mary Gentle
Hellspark, Janet Kagan  (re-re-re-re-re&c-read)
Undertow, Elizabeth Bear
Thin Air, Rachel Caine
Into the Wild, Sarah Beth Durst
Last Chance to See, Douglas Adams and Mark Carwardine
Lady Susan, Jane Austen
Bad Monkeys, Matt Ruff

Why is the Sun Up?

The hurricane passed by yesterday afternoon and evening, on its way to Nova Scotia. Impressive amount of wind throwing rain like trebuchet loads of pebbles at the windows. We weathered it warm, dry, with lights unflinching (well, OK, they flinched a little bit -- but you would have, too).

We did the thrice-damned Thing with the clock, so of course I woke up at "4:30" this morning, and will be exhausted by "9:30" this evening. Can we please just choose one time system and stick with it?

Didn't think so.

The Last Burst to get Duainfey outta here corresponded with a burst at the day-job, the combination of which did my wrists no good at all. I tried to ease off as much as a I could, only to notice on Friday that the pain in my right wrist was not the usual toothachy pain of (mere) tendonitis, but a hard pull on the palm side of the wrist, which is Much Scarier. Get thee behind me, Carpel Tunnel Syndrome! I need to get cracking on Longeye, which is still due in March-at-the-latest, the day-job workload isn't looking like easing off any time soon, and neither of those is negotiable.

Lest you think us sluggard, we've signed a bazillion books this weekend, enough to cover the rest of the Liaden Universe(R) Companion Volume Two orders that still need to be mailed. We did go out for breakfast yesterday morning at the South End Cafe -- mmmm, strawberry crepes -- before the rain hit, and drove out to Unity under a gray and busy sky.

Today, we'll take some time off to do an interview in Second Life:

Meet the Authors Steve Miller and Sharon Lee
Sat Nov 03 19:35:19 2007

Sci fi writers Steve Miller and Sharon Lee will be on the Meet the Author show at 2pm SLT today (Pacific time, Sunday) to discuss their fiction and their experience on SL. They're well known on SL as Elan Neruda and Kit Wright Jimenez and fans of their stories about the Liaden Universe enjoy their Chatrez sim.

See them in Cookie Town Center at 2pm where they will be interviewed and take questions from the audience. This event will be broadcast by SLCN TV on www.slcn.tv so come along and be filmed.

...then back to bidness as usual. Perhaps I'll recover the top of the worktable today...

Liad in Russian, Part Two

As reported Elsewhere in this Journal, we recently received the Russian edition of the novel known as Balance of Trade (aka Commercial Balance, according to the Babelfish translation, which is...charming... in a demented sort of way) from Meisha Merlin's agent. This was very pleasant and we did truly rejoice in receiving it.

We were subsequently made aware, by _aisling_, that the Russian edition of Crystal Soldier (aka Soldiers of the Crystal) was already in print, which was...interesting, since we have not yet seen a copy. One thing led to another, which finally led to this, and the realization that, in addition to Crystal Soldier, we have never seen Russian editions of Local Custom/Scout's Progress (aka Local Custom/Way of the Intelligence Officer) or of Plan B/I Dare (aka Plan to b. derzayu).

So, the plea -- can someone help us acquire these books? If you can help -- or can think of a way to help (there is, for instance a Big Russian Language Bookstore in New York, but their website is not very friendly to non-Russian-language readers and their phone service is, um...less so) -- accomplish this, drop me a note.