¡Yo Quiero Painted Man!
Do you live in Spain, not understand English, but still want to read my books?
It looks like I’m going to have some good news for you soon.
In the meantime, maybe I’ll have empanadas for dinner.
Blog
The Coolest Goddamn Thing I Ever Saw
If this is true, it’s the coolest fucking thing in the world.
Genetic engineering has always fascinated me, both as a science fiction fan/writer, and as a member of the human race. It has been around for tens of thousands of years, since mankind first domesticated animals and began sowing plants. But recently, as it has in all aspects of science, genetic engineering has leapt forward, hinting at limitless potential to help mankind raise itself out of the primitive muck it is still mired in before our brief chance at existence snuffs out.
Creating bacteria that can eat waste and poop beneficial materials has been the holy grail of genetic engineers for some time, and there have been spectacular successes and heartbreaking failures. But this, this could change the entire fucking world.
Think of it. No more dependence on foreign oil. No more $4 gas. Oil becomes a limitless, renewable resource, and we spare the planet all the carbon emissions previously used in drilling and refineries. And if there’s still too much carbon? Who cares! We’ll just engineer some bugs that eat carbon and poop chocolate.
Of course, there’s always the chance that the bacteria would overbreed and escape into the environment, eating all the carbon and wood in the world. What an oily, chocolately mess that would be.
There’s a story in there somewhere. Too bad I don’t have time to write it.
Early Reviews
As I mentioned a few posts ago, Harper Collins Australia gave away 10 copies of The Painted Man to a book review website called Booktagger. Booktagger allows users to list books they have read, and share their opinions.
In a promotion, the site offered the copies to the first ten Australian readers to register with the site and request it. The books were all taken, and again the anxiety began.
Will they like it? Will they hate it? Will anyone even bother to read it, much less post a review? Heaven knows, I get plenty of free advance read copies of books that I never end up reading.
Every time a piece of my work is put “out there”, I get these feelings. I have such a love/hate relationship with my writing that it is impossible for me to be impartial and see it as others might, and even if I did, readers are as wide and varied as snowflakes. What one reader loves, another will hate. There are going to be people who despise my writing and are willing to stand on a blog pulpit and describe why in great detail for all to see. I feel like I have to be tensed and ready to roll with the blow to my ego, letting the pain go as I search the review for things I might actually improve in the future.
I always expect the reviews will be bad. I am never entirely satisfied with my own work, and always expect that others will be unsatisfied as well. That many people have enjoyed it so far never seems to help this feeling. Reviews by friends and family, however heartfelt, always feel a little biased, and reviews by publishers are business decisions based on sales potential, and are thus colored in their own way. Against the only critics that really matter, real fantasy book readers, people known for being smart and critical, I am as yet untested.
But the Booktagger readers live on the other side of the world, and don’t know me from a wallaby. They have no reason to say anything nice about me. Surely, if I could trust anyone, it’s them. And how stoked would I be if they liked it?
So with both excitement and trepidation, I started checking the review page for my book, waiting to see if anything popped up.
Since then, five out of those ten readers have posted reviews on the website, with a new one being added almost every day this week, and they’ve all been good so far. It’s am amazing feeling, and makes up for all the nights I spent banging my head against the keyboard and cursing the words (or lack thereof) on the screen.
You can view the ever growing list on Booktagger’s Painted Man Review Page. Another reader posted her review elsewhere, and it was quite positive, but if you haven’t read the book, be warned, because it contains something I consider a major spoiler.
Epidemic
As I have mentioned, there has been an epidemic of babies in my life lately. Call it a blessing or a curse, a new one seems to come along every few weeks. The latest is my new nephew, Zack Dylan Feinsand. Young Zack showed up a few days early, and popped out at a whopping 8 pounds.
Have a look:
Zack was the last one in line before Dani, so my next “welcome to the world” post will be extra special!
The Circle of Life
Having kind of a bizarre week. Within the close A-list of friends and family in my life, there was a wedding, a birth, and a funeral. It’s been a roller-coaster that has left me utterly drained, both physically and emotionally.
All three major life stages were represented in the span of just a few days, the never-ending cycle that has gone on since life first formed into distinct sexes, somewhere in the primordial soup that brought forth life on Earth.
I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I’m thirtysomething and about to become a parent myself, but I’ve found myself thinking about stuff like this a lot. My parents’ mortality. My own aging, and how I am not as resilient as I once was. My child, and how she will carry on a piece of me into future generations. It’s both terrifying and comforting, making me feel helpless against the demands of nature’s laws even as it illustrates a greater pattern that transcends such things and binds the universe together in order and harmony.
I’ve always heard people talk about these feelings, and thought I understood them, but there’s a big difference, it seems, between understanding them and feeling them yourself.
I think that was the last threshhold. I’m an adult now. I can’t deny it any longer.
Shit.