My God, it’s full of books

My first-ever podcast interview is up, thanks to Shaun Duke and Julia Rios! During ICFA, they interviewed me for the Skiffy & Fanty Show and it was excellent fun.  We talked about Cooking the Books, upcoming stories in Asimov’s and Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and the worldbuilding behind Bone Arrow… which led me to talk about:

(A) Clouds & wind
(B) Monsters
(C) Wingbuilding

       or

(D) Poop

If you selected D, you win! Great Job, Me! I blame this odd turn of events on my forebears, engineers all. But, truth be told, I do think about structural and engineering details a lot when I build a world. And one part of those details is often poop. Even if it’s not always front and center in the books (Which, thank goodness, it’s not,), thinking about it is important. Go on, have a listen.

So, there you go — more than you ever wanted to know, possibly. Along with the very helpful caution to not run your public water supply through a cemetery.

I’m still curious as to who Chadwick is. People have been sending me helpful suggestions.

Under the sign of Tor.

In other news from last week, I got to visit the Tor home office – which was very cool! The Flatiron building is amazing and gorgeous and exactly the kind of place I pictured myself having a stylish office (and equally stylish wardrobe) when I was in school.

While I wasn’t allowed to visit the house Kraken*, or to play with the Faraday cage**, or borrow any of the Tesla gear*** that they deny storing on site, I can attest that my first thought upon entering the Tor offices was:

“My God, it’s full of books.”

Because it really, really is.

I visited with editors including Melissa Ann Singer, Claire Eddy, the wonderful Ardi Alspach, met Tom Doherty briefly, as well as many fantastic people on the editorial, graphic design, and marketing teams, and got to hang out with Miriam Weinberg and Kelly Quinn, Diana Pho, and Marco Palmieri. And Miriam and I nattered a bit about the book – which was very exciting!

Your weight on a Neutron Star, at the Hayden Planetarium

I also had a chance to visit the Hayden Planetarium with a fabulous young person of my acquaintance. I have determined that this is the best way to visit any planetarium. We played with all the things!  And then had dinner with Asimov’s editor, Sheila Williams and friends – my first introduction to the sheer size of salads at Manhattan diners. This was a very good evening, filled with salad.

Now I’m back home for a few months, grateful for the travel and happily working on several projects that I can’t talk about quite yet. I promise to keep you posted.

 

* Not really
** Well maybe
*** 100% Swear This Is Completely Untrue, For Real