Fortune-telling and ChatGPT
There’s a whole genre that’s emerged recently that is basically “Look what ChatGPT” said. Rather than fight it, here’s my contribution. I asked ChatGPT: “Do you know the novelist Erik Hanberg?” And it did! So that’s either great or terrifying, depending on how you view language models/AI chatbots these days. It wrote, among other things: He has written several books, including both fiction and non-fiction works… Hanberg is also the founder of a publishing company called Swan Tower, which helps independent authors publish and market their work. It starts well, but then… Swan Tower? Huh? What the heck is that? Read more…
100 seconds to midnight?
It’s no accident that my cover for 1999 has a nuclear explosion on it. The plot is about a year that repeats over and over. I started with the central idea of so many time loop movies, but I asked, “What if the time loop was for a whole year instead of just a day?” I also wondered, “What if everyone knew they were in a time loop? And not just the one or two main characters?” The more I played out the scenarios in my head, the uglier it got. Hence, the bomb right there on the cover. Our collective experience of COVID featured heavily Read more…
1999… on YouTube!
I’m trying something new with my newest book, 1999. I worked with the great Doug Mackey, who narrated The Lattice Trilogy, to create an audiobook of 1999. And, for the first time, I’m experimenting with having the audiobook on YouTube. You can buy your own copy on all the main audiobook sites. But as more and more people are using YouTube, I thought I’d try this out. It’s also a good way to check out the book risk-free! If you like it, keep listening or go buy it and finish it on your Kindle or in paperback!
The power of play
I’m fascinated by the ways that recreation and play react to technology changes–but sometimes can drive technological change too. How to make a whistle One of the examples of “play” following technology is the tin whistle. I knew the rough idea of how the tin whistle came to be when I identified it as the title for the last book of The Lattice Trilogy. But in order to make sure I was using it appropriately I did a lot of research, including purchasing my own (pictured above). This one has the name of the original inventor on it. Clarke was the first Read more…
GPS and the fictional history of The Lattice
The origins of our Global Position System are actually pretty interesting. And it tracks very closely with the fictional history of the Lattice in The Lattice Trilogy (which is available as a box set if you haven’t read it). Let’s start with the history of The Lattice in the books. In the future, the US develops the Lattice as a secret defense project to spy on the rest of the world. It works! They can see all of history and they can see thoughts of anyone they want to. They have total knowledge. That is, until Japan figures out how to hack into the signal Read more…
Some of the robots and drones in Semi/Human
These are some of the drones that inspired action sequences of my new book Semi/Human. Check these out and see where technology is already. And if you want to imagine these in action in a book, check out Semi/Human!
10 Years of Self-Publishing
I happened to notice that this July marks 10 years of self-publishing. I started out with just paperback books of The Little Book of Gold in 2009 and now I have more than ten books in ebook, paperback, and audiobook (plus even a few books in foreign languages). Checking the numbers… holy cow! I’ve sold more than 52,000 books! And on top of that, 2019 has been my best year so far (and I still have five months to go!). For as much as I’ve enjoyed the process, it’s a continual learning process. Here are some of the lessons I’ve Read more…
Why “Dune Peninsula” at Point Defiance Park?
On Saturday, July 6, Metro Parks opened a new park in Tacoma. “Dune Peninsula at Point Defiance Park” was the culmination of years of work at Metro Parks. Hundreds of thousands of cubic yards of dirt moved… EPA cleanup… construction… and more. It was an amazing achievement that the voters of Tacoma, Metro Parks, and the many people who took on this challenge should be very proud of. And long-time readers know that the name of the park has been something of a quixotic goal for me since 2013. Along with some others like Katy Evans and Dan Rahe, we Read more…
I was a guest on the Move to Tacoma to talk about Frank Herbert and Dune
I always enjoy a chance to go onto podcasts and talk about Frank Herbert and Dune Peninsula. Here I sat down with guest host Jasmyn Jefferson, filling in for Tacoma Real Estate Agent Marguerite Martin on the Move to Tacoma podcast, part of the Channel 253 network. Enjoy! A new park! Dune Peninsula at Point Defiance
Light the Night
One of things that I love about science-fiction writing is that it gives me an opportunity to really write about how the legacy of past is still shaping our lives today. Back in 2014, I wrote about how from space you could still trace the divide in Berlin, even though it’s long since been demolished. How? Because East and West Berlin used different kinds of street lights, and even though the city is unified, changing them out was really expensive. So, 25 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the lights were different enough they could be used to Read more…
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