Where will House of Cards Season 3 leave us?

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[Warning, this blog post is full of spoilers for House of Cards, not to mention The Player, All About Eve, Breaking Bad, and The Great Gatsby. Proceed with caution]   House of Cards is great television. Season 1 is better than Season 2, I thought, but both seasons are very good. The drama is excellent, even if the show’s reading of politics is a little absurd. But that’s like complaining that Lost didn’t show what it was really like to crash on a tropical island. If you’ve watched the show (and again, this is your last chance to avoid spoilers) Read more…

The #5RTs Project is out of “beta”

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Since November(ish) I’ve been doing something called #5RTs on Twitter. Every Sunday through Thursday night, I retweet five tweets, usually links or pictures, but not always. I will often add a word or two of commentary in front of it, even if it’s just a LOL. Sometimes there’s a theme, sometimes not. They’re numbered too. Before them, I usually announce that they are coming (although since it’s a needless tweet, I have often made that announcement bombastic or silly). After the tweets, I sometimes add another tweet or two of commentary about them that didn’t fit into the RT. For Read more…

The Legacy of Technology

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As I continue to work on Book II of The Lattice Trilogy, I am writing more and more about the legacy of old technology. Writing about “old” technology in 2081 means writing a lot about current times (and the next few decades). But there are so many examples of legacy technology today. We are surrounded by it. We often think of technology as this march of progress, but a better image would be of geologic strata. New technology is layered over older technology, but the old technology doesn’t go away. It’s just not as visible. It’s a much more accurate Read more…

More Games

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My plan to play more games in 2014 has gone quiet well so far. In addition to the chess tournament in January, I’ve been able to play a lot of friendly games with folks around Tacoma. Ticket to Ride A few weeks ago I went to Tacoma Games, where I played Ticket To Ride with some local fans of the game, (game pictured above). Tacoma Games sells board games, and also has board game nights, where you can go in to try out new games. This is a really fun game. I have the “Europe” map, but have also now played Read more…

My first chess tournament

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The best chess player in the world right now is a 23-year-old Norwegian guy named Magnus Carlsen. Actually, he’s the best chess player ever–he has a higher chess ranking than any chess player has ever earned. I am not Magnus Carlsen. The degrees of separation between me and him are extreme. This writer at last year’s World Chess Championships puts it well: The skill gap in chess is remarkable: these Grandmasters would demolish someone who would easily beat someone who would wipe me off the board. And I’m guessing that this writer would crush me. Chess is one of those things that Read more…

A $0.99 sale on The Lead Cloak!

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All this week, ebook editions of The Lead Cloak are on sale for $0.99. If you’ve been putting off buying your copy, this would be a great time to pick it up. Here’s a link to all the online stores carrying the book. A recent blog post about it called it, “One of the best for the new year!” I hope you’ll check it out!

Cover story in the Weekly Volcano!

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I knew that The Lead Cloak had been written up in the Volcano … but I hadn’t seen that it was the whole cover until this afternoon. Wow!   That looks amazing! Read the article yourself, which is mostly a Q&A about the book and sci-fi, but there is a very cool section at the beginning: This sci-fi novel is a page turner: The year is 2081 and people are living experiences, hearing thoughts and seeing sights through the eyes of others … The book is a phenomenal collection of characters, with no one playing ultimate villain or reigning good Read more…

Four Tacoma Authors Take Publishing Into Their Own Hands

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Well, there are actually a lot more than four local authors doing it. But it’s great to see independent publishing getting some coverage as a trend. It’s certainly changed my life–finding readers has been incredibly motivational and my writing has picked up substantially. It’s just hard to believe that if three years ago when I was ready to publish The Saint Go Dying that if I’d spent all the time trying to find an agent, and then an editor, that that book would even be out right now. Let alone another five. That said, I’m not a die-hard about self-publishing. I Read more…

“Staggeringly Smart”

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So. The Lead Cloak was reviewed by Kirkus Reviews, and it’s got a humdinger of a review. Most of it is actually a pretty crisp plot synopsis, so don’t click through if you don’t want to read a couple spoilers. But here’s the end of the review: The Lattice is a staggeringly smart example of what sci-fi critics call the “Big Dumb Object,” but Hanberg’s expertly honed storytelling is sleek and fast enough that readers won’t get tripped up in the twists. A solid premise supports this entertaining tale. As you might imagine, I was pretty pleased. “Expertly honed storytelling?” I’ll Read more…

11 Years in Downtown Tacoma

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I moved to downtown Tacoma in August of 2002, living in the awesomely located and beautiful Bostwick Building. A year later I moved up the hill a couple blocks, and I’ve lived here ever since! There’s a lot to like about living downtown. The easy proximity to so many cool restaurants, coffee shops, and stores. How easy it made it for us to go to one car. This video has a little bit of us in, as we talk about what it’s like to live downtown with a young kid, but also the experiences of other people downtown as well. Read more…