Mid-May 2024 - growing all the things
and the book I put down
Hi Everyone,
Where I live, gardening season has arrived. The last few weekends, sometimes even in the rain, I’ve been working outside (which is fantastic—mostly). I’ve devoted most of the garden to growing food. It’s not a huge space, but I manage to grow a lot of tasty things.
Because I write about ordinary people trying to function in the future, gardens and food tend to show up in my fiction. I’ve never been a fan of getting ones daily nutrition through a pill or a shake—I think that takes away from being human (and would probably leave me grumpy).
But food in the future will likely be different, here’s an interesting article discussing what dinner might look like.
Writing Updates
The Lost Star Chart is with beta readers. I think it’s coming together nicely. Sometime ago, I bought some artwork to be the cover and this week I have someone working on the typography—I can’t wait to see it. I’ll be able to do a cover reveal soon.
I’ll be running a kickstarter for this book, which means both paperbacks and hardcovers (with dust jackets!) will be available. Stay tuned.
For the last week or so, I’ve been editing the sequel to Hope is the Thing With Feathers (I haven’t thought up a title for the book yet). It’s very different to the first book, but it stays true to the characters. There’s a lot of editing to go. Maybe I’ll have it ready for the fall, but most likely early 2025.
Something Awesome
For some reason, last fall I just stopped making collages. It wasn’t a deliberate choice and it only just dawned on me how long it’s been.
The collage above is by Anja Brunt, it’s simple and fantastic. It also has left me thinking about digging into my collage supplies and making a few of my own (after the garden is planted).
What I’ve not been reading
Remember when I said that I was reading The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu (translated by Ken Liu)? I got about half-way through and stopped. The book was simply not for me. It had a fascinating big idea, and I enjoy a big idea, but I need compelling characters. I didn’t find any of the characters in the book interesting—they all seemed like cardboard cut-outs to me.
I used to force myself to read every book I started, but lately, I’ve backed away from that. There are so many books out there I want to read, there’s no point slogging through one I’m not enjoying.
Do you finish every book you start?
I’m about half-way through watching the Netflix adaptation—so far, it’s okay (again, I think the characters aren’t what they could be). However, I’m baffled by all the smoking. I’m around academics all the time and no one smokes, in the show all the academics (because the story follows a group of young physicists) seem to smoke all the time.
That’s all I have, I’ll be back in your inbox in June. And thank you for joining me.
Cheers,
Jeannette
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Asa Kleve craved a life of intergalactic adventure.
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My Books:
Hope is the Thing With Feathers - direct or from the shops
Encoded Orbits
Fractured Orbits - direct or from the shops
The Alien Algorithm - direct or from the shops
Subject 34 - direct or from the shops
Settler Chronicles
Day 115 on an Alien World - direct or from the shops
Far Side of the Moon - direct or from the shops
Abandoned Ships, Hijacked Minds - direct or from the shops
The Alien Artifact - direct or from the shops
And if you aren’t already a subscriber, what’s stopping you (especially if you have read this far)?