Queen of Candesce is already available in hardcover and in audiobook format as well.  The paperback edition is on its way, and you can order it now from Amazon.

If you've been holding off buying QofC because it's only in hardcover, I heartily encourage you to give this edition a look.  While Pirate Sun has been selling like hotcakes and is getting a very good critical reception, Queen of Candesce is my personal favourite of the Virga books to date (is an author allowed to say stuff like this?  My editor may kill me).  Rollicking adventure aside, QofC is set in a unique environment even for Virga:  the inbred, decadent wheel-world of Spyre.  It also features Venera Fanning, who has been one of the most fun characters I've ever written about.  Not only that, I think it's the funniest book I've written.  It continues the saga of Virga, opening the world, characters, and situation out in new directions.  If you enjoyed Sun of Suns, you'll love Queen of Candesce.

And for all of you who complain that I don't promote my work enough:  so there!

This is my all-time favourite cover for my books, just barely edging out another Martiniere cover, the one for Lady of Mazes.  What's so cool about this image is that it's a faithful rendering of the last scene of Chapter 1, but it manages to look like it's some sort of abstract fantasy.  In fact, everything in this scene is possible (if not plausible) physically, part of the "Newtoninan SF" principle I've been using in these books.

Oh, this is going to be fun. 

 “One thing I can guarantee,” said Venera Fanning. “There has never been a prison break quite like this one.”

 The barrel-shaped tugboat was so old that moss had spread continents over its hull, and tufts of grass jutted from its seams like hairs from an old man’s chin. The powerful drone of the vessel’s engines, as its small crew tested them, put a lie to any impression that it was feeble, however. In fact the bone-rattling noise of the test quickly drove Venera and her small group away from the drydock framework that enclosed the tug.

Venera turned away from it and squinted past the light of Slipstream's sun. The city of Rush spread across half the sky, its gaily bannered habitat cylinders turning majestically among wisps of cloud. It was mid-day and the air was full of airships, winged human forms, and here and there cavorting dolphins.

 One figure had detached itself from the orderly streams of flying people, and was approaching. Venera saw that it was a member of her private spy network, a nondescript young man dressed in flying leathers, his toeless shoes pushing down on the stirrups that drove the mechanical wings strapped to his back. He hove to and she admired the sheen of sweat on his shoulders as he saluted. “Here's the latest photos.” He proffered a thick envelope; Venera took it, forgetting about him instantly, and tore it open.

 Her fingers rose of their own accord to touch the scar on her jaw as she looked at what the pictures revealed: the planes and corners of a stone prison that hovered alone in cloudy skies. Not one building, but six or seven that had been lashed together over the decades, the blocky, boulder-like edifice hung half-wreathed in its own fog bank. The blocks, spheres and triangles of the Falcon New Prison were of various architectural styles and colors, literally thrown together and hybridized with clumsy wooden bridges and rope-and-chain lashings into one cancerous monster whose only common element was that all its windows were barred.

 With no gravity to flatten it, the composite prison was stable enough; storms were rare on the edge of civilization and there were no obstacles for the place to run into in its endless drift. The New Prison was a child of neglect, a forgotten mote on the fringe of the vast cloud of worker's dormitories, collective farms and planned cities that was Falcon Formation. Most of the cargo delivered here was on a one-way journey.

 Venera intended to make an unscheduled pick-up.

 continued...

Way over at the Whatever, John has made an announcement about a really fun project he dragged me into a couple months back.  It's true:  John, and Elizabeth Bear, and Jay Lake, and Tobias Buckell and I have been working together for several months to present you with a new near-future vision, one that's decidedly urban but calls into question what a city really is... and what the boundaries of sovereignty are in a future where some of the world's cities will have greater populations than the countries they are in. 

So, if the cyberpunks were all about corporate control, sticky technologies and software, we're all about sustainable communities, parallel economies and remapping reality with your GPS and your sleeping bag. It's the city alive, the city as beast and brother and increasingly, self-aware actor in the global political arena.

Or, as Shriekback sang in their song "Hymn to Local Gods" (a reference sure to date me as one of the old guys):

I'm actually engaged in writing several stories set in my world of Virga (the setting for Sun of Suns, Queen of Candesce, and the forthcoming Pirate Sun).  "The Hero" is the first--thanks to Jonathon Strahan for choosing it for Eclipse 2!

I'm in pretty amazing company with this anthology; here's the lineup:

The Hero, Karl Schroeder
Turing’s Apples, Stephen Baxter
Invisible Empire of Ascending Light, Ken Scholes
Michael Laurits is: Drowning, Paul Cornell
Elevator, Nancy Kress
The Illustrated Biography of Lord Grimm, Daryl Gregory
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, David Moles
The Rabbi’s Hobby, Peter S. Beagle
The Seventh Expression of the Robot General, Jeffrey Ford
Skin Deep, Richard Parks
Ex Cathedra, Tony Daniel
Truth Window: A Tale of the Bedlam Rose, Terry Dowling
We Haven’t Got There Yet, Harry Turtledove
Fury, Alastair Reynolds

I won't say anything about what "The Hero" is about, except to say that it does have to do with one of the major plotlines running through the first three Virga books; and it doesn't have any of the characters from those books in it.

Just thought I should summarize what I'm up to lately, which is quite a lot:

• I'm finishing The Sunless Countries for Tor.  I just burned a city and the protagonist has sold out to the enemy.  Ah, it warms my heart!
• I'm working on a talking-book novella for a secret project.  It should be announced at Worldcon.  And no, I can't say more.
• I have four other short story/novella commissions I'm trying to meet.  This will be quite a year for short fiction for me.  I rather dried up there for several years, during the period when I was writing Permanence and Lady of Mazes.  But I'm back, and having loads of fun.
• I'm thinking about how to top Virga.  Ha!  No mean feat--but just wait until you see where The Sunless Countries takes us.  After I'm done with you, you'll be willing to believe in Santa Claus again.

As usual, the more productive I'm being on the fiction side, the less frequent my updates on the website.  It's a handy barometer for how hard I'm working, as a matter of fact.  So if you don't hear from me for a while... think 'good stuff coming.'

Tor has told me that they're going to release the Virga books in audiobook format (through MacMillan's audio division) on an aggressive schedule.  I don't have exact release dates, but here's the general timing--and it's quite tight:

1. Sun of Suns will be out in June
2. Queen of Candesce will be released in July
3. Pirate Sun will be out in August, essentially simultaneously with the release of the print version.
   

I've known this was coming for months, but couldn't talk about it.  Now my publisher, Tor, has revealed that Sun of Suns, my rollicking postmodern space-opera, will be next week's free ebook download from Tor.com.  Want a copy?  Then head on over to the new site and register.  It's free, and if you act now, you'll also gain access to a couple of other free ebooks.

Believe me, it'll be worth it to join the new site.  Tor isn't just pasting new art on an old site, here; they're opening up their entire operation.  The new tor.com will be a participatory playground for fans, thoughtful readers, and aspiring writers. It'll also have original art and stories, and stuff I still can't talk about.

This is fun: I'm helping organize a “SciBarCamp” with a diverse group of local people including entrepreneurs, students, artists, and scientists.  The event will take place at Hart House at the University of Toronto on the weekend of March 15-16, with an opening reception on the evening of March 14.

SciBarCamp is a gathering of scientists, artists, and forward-thinking members of the public for a weekend of talks and discussions.  The goal is to create connections between science, entrepreneurs and local businesses, and arts and culture.  The themes are:

• The edge of science (eg, synthetic biology, quantum gravity, cognitive science)
• The edge of technology (eg, mobile web, ambient computing, nanotechnology, web 2.0)
• Science 2.0 (open access, changing models of publication and collaboration)
• Scientific literacy and public engagement (eg, one laptop per child project, policy and science, technology as legislation, science as culture, enfranchising the poor, the young, the old)

In the tradition of BarCamps, otherwise known as "unconferences", (see BarCamp.org for more information), the program is decided by the participants at the beginning of the meeting, in the opening reception.  Presentations and discussion topics can be proposed at the SciBarCamp website or on the opening night.

The talks will be informal and interactive; to encourage this, speakers who wish to give PowerPoint presentations will have ten minutes to present, while those without will have twenty minutes.  Around half of the time will be dedicated to small group discussions on topics suggested by the participants.  The social events and meals will make it easy to meet people from different fields and industries.  Our venue, Hart House, is a congenial space with plenty of informal areas to work or talk.  There will be free wireless access throughout.

Our goals are:

• Igniting new projects, collaborations, business opportunities, and further events.
• Intellectual stimulation and good conversation.
• Integrating science into Toronto's cultural, entrepreneurial, and intellectual activites.
• Protoyping a model that can be easily duplicated elsewhere.

Attendance is free, but there is only space for around 100 people, so please register soon by sending an email to Jen Dodd (dodd.jen@gmail.com) with your name and contact details..  Include a link to your blog or your organization's webpage that we can display with your name on the participants list at www.SciBarCamp.org.

More information can be found at www.SciBarCamp.org.

This site's rapidly evolving, so don't be surprised if parts of it are empty.  In the About folder, though, I've just added a folder called "The Lab."  This is a collection point for cool stuff that I want to keep, and cool ideas I may want to write about but which have no other home on the site.

Incidentally, I'm working up an "Interviews" folder that will hopefully contain some videos as well as links to those print interviews that are online.

And coming very soon:  the Vote Venera in '08 Page!