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In case you mis-typed

Karl Schroeder — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 06:39:41 -0600

It's uncanny, really, but the guy in this picture looks exactly like I imagined Chaison Fanning to look, and the woman looks precisely like Venera Fanning (it's that particular quality of vapid emptiness in the eyes...).

Oh, and the hair. I'm sure Venera would wear hers that way.

Go on and buy it! You know you want to.

Coming in December

Karl Schroeder — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 13:56:05 -0600

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.

Why I fear John Scalzi

Karl Schroeder — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:55:54 -0600

If you haven't seen this, you owe it to yourself to discover Wil Wheaton's reaction to John Scalzi's prank of the century. The man is in a league of his own, seriously. I now regret that John knows who I am, because that means I'm, you know, potentially on his list.

Jo Walton on Lady of Mazes

Karl Schroeder — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 17:52:56 -0600

Jo Walton has some very kind words to say about Lady of Mazes; it's the sort of review I could have hoped for more of when the book first came out. Actually, the public reception to this novel perfectly encapsulates my career: rave reviews, nobody buying. Jo talks about how much she enjoyed the novel, and how surprised she was that it wasn't being talked about everywhere. I wasn't surprised--more like, resigned.

Somebody recently told me, "science fiction can only look in one direction at a time, and right now, that direction is Charlie Stross." (Who is, I hasten to add, eminently worthy of our regard.) But it does seem to be the case that "there can be only one" in SF, or at least it seems that way when it comes to SF novels in any given year. I'm currently enjoying the irony of having thousands of people become aware of my work through the free download version of Ventus--for which I receive nothing, of course--rather than, say, through my current, critically-acclaimed, award-nominated series. I've given up trying to figure out why this sort of thing happens, but I know I'm far from alone--check out Kaythryn Cramer's list of 100+ people who have never won a Hugo, for instance (it's astonishing who's on it).

Anyway, my warm regards and thanks to Jo for talking about the book that is, in many ways, my favourite--Lady of Mazes was certainly the more challenging and rewarding project I've ever undertaken, and of all my characters Livia Kodaly is closest to my heart.

Congratulations Hugo Award winners!

Karl Schroeder — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 09:02:55 -0600

Head on over to Tor.com for a complete list of the winners. I feel a connection to this year's awards, because so many good friends were nominated, and some won. (Hey, John, Elizabeth!) I'm pleased to see that Stephan Martiniere won as Best Professional Artist, a recognition he's deserved for a number of years now; and also it's good to see my editor, David Hartwell, land his second Hugo for Best Editor, Long form (best book editor).

I hope you guys partied til dawn.

Another great Pirate Sun review

Karl Schroeder — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 08:16:37 -0600

Well, I guess I can finally relax. I'd been worried about my choices in crafting the Virga series, because everybody seemed to have opinions about where the story should go next, and their ideas never seemed to jibe with my own. "Hayden Griffin has to come back in book three!" "The third book needs to go outside Virga and look at Artificial Nature!" And on and on. I had this terrible feeling as I was writing Pirate Sun that I was crafting a book that would please no one, and I let it go to Tor's production department with something of a feeling of dread.

Yet now, Ernest Lilley, over at SFRevu.com, has this to say:

In the Virga saga, Schroeder demonstrates that he is capable of rich characters, exciting action, compelling plot, and very solid science. ...It's fun in the same league as the best SF ever has had to offer, fully as exciting and full of cool science as work from the golden age of SF, but with characterization and plot layering equal to the scrutiny of critical appraisers.

Great review of Pirate Sun on Sci Fi UK

Karl Schroeder — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 16:30:11 -0600

Britain's Sci Fi UK website has a smashing review of Pirate Sun. It's worth quoting at length:

This series by Schroeder succeeds remarkably on two distinct levels. Actually, three levels if you count the hybrid fusion of its two modes as a separate success itself.

On the one hand, the series exemplifies all the many wonders inherent in the Big Dumb Object-or "extremely alien environment"-mode of SF. ...Schroeder has conjured up a mind-croggling "steel beach" to add to the genre's rich roster of such places, worked out its mechanics and cultures with masterful ingenuity, and then figured out what kind of adventure such a place would best support...

But on top of this, he has found a way to legitimately recreate the melodramatic thrills found most prominently in the literature from what editor and critic David Pringle calls "the Age of the Storytellers." The exploits of Chaison and Venera, and the gleeful yet bloody-minded pellmell tone and pace of the telling, hark back to Robert Louis Stevenson, Alexander Dumas and, of course, Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Queen of Candesce in audiobook form

Karl Schroeder — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 18:32:39 -0600

As previously mentioned, Sun of Suns is out in audiobook format; you can get it at audible.com and also download it directly into your iPhone or iPod Touch from iTunes (i think). But, as promised, the other Virga books are following quickly, and now Queen of Candesce is out!

Pirate Sun should follow in short order. Since each of these books clocks in at about 10 hours in length, they should provide plenty of jogging, exercise-biking, or commuting time.

I'm finding it really interesting listening to these books. I've started with Sun of Suns, and thought initially that it would be really weird and, well, narcissistic if I did more than listen to the first chapter. But the thing is, though I know what's happening and what's to come, and often wince at what I actually wrote down, the experience of hearing the story told by someone else actually changes it. For the very first time since I started writing, I'm having the (partial) experience of encountering my own work as a reader.

There's a certain melancholy to being a writer, in that sense: you write the books you want to read, but once they're done you can't read them. But, while the experience of encountering the books through the readers isn't completely fresh, it's different enough to greatly reduce that sense of melancholy. And I never expected that.

Ventus downloads continue strong

Karl Schroeder — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 18:18:23 -0600

Oh, it's terrible to play favourites. It's just that I lived with Ventus for so long--it took seven years to write--and it was my first published solo novel. I've offered it as a free download for nearly a year now, and it's still in high demand: for instance, last month, in July 2008, I recorded 1300 downloads from this site alone. Since it's also available now from many public ebook sites, I have no idea what the actual numbers are like.

Thanks to everybody who's enjoying the book, I'm gratified I've been able to share this world and these characters with you.

Pirate Sun is out!

Karl Schroeder — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 18:06:13 -0600

Sales seem brisk on Amazon, even though the official release date is tomorrow; and people are telling me that they've been seeing it in the stores and buying it already (thanks, Fred!). There seems to be a gratifying level of interest out there, and early reviews have been highly favourable.

Let me warn you, though: Pirate Sun is the most adrenalin-packed of the three Virga books. I know the first two just tore along, with sword-fights, boarding parties, naval/aerial battles and lots of intrigue. Pirate Sun ups the ante on all this stuff. It's a cross between The Odyssey and The Three Musketeers, and starts with a prison-break unlike any you've ever heard of (I guarantee that!). Along the way you'll encounter a Virgan flood (also unlike anything else you've seen) and a battle between two cities where they throw whole neighbourhoods while trying to encircle and absorb one another. (A little hint about that: the fantastic cover art by Stephan Martiniere is actually an accurate rendering of a scene from that part of the book.)

I'm now in the middle of editing the fourth book, The Sunless Countries. Don't despair: Pirate Sun wraps up the major plotlines that were kicked off in Sun of Suns. The Sunless Countries will expand the world of Virga in new directions, introduce some new characters, and answer some of the questions raised in the earlier books.

What has Phoenix found on Mars?

Karl Schroeder — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 19:02:29 -0600

Aviation Week has created a shitstorm on the web by publishing this article. They claim that the White House has been briefed about a forthcoming announcement from the Phoenix Mars lander team--something significant, apparently, that will blow the doors off the recent confirmation of water and even the revelation that Martian soil would be capable of growing Earth plant life.

On sites like Slashdot, people are lining up to speculate about what the news is. Is it life? Ideas range from the possibility that Phoenix's microscopes have spotted fossils, to actual confirmation of life. NASA, however, was careful in its statement to state that no direct sign of life, past or present, has been found.

Many others are jumping in with sober reminders that Phoenix isn't even equipped to find life--just water and maybe organic substances. The most likely scenario is, in fact, that Phoenix has discovered organics in the Martian soil.

This would be a big discovery, true; it would make an unequivocal statement that Mars is a habitable planet, only the second one in the universe known. If our very next-door-neighbour is hospitable to life, then how much more likely is it that many other worlds also are?

...Of course, such a discovery isn't as world-shaking as it sounds. After all, for a very long time now, we've known that there's no known reason why other planets wouldn't be habitable--Mars included. This would just be confirming what we've already deduced from the available evidence: that safe havens for life are abundant in the universe.

From this point of view, the Phoenix team briefing the White House is really just a piece of grandstanding--a last-ditch attempt to squeeze money from a science-hostile administration before the expected recession/depression gets the space program killed.

But there is one other possibility.

The recent discovery that the soil at the Phoenix lander site could support some earthly plants would appear to contradict the findings of the Viking landers from the 1970s. Those craft deployed sophisticated experiments to determine whether life is present on Mars, yet the instruments returned ambiguous results. There was a strong signal indicating life from some of the instruments, yet no evidence of biological material in the soil. The official interpretation that has become orthodoxy as a result, is that the Martian soil is highly oxidizing, ie. that it contains compounds such as hydrogen peroxide that destroy biological materials.

But if Phoenix has found that you could grow earthly plants in the soil at its site, doesn't this cast serious doubt on that interpretation?

Here's the logic in its most direct form:

The Viking experiments indicated the presence of metabolism, but did not find biological materials. The failure to find organics was puzzling, and meant either that the instrument failed or there were no organics. But the metabolism tests did indicate life.
A strongly-oxydizing soil was the only consistent interpretation other than life+instrument failure to account for the test results.
Phoenix has found water and soil that can apparently support plant growth. This would appear to contradict the hypothesis of strongly oxydizing soil. If Phoenix has found organics, or has at least found that there is little likelihood of a strongly oxydizing soil existing anywhere on Mars, we are then left with:
The Viking landers detected life in 1976. One of their instruments failed to do its job and did not correctly characterize the chemical makeup of the soil, leading to thirty years of muddied waters in the quest for life on Mars.

By this hypothesis, NASA is being coy by saying that Phoenix has not detected life. It hasn't; what it's done is confirm that the Vikings already found it!

Now, NASA's not actually going to say this. Scientists are (rightly) conservative with their pronouncements, and even vindication of the Viking experiments doesn't actually prove anything. A Mars sample-return mission would have to be undertaken to do that. But maybe that's the funding that NASA is looking to get here.

Because the fact remains that if you can grown vegetables in Martian soil, it can't be the kind of hostile chemical bleach that would be necessary to invalidate the Viking experiments. Even without any data beyond what's already been released, the evidence now points to life on Mars, and fairly cries out for a follow-up investigation. And that, I suspect, is what NASA is going to call for.

Sadly, no worldcon for me this year

Karl Schroeder — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 18:18:29 -0600

Unfortunately, I also have to cancel my upcoming visit to Ann Arbor to frolic with Tobias Buckell and John Scalzi; we were all going to celebrate the releases of our respective novels, but you guys will have to party without me this time. My apologies to everyone who was hoping to see me, and sorry as well that I couldn't have done it sooner than a week before the convention; but I didn't know this was going to happen myself until a couple of days ago.

I'll update the Events page of my site as soon as I know when my next appearances will be.

In my hot little hands...

Karl Schroeder — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 16:35:16 -0600

Oh, this is going to be fun.

Tor.com is live!

Karl Schroeder — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 16:18:56 -0600

It's got short stories and (for a while) free ebooks. It's got some of the best fantasy/scifi art you can find. It's got John Scalzi...

The Tor.com website is now live.

This place is going to become a major hub, and it's not going to take long. With the kind of talent they've got blogging over there--and with the kind of talent they've got writing original short fiction--this site is gonna be flypaper for every SF and Fantasy fan out there. And deservedly so: Tor has lavished a tonne of care and ingenuity on this portal, and more importantly they've invited the readers to come in and play too. Tor.com isn't some arms-length advertising exercise, it's a social networking site for fans of cyberculture. Go check it out.

And while you're there, check out the jaw-dropping list of free novels and art you can download for a limited time.

"Green Shift" is mainstream policy

Karl Schroeder — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 07:56:07 -0600

If the Conservatives had come up with the Green Shift policy, I would be voting Conservative. If the NDP had come up with it, I'd be voting NDP. In fact, in Canada it's the Green Party that first developed the idea of a revenue-neutral transition from taxing income to taxing waste. Who came up with it doesn't matter. What matters is that it happen, and soon.

The fact is that tax plans like this are not new. Germany has been employing a similar tax for ten years now, and Germany's record with green tech is stellar: 250,000 jobs directly relating to sustainable technologies is nothing to sneeze at. Other countries that are either enacting such measures now or are intensively studying them include the UK, Portugal, and the Netherlands.

The devil's always in the details, but tax shifts like this are fundamentally simpler than other measures the provinces are already planning, such as the cap and trade market for carbon that is a major goal of the Western Climate Initiative (which 70% of Canadians now belong to). Tax shifting is simple: the government stops taxing you for being productive, and starts taxing you for being wasteful. This means more money in our pockets for at least two reasons: first, the carbon tax is immediately offset by income and business tax reductions; secondly, making waste expensive gives companies incentive to become more efficient, and efficiency drives down costs. This is why costs don't get passed on to the consumer, and it is why everything eventually becomes cheaper rather than more expensive.

When demand for fossil fuels increases, their prices go up. When demand for renewables like wind or solar power increases... their prices go down.

You can have more money in your pocket while making a huge difference to the environment. And this tax would not apply to gasoline.

The reason the Conservatives are complaining about the "Green Shift" proposal is that it would have been a perfect policy for them--more money all around with less of a hit on the consumer--but they didn't think of it first.