by Eric Flint | Jun 26, 2015 | Information, Newsletters | 16 comments There have been some modifications in my publication schedule from what it looked like in March. Here’s how it looks now: 1636: The Cardinal Virtues will be coming out in a week, at the beginning of July. It’s probably already showing up in some bookstores. In October, Baen is publishing an anthology in honor of David Drake titled Onward, Drake! (Which has a really, really ridiculous cover which I am really, really, really looking forward to teasing David about when I see him this coming weekend at Libertycon. Oh, chortle!) I have a story in the anthology titled “A Flat Affect.” In November, the mass market edition of Cauldron of Ghosts will be coming out. That’s a novel I co-authored with David Weber set in his Honor Harrington universe. In December, the mass market edition of 1636: The Viennese Waltz is coming out. 1635: A Parcel of Rogues will be coming out in January, 2016. Ring of Fire IV will be coming out in May, 2016. The lead story in that volume will be a novelette by David Brin. The Span of Empire will be coming out in late summer or early fall of 2016. 1636: The Ottoman Onslaught will be coming out in January, 2017. The big modification in my schedule is that we swapped places between The Span of Empire and 1636: The Ottoman Onslaught. We decided to do that for several reasons. First, I didn’t particularly want to have four Ring of Fire volumes coming out in a row without anything else in the mix. Yes, I know the Ring of Fire series is what I’m best known for, but I write lots of other stuff as well. In fact-harrumph-of the fifty novels I will have published when 1635: A Parcel of Rogues comes out in January, only fifteen of them are Ring of Fire volumes. So there. Second, my co-author on The Span of Empire is David Carrico, and he’s been waiting an awful long time to see this novel…
Blog
by Eric Flint | Jun 23, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 90 comments John Scalzi has raised some objections to and reservations about the proposal that will be coming out of Sasquan for making some changes in the structure of the Hugo awards. I thought his comments were worth taking up and I’ll be doing so here. I had a friendly private exchange with John on the subject, and I want to emphasize that I view this as a discussion more than a debate. You can find John’s remarks here: Note to WSFS Members: Killing the Best Novelette Hugo is a Terrible Idea Since he put up this post and he and I had our private exchange, John’s major objection seems to have become a moot point. It now seems that the proposed amendment to the Hugo rules that would have eliminated the category of “Best Novelette” has been withdrawn. But he also registered a disagreement, if not as strong a one, to the idea of adding a category for “Best Saga.” (I.e., a best series award.) And that’s what I want to address in this essay. I want to start indirectly, though, by taking up some comments that were made by other people in response to John’s post. I was particularly struck by comments that expressed either indifference or even hostility to a series award because it would mostly benefit male authors. A series award wouldn’t be helpful to female authors? Let’s consider some authors active today in fantasy and science fiction: Ilona Andrews Kelley Armstrong Elizabeth Bear Patricia Briggs Jacqueline Carey Julie Czerneda Kate Elliott Diana Gabaldon Barbara Hambly Laurell K. Hamilton Charlaine Harris Tanya Huff Kim Harrison Robin Hobb Sherrilyn Kenyon Mercedes Lackey Elizabeth Moon Naomi Novik Jody Lynn Nye Tamora Pierce Melanie Rawn Laura Resnick Kristine Kathryn Rusch Nalini Singh Judith Tarr Sherri Tepper Margaret Weis Janny Wurtz Jane Yolen Sarah Zettel Of the thirty authors listed above: All are popular and have published…
by Eric Flint | Jun 16, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 245 comments Having come up with that nifty albeit long-winded title, I’m tempted to just write “see above” and take a nap. Mission accomplished… Sadly, some people need to be convinced that “inevitable” means “not evitable.” You don’t think there’s such a word as “evitable”? Tch. Of course there is! If there weren’t, how could anything be in-evitable? “Evitable” derives from the Latin evitare (“to avoid). It’s an adjective that means capable of being avoided; avoidable. In essence, what the Sad Puppies are arguing is that if people follow their lead, the tendency of the Hugo Awards to be slanted in favor of what are generally called “literary” qualities can be avoided. No, sorry, it can’t. You have as much chance of eliminating the tendency of a literary award to be tilted in favor of literary factors as you have of doing any of the following: Getting a fashion competition to award first place to blue jeans and a sweatshirt. But they’re so comfortable! And people wear them all the time—including those God damned probably-a-bunch-of-pinkos (PABOPs) when they’re not putting on a public show. Getting a dog show to award “best dog of show” to an unpedigreed mutt. But he’s such a good dog! Friendly, great with kids, never growls at anybody except people trying to break into the house and then—hooweeeeee!—watch the bastards run for their lives. And they gave the award to that—that—look at the damn thing! Its skull is narrower than a high-heeled shoe! God damn pointy-headed effete asinine retards (PHEARs). Getting a gourmet cooking competition to award first place to a dish consisting of a cheeseburger and fries. But almost everybody eats cheeseburgers and fries! Try setting up a chain of escargots-and-tofu restaurants and see how fast you go bankrupt! This is pure snobbery, what it is. God damn highbrow elitist stuffed shirt icky abominable nabobs (HESSIANs). Shall I go on? And on… and on… What the Sad Puppies can’t seem to grasp is that any sort…
by Eric Flint | Jun 13, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 68 comments In this essay, I want to address the second of the two objective problems with the Hugo Awards that I referred to in my last essay. That problem is the ever-widening distance between the structure of the awards and the reality of the market for fantasy and science fiction. When the Hugo Award was first launched, in 1953, four awards were established. The distinction between them was based on word count, as follows: Best short story: Any story up to 7,500 words. Best novelette: Any story between 7,500 and 17,500 words. Best novella: Any story between 17,500 and 40,000 words. Best novel: any story longer than 40,000 words. A little more than a decade later, in 1966, the newly-founded Science Fiction Writers of America (which later became the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America) launched the Nebula Award, which is considered the other major award in F&SF. The award structure they adopted for written fiction was identical with that of the Hugo; i.e., the same division between three short form and one long form stories, using the same word counts. At the time, it made perfect sense to structure the awards in this manner, that is to say, heavily in favor of short fiction and with the definition of novel set with a very low word count. The genre of F&SF was predominantly a short form genre, and what (relatively few) novels got published were generally in the word count range of 40,000 to 60,000 words. Today, that structure is hopelessly outdated. Short form fiction is now a very small part of fantasy and science fiction, whether you measure that in terms of money—where it’s now a tiny percentage of the income authors receive—or in terms of readership. It’s certainly a larger percentage of the readers than it is of income, but it’s not more than 10% and it’s probably closer to 5%.…
by Eric Flint | Jun 11, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 66 comments What I want to do in this essay is go back to where I started in my very first post on subject (“Some comments on the Hugos and other SF awards,” posted April 16), which is to discuss the problems the Hugo awards actually do have—which, as I’ve now spent a lot of time explaining, has nothing to do with the political issues that the Sad Puppies insist are central. I singled out three key problems, two of them objective and one which is of a more subjective nature. The first of the two objective problems is the subject of this essay. It’s not complicated. The genre of science fiction and fantasy with all its related sub-genres—some of which, like paranormal romance, are so popular they often get their own sections in bookstores—has become enormous. It is a far, far larger field than it was half a century ago. But even back then, there was always some disparity between the tastes and opinions of the people who voted for the Hugo awards and the F&SF readership as a whole. To name what is probably the most outstanding example, Andre Norton never received a Hugo award. She was only nominated twice. But she was hardly alone in being overlooked in the Hugo awards. Many other prominent and important authors of the time, whose stories filled the major magazines and the shelves in bookstores, also never received a Hugo award and in many cases were never even nominated. Christopher Anvil was never nominated. Not once. A Bertram Chandler was never nominated. Hal Clement was only nominated once. He didn’t win. L. Sprague de Camp did win one Hugo, but it was for his autobiography and came almost at the very end of his long life. He never received the award for his fiction, despite that fiction being an enormous body of work spanning more than half…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 366 comments One of the comments that was put up on my web site while I was out of town was a long one by Brad Torgersen. Because of Brad’s prominence in the debate over the Hugo Awards, I think it’s incumbent on me to respond to him. My response is going to be long because I’m going to put it all up in one post today. I’m doing that because Brad will be deploying soon and is likely to lose access to the internet for a while. I don’t think it’s fair for me to criticize his arguments if he can no longer respond. Whether he chooses to respond or not will be his decision. If he does, I will make no further responses to him beyond this one. I think the argument we’re having about the Hugo awards is approaching its productive limits. I will make one more post in a day or so, but that one will deal purely with my own practical suggestions for ways I think the Hugo awards could be improved. The post by Brad that I’m responding to here is a long one—you can find it in the thread under “AND AGAIN ON THE HUGO AWARDS”—so I think this will work best if I begin by quoting all of it. My reply will come afterward: (the original comment can be found in context in the thread under “AND AGAIN ON THE HUGO AWARDS”— webmaster) “The following is general commentary, not directed at Eric Flint per se. But at the body of the thread and all the comments as a whole. “The thing about self-identifying progressives in 21st century America is that they don’t realize when they’ve won. Especially in the field of SF/F publishing. You cannot fight against The Man when you are The Man. In SF/F publishing, progressives make up the vast bulk of editors, authors, artists, and publishers. Oh,…
by Eric Flint | Jun 8, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 342 comments I’ve been traveling a lot for the past few weeks, so my ability to respond to comments made here is intermittent. One of the comments that was put up on my web site while I was gone lately was a long one by Brad Torgersen. Because of Brad’s prominence in the debate over the Hugo Awards, I think it’s incumbent on me to respond to him. Before I can do that, however, something else has to be dealt with first. One of the main points I’ve been trying to make, partly in the hope that I can persuade the Sad Puppies to change their minds, is that while scurrilous attacks have been made on them those attacks have come from people who have no real power or influence in the science fiction and fantasy community. Unfortunately, there’s a reliable old quip, variously attributed to Voltaire and Maréchal Villars: Lord, protect me from my friends; I can take care of my enemies. With the modification that I don’t consider the Sad Puppies to be “enemies” but simply opponents in the current wrangle over the Hugos, the quip has found a home again. While I was attending SFWA’s Nebula Awards weekend, the following statement was made on her Facebook page by Irene Gallo in response to a question. (The question was “what are the Sad Puppies”?) “There are two extreme right-wing to neo-nazi groups, called the Sad Puppies and the Rabid Puppies respectively, that are calling for the end of social justice in science fiction and fantasy. They are unrepentantly racist, sexist and homophobic. A noisy few but they’ve been able to gather some Gamergate folks around them and elect a slate of bad-to-reprehensible works on this year’s Hugo ballot.” When it comes to sheer, breath-taking dishonesty and just plain silliness, this statement is far worse than any of the ones cited by James May which I dealt…
by Eric Flint | May 18, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 160 comments James May, who keeps posting here, is the gift that never stops giving. In one of his most recent posts, he insists once again that the SJW (social justice warrior) hordes are a menace to science fiction. So, in this essay, I will go through his points one at a time to show how ridiculous they are whether examined in part or (especially) as a whole. Let’s start with his first two paragraphs: “I don’t have to pretend anything. It’s not my imagination this crusading feminist movement exists nor that it’s baked into core SFF at every level as the new go-to ideological orthodoxy. In fact they do amount to squat. This is a very specific ideology that speaks a very specific faux-academic language and has very specific goals and issues. It is radical lesbian-centric racialized feminist to its core and its central bogey man is the straight white man. “As an example, just the 5 ideologically same-page winners of the Nebulas last year alone outnumber the entire imaginary racially and sexually supremacist culture supposedly bound by a similar opposite number ideology from Burroughs in 1912 to Niven/Pournelle in 1974. There is no semantic or thematic ideology that binds Burroughs, Heinlein, Van Vogt, Asimov, Herbert, Zelazny and Niven into such a club. That is a matter of record, as is the non-fiction writings of those 5 2014 Nebula winners.†The first thing to notice about this rant is that in the name of attacking a “crusading†movement which is an “ideological orthodoxy†that “speaks a very specific faux-academic language†James May immediately proceeds to… Use crusading terminology which is ideologically orthodox and speaks a very specific faux-academic language: “It is radical lesbian-centric racialized feminist to its core.†That phrase is practically dripping Rush Limbaugh-speak. He then informs us that all—yup, each and every one—of the 2014 Nebula winners were “ideologically same-page†which is a…
by Eric Flint | May 14, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 172 comments I swore to myself—again—that I was I was going to stay away from this ruckus after my first two essays (one long, one short) but some of the posts put up on my web site have worn down that resolve. A friend of mine once said “ignorance can be fixed; stupid is forever.” I suspect he’s right, but I will sally forth once again in the hopes that some of these seemingly-stupid statements and arguments are really just the product of ignorance. Let me start with this statement, from a recent poster named James May (and don’t complain, dammit; once you post on MY web site, you’re fair game): “The social justice warrior argument is not specious but right on point. When you have SF authors writing posts about white privilege and others saying straight out they won’t review white men then that represents a sea-change, and a very new one, only 3 years old or so. That sort of thing is not occasional but obsessive and daily and it is not the usual right vs. left, although it is often couched in those terms. That is why people make the mistake of stretching this conflict years and even decades back rather than the months back it deserves.” I have two points to make about this, one of which is: Who the hell are you talking about outside of your right-wing echo chamber where idiot acronyms like “SJW” mean something? But I’ll get back to that. My first point—picture me spluttering my coffee all over the place when I read it—has to do with this statement: “When you have SF authors writing posts about white privilege… that represents a sea-change… This is why people make the mistake of stretching this conflict years and even decades back rather than months it deserves.” Excuse me? SF authors have been writing about racism—AKA “white privilege”—for decades. And they came…
by Eric Flint | Apr 23, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 20 comments In light of the discussion that’s ensued here and elsewhere in response to my essay on the current situation with the Hugo awards (see below), I decided to make a few more comments. There are two points I want to make, the first in the way of a clarification. The following statement of mine in the initial essay has been somewhat misinterpreted, I think: “What’s involved here is essentially a literary analog to genetic drift. Biologists have long known that the role played by pure chance in evolution is greater in a small population than a larger one. The same thing happens in the arts, especially those arts which have a huge mass audience. The attitudes of the much smaller group or groups of in-crowds who hand out awards or do critical reviews are mostly influenced by other members of their in-crowd, not by the tastes of the mass audience. Over time, just by happenstance if nothing else, their views start drifting apart from those of the mass audience.” Some people have interpreted this as a sarcastic remark, in which they seem to think I am deriding the tastes of what I called the “much smaller group or groups of in-crowds.” But that wasn’t my point. What I was trying to explain, perhaps not clearly enough, was that once science fiction and fantasy became the enormously popular genre of fiction that it is today, the critical attitudes of any group of fans or aficionados will inevitably diverge over time from those of the mass audience as a whole. The problem, I think, lies in a misunderstanding of the term “popular” when it is used to refer to a “popular author.” What happens is that people start thinking that a “popular” author somehow represents or reflects the mass audience—as opposed to the oft-derided “literary author” who only appeals to a small subset of the mass audience. But…
by Eric Flint | Apr 22, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 4 comments I can see it’s time I need to establish some rules for the ongoing discussion/debate on my essay (see below) on the current ruckus over the Hugo Awards. Rule One. Do not come into my web site and call me a liar or stupid or dishonest or any other derogatory term. You’re welcome to disagree with me, but do so in a civil manner. There is no warning for this rule violation, because it’s so obvious it shouldn’t need one. So, whoever the jackass is who goes by the monicker of “rollory”, a pseudonym, naturally, you’re out of here. The technical term is banned, I believe. I’m willing to suffer fools up to a point, but I’m not willing to suffer assholes. Rule Two. This is not your private soapbox. I don’t mind people posting their opinions here, even when I sharply disagree with them. But once or twice is enough. After a while, it becomes obvious that someone isn’t going to let go of a bone and they keep chewing on it. Do so elsewhere. Specifically, I don’t have time to argue any longer over whether Theodore Beale’s pseudonym “Vox Day” is the vicious (not to mention stupid) racist and misogynist he so obviously is. You have the constitutional right to defend racism and misogyny. You do not, however, have the constitutional right to do it in my web site. So take a hike, at least on that subject. I’m not removing any of the existing posts, not even the ones by the shithead who calls himself “rollory.” But if anyone puts up any more posts defending Beale and/or his opinions, the post will be removed and you will be henceforth banned from the site. Eric 4 Comments Steve Bailey on May 6, 2015 at 10:39 AMMan, what a poor time for a first visit.It took the better part of an hour digging through other posts…
by Eric Flint | Apr 16, 2015 | Hugo Controversy | 255 comments I’ve been doing my best to stay away from the current ruckus over the Hugo Awards, but it’s now spread widely enough that it’s spilled onto my Facebook page, and it’s bound to splatter on me elsewhere as well. It’s also been brought to my attention that Breitbart’s very well-trafficked web site—never famous for the accuracy of its so-called “reporting”—has me listed as one of the supposedly downtrodden conservative and/or libertarian authors oppressed by the SF establishment. Given my lifelong advocacy of socialism—and I was no armchair Marxist either, but committed twenty-five years of my life to being an activist in the industrial trade unions—I find that quite amusing. So I decided it was time to toss in my two cents worth. Well… if we calculate words as being worth eight cents apiece, my five hundred and eighty dollars worth. (Not quite, but I’m an author so I’m rounding the word count up. To do otherwise would get me drummed out of the Scribbler Corps.) So, here goes. First, on the Hugo and Nebula (and all other) awards given out in science fiction. Do they have problems? Yes, they all do. For a variety of reasons, the awards no longer have much connection to the Big Wide World of science fiction and fantasy readers. Thirty and forty years ago, they did. Today, they don’t. Is this because of political bias, as charged by at least some of the people associated with the Sad Puppies slate? No, it isn’t—or at least not in the way the charge is being leveled. I will discuss this issue later, but for the moment let me address some more general questions. What I’m going to be dealing with in this essay is a reality that is now at least tacitly recognized by most professional authors—and stated bluntly on occasion by editors and publishers. That’s the growing divergence between the…
by Gorg Huff | Mar 13, 2015 | Information | 5 comments After it became clear that we wouldn’t be holding the 1632 series minicon at Contemporal this year, we approached LibertyCon and they’ve agreed to host us. LibertyCon is a longstanding and very popular SF convention in Chattanooga that I’ve attended a number of times, including as MC and (IIRC) Guest of Honor. This year, David Weber and David Drake will be attending LibertyCon also. LibertyCon is being held this year on the weekend of June 26-28. Here’s the URL, for those of you who are interested: http://www.libertycon.org 5 Comments George ferguson on March 16, 2015 at 10:20 AMKeep it in NC, but, come west to Asheville or Charlotte. Bryan on March 16, 2015 at 9:34 PMor go a little further west to Chattanooga, TN http://chattanoogaconventioncenter.org/ Reinaldo on March 28, 2015 at 5:52 PMHi all, here every person is sharing these experience, so it’s pleasant to read thisweblog, and I used to go to see this web site daily. masajistas alicante on April 19, 2015 at 7:49 AMMuy Interesante Mike on May 19, 2015 at 11:40 AMGorg, it looks like Eric’s Appearances page still lists Contemporal and not Chattacon. Alas, I won’t be able to make either. Libertycon filling up fast by Gorg Huff | Apr 28, 2015 | Information | 2 comments Minicon Update: Latest report from Uncle Timmy: they already have over 550 people preregistered and the Banquet is almost sold out. Remember that Libertycon has a hard cap of 700 registrations. 2 Comments Jen on May 11, 2015 at 2:33 AM What I’m Reading on 04/17/2015 | Blog | Bob Sutor Innovation on June 10, 2015 at 6:16 AM Ericflint.net – The official home page of author Eric …
by Gorg Huff | Mar 13, 2015 | Information | 25 comments I’ve discussed my publication schedule with Baen Books and here’s how it looks now: 1636: The Cardinal Virtues will be coming out in July, 2015. 1635: A Parcel of Rogues will be coming out in January, 2016 Ring of Fire IV will be coming out in May, 20161636: The Ottoman Onslaught will be coming out either in late summer or early fall of 2016. The Span of Empire will be coming out either at the end of 2016 or early in 2017 1636: The Ottoman Onslaught is my next solo novel in the 1632 series and is the direct sequel to 1636: The Saxon Uprising (as well as “Four Days on the Danube,” my short novel in Ring of Fire III). The Span of Empire is the third book in the Jao Empire series, which began with The Course of Empire and The Crucible of Empire. David Carrico is my co-author on the book.I’m only listing new titles. There will also be a number of reissues – Mother of Demons (April), 1636: Commander Cantrell in the West Indies (June), Cauldron of Ghosts (October) and 1636: The Viennese Waltz (November).I also have coming out:— a short novel (“Sanctuary”) coming out in April in Bill Fawcett’s anthology By Tooth and Claw— a novelette (“Operation Xibalba”) in an anthology dedicated to Poul Anderson that Baen is reissuing in June (Multiverse)— and a short story (“A Flat Affect”) that will be included in a David Drake commemorative anthology being edited by Mark Van Name. I don’t know yet when that will be published. 25 Comments John Cowan on March 13, 2015 at 10:22 AMYou gave me quite a shock there! Usually people are only commemorated after they’re dead. Mike on June 22, 2015 at 7:27 PMThat was my reaction too! Tweeky on March 14, 2015 at 5:03 PMI’m wondering when the first snippet for 1636: The Cardinal Virtues will be posted. Drak…
by Eric Flint | Jan 17, 2015 | Information Thomas Babington Macaulay Speechs to House of Commons Opposing Proposed Life + 60 Year Copyright Term on 5 Feb. 1841 Favoring a 42-year Fixed Term over a Life + 25 Year Term on 6 April 1842 A Speech delivered in the House of Commons on the 5th of February, 1841 by Thomas Babington Macaulay On the twenty-ninth of January, 1841, Mr. Serjeant Talfourd(1)Â obtained leave to bring in a bill to amend the law of copyright. The object of this bill was to extend the term of copyright in a book to sixty years, reckoned from the death of the writer. On the fifth of February Mr. Serjeant Talfourd moved that the bill should be read a second time. In reply to him the following Speech was made. The bill was rejected by 45 votes to 38. [Note: The law and its amendment may be summarized thus: Existing law: Copyright for life or 28 years, whichever longer. Talfourd: Copyright for life and 60 years Mahon: Copyright for life and 25 years Macaulay: Copyright for life or 42 years, whichever longer] Though, Sir, it is in some sense agreeable to approach a subject with which political animosities have nothing to do, I offer myself to your notice with some reluctance. It is painful to me to take a course which may possibly be misunderstood or misrepresented as unfriendly to the interests of literature and literary men. It is painful to me, I will add, to oppose my honorable and learned friend on a question which he has taken up from the purest motives, and which he regards with a parental interest. These feelings have hitherto kept me silent when the law of copyright has been under discussion. But as I am, on full consideration, satisfied that the measure before us will, if adopted, inflict grievous injury on the public, without conferring any compensating advantage on men of letters, I think it…
by Gorg Huff | Dec 28, 2014 | Newsletters | 10 comments Well, I got through the holidays intact. This is always a bit of a dicey proposition because I do most of the cooking over the holidays and while I’m a rather good cook I am not one who is serene and philosophical and maintains his equanimity throughout the process. To the contrary. On those days when the cooking gets concentrated, my kitchen is filled for hours with expletives deleted. Well, actually, not deleted. I daresay I am directly responsible for expanding the vocabulary of my grand-children, something my daughter is not entirely pleased with. But, all’s well that ends well. Everyone got fed and seemed to enjoy the meals, and I made it through another holiday season without suffering a stroke or a heart attack and with no more than a modicum of flesh wounds. and those, quickly healed. So, back to work, which is far more relaxing. I almost never curse in front of computer. Well. Okay. Except when it screws up, which is fairly often. I have told my tech guru Rick Boatright many times that electrons just hate me, for no discernible reason. For years, Rick dismissed that theory as patent nonsense, but I think that lately he’s been reconsidering. He tells me that things go wrong with my computers that he’s never seen happen to anyone else. (I knew it! I knew it! The little bastards have it in for me!) Mike Resnick and I are closing in on finishing “The Gods of Sagittarius.” We’d hoped to have it done by the end of the year, but between the disruption of the (miserable damned) holidays and various other problems, it’s taking longer than we’d projected. (If you’re wondering, ask any publisher or editor: this is not an abnormal state of affairs with authors. For whatever neurological reason, the mental talent involved in being a good scribbler seems to be genetically linked…
by Brad R. Torgersen | Nov 10, 2014 | Newsletters | 26 comments I’m a little behind on this newsletter. To bring everyone up to date, I’ve turned in three manuscripts over the past two months or so. I just turned in the manuscript for the next 1632 series novel, 1636: The Cardinal Virtues. Baen Book has it scheduled for publication in July, 2015. My co-author on the novel is Walter Hunt and it recounts the events leading up to the outbreak of the French civil war. (What? You didn’t see that coming? It’s not as if I haven’t dropped more than, oh, five hundred hints or so across the past half dozen novels.)Earlier, I turned in the manuscript for The Span of Empire, which is the sequel to The Crucible of Empire. David Carrico is my co-author on this novel. I began the series working with K.D. Wentworth, but as many of you already know Kathy passed away a couple of years ago. She’d only written four chapters before she broke off working on the novel due to her illness. I asked David to step in and he did an excellent job of completing the first draft. We don’t have a publication date yet for the book. I also turned in the manuscript for 1637: The Volga Rule, which I co-authored with Gorg Huff and Paula Goodlett. This novel is the sequel to 1636: The Kremlin Games. No publication date has been set yet. Over the summer I also wrote a short novel titled Sanctuary, which will be appearing in the second anthology in the Clan of the Claw setting created by Bill Fawcett. The anthology is titled By Tooth and Claw and it’s coming out in April of next year. Right now I/m working on a novel with Mike Resnick titled The Gods of Sagittarius. We’re about halfway done and we should be turning in the manuscript in a few weeks. Once that’s done I’ll start working on my next solo novel in the 1632 series. Baen Books has…
by Brad R. Torgersen | Sep 17, 2014 | Information There will be a performance next Wednesday of an audio drama based on a novella I write set in the Belisarius universe. The novella and the drama based on it is titled “Islands.” The script was written by Tony Daniel, another author who publishes through Baen Books. Here are the details for anyone interested:https://www.facebook.com/events/289227797946840/ — Eric
by Brad R. Torgersen | Jul 29, 2014 | 1632Snippet | 13 comments Mammoth Screen is renewing their option on the 1632 series for another year. They’ve hired a well-known screenwriter and have the script for the first episode. They’ve also made a deal with ITV Studios for worldwide distribution. This is important because ITV is a big deal in the UK. We’re still a long ways from an up-and-running TV series, but things are looking good. — Eric 13 Comments John Cowan on July 29, 2014 at 8:30 AMOf course, things can stay this way for years. Well, it’s money. Ryk E. Spoor on July 29, 2014 at 10:14 AMExcellent! As John says, either way, it means money. The second way would mean much MORE money, and we’ll hope for that, but at least they’re still paying! Tweeky on July 29, 2014 at 9:27 PMDoes this mean there’s going to be a 1632 TV series? Ryk E. Spoor on July 30, 2014 at 9:31 AMIt means someone is interested in making a series. But an option is a LONG way from actually MAKING anything. The “someone” getting the option, in this case, is a company that actually might be able to do it, but that’s not even close to a guarantee. Cobbler on July 30, 2014 at 12:38 AMI hope Eric maintains some creative control. Though that’s easier said than done.When they made a TV movie of A Wizard of Earthsea, they promised Ursula Le Guin to hew close to the book. Le Guin publically complained about the result. Starting with making Ged a petulant white boy. “Most of the people watching have never read your book, so who cares?â€I can imagine Mammoth turning 1932 it into a time-traveling Beverly Hillbillies. Mark L on July 30, 2014 at 4:28 PMThe comic strip Funky Winkerbean has a thread on one character’s book being turned into a made-for-TV movie. The book was a memoir about the character’s wife’s death from cancer. The movie being made? Not so much…
by Brad R. Torgersen | May 26, 2014 | Newsletters | 11 comments I’ve been feeling a little guilty because it dawned on me a while back that the photograph of myself that I’ve been using on this web page is pretty far out of date. How far? I’m not really sure, but I figure it was taken about a decade ago. Given that I’ve been known to make sarcastic remarks about people who keep public photos of themselves that are ridiculously out of date, I figured I better take care of the problem. So I had the same professional photographer I used then, whose work I like, do a current set of portraits for me. One of them is now being used as my picture on the web site’s home page, and I added several others to the Photo Album section.In other news of the day, I have a novella coming out next month in a volume published by Phoenix Pick titled The Aethers of Mars. Phoenix Pick is an imprint of Arc Manor, and is edited by Mike Resnick. Each volume matches an established writer with a newer writer telling stories set in the same universe. My story, “In the Matter of Savinkov,†is set in a steampunk universe developed by my partner in the project, Chuck Gannon. Here’s the URL, for those interested. In still other news of the day, Baen Books has scheduled a 1632 novel I co-authored with Paula Goodlett and Gorg Huff for publication in November of this year. Paula and Gorg were my partners in writing 1636: The Kremlin Games. The new novel, 1636: The Viennese Waltz, is set in (where else?) Vienna. The new novel involves many of the characters developed by Paula and Gorg for a number of stories published in either the Grantville Gazette magazine or one of the Ring of Fire anthologies. It will also serve to some extent as one of the prequels to my next solo novel in the series. (The title of which I haven’t…
by Brad R. Torgersen | Feb 23, 2014 | Newsletters | 5 comments The next stories I have coming out are: I have a novelette coming out next week in an anthology titled MULTIVERSE, which is entirely devoted to the work of Poul Anderson. My story is set in Anderson’s “Operation Chaos” universe. Other authors in the anthology include Larry Niven, Raymond Feist, Nancy Kress, Harry Turtledove, Terry Brooks, Robert Silverberg, S.M. Stirling and Tad Williams. Here’s the URL. In April, Cauldron of Ghosts, co-authored with David Weber. Cauldron is part of the Honor Harrington universe and is a sequel to Torch of Freedom as well as, to a degree, a companion volume to David’s Shadow of Freedom. For those interested, here’s a link to Baen Books’ publishing schedule. As usual, sample chapters are available on the site.In May, I have a novella titled “In the Matter of Savinkov” coming out as one of two stories in a volume titled The Aethers of Mars, published by PhoenixPick. The volume combines two related novellas set in a steampunk universe, one by me and one by Chuck Gannon. Here’s a link to it. I just turned in the manuscript for the next 1632 series novel, 1636: Commander Cantrell in the West Indies, which I co-authored with Chuck Gannon. Chuck was my co-author on a previous 1632 series book, 1635: The Papal Stakes, and will be writing two more novels with me in the future. Commander Cantrell will be coming out in June. I also turned in the manuscript for 1636: The Viennese Waltz, which will be coming out in November of this year. Paula Goodlett and Gorg Huff were my co-authors on that novel, as they were on 1636: The Kremlin Games. The Viennese Waltz is partly based on a number of stories written by Paula and Gorg which were previously published in one of the Ring of Fire or Grantville Gazette anthologies. It also partly serves as one of the prequels for my next solo novel in the series, which I will start writing sometime this summer. Another novel I’ve turned in recently is Castaway Planet, which I co-authored with…
by Eric Flint | Jan 23, 2013 | Information, Writing Dear friends, As many of you know, for the past several years I have been teaching a seminar once a year on the business of being a professional writer. This is a three-day seminar that I do with Kevin Anderson, Rebecca Moesta, Dave Wolverton (who often writes under the name of David Farland) and various special guests who vary from one year to the next. This is not the usual writer’s workshop. We assume that those people who take the seminar have the skills to be professional writers. What we spend three days doing is teaching you everything you need to know about the business of becoming a writer. That includes strategies for getting published, the use of agents, electronic publishing, how to read and understand contracts and royalty statements, and so on. People who’ve taken this seminar in the past have uniformly told us that they found it very helpful. Many of them take the seminar a second or even a third time-so many, in fact, that we now have a special lower rate for alumni. This year, in 2013, we will be holding the seminar on May 14-16 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. (Past venues have includes Pasadena, California; Salt Lake City, Utah; and Las Vegas, Nevada.) Special guests will include Jim Minz, the chief editor for Baen Books; Joan Johnston, a bestselling romance author; James Owen, a bestselling storyteller and illustrator; and Mark Leslie LeFebvre, the Director of Self Publishing and chief of author relations for Kobo.If you’re interested in looking further into the seminar, please look at our URL: http://superstarswriting.com/ POST HOC: I also participated in a different sort of seminar this year for the first time. This was a more traditional writers workshop, although it also covered aspects of the business of publishing. The workshop was held on a Caribbean cruise liner to the Bahamas and lasted for four days: December 2 through December 6.…
by Eric Flint | Jul 19, 2012 | Information | 24 comments A number of people have asked me if I’ll be continuing the Jao Empire series I’ve been doing with Kathy Wentworth, now that Kathy has passed away. (She died in April from complications following cancer surgery.) The first two books in that series were THE COURSE OF EMPIRE and THE CRUCIBLE OF EMPIRE. Kathy and I had started a third book in the series, with the working title of THE SPAN OF EMPIRE. She wrote the first two chapters and sent them to me last summer. I rewrote the chapters, added a third chapter, and sent them back to her along with a further development of the plot outline (which by now comes to about 6000 words and isn’t finished). I told Kathy to set aside three more chapters for me to finish the battle scene I started in Chapter 3. She then wrote two more chapters (7 and 8, leaving aside chapters 4-6 for me) and had started on Chapter 9 when she broke off due to her illness. And that’s where things stand in terms of the manuscript. Contractually, the situation is complicated because Kathy and I didn’t yet have a contract for SPAN OF EMPIRE but we did have a very old contract for a novel called COLDFIRE. That was a story Kathy started many years ago and then got stalled on. I agreed to finish it with her and we got a contract from Baen. That story is really Kathy’s, though, not mine, and it’s not something I want to try to finish on my own. I do, however, want to finish SPAN OF EMPIRE. So… I’ve been discussing the situation both with Kathy’s husband, who controls her estate, as well as Baen Books. I think we’ll be able to work something out to everyone’s satisfaction so that work can resume on THE SPAN OF EMPIRE. As soon as anything gels,…
by Eric Flint | Feb 13, 2012 | Information Eric will be the guest of honor at SoonerCon 21, June 15-17 2012 in Oklahoma City, OK. http://www.soonercon.com/ Eric will be the master of ceremonies at LibertyCon 25, July 20-22 2012 at the Chatanooga Choo Choo hotel in Chatanooga, TN http://www.libertycon.org/ Eric, and the entire 1632 crew will be holding the 2012 edition of the 1632 Minicon at WorldCon 70 / Chicon 7 Aug 30 through Sept 3 2012 in Chicago. http://chicon.org/ More appearances will be listed as we know them.
by Eric Flint | Apr 13, 2011 | Information | 3 comments For those of you with Kindle e-books, I recently put up a collection of my short fiction in the Kindle store at Amazon. The title of the volume is The Flood Was Fixed & Other Stories>. Some of these are reprints from various magazines but others have never been published before. Included in the collection are three stories that were my initial stab at developing what eventually became the novel Boundary. Dave Freer and I also put up a collection of stories we’ve written together over the years in the Kindle store. The title of the collection is Crawlspace & Other Stories. It includes the long novella “The Genie Out of the Vat” which is the first of the stories in the Rats, Bats & Vats series. The stories in Crawlspace are available for individual purchase as well. Right now, the individual stories in The Flood Was Fixed aren’t available separately, but we’ll be adding that before too long. We’ll also be making the collections available in several other e-book formats, within a short time. We’ll post that here when it’s done. 3 Comments Timothy Edwards on August 30, 2011 at 3:56 PMWhen I heard about Orwell’s 1984 being “retrieved” from the Kindles of purchasers, I decided against _EVER_ having a Kindle – if you don’t want to sell your e-books without DRM, at least provide one I can read on my Nook. Bret Hooper on September 2, 2011 at 10:15 PMDear Eric:Like many others, I am looking forward to the publication, under whatever name, of “1636: Drums Along The . . . .” But please, try to avoid what was a fairly common; no, UNFAIRLY common colonial practice of asking a member of one tribe for the name of an enemy tribe, and then using that name, e.g. the tribal pejorative “mohawk” (cannibal) which a neighbor tribe used for the Kanyengahaga nation, which was the northeasternmost of the five nations,…
by webmaster | Apr 29, 2007 | Eric’s enterprises, Information, SF Sites | 9 comments From Eric Flint: I’m sending this letter to everyone who has at one time or another bought an issue of the Grantville Gazette, the electronic magazine devoted to the 1632 series, or purchased one of the various multi-issue packages we offer. Many of you are regular readers of the magazine. The purpose of this letter is to tell you that we are making a number of major and exciting changes to the magazine, beginning with the next issue. That’s Volume 11, which will be coming out on May 1st. The Grantville Gazette, which Jim Baen and I began as an experiment, has proven to be a very successful venture in electronic publishing. Successful enough, in fact, that beginning with Volume 11 we will doing the following: We’re raising the pay rates for the authors. Up until now, the pay rates for the Gazette have only been semi-pro rates. Beginning with Volume 11, we’ll be paying rates that meet—exceed, in fact—the minimum rates set by Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, Inc. SFWA is and has been for decades the recognized professional association for science and fantasy authors. We’re moving to a regular bi-monthly publication schedule. Up until now, the Gazette has been published on an “occasional” basis—meaning whenever we had enough good stories in stock to put out another issue. In practice, for the past year and half, we’ve been maintaining a quarterly schedule, and we’re now at the point where we have more good stories and articles than we can handle without shifting to a bi-monthly publishing schedule. Beginning May 1, therefore, the Gazette will now be published regularly on the first day of the following months: May, July, September, November, January and March. I will start writing a regular serialized story of my own, beginning with Volume 12, coming out in July. An episode of that story will appear in each succeeding…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | Salvos Against Big Brother I ended my last essay as follows: Is it true that modern electronic devices have made copyright infringement “so effortless” that it has become —or threatens to become— a serious menace to legitimate copyright owners? The answer is “no.” In the next issue, I’ll explain why. The reason the answer is “no,” in a nutshell, is encapsulated in the subtitle of this essay: There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. That colloquial expression captures a fundamental economic truth. Nothing that requires labor to be performed is really “free.” You’re going to pay for it, one way or other. Either by performing unpaid labor yourself, or by paying someone else for it. If not directly, then indirectly. The real difference between a toll road and a “freeway” is not that a toll road costs you money and a freeway is “free.” It most certainly is not “free.” That freeway was built and is maintained by the taxpayers’ money. The only difference, from the standpoint of cost, is how the money is collected. In the case of toll roads, it’s collected directly from the users in the form of tolls. In the case of a freeway, it’s collected from the entire population in the form of taxes. Let’s now apply that economic principle to crime. Whatever else it is, crime is also labor. In some cases —what are often called “crimes of passion”— that fact is simply irrelevant. But it is not irrelevant at all when the crime involved is one that is either motivated by a desire for profit, or simply profit’s poor second cousin, the desire to eliminate a cost to yourself. To give an example, most shoplifters do not steal in order to resell at a profit. They steal for their own use— but it’s worth the risk to them because they eliminate the cost of paying for the stolen…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | Salvos Against Big Brother In my last essay, I ended by saying that the claims made today on behalf of DRM—that stands for “Digital Rights Management”—can be summarized as follows: The advent of digital media makes it so effortless to copy an intellectual creator’s work that traditional notions of “fair use” have to be abandoned. In today’s world, any sort of “fair use” will inexorably and inevitably lead to wholesale violation of copyright. Therefore, fair use must be banned entirely—or, at a bare minimum, have tremendous restrictions placed on it. And I concluded by paraphrasing Mary McCarthy’s famous quip that every word in the above statement was a lie, including “the” and “and.” Let’s start with “makes it so effortless.” What’s being claimed here, by the proponents of DRM, is that because digital data can be processed by computers all of the traditional practical obstacles that made it difficult for somewhat to infringe copyright have vanished. “Online piracy” has therefore become rampant. If someone wants to produce a “pirated” version of an electronic text, they no longer have to have access to printing presses, nor do they need the financial wherewithal to operate them or pay someone else to do so. They can simply duplicate the text on their own home computer and thereby completely circumvent the need to pay the creator of the work under traditional copyright laws. For this reason, DRM supporters claim, all electronic text must be carefully encrypted. That forces the prospective user, whether he wants to or not, to pay the creators of the product the money that is legitimately owed to them. Without the code to open the encryption—to get which, he must pay for the legitimate product—the “pirate” is out of business. Furthermore, in order to prevent anyone from producing an illegal code-cracking mechanism, severe penalties must be levied against any such activity. And finally—oh, they’re a thorough lot, these…
by webmaster | Jan 17, 2007 | Information, Writing | 14 comments The forthcoming page is somewhat out of date, but until we can get it fixed up, here’s the master’s schedule in his own words, quoting from a Baen’s Bar post on Jan 17, 07 — Loyal Minions Here’s my complete publication schedule for the next year, if you’re interested: January 2007 Flint, editor Grantville Gazette III February 2007 Laumer The Long Twilight & Other Stories Lackey Bedlam’s Edge (Red Fiddler story) May 2007 Flint & Weber 1634: The Baltic War July 2007 Flint, editor The Best of JBU 2006 Flint & Drake The Dance of Time (pb reissue) August 2007 Flint & Freer Pyramid Power Anvil The Trouble With Humans October 2007 Flint & DeMarce 1634: The Bavarian Crisis November 2007 Flint, editor Grantville Gazette II (pb) December 2007 Flint & DeMarce 1634: The Ram Rebellion (pb) January 2008 Flint, editor RING OF FIRE II Laumer Earthblood & Other Stories They originally had BOUNDARY scheduled to come out in paperback in October, but then Toni decided the second half of the year was getting absurdly overloaded with Flint titles (_I_ didn’t think so, whine), so it’ll now come out sometime right after January of 2008. 14 Comments Mark L on January 18, 2007 at 11:19 AMWhat is the difference between the Ring of Fire series and the Grantville Gazette? I am writing a review of GGIII for the Galveston newspaper, soon, and I would like to know. David on January 18, 2007 at 12:00 PMAlso, what is planned for the next Trail of Glory/Arkansas story?David Walters Walt Boyes on January 18, 2007 at 10:08 PMI have a story in Ring of Fire (I), and one coming in Ring of Fire II. The difference between the two Ring of Fire volumes, and the Grantville Gazettes is this: the Gazettes are intended to be a magazine, published first online, and then going to print. Also, the RoF stories are mostly by…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | Salvos Against Big Brother Although this column addresses the controversy surrounding so-called Digital Rights Management, I devoted my first three essays to a discussion of the general principles concerning copyright as such. As I explained, I did that because it’s impossible to discuss DRM intelligently without understanding that all the issues involved are couched within—derive from, actually—the general principles in our society that govern copyright as a whole. Copyright is not an issue sitting over here, with DRM being a different issue sitting over there. In reality, DRM sits right inside of copyright. The link between the two—the cushion that DRM sits on, if you will allow me to develop this into a metaphor—is called “fair use.” It is one of the most critical aspects of copyright law, and has been since the inception of the copyright era in the early eighteenth century. And my metaphor is actually a good one, because “fair use” is exactly that—a cushion. It’s the provision in copyright law—I’m about to lower the bar for this metaphor—that keeps society’s buttocks from getting too badly bruised by the hard limits that copyright places on society’s ability to benefit from creative intellectual or artistic work. But DRM is too heavy. It’s steadily squeezing all of the real substance out of society’s fair use cushion. By now, that cushion isn’t much more than a skimpy little pad. Before too long, the way things are going, it will be gone entirely. The definition of “fair use” is slippery in copyright law, and always has been. In the nature of things, it’s a gray area rather than a sharp line. Trying to define it precisely, in legal terms, poses much the same problem that trying to define pornography does. One person’s filthy disgusting story is another person’s literary masterpiece. Terms which have both been applied, to give just one example, to James Joyce’s famous novel Ulysses. Whatever the…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | The Editor’s Page This article was originally published in Jim Baen’s Universe Vol 1, Num 4, December 2006. By Eric Flint Since our third issue came out a few weeks ago, we’ve expanded our staff by adding two new people. Beginning a few weeks ago, Stoney Compton became our assistant art director. And starting with this issue, Mike Resnick is going to be joining the magazine as our new executive editor, while my title changes from the former simple “editor” to “editor-in-chief.” If you’re wondering what those titles really mean, I’ll explain in a moment. I’ve known Stoney for thirteen years, since we met at the annual award presentation of the Writers of the Future contest in 1993. I’d won first place in the 1992 winter quarter’s contest and Stoney had won second place. We became friends over the course of that weekend and have remained in touch ever since. Earlier this year, at my recommendation, Jim Baen bought Stoney’s first novel Russian Amerika, an excellent alternate history that will be coming out in April 2007. (Yes, that’s a plug. It really is good—and, better still, it doesn’t retread the standard ground that so many alternate history novels do.) Stoney started helping the magazine informally a few months ago, in all sorts of ways. Eventually, it simply made sense to officially add him to the staff. Stoney did and will wind up doing all sorts of things for the magazine. But since he’s a professional graphics designer and will probably spend most of his time working with Dave Freer on the magazine’s art work, we decided to give him the title of assistant art director. My personal acquaintance with Mike Resnick is much more recent than that, although I’ve known who he was for . . . Jeez, I dunno. Three decades, something like that. In my years as an unpublished author—we won’t dwell on that miserable period—there was no one…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | Salvos Against Big Brother I ended my last essay by presenting the general principles needed to answer the question, how long should copyright terms last? For those of you who didn’t read or don’t remember what I said, here it is: First, authors need to have enough protection to enable them to be able to make a living as full-time writers. Second, that protection has to be long enough to provide them with a motivation to write for the public, and see doing so as a possible profession. But that’s it. Those are the only two legitimate concerns. Any term of copyright which exceeds that minimum necessary length, as Macaulay put it in the quote I cited in my last column, has no legitimate purpose. Once you cross that line, a necessary evil has simply become an evil—and the farther past that line you go, the more evil it gets. Now let’s get into the details. The first thing I need to establish are some facts. I need to do that because I’ve found that many people, including many authors, have very unrealistic notions about how long copyright actually protects anything. What happens is that they look only at the law—ignoring all social and economic realities—and say to themselves, “Oh, wow, anything that gets written—including anything I write myself—will be protected by copyright for seventy years after I die.” Uh, no. In the real world—except for intellectual property owned by giant corporations—here is what really happens: The longer copyright lasts, the less likely it is that 99.99% of anything ever written will ever get reissued. What excessively long copyright terms actually do is destroy writing. They don’t protect writing, they ravage it. Why? Well, it’s simple—if you look at writing as a professional craft, subject to economic imperatives like any other form of work, instead of a legal or philosophical abstraction. Here is the cold, hard reality. I call it the ninety-nine percent rule:…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | The Editor’s Page This article was originally published in Jim Baen’s Universe Vol 1, Num 3, October 2006. by Eric Flint Jim Baen, the founder of this magazine, died three months ago. Between that and the fact that we’ve now had enough initial experience with Universe to have a much better sense of the prospects for the magazine than we did when we launched it at the end of last year, I think it would be appropriate for me to use this issue’s Editor’s Page to let our readers know what our current plans are. Jim was replaced as publisher of Baen Books by Toni Weisskopf. I met with Toni at the recent Worldcon in Los Angeles to discuss the prospects for the magazine and, most importantly, to decide whether we’d continue with Jim Baen’s Universe after the first year was over. When we launched the magazine, Jim didn’t want to commit to more than one year’s publication. Six issues, in other words. Given that there were so many as-yet-unknown variables involved in publishing an electronic magazine based on the business model we’re using, I completely agreed with him. We simply had no way of knowing ahead of time, without any experience, whether a magazine like this could make it commercially. We had a lot of theories, when we started, but theory is a treacherous beast if it’s not muzzled by facts—and we had no facts. True, we could use Baen Books’ experience with Webscriptions, selling e-ARCs and distributing the e-magazine The Grantville Gazette as something of a guide. But none of those really served that well as a model for a magazine like Universe. That’s the reason, if anyone has ever wondered, that we’ve been selling subscriptions only in the form of a fixed one-year package. Regardless of what month you start your subscription, what you’re going to get is the first six issues, starting with the June 2006 issue—as opposed to a…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | Salvos Against Big Brother Originally published in Jim Baen’s Universe, Vol 1 Num 2, August 2006 I want to continue my discussion of copyright, which I began in last issue’s column, before turning my attention to the issue of so-called “Digital Rights Management” itself. The reason I want to do so is because what lies at the heart of DRM is one set of answers to a few simple questions: 1) What sort of protection do authors require, to make sure that they can and will keep engaging in their labor? 2) Why do they need a particular sort of protection, as opposed to another? 3) For how long do they need it? I’ll address the first two of these questions in this column, and the third one in the next. Let’s start with the first one, whose answer is obvious. If you don’t figure out a way to pay people to do labor such as writing fiction, one of two things will happen: a) Some potential writers won’t do it at all. b) Most will, simply because they feel a personal urge to do so. But, because they can’t make a living as authors, they will—certainly on average—never get all that good at it. The second point, by the way, is much more important than the first. The number of people who set out to become writers for the purpose of making money is miniscule, and always has been. To be blunt, only a moron would take up being an author as a way to make a living, much less a good living. As careers go, for all but a tiny percentage, it is either impossible altogether except as a part-time occupation, or pays dismally and erratically even if you can manage to do it full-time. I know a lot of authors, and I’m an author myself. I do not know a single one who set out to…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | The Editor’s Page This article was originally published in Jim Baen’s Universe Vol 1, Num 2, August 2006 by Eric Flint My original plans for this issue’s “The Editor’s Page” got swept aside last month by the death of Jim Baen, the man who launched the magazine and whose name is—and will remain—on the masthead. Jim lived just long enough to see the first issue of the magazine come out on June 1. Less than two weeks later, on June 12th, he suffered a massive stroke from which he never recovered consciousness. He died on June 28th. That’s not much of a consolation, but it’s some. This magazine was important to Jim for several reasons, one of which I will spend most of this editorial discussing. He was only sixty-two years old when he died, after a life of many accomplishments, of which Universe was one. And by no means the smallest, either. For Jim, the magazine was both a return to his own origins—he was the editor of Galaxy back in the mid-seventies, early in his career—and a continuation and expansion of a policy he had made central to Baen Books since the onset of the electronic era. That was his complete and total opposition to so-called Digital Rights Management and all the panoply of laws, regulations and attitudes that surround it. One of the reasons he asked me to be the editor of Jim Baen’s Universe is because he knew I shared, in full, his hostility toward DRM. He wanted Universe, among other things, to be a showcase demonstrating that it was perfectly possible for a commercial publisher to be successful without soiling themselves with DRM. (“Soiling” is the genteel way to put it. Jim was far more likely, in private correspondence and conversation, to use a simpler Anglo-Saxon term.) There are a lot of ways you can examine Jim Baen’s life and his career. I spent some time thinking about how I…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | Salvos Against Big Brother I’m going to be writing a regular column on the subject of electronic publishing, and the challenges it poses to modern society—as well as the opportunity it provides. This column will take up a number of related issues, including such matters as the proper length of copyright terms, the nature of Digital Rights Management and why we are opposed to it, and the largely mythical nature of so-called “online piracy.” We decided to keep this column separate from my general editor’s preface for each issue—see “The Editor’s Page”—because we think the issue is important enough for a separate column of its own. Furthermore, there will usually be a number of specific matters relevant to each issue of the magazine that I will need to address in “The Editor’s Page” that would simply get in the way of this discussion. We’re calling the column “Salvos Against Big Brother” because that captures the key aspect of the problem, so far as Jim Baen and I are concerned. Both the publisher of this magazine and its editor believe that so-called Digital Rights Management (DRM)—by which we mean the whole panoply of ever more restrictive laws concerning digital media, including the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)—are the following: First, they represent a growing encroachment on the personal liberties of the American public, as well as those of citizens in other countries in the world; Second, they add further momentum to what is already a dangerous tendency of governments and the large, powerful corporations which exert undue influence on them to arrogate to themselves the right to make decisions which properly belong to the public; Third, they tend inevitably to constrict social, economic, technical and scientific progress; And, fourth, they represent an exercise in mindless stupidity that would shame any self-respecting dinosaur. As this column progresses, in issue after issue, I will wind up spending most of my…
by Eric Flint | Jun 9, 2021 | The Editor’s Page This article was originally published in Jim Baen’s Universe Vol 1, Num 1, June 2006. By Eric Flint In my editor’s remarks for this first issue of Jim Baen’s UNIVERSE, I want to discuss the current state of the short fiction market in science fiction and fantasy. I’m sure most people reading this already know that short form fiction has been declining steadily for decades, in our genre. All four of the major paper magazines still in existence—Analog, Asimov’s, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and Realms of Fantasy—have been struggling against declining circulation figures for a long time, with no end in sight. Many smaller magazines have folded altogether. And the one major online F&SF; magazine that had been paying the best rates in the industry, the Sci-Fi channel’s SciFiction, recently closed down. The reasons are complex, and I’m not going to get into them here beyond a few brief remarks. What I want to talk about instead is the impact that the decline of short form fiction has on the field as a whole. That’s true, regardless of what causes it. In a nutshell, it’s extremely damaging, and for two reasons—one which affects authors directly, the other which affects the readership base of the genre and therefore its future. The absence of a large and vigorous market for short form fiction hammers authors directly. That’s because it makes F&SF; authors almost completely dependent on the novel market. And, while the novel market is and always will be intrinsically more lucrative than the short form market, it is also an extremely harsh environment for authors. Why? Well, simplifying a lot, it’s because of the fundamental economics involved. Novels, unlike washing machines and toasters and automobiles, are unique, each and every one of them. Not “unique” in the sense that they don’t have generic similarities, but “unique” simply in the obvious fact that each and every story has…
by webmaster | Apr 24, 2006 | Information The loyal minions have just heard that Eric has accepted an offer to be a guest at Conspiracy 2, the 28th annual New Zealand SF Convention to be held in Wellington over Queen’s Birthday weekend, 1 – 4 June 2007. for more information visit http://conspiracy2.sf.org.nz (NOTE: The link points to the 2007 version of the page via the Wayback Machine at Archive.org.)Â –Loyal Minions (Just for a sense of scale, and to let you know how cool it might be to go to, this year’s New Zealand national SF Convention is being held in a hotel with 68 rooms, and they say that “we should be able to take over a large chunk of it.” The 2007 con hotel has 65 rooms.)
Eric said, in the preface to Grantville Gazette Volume V: “Sigh. Not one of these stories deals with Ye Big Picture. Not one of them fails to wallow in the petty details of Joe or Dieter or Helen or Ursula’s angst-ridden existence. Pure, unalloyed, soap opera, what it is.” And we continue in our grand soap operatic tradition with Grantville Gazette (count ’em) Volume Seven. Is Jon and Linda Sonnenleiter’s introduction of up-time style pizza to Naples critical to the war? Nope. Don’t think so. Neither is Mark Huston’s quiet story about an elderly couple and their choices. But the fans don’t much care, we’ve found. Ditto for John and Patti Friend’s crew of misfits who, somehow, make their way to Magdeburg. They’re not important to the events we’ll all read about in 1634: The Baltic War, at all. Neither is Virginia DeMarce’s Minnie Hugelmair or Tina Marie Hollister. They’re just not at all the type to get involved in politics and war. No more so is Russ Rittger’s Chad, who manages to find himself as something of a laundry mogul, or Terry Howard’s Jimmy Dick, who seems to drink himself into a philosophical mood with some regularity. On the other hand, Rick Boatright’s radio heads just might have an effect on that little altercation up in the Baltic, and there’s just no telling what Kerryn Offord’s Dr. Phil might come up with next. Kim Mackey’s Colette . . . well, she’s got this really, really rich relative who just might come in handy to know. And, if you’d like to build a Victrola, explore the mass media implications, plan the route for a railroad—not to mention learn about the engines for the trains, well, this is the place. Chris Penycate, Gorg Huff, Carsten Edelberger, Iver Cooper and I will tell you what we know about those. So, grab your coffee (or whatever beverage), load up on the chocolate bonbon’s, kick back in…
by webmaster | Mar 15, 2006 | Information | 2 comments Travel plans announced to date: I-Con March 24-26 Stoney Brook University, NY Eric Flint and Ryk Spoor (Not a Baen’s Universe event probably; there is not time to set it up) Nebula Awards Weekend May 4 – 7, Tempe, AZ Eric Flint and David Weber will be presenting the first ever Andre Norton award. Sarah Hoyt (Eric’s co-author and a member of the Baen’s Universe editorial board) will be attending. Convergence July 7 – 9, Bloomington, MN Eric Flint and David Weber will be there.. David Weber GoH, Eric Flint “Past GoH” Conestoga July 28 – 30, Tulsa, OK David Drake GoH Rick Boatright & Paula Goodlett will be there. (No they’re not authors, No, Eric won’t be there, but there will be a “Universe” presense and we thought you might want to know.) 1632 Minicon IV – Aug 4-5-6, Mannington, WV Eric Flint, Virginia DeMarce, Paula Goodlett, Rick Boatright, and a host of others. WorldCon August 23 – 27, Los Angeles, CA Eric Flint and countless other authors. Con-Stellation October 20-22, Huntville, AL Eric will be attending, David Drake GoH, with Toni Weisskopf World Fantasy Con November 2 – 5, Austin, Texas. Eric Flint and David Drake and a host of others. Note that membership to WFC is strictly limited. 2 Comments Sea Wasp on March 15, 2006 at 3:23 PMHey, what about I-Con? Coming up the 24 – 26th of March? webmaster on March 15, 2006 at 6:25 PMOk, what about it? — I can only list the things I know about. 🙁 Even loyal minions have their limits you know.