Tag Archives: ramblings

General Posts

Thursday Afternoon Ramblings

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I wanted to write this on September 11, but work had me too busy.  Do you remember how we felt after 9/11?  I’m not talking about immediately after.  I mean once the initial shock wore off, and we as a collective picked ourselves up.  Yes, we were angry.  Yes, we were shaken.  Yes, we were saddened.  But we were something else, as well.  We were galvanized.  After the divisiveness of the 2000 election, it was refreshing to pull together as a people, turn our collective attention to the Taliban, and show them our greatest strengths as a people.  Before the attacks, I stood as firmly against President Bush as anyone.  From 9/11 until the decision to invade Iraq, I pledged my full support to my president, and it felt good.

For a little while after 9/11, we weren’t conservatives or liberals.  We weren’t Bible thumpers or baby killers.  We weren’t homophobes or fags.  We didn’t condemn each other for where we ate lunch, or hassle each other about nonsense.  We were all Americans.  We all rallied around the flag.  I remember a black friend of mine saying that for the first time in his life, he felt patriotic.  It didn’t last long, not even a full year, but for a little while, politics took a backseat to our nation.  During one of our darkest hours, we held ourselves high and told the rest of the world that when we are threatened, we will pull together.

I know there were examples of idiots who beat up Middle Easterners or attacked mosques, and I don’t mean to ignore those facts, but by far, those were the exceptions, not the rule.  For the most part, we stood shoulder to shoulder ready to defend our country, rebuild what was destroyed, and honor those who were lost.  For weeks after the attack, President Bush had a 90% approval rating.  90%.  That’s unbelievable.  It felt good to know we could be one people again.

But like I said, it didn’t last.  Personally, I stopped supporting the president when the decision was made to move the focus from those who attacked us to Iraq.  From there, it continued to unravel.  Today, we are as fragmented and divided as ever.  When Osama Bin Laden was killed, instead of celebrating our victory as a nation, each side of the political spectrum taunted the other.  That sickened me.  Today, instead of mourning the death of a good man in Libya, both sides are politicizing the tragedy.  Republicans are also shocked and outraged that President Obama is meeting with the Muslim Brotherhood president from Egypt.  Never you mind that Egypt has been our ally since WWII.  Never you mind that every single president since George Washington has met with at least one controversial head of state.  Never you mind that the goal of the Iraq War was to spread democracy to the Middle East and that the president of Egypt was democratically elected.  Because President Obama is meeting with him, it’s further proof that he must be in cahoots with his Muslim brothers.

It’s sickening, and since we have tarnished the memory of all those who died on 9/11, and since we’ve failed to learn any lessons from that tragedy, we deserve whatever happens to us.  Today, I’m more ashamed to call myself an American than at any other time in my life.  I love my country, but my fellow Americans make me want to puke.

General Posts

The Writers’ Workshop Ramblings

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The Writers’ Workshop of Science Fiction and Fantasy

In seeking publication for his newest workshop project, Bram Stoker award-winning editor Michael Knost sought a small press, for the care and enthusiasm a good one harbors for the genre and its fellow writers. Seventh Star Press is that kind of publisher, bringing its own love for science fiction and fantasy to the project, and its “got your back” attitude for genre writers and other small and independent presses.

Seventh Star Press is very excited about the opportunity to release this project, but as it is one outside of our originally projected 2012 publishing schedule, a little help from outside is needed to bring this project to fruition.

Perhaps the first question that comes to your mind, if encountering us for the first time, is:  Who is Seventh Star Press?

Formed in the fall of 2008, Seventh Star Press is a respected speculative fiction publisher based in Lexington, KY, boasting works from such authors as Jackie Gamber, Michael West, D.A. Adams, Steven Shrewsbury, David Blalock, R.J. Sullivan, J.L. Mulvihill, and Stephen Zimmer.  The press also features two highly-acclaimed, award-winning artists, Matthew Perry and Bonnie Wasson, whose creative work is featured on the covers and interiors of all SSP releases.

Now that you have a little more of an idea about us, we would like to introduce you to the particulars of this proposed book project.

The Writers’ Workshop of Science Fiction and Fantasy is a collection of essays and interviews with some of most influential names in the industry; each article covering a specific element of the craft of writing science fiction and fantasy.  The collaborators in this wonderful anthology include:

Neil Gaiman — “Where Do You Get Your Ideas?”

Orson Scott Card — “On Rhetoric and Style.”

Lou Anders — “Nebulous Matters, or Speculations on Subgenre.”

Lucy Snyder — “Ursula K. LeGuin Talks About A Lifetime in the Craft.”

James Gunn — “Beginnings.”

George Zebrowski — “Middles.”

Jay Lake — “Endings.”

Nayad Monroe — “Tim Powers Talks About Writing Supernatural Awe and More.”

Pam Sargent — “Talking Too Much, or Not Enough: Dialogue in Science Fiction and Fantasy.”

Geoff Fuller –– “How Alien the Alien: A Primer on Viewpoint.”

Nancy Kress — “The Green-Skinned Zorn Laughed With Grief: Character and Emotion in Science Fiction and Fantasy.”

Harry Turtledove — “Alternate History: the How-To of What Might Have Been.”

Kelly Green — “Larry Niven Talks About the Collaborative Process.”

Joe Haldeman — “Hemingway Talks About Writing.”

Nisi Shawl — “Unbending Gender.”

Alan Dean Foster — “Reverse Engineering: Writing Novelizations.”

Alethea Kontis — “Kevin J. Anderson Talks About Spin-off Novels and Prequels.”

Elizabeth Bear –– “Tactics of Worldbuilding.”

Jackie Gamber–“Ann and Jeff Vandermeer Talk About Weird Fiction”

Michael Knost — Short fiction editors Ellen Datlow, Stanley Schmidt, Gordon Van Gelder, James Patrick Kelly, Mike Resnick, and John Joseph Adams discuss what they are looking for when reading submissions.

Levels of Participation

There are seven levels of participation, six of which involve receiving a version of the book, ranging from the eBook to a limited hardcover edition.  We invite you to look over the various levels and rewards in this campaign, the core of which serve effectively as a pre-order offer for The Writers’ Workshop of Science Fiction and Fantasy.

What does the money raised in this campaign go towards?

The money raised in this campaign goes towards paying pro-rates for collaborators, as well as cover art fees and other hard costs involved in producing this title.  It will be issued in a limited hardcover edition, softcover, and various eBook formats.

How You Can Help Further

We encourage tweeting, posting, sharing, and we happily do interviews too!

You can join with us in bringing writers a wealth of insight and writing advice in a book that is rich in premium content.  Take a look at the seven options we have for this campaign and come aboard today!

General Posts

Monday Morning Ramblings

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Here’s a farm update.  After two years of research, planning, testing, set-backs, building, and rebuilding, our first hydroponic system is up and running.  For the trial run, we’re growing three varieties of tomato, two kinds of lettuce, cucumbers, and cauliflower.  So far, the seedlings for spinach and peppers haven’t sprouted, though one of spinach plants looked promising this morning.  Right now, the young plants are growing well and all is working as it should.  Hopefully, in the next couple of months, we’ll have our first harvest of fresh, organic veggies, just as prices begin to skyrocket.

The thing I love about this system is the simplicity.  It’s an easily repeatable design and functions quite nicely.  We won’t know if it fully works until we get a harvest, but so far, the lights seem to produce ample spectrum; the grow chamber floods and drains the way it should; and the plants have shot up quite a bit in one week.  After watching them flourish so quickly, I’m more convinced than ever that indoor growing is the future of farming, especially as weather patterns become more and more erratic and more and more extreme.  The indoor environment is more stable, more efficient, and more controllable than outdoors.  Long-term, indoor production will be the solution to farming.

I’ll continue to post updates as the plants mature.