Robert J. Sawyer

Come to my Readercon Kaffeeklatsch

2009-07-09T05:44:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow (Friday, July 10, 2009), at 5:00 p.m. in Room 458 (but you have to sign up in advance at the con, and space is quite limited): an opportunity to spend an intimate hour over coffee (or whatever) with me. Always one of my favourite parts of any convention that has them.

Star Trek Viewmaster

2009-07-08T22:32:00.002-04:00

Click picture for larger version
Over at TrekMovie.com, someone asked, about the Star Trek Viewmaster reels from the 1960s: "Always wondered why there was not a real shot of the Enterprise and the Exeter in the set ... instead of a shot of two of the model kits in space. Anyone know?"

Yes, indeed. I do. :)

Only the Exeter in the background was the AMT model kit; the Enterprise in the foreground was the 33" ("the three-footer") model of the ship created for the TV series; the Viewmaster shot of it (above) is gorgeous.

And the reason it was done that way is simple: to get the Viewmaster 3D effect, they had to shoot with special stereo cameras. That was back when Sawyers (no relation) or GAF actually sent their own camerapeople onto the sets of TV shows they were making Viewmaster reels for (which is why it was "The Omega Glory" -- not because it was the best episode, but because it was the one that happened to be filming the week the Viewmaster cameraman was in the studio).

The shots of the Enterprise and Exeter used in the actual episode weren't new miniature footage, but rather recombinations of existing footage, and so there was no way to get the 3D effect from the existing opticals; Viewmaster redid the shot from scratch, and it actually is quite gorgeous. Think of it as the very first example of Star Trek Remastered. ;)

Later, Viewmaster reels were done on the cheap; the Star Trek: The Motion Picture set is an example. They'd use stills from the movie -- two or three split-screened, so that the stills were at different focal depths, but weren't themselves three-dimensional.

Googling around, I find that the blog My Star Trek Scrapbook has a great page devoted to the Classic Trek Viewmaster set.

Aurora Voting deadline crunch

2009-07-07T17:52:00.003-04:00

If you're voting by mail, tomorrow -- Wednesday, July 8, 2009 -- is the postmarked-by deadline.

If you're voting online, you have until Wednesday, July 15.

If you're a member of this year's Worldcon in Montreal (and a Canadian) you can vote for free; otherwise, there's a $5 charge to help defray the cost of manufacturing trophies.

The online and paper ballots are here.

Many fine nominees this year, including -- cough, cough -- my own Identity Theft and Other Stories.

Hangin' with Saskatoon writers

2009-07-07T16:48:00.004-04:00

Last night, Carolyn and I had dinner with some of the great writers here in Saskatoon.

Back row: Saskatchewan Book Award winner Brenda Barker, Governor-General's Award winner Arthur Slade.

Front row: Books in Canada First Novel Award winner Geoffrey Ursell, Hugo Award winner Robert J. Sawyer, John W. Campbell Memorial Award finalist Barbara Sapergia.

Dean Wesley Smith on "Life After Copyright"

2009-07-07T15:38:00.001-04:00

Well said, and well worth reading. "Life After Copyright" by Dean Wesley Smith.

Another thread at the Borders Science Fiction blog

2009-07-07T12:29:00.003-04:00

I'm the guest blogger at Borders.com's science-fiction blog Babel Clash right now. Here's my latest post -- but, as before, I've turned off comments here; come join the fun at Babel Clash, and share your views:

Join the conversation at Babel Clash.

It's a different world

2009-07-07T11:37:00.002-04:00

From TCON-News, the email newsletter of Toronto's Polaris, a science-fiction media convention coming up this weekend (I won't be there this year, but it is a very good convention):

Authors, of course, sign books (or anything else) for free; it's just part of what we do. We even sign used copies (for which we received no royalty from the bearer) for free. An author gets around $2.50 in royalties for a new hardcover and maybe 60 cents for a paperback, so a typical actor's signature (which -- ahem, is paid for in cash: wonder how many of these transactions are reported to the IRS?) is worth what an author earns for ten hardcovers or 40 paperbacks.

Above: the one and only autograph I ever bought -- US$20 in 2007, including the photo -- from Bob May, the man who was inside the Robot suit on Lost in Space.

Penguin Canada appoints new genre-fiction editor

2009-07-06T19:40:00.002-04:00

My new editor at Penguin Canada is Adrienne Kerr. Formerly a Penguin Canada sales representative for Southwestern Ontario, Adrienne won this year's Libris Award from the Canadian Booksellers Association as Sales Rep of the Year.

Prior to joining Penguin in May 2006, she was a book buyer with HDS Retail (which operates airport bookstores in Canada). Before that, she was assistant manager at Nicholas Hoare Books in Toronto and marketing assistant with Groundwood Books.

Adrienne assumes her new editorial duties starting a week today, on Monday, July 13, 2009. Besides me, she will be the Canadian editor for such writers as John le Carré, Ariana Franklin, Pauline Gedge, and Rennie Airth.

Quill & Quire has a nice photo of Executive Editor Nicole Winstanley and Adrienne Kerr from 2007 here (3rd photo down).

Welcome aboard, Adrienne!

RJS guest blogs in Boders SF blog

2009-07-06T19:08:00.003-04:00

I'm the guest blogger for July 2009 in Borders Books's science-fiction blog "Babel Clash," co-sponsored by i09. My first post -- my opening salvo, if you will -- is over there, and also posted below, but I'm turning off comments on this topic here; come on over to Borders.com and chime in there!

Join the conversation at Borders.com!

CompuServe Classic: R.I.P.

2009-07-06T17:39:00.004-04:00

I joined CompuServe sometime in 1987.

I used to be a sysop (system operator) of the WordStar Forum there, and I hung out a lot in the Science Fiction and Fantasy Forum (so much so that the command GO SAWYER at the CompuServe prompt would take people there).

On October 10, 1989 -- almost 20 years ago -- I was given a "sponsored account," meaning I didn't have to pay for my connect time (I remember one year prior to that my bill for CompuServe connect time was $700). It was a joy to be able to go anywhere and do anything on that service without getting charged -- such was the online world back in the day.

I made my first online friends on CompuServe -- including SF writers John E. Stith, Mike Resnick, Barbara Delaplace, and Roger MacBride Allen, and all sorts of WordStar users; many of them are still good friends to this day.

And now, it's over: AOL, which acquired CompuServe some years ago, has finally shut down CompuServe Classic.

CompuServe was a very important part of my life from 1988 until the early 2000s. I made friends there, I learned things there, I did tons of online research there (using a service called Magazine Database Plus), I won awards there (the CompuServer Science Fiction and Fantasy Forum's HOMer Award), I sold the one and only bit of shareware I ever wrote there (MICKEE: The Mouse Interface for the Control-Key Editing Environment, which gave mouse support to WordStar), I got my email there, I even hosted my webpage there for a while (with the ungainly address of ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/sawyer, and (long before anyone had heard of blogging) I began this online journal there (with entries starting back in 1999 salvaged here).

R.I.P., CompuServe. You were good to me, and you mattered, and I will always remember you.

My Readercon programming

2009-07-05T20:21:00.003-04:00

I'll be attending Readercon 20, July 9-12, 2009, near Boston. Here's the programming I'll be on:

Friday 11:00 AM, Vineyard: Reading (60 min.) from his recently published novel WWW: Wake.

Friday 5:00 PM, Room 458: Kaffeeklatsch.

Saturday 10:00 AM, Salon F: Autographing.

Saturday 12:00 Noon, VT: Federations Group Reading (60 min.) John Joseph Adams (host) with K. Tempest Bradford, Robert J. Sawyer, Allen Steele, Catherynne M. Valente, Genevieve Valentine: Readings from the original and reprint anthology (cover blurb: "Vast. Epic. Interstellar.") edited by Adams and published by Prime Books in January.

Saturday 1:00 PM, Salon E: Panel: Novels of Advocacy vs. Novels of Recognition. Paolo Bacigalupi, John Clute, Ken Houghton, Barry N. Malzberg, Robert J. Sawyer (Leader), Graham Sleight: At the keynote Thursday night panel at Readercon 18, our panelists stumbled upon a useful taxonomic distinction: novels that advocate for a particular future (a la Heinlein) versus novels that merely attempt to recognize and describe a possible one (a la Gibson). There was some debate as to just how strongly the field was moving from the former to the latter, and if there was such a trend, its relationship to others (optimism vs. pessimism, far futures vs. near futures, etc.) One of the panelists, Graham Sleight, has recently renewed the discussion online. We'll explore the numerous possible directions raised by Sleight and others.

Saturday 3:00 PM, Salon E: Panel: Is Darwinism Too Good For SF? Jeff Hecht (Leader), Caitlin R. Kiernan, Anil Menon, James Morrow, Steven Popkes, Robert J. Sawyer: This year marks the sesquicentennial of the publication of The Origin of Species and the bicentennial of Charles Darwin's birth. Considering the importance of the scientific idea, there has been surprisingly little great sf inspired by it. We wonder whether, in fact, if the theory has been too good, too unassailable and too full of explanatory power, to leave the wiggle room where speculative minds can play in. After all, physics not only has FTL and time travel, but mechanisms like wormholes that might conceivably make them possible. What are their equivalents in evolutionary theory, if any?

Aurora Award banquet tickets can now be purchased online

2009-07-05T16:11:00.003-04:00

... using PayPal. See here. Carolyn and I just bought ours.

Cool YouTube promo for Calgary's Con-Version

2009-07-05T15:11:00.002-04:00

Con-Version is Calgary's annual SF&F convention. Author Guests of Honour this year are Terry Brooks, Tanya Huff, and Robert J. Sawyer -- and now there's a nifty promo for the con on YouTube. Check it out.

See you in August!

Book Banter podcasts Rob

2009-07-04T12:06:00.002-04:00

Book Banter, a podcast produced by Alex C. Telander of Sacramento, interviews Robert J. Sawyer, talking about his novel Wake.

Bringing some sense to ebook pricing

2009-07-02T21:29:00.003-04:00

My favorite ebook format is eReader (now ultimately owned by Barnes & Noble), and they've announced some nice pricing initiatives over at eReader.com, which should help to bring some sanity to ebook pricing:

And, yup, my Wake, which is a $25 hardcover, is just $12.95 there, and my Hugo Award-winning Hominids is just $5.99.

It's official: you're in the right place!

2009-07-02T20:51:00.002-04:00

Yep, according to Speculative Fiction Examiner, this here blog is one of "10 author blogs to follow."

If that ain't cool enough, SciFi Wire just included my Twitter feed on its list of "40 more sci-fi Twitter feeds you should be following" -- one of only two author feeds to make the list (the other is William Gibson's).

Like MasterCard, I'm everywhere you want to be -- including Facebook (where I'm RobertJSawyer). :)

As Kor once said, "Pity. It would have been glorious."

2009-07-02T19:30:00.002-04:00

From Ansible 264, a news note from Farah Mendlesohn:

Well, I know who the unamed appointee was, but I'm not saying -- except to say it wasn't me.

I was, however, solicited to apply by UC Riverside back in October, 2008. This is the solicitation; it would have been an amazing job:

It would have been a great job, and, as many commentators had said, a great signal to the world of science fiction's respectability and stature. Too bad it isn't going to happen.

Edward Willett on the science of Wake

2009-07-01T12:58:00.005-04:00

You gotta love Edward Willett. Here it is, in the thick of Aurora Award voting, where his absolutely first-rate Marseguro is competing against Hayden Trenholm's wonderful Defining Diana and my own Identity Theft and Other Stories, and what does Ed do? Why, he writes a glowing review of Hayden's book, and then follows that up by devoting his latest science column to issues in my new novel Wake.

Ed's column ("Willett's World of Science") is available both as text and with Ed himself reading it aloud (and Ed has an amazing voice). Check it out! And -- thanks, Ed!

Table of Contents: Distant Early Warnings

2009-06-30T18:07:00.002-04:00

DISTANT EARLY WARNINGS
Canada's Best Science Fiction
edited by Robert J. Sawyer

Robert J. Sawyer Books [Red Deer Press],
trade paperback, August 2009

[Award wins cited are for the stories listed; all the short-story authors have won or been nominated for the Hugo or Nebula, or have won the long-form Aurora]

Table of Contents

"Copyright Notice, 2525" by David Clink [poem]

Introduction by Robert J. Sawyer

"In Spirit" by Paddy Forde [AnLab winner; Hugo finalist]
"The Ray-Gun: A Love Story" by James Alan Gardner [Sturgeon Award winner; Hugo and Nebula finalist]
"Bubbles and Boxes" by Julie E. Czerneda
"Shed Skin" by Robert J. Sawyer [AnLab winner; Hugo finalist]
"Halo" by Karl Schroeder
"The Eyes of God" by Peter Watts
"You Don't Know my Heart" by Spider Robinson
"A Raggy Dog, a Shaggy Dog" by Nalo Hopkinson
"The Cartesian Theatre" by Robert Charles Wilson [Sturgeon winner]

Lightning Round [short-short stories]

"Ars Longa, Vita Brevis" by James Alan Gardner
"Men Sell Not Such In Any Town" by Nalo Hopkinson
"The Abdication of Pope Mary III" by Robert J. Sawyer
"Repeating the Past" by Peter Watts
"The Great Goodbye" by Robert Charles Wilson
"Stars" by Carolyn Clink [poem]
Award-Winning Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy [annotated list]
Online Resources

Distant Early Warnings

2009-06-30T16:16:00.004-04:00

Cover art by James Beveridge
Cover design by Karen Thomas

Click picture for a larger version
Behold the cover for Distant Early Warnings: Canada's Best Science Fiction, edited by Robert J. Sawyer, and published by the Robert J. Sawyer Books imprint of Red Deer Press. Copies arrived in our warehouse from the printer today.

We'll be launching the book at Readercon in Boston in July; McNally Robinson in Saskatoon on Tuesday, July 28, at 7:30 p.m.; and at Antcipation, the World Science Fiction Convention in Montreal.

Distant Early Warnings contains stories by Hugo Award winners Spider Robinson, Robert J. Sawyer, and Robert Charles Wilson, Hugo nominees Paddy Forde, James Alan Gardner, Nalo Hopkinson, and Peter Watts, and Aurora Award winners Julie E. Czerneda and Karl Schroeder, plus poetry by Carolyn Clink and David Livingstone Clink.

Freedom Scientific podcast features RJS and Wake

2009-06-30T12:25:00.006-04:00

Freedom Scientific makes JAWS, the screen-reading software that Caitlin Decter uses in my novel Wake. JAWS is the world's most popular screen-reading program for the blind.

A quite lengthy and detailed interview between Robert J. Sawyer and Jonathan Mosen, Freedom Scientific's Vice-President of Blindness Hardware Product Management, begins a couple of minutes into the podcast (but the preamble is fascinating, full of interesting stuff about products for the blind).

The interview deals with how I researched blindness, my own experience with blindness, the reaction to Wake from the blind community, plus my residency at the Canadian Light Source, machine consciousness, the role of science fiction, and a bunch of other cool topics.

The MP3 of the podcast is here, and the Podcast XML link is here.

I've done a lot of audio interviews related to Wake, but this one is a particularly in-depth and interesting one, I must say. Incidentally, the interview was recorded via Skype with me in Saskatoon, and Jonathan in New Zealand.

From Jonathan's introductory comments:

Aurora Awards endcap display

2009-06-30T12:14:00.003-04:00

So, I wandered into the local McNally Robinson here in Saskatoon, and what should I find in the science-fiction section but this wonderful endcap display honouring this year's Aurora Award nominees. W00t!

Titles pictured:

Identity Theft and Other Stories by Robert J. Sawyer

Marseguro by Edward Willett

After the Fires by Ursula Pflug

The Year's Best Science Fiction, 26th annual collection

Nice! Canadians may vote for the Auroras here -- and voting closes in a week.

James Alan Gardner wins the Sturgeon

2009-06-29T16:51:00.003-04:00

James Alan Gardner's "The Ray-Gun: A Love Story" is this year's winner of the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for Best Short Story of the Year.

I'm thrilled because Jim is my friend; because Jim is in my little writers' group, and we workshopped the story; and because I'm reprinting the story next month in Distant Early Warnings: Canada's Best Science Fiction, an anthology being published under my Robert J. Sawyer Books imprint.

Jim's story is also a current Hugo Award finalist -- don't forget to vote!

Way to go, Jim!

The Dragon Page reviews Wake

2009-06-28T18:07:00.005-04:00

Saying, among other nice things:

The full review, by Michael Hickerson, is here.

Writers make their characters up

2009-06-28T12:47:00.005-04:00

Yesterday, as part of my outreach duties as writer-in-residence at the Canadian Light Source synchrotron, I attended a book club meeting; the clubs members -- six very nice women -- had all just read my John W. Campbell Memorial Award-winning 2005 science-fiction novel Mindscan.

At one point, I got asked the inevitable question: who are the characters based on? And to answer that I opened one of their copies of my book and read this little scene, because not only is the answer true, it's also important. Here, Jake Sullivan is oohing and aahing over meeting Karen Bessarian, author of some beloved young-adult novels: