R.E. Stearns's Blog

I'm super excited to show you the cover for my next book!

The smart city that secures the world's idyllic way of life is failing, and it's up to a single engineer to find out why.

Engineer Elys Kundakçi has been on the run since the fascist Republic's secret police framed her for a disaster that wasn't her fault. When she's picked up by a squad of armored social workers from an independent planet, she finds herself in a much-needed safe harbor.

The social workers rescued Elys so she can fix the station's smart city infrastructure that decides where people live, runs their economy, and coordinates social services. Her rescuers' leader is patient, compassionate, and distractingly attractive. Elys's friendship — and, she dares to hope, romance — with her grows while Elys works on the station's problems.

As signs point toward nearly undetectable sabotage, Elys must find the programming error and the saboteur behind it before the smart city's mistakes reveal her location to the Republic operatives hunting her, or the Republic takes advantage of the independent planet's disarray to invade, kill Elys, and steal everything her hosts built their beautiful station to achieve.

This ebook is on pre-order now (at Amazon and other places) and available to buy or borrow from your local library on October 1, 2024. Early readers will notice some enormous differences from the version they read let’s-not-think-too-hard-about-it years ago. I’m proud of how it turned out.

It’s been a slow few years since I last updated this site. I wrote novels that didn’t sell, and I’m working to either sell or self-publish one while finishing another one, so, nothing new for you to read yet.

But! Here’s a podcast I visited to rave about a wonderful book:

My Word As Vorkosigan: The Vor Game by Lois McMaster Bujold

Well, I said I'd blog more and then stopped blogging for months. Is blog fade still a thing?

But! Today I want to tell you that I am on Shepherd.com recommending books, for one article only! They have a classy format for recommendations and they offer Bookshop.org links, so check out the other themed book recommendation lists, too.

I am as slow a reader as I am a writer, and I don't finish everything I start reading, so it can be challenging to create a list of current books on any particular theme. Fortunately if one widens the theme definition, one can fit in quite a lot. I believe in reading widely, and my recommendation list reflects that.

Although, I should read more poetry. It's not as if there's a shortage of sci-fi poems. I mean, please write more, but also, they're out there to read if one wants them!

Here are online sources of free and excellent spec fic poetry:

Eye to the Telescope is my absolute favorite. Every issue contains something amazing, often multiple amazing somethings.The SFPA Poetry Contest posts their winners annually.When you want something more fanciful, Liminality is full of neat stuff.And I had to do this; I am imperfect: Lovecraft wrote an alarming amount of poetry. Fungi from Yoggoth continues to be my favorite of his, but I also like the ones he included in Christmas letters to his friends (which he had. Shocking, I know).

In other news, early readers have read my new project! I might? Finish it in 2021? It feels late, but I've barely been working on it for a year. That's pretty typical for my novels.

I'm going to miss NaNoWriMo, though. Good luck, Wrimos. I'll be cheering you on.

Good news! I have unpacked enough moving boxes to locate all of my recording equipment, which means I can now share the following blog post. Do not listen to the audio on your best headphones, though. I'm still looking for the perfect new recording spot.

Barbary Station, the place, came to me almost fully formed. The next two books in the trilogy challenged me to create more interesting settings where people chose to live and work. As Wired has shown us in its Future of Work series, what needs doing and who does it should look a lot different in the future. Might be better for us, might be worse.

But one occupational change I do not see us gravitating toward is this generalist, "back to the land" nonsense that both the extreme American left and right are espousing right now. I've lived on a working ranch. Do you have any idea what goes into just keeping one flock of chickens happy, healthy, and safe from predators, never mind cows, dogs, horses, elderly neighbors, pond fish, and the plants in the garden?

At least the elders and critters try to take care of themselves. Have you ever grown enough veggies to feed yourself? Weeding and watering are so boring. Even with sprinklers, if you're counting on your garden for food you have to look at every plant to make sure it's getting the right amount of water, sun, and nutrients, and hasn't been infested or infected by some other hungry lifeform. In America, if you don't keep your defenses solid (and I do mean defenses. Fences aren't enough), then deer, birds, squirrels, and wild boars will eat more of your veggies than you will. And that's in a friendly area where everybody is armed and everybody knows everybody is armed, so you don't have local humans in enormous trucks chasing your cows or stealing from you (but damn their rude, littering, cow-hassling guests). Yes, I have a complex relationship with violence in general and ranged weaponry in particular. That's a whole different post.

The combination of tedium and danger is why we have specialists. For example: a farmer who doesn't make their own fertilizer or medicine. Maybe they don't even gather their own seeds at the end of harvest or keep animals for breeding (the ones which only make sperm, noise, and destruction).

The time this example farmer saves by not doing all that lets them raise as much food as the land will support, and then sell the excess to somebody who will sell to you. In addition to fertilizer, pharmaceuticals, and seeds, a specialized farmer may also rely on police or neighbors to (theoretically) protect the farm. If the farmer spends hours patrolling their own land, then they can't spend that time growing food and taking care of critters.

Oh, and automation is expensive to get started and tricky to keep working right now, no matter what you're automating. That's not an option for everyone. I'm not even talking about seasonal farm labor here, but that's a separate kettle of fish.

So there's one example of the advantages of dividing up labor, and here's another: Do you think a bunch of "back to the land" Instagrammers or militia members (not exclusive categories, I know) could have developed a safe and effective coronavirus vaccine? Can you imagine the researchers who did it (yes they did) developing vaccines while they also grew their own food, designed and repaired their own equipment, made sterile supplies, and took care of their personal lives (childcare, health, pets, weather-appropriate clothing upkeep, stopping their homes from falling apart around them, etc.)?

They didn't have to do most of that by themselves. Your favorite writers, musicians, inventors, game designers, and artists outsource or ignore some of that too, so they can focus on making nice things for you. I am so tired of hearing about how "society is the problem" (different from "this system in society is the problem," which is often true) and the "solution" is to be entirely self-sufficient.

Take it from someone who's had to figure out likely ways for human life to function in the future: If you had no choice but to do everything yourself, you'd be tired, malnourished, and basically useless to anybody you like. And as soon as you have a health problem, you'd probably be dead. Did you take any time out of all your farming and self-defense to learn first aid and how to make sterile medical supplies? I keep harping on sterile medical supplies because it's easy to give yourself a deadly infection by putting germy medical supplies on open wounds, which you will get in the course of growing plants and raising critters at a survivable scale.

Living on a ranch was a wonderful experience to have, but I got tired of being covered in shit and dirt and sunburns. I am a terrible (if enthusiastic) gardener. I'm happy to buy from local specialists while I specialize in making things they can enjoy in the evenings after long days of doing important activities I am bad at.

And now, bonus trivia: The song that's playing in Iridian's head whenever she's executing a plan Adda thought of is something like "She's My Pusher" by The Crystal Method. Updated for her time, of course.

References

Jordan, K. & Kirkland, S. (2006). She's my pusher [Recorded by Jordan, K. & Kirkland, S. (The Crystal Method)]. On Vegas (10th Anniversary Edition). Los Angeles, CA: Outpost Recordings. Maragakis, L. L. & Kelen, G. D. (2021, January 8). Is the COVID-19 vaccine safe? Johns Hopkins Medicine. Mayo Clinic. (2021, February 10). COVID-19 vaccines: Get the facts. National Institute of Health. (2021, January 12). Experimental coronavirus vaccine highly effective. Wired.com Future of Work tag.

Like every other American, I'm going to grumble about (or, on the audio, be cartoonishly blasé about) "Democracy Demolition Night" (Caravella, Navarro, & Bakalar, 2021), the dumbest coup attempt of the year. We have time for one more coup attempt before president #46! Maybe the feds will read the right forums next time (Tally & Levy, 2021). All I'll say about the attention addicts who tossed the Capitol is that I hope their cars stall in the middle of a forest in subzero temperatures during their drive home, and a moose gets its tongue stuck to their road-salt-covered vehicle.

For a summary of the 2021 electoral college certification ceremony and the interrupting mob, read the National Public Radio article "Timeline: How One of the Darkest Days in American History Unfolded" (Monanaro, 2021).

News accounts are focusing on the pipe bombs, the property damage, the terrorized elected officials, and the conspiracy theories. They're ignoring the many people who were working at the Capitol when the mob arrived and just... did their jobs anyway. That's the kind of people, and characters, I’m interested in hearing more about.

I want to point you toward two vivid accounts of Capitol journalists' experiences on the 6th. The first is a set of interviews with three New York Times reporters who were there, presented by The Daily in high-quality audio (Barbaro, 2021). Two of those busy journalists also contributed to this article (linked through the Wayback Machine to skip the paywall) describing how first the mob, then the Capitol police, attacked photographer Erin Schaff for documenting the chaos more effectively than the Trump supporters with their cell phone cameras. These journalists were, again, skilled professionals at their workplace doing the job of informing the public about the national election process.

The second group of Americans who are substantially less awful than everybody else in the Capitol on Wednesday were the staff who saved the electoral college ballot boxes. The senate chamber was playing host to these beautiful and flammable boxes which contained the certificates of each state's electoral votes. Destroying those might've delayed the election process for a few more hours while lawmakers agreed to use the digital copies of the results. Also, those pretty boxes represent the limited autonomy we have over choosing our national leadership. Everybody left them in the senate chamber while they fled the armed insurgents.

Everybody except the people described by various sources as "aides" (Woodward, 2021) or "floor staff" (Merkley, 2021), who either grabbed the electoral college boxes on their way out the door or went back for them after the senate chamber was already evacuated. I hope somebody figures out who these people are and gives them the medals they deserve. They saved us from yet more wasted time on posturing politicians, and preserved some lovely national symbols. Give them any job they want after this.

So, that's my reminder that there were actual heroes at the Capitol on January 6th, and they didn't wear costumes, red hats, or uniforms. While hundreds of cops and rioters milled around in the halls of power, these Americans took the opportunity to do the jobs they agreed to do and made the world slightly better. Our giant, violent, ridiculous, diseased country contains multitudes. Happy 2021.

References

Barbaro, M. (2021, January 7). An assault on the Capitol. The Daily [Podcast].Caravella, V., Navarro, A., & Bakalar, J. (2021, January 7). The Giant Beastcast: Episode 294. The Giant Beastcast [Podcast]. GiantBomb.comFandos, N., Schaff, E. & Cochrane, E. (2021, January 7). ‘Senate being locked down’: inside a harrowing day at the Capitol. New York Times via the Internet Archive.Merkley, J. [SenJeffMerkley] (2021, January 6). Electoral college ballots rescued from the Senate floor. If our capable floor staff hadn’t grabbed them, they would have been burned by the mob. [Tweet].Montanaro, D. (2021, January 7). Timeline: how one of the darkest days in American history unfolded. National Public Radio.National Archives. (2020, December 14). 2020 Electoral college results.
Tally, I., & Levy, R. (2021, January 6). Extremists posted plans of Capitol attack online. Wall Street Journal.
Office of Senate Curator. (2012, May 13). Ballot box, electoral college.Woodward, A. (2021, January 7). Senate aides rescued boxes containing the electoral votes as a mob besieged the Capitol. Without them, Congress may not have been able to affirm Biden's win as quickly. Business Insider.

This is a post for people who want to write, so if you are not interested in writing, see you next time. For folks writing novels during National Novel Writing Month: You've got nine days left! Feel free to take that as "You only have nine days!" or "You have nine full days," whichever motivates you more.

I won NaNoWriMo 2020, for the first time since the initial Barbary Station draft, which was seven years ago. This year I finished a first draft of a story you might actually read one day. Here's my word count graph:

The Y axis is project word count, and the X is, of course, dates. The NaNoWriMo website recommends you write 1,667 words per day for thirty days, which is what that rising light blue line represents. You might notice that the first day the number of words I wrote, in dark blue, significantly exceeded the recommended word count was November 11. That's when I joined 4thewords.

And I frickin' doubled my daily word count.

Writing is my full time job at the moment, so you'd think (I'd think) I'd write more like 7,000 words in a day. As it turns out, 5k is the max before my brain protectively removes my conscious ability to string sentences together, and it's usually a real struggle to write that much. That was before I found a website that gamifies the hell out of drafting.

4thewords is a browser-based role playing game in which each word you type is a blow against a monster (or a sapient, nonbinary cloud opponent, in the case of this month's special event). This game has been around for a few years, and rumor is it hasn't always been a stable writing platform. However, I wrote the whole second half of a novel in it this year, and I didn't lose a single word to technical issues. That's better than Microsoft usually does for me.

I attribute my writing speed increase to two features of this game:

I get started earlier and keep writing longer because there are quests! Nothing keeps me engaged like helping imaginary people. You are great, don't get me wrong, but you aren't going to see any benefits of my work for a year at least. These people are being hunted by giant spiders which are vulnerable to words. And,
the game's monster battles are time-limited. If you don't defeat the beasties in the time which ticks down in the left corner of your writing space, the monsters escape (to kill again, presumably).

And if those factors don't inspire you, completing quests often wins you colorful clothes for your avatar. Yes, there are weapons, accessories, pets, mix-and-match armor sets, and unnatural hair colors. It's a good RPG.

So if you've never checked 4thewords out, or haven't seen it in a few years, I highly recommend its free trial. It might be the boost you need to get across the NaNoWriMo finish line. And, since I wrote this post in the game, thank you for joining me in this battle against a ferocious nimbbit.

I hope you are continuing to survive out there. Ghosts are not part of my target audience. Why would ghosts care about these articles I found while researching for the next book?

Anders, C. J. (2020, May 12). Never say you can't survive: how to get through hard times by making up stories. – As I said, this is not a ghost-friendly post.
Danaher, J. (2019, October 15). Escaping Skinner's box: AI and the new era of techno-superstition. – Audio version available on the site.
Gibbons, W. (2011, March 20). Why don't hawks fight back? – Older article, still entertaining, not political.
MC Fire Protection. (2017, October 14). Emergency lighting explained. – It's slightly more complicated than I expected.
Medic Wiki. (2019). Handcuff injury. – Yes, I am including a date for a wiki article. It's useful to know when the last substantive update was made. When you cite a Collins English Dictionary definition, do you cite the one in the original 1979 edition, cite the edition you're looking at, or throw up your hands and cry, “who can say when this document was published?” Anyway, this article is a practical discussion of what happens when metal presses on the superficial radial nerve in your hand the wrong way. The site is strongly biased against police, so expect some passionate writing.

Also, I'd like to thank those of you who have sent me notes with page numbers where you stopped reading Shieldrunner books. That's interesting and helpful! As someone who drops most books I start without finishing them, I like the idea that your time spent with mine might still have a useful outcome, even if you don't enjoy the whole story.

Just one caveat: I do not recommend sending similar information to authors who have not asked for it. That would be "unsolicited constructive criticism," which is about as welcome as any other unsolicited advice. Happy reading, y'all.

I have openings for volunteer alpha readers and beta readers, and you, oh person who found this post, are invited.

For my purposes, alpha readers are people who look at up to three versions of the beginning of a story and tell me where and why they'd stop reading if they found the story in a library. Beta readers read the whole story and offer feedback on it. Since I only finish about two short stories and a single novel-length one per year, neither position seems to be a terrible burden.

Caveats:

I need folks who can glance over a document, tell me when they'll send the feedback on it, and then send feedback within the timeframe they specified.
I have a test story which should let us figure out whether you and I are a good developmental reader/writer match. So, you get to read something new right away!
There's a legal document to sign, to confirm that I can't don't pay readers, and to discourage folks from posting excerpts on the internet (which makes stories more difficult to sell).
Your name may end up in a novel's acknowledgements (unless you tell me not to, in which case we'll find you an appropriate sobriquet).

Use my contact page to tell me if you'd like to try alpha or beta reading.

I wrote a couple of blog posts these past few months, and I didn't publish them, and I'm glad. As has become usual for 2020, the situation changed. By now, I would've been sorry I'd posted something which sat on my website while people were protesting for the protection of Black lives, and while thousands of others died of COVID-19. Mine is definitely not a voice you needed to hear in April or May of 2020.

So, I have been writing for this entire year.

I don't say that to brag. 2020 has failed to provide the energy many people draw on to create. I don't blame anyone for not pushing through it. I'm lucky enough to be white, pathologically introverted, and married to somebody with a very particular (and marketable) set of skills. I can look forward to reading books about this period when it's over. This year has slowed me down a bit, but I'm going to be one of those people who dies while writing a journal entry. A bad year isn't going to stop me.

My goal for writing novels is to entertain teachers, activists, medical professionals, scientists, developers, and other more useful people than myself. The people who hold the world together. If we're lucky, a story I write will give those folks a break.

That's why I turned in a draft of a new novel last week. Now, this doesn't mean it'll sell, or that you'll ever read it. It's just that this story now meets some criteria of "finished" which it's never met before. Blogging is likely to return to its typical monthly schedule. Be safe.

I adore writing at home, and the internet hosts enough articles about working from home (WFH) to give anyone the tools they need to solve their own WFH problems. But what if you were already working from home, and your newly quarantined housemate is so stir-crazy that they can’t read a single article? My spouse is stuck at home with me now, so here’s what I’ve done to accommodate my new coworker.

First, major disclaimers: We don’t have kids. You’d know better than me how these tactics might work with children involved. And if you're one of the essential few who cannot work from home, thank you. What you do is important, whether or not you're able to do it during a pandemic. Stay safe out there.

Make reminders of your goal more prominent than ever.

However you usually inspire yourself to sit down at your desk/instrument/easel/adjustable bed to do what you do, make it even more obvious to yourself now. Highlight due dates on your calendar, set reminders on your phone, print out inspiring quotes, whatever it takes. A new coworker, even one you love, is more distracting than you might expect, and you have dreams to realize.

Keep and communicate your schedule.

My spouse knows I write during the same hours every weekday and I use the Pomodoro method. Whatever he wants to interrupt me about is either an emergency or something that can wait 25 minutes. He knows this, so he chills out while I continue using the schedule that works for me.

Model healthy behavior.

I’m better at going to bed when I intend to than my spouse is. When I loudly announce, “I’m going to bed!” it reminds him to get enough sleep too. If you’re better about exercising, eating well, or some other healthy habit than your housemate, call their attention to it in a polite way to remind them that they’d feel better (and stay out of your hair more) if they continue their own healthy habits. This goes double for washing your hands.

Defend your alone time.

Even if it’s just a corner of a couch and some noise cancelling headphones, you need your space. It doesn’t mean you don’t like your housemate anymore! Feel free to gently remind them that it’s not about them or anything they did. You deserve time to yourself when you need it, and they do too. There is nothing wrong with that.

If your housemate is struggling, plan time to help them.

Because if they break down sobbing on the floor between your workspace and the kitchen where the caffeine is, how will you get anything done? Read the WFH articles and share applicable tips, set out their pill bottles so they take their meds, and patiently help them sort out a WFH arrangement which they feel comfortable with. Do not turn yourself into their personal assistant. Just guide them into their new WFH groove. Then you can get back to work.

As a reminder in these wild times, I have two new books out: Gravity of a Distant Sun, the final book in the Shieldrunner Pirates trilogy (which begins with Barbary Station); and Six Lost Souls, a novella set in the same universe. Enjoy!