In one of those strange confluences, today I find myself with three contracts to read and a short interview to answer. Not a bad situation to be in!

And a couple of days ago I stumbled across the seeds of what might be my next novel. It’s much too early to know, but I am very intrigued.

Also, I have a short story coming out in March, so if you haven’t already signed up for my newsletter, please do so. It’s the best way to keep in touch. The next issue I have planned will go out to announce the release of the story, titled “The Way Home.” Find the sign up form over there –> in the right sidebar.

More soon…

This post is for the few gym rats who might be out there — my thoughts on weight machines by Hoist.

Around Thanksgiving our local 24-Hour Fitness gym closed for a few days, and when it re-opened most of the old weight machines were gone, replaced with a new line of equipment by a company called Hoist.

My evaluation so far: I don’t like Hoist all that much — not so far anyway — although I can appreciate aspects of their equipment, and I presume as time goes by I will adapt.

The main factor that makes Hoist different is that the seat moves on most of the machines. I presume this is to get more benefit from the exercise through every angle of the lift, and this aspect is fine with me. I don’t have any objection to it.

Another positive aspect is that the hand grips on most of their machines are a material somewhat like hard-rubber, so it’s more comfortable to lift with bare hands than with gloves.

There are three factors that I don’t like:

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After several weeks of intense revision, Book 3 of The Red Trilogy has gone off to Joe Monti, my editor at Saga Press. I am eagerly awaiting his opinion.

This was a difficult book to write, but I like the way it’s come together, and look forward to the improvements that will happen as I get more editorial feedback.

How long did it take to write? This question might be of interest only to other writers, but for me, when I’m in the midst of a first draft it can feel like the draft is taking forever, with very little progress. Then again, for me, progress is usually made in fits and starts, with seemingly useless days of incredible effort, followed by a day of fantastic word flow.

At any rate, looking back at my notes, I did some initial brainstorming on this story in early April, and then again in May. I tried writing the opening a couple of times, discarded most of this effort, and began again on May 12. That day I managed 1300 words. Then I didn’t write anything else until after I returned from the Nebula Awards. So let’s say around eight months to a really solid draft. For comparison, The Red took around five months, and The Trials took seven. You’d think these books would get easier to write, not harder…but at least it’s “done”–for the moment anyway!

And another amazing Larry Rostant cover, this one for The Trials, book 2 of The Red Trilogy, to be published by Saga Press in August.

Here’s the full image of the Saga Press cover by the amazing Larry Rostant:

This popped up on Twitter yesterday:

Cover art for The Red:First Light by @LindaNagata – delighted to be asked by @SagaSFF to do this trilogy #BookCover pic.twitter.com/PMKw7vdrBq

— Larry Rostant (@LarryRostant) January 12, 2015

CLICK THROUGH TWICE TO SEE IT IN FULL!

Artist is the awesome Larry Rostant.

As it turns out, the covers for both The Red and The Trials are up at Simon & Schuster’s website. The images are small, but you can find them here.

Late in the day on January 2nd, a predicted storm rolled in over Maui with high winds and rain. Over the last few years, the electricity has been going out at our house every time any sort of mild storm blows through — at least five outages in 2014 — so given the strength of this storm, we we were all surprised the power held out as long as it did. But around 7:30 pm two explosions announced the end of light and heat.

As expected, power was not restored overnight, so in the morning we finally had a chance to put into use the two generators Ron had picked up a few years ago. None of the earlier outages had lasted long enough to bother. The little Honda generator provided that essential of life, morning coffee:

The big Honda generator successfully ran the refrigerator all day, along with occasional use of the microwave (at the same time!), as well as charging up phones and laptop computers — all of this on one small tank of gas. I was very impressed with how well it worked. And I was able to keep working on book 3 of The Red Trilogy!

We were fortunate and didn’t have much damage — just a lot of leaves and twigs in the driveway and a few broken branches. We also collected a lot of avocados that had blown off the tree:

Oh, and there was a bit of frost on Haleakala’s summit. I think that’s ice, not snow:

Power finally came back on at 10:30pm last night, after a twenty-seven hour outage. My gratitude goes out to the amazing, hard-working crews at Maui Electric. But at the same time, this storm ought to be a wake-up call for Maui County. We do not have a resilient electrical grid and if/when a hurricane rolls through her, the damage will be vastly more.

Happy New Year!

Back in 2011 I started posting an annual list of writing goals that I would try to accomplish in the ensuing year. “Goals” in this sense are things that I can accomplish through my own efforts and perseverance, as opposed to “dreams” which require the cooperation of others (for example, writing a novel is a goal; having a novel sell madly well is a dream).

So here are my writing goals for 2015:

1. Revise and polish the third novel of THE RED trilogy so that it’s ready for publication. (The first draft is already done.)

2. Write at least one novella set in an existing story world. I really want to write a novella, though I’m not sure why. Maybe because it feels like a novel, but doesn’t take so long? 😉

3. Write at least two short stories unrelated to anything else I’ve done. (One story is already commissioned, so I have an extra incentive to meet this goal at least halfway.)

4. Write at least three nonfiction posts that I feel comfortable marketing to high-circulation websites. (I copied this one from last year. Maybe this year I’ll do it.)

5. I almost forgot this goal: WRITE A NEW NOVEL. But I’ll go easy on myself and call this goal fulfilled if I have a new novel planned and well begun by the end of the year.

I should be able to do these five goals. Right?