Science Fiction World is the primary publisher of Chinese-language short science fiction. I’ve been told they are the largest-circulation SF magazine in the world. A few years ago they translated and published my novella “Goddesses,” but I never saw that edition.

Now they’ve translated and published my story “The Way Home.” It appeared in the June issue. I just received my copies, so I thought I’d share them here. Of course I can’t read the issue, but check out the cover art below.

“The Way Home” was originally published last March in the anthology Operation Arcana. It was republished at Lightspeed Magazine, where it’s available to read (in English) online.

I’m just back from the mainland and much is going on. Here are two time sensitive happenings. (Act now! Deadlines are imminent!)

Tor.com is hosting a sweepstakes. They’re giving away five copies of The Red. Comment on the post to enter. Sweepstakes ends 12:00 PM ET on August 26th. Open to legal residents of 50 United States and D.C., and Canada (excluding Quebec).

The Women in Science Fiction Storybundle ends on August 27. This is a chance to buy a lot of ebooks for not much money, including my novel Memory. Follow the link for details.

And here are some links to posts of mine around the web:

At the Women In Science Fiction blog, run by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, I talk about my novel Memory. This is in relation to the Storybundle.

At John Scalzi’s blog Whatever I have a Big Idea post in which I talk about both The Red and its sequel The Trials.

At Tor.com, I have a post titled Wired Soldiers: The Technology Behind The Red.

At Charles Stross’s blog, Judith Tarr, Nicola Griffith, and I have each posted on women in science fiction, looking at things from different perspective. Here are links to all three posts.
• Where Have All the Women Gone? by Judith Tarr
• Data, books, and bias by Nicola Griffith
• Chilling Effects by Linda Nagata

And finally, one more review of The Red, this one at LitStack Review.

I’m on the road heading to Worldcon, but I can’t let today pass without posting that The TRIALS is now out! It’s available in hardcover, mass market paperback, eBook, and audio book editions.

Click here for links to online vendors.

Here’s a link to the audio book at Amazon.

I can’t resist a countdown.

The Trials is book 2 of the Red Trilogy and its publication date is only ONE WEEK away.

You can order it from your local bookstore, or preorder online. Here are links to some US retailers:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Powell’s Books
Mysterious Galaxy
Tattered Cover

The Trials will be available in multiple formats: hard cover, paperback, ebook, and audio book.

Here’s the back cover copy:

Lieutenant James Shelley and his squad of US Army soldiers were on a quest for justice when they carried out the unauthorized mission known as First Light. They returned home to America to face a court-martial, determined to expose the corruption in the chain of command that compelled their actions. But in a country still reeling from the nuclear terrorism of Coma Day, the courtroom is just one battlefield of many.

A new cycle of violence ignites when rumors of the elusive, rogue AI known as the Red go publicand Shelley is, once again, pulled into the fray. Challenged by his enemies, driven by ideals, Shelley feels compelled to act. But are the harrowing choices he makes really his own, or are they made for him, by the Red? And with millions of lives at stake in a game of nuclear cat-and-mouse, does the answer even matter?

Another link round up, but these are more personal:

Over at SF Signal, I chat with Paul Weimer about the Red Trilogy, artificial intelligence, and my weird writing career:

LN: The problem with the term “artificial intelligence” is that it means different things in different contexts, and to different people. In science fiction the standard trope is a complex computer program that becomes self-aware and begins to act like a human, and thereby becomes a pain in the ass—which isn’t a very useful transformation, from a practical perspective.

If you missed it, I’ve also got another recent interview up at SFRevu. Ernest Lilley asks some insightful questions.

Linda: I tend not to use the term “soft science fiction” because the meaning seems to change depending on circumstance. In my own mind, I see science fiction as a continuum between hard science fiction and space fantasy. At the harder end of the spectrum, technology in a story is more or less plausible and attempts are made not to violate basic laws of nature. Some say hard SF is focused on the technology, but for me, that’s not the defining characteristic. My stories aren’t about the technology. They’re about the characters and how their lives are affected by that technology.

And Kristine Kathryn Rusch has a blog post just up explaining what inspired her to put together a Storybundle themed around women in science fiction.

Suffice it to say that it became apparent to me that from the young writer/reader point of view, women didn’t write science fiction, because by the year 2000, most of the sf by women had gone out of print and was almost impossible to find.

I’ve been reading a lot of interesting posts and articles, so I thought I’d share a few of them here.

Can we reverse the aging process by putting young blood into older people?
“A series of experiments has produced incredible results by giving young blood to old mice. Now the findings are being tested on humans. Ian Sample meets the scientists whose research could transform our lives.”
This is a very long read, it’s rather disturbing in more ways than one, but it’s fascinating too. Find it at The Guardian/Science.

I’m Too Old for This
A mostly cheerful and realistic reflection on the liberating aspects of middle age and beyond experienced by many women, including yours truly. The ability to “shrug off annoyances that once would have knocked me off my perch” is a huge plus. “I’m too old for this” has been one of my mantras for a while, and I’m not sixty yet! Find it at the New York Times.
h/t Morgan J. Locke (@MorganJLocke)

The tree of life gets a makeover
When I went to school, the five “kingdoms” of life were animals, plants, fungi, protista, and monera — but things are changing. This is a fascinating article discussing the effect of genetic analysis on the classification of living things. Find it at Science News.
h/t David Brin (@DavidBrin)

Nerds of a Feather, Flock Together is a fanzine that includes reviews of science fiction, fantasy, crime, and horror fiction, plus film and video game reviews. They also run some special features, with the most recent being the “6 Books” interview. Writers are asked six questions about the books they’re reading, will read, or wrote.

So far the series has included James Cambias, Django Wexler, and me.

So check it out! It’s a great way to find new books. I know, because I read the interviews and immediately downloaded a sample of Cambias’s new novel Corsair. Looks intriguing!

Here’s a link to all three interviews. Let me know what you think.

Storybundles are themed collections of ebooks, sold together at discount, and available only for a very short period of time. They’ve been popular with readers, but this is the first time I’ve had a chance to participate in one. The newest bundle — Women in Science Fiction — was put together by Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

Why do a bundle of women science fiction writers? Here’s what Kris had to say:

I received a huge shock late last year when some younger writers told me that women didn’t write science fiction. “Present company excepted,” they said to me.

“But…but…what about…” and I listed wonderful writer after wonderful writer, whom these young writers had never heard of. I did some research and realized that even though women have written sf since the beginning of sf (in fact, you could argue that a woman started the genre. Hats off to you and your Frankenstein monster, Mary Shelley!), women and their fiction never received the press that their male counterparts did. That’s why those young writers had no idea women have always written science fiction.

So I decided to do a bunch of projects to rectify the publicity problem, including this StoryBundle.

So here we are!

(more…)

Yes, I’m excited!

The Trials is book 2 of the Red Trilogy and its publication date is only two weeks away.

You can order it from your local bookstore, or preorder online. Here are links to some US retailers:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Powell’s Books
Mysterious Galaxy
Tattered Cover

The Trials will be available in multiple formats: hard cover, paperback, ebook, and audio book.

Here’s the back cover copy:

Lieutenant James Shelley and his squad of US Army soldiers were on a quest for justice when they carried out the unauthorized mission known as First Light. They returned home to America to face a court-martial, determined to expose the corruption in the chain of command that compelled their actions. But in a country still reeling from the nuclear terrorism of Coma Day, the courtroom is just one battlefield of many.

A new cycle of violence ignites when rumors of the elusive, rogue AI known as the Red go publicand Shelley is, once again, pulled into the fray. Challenged by his enemies, driven by ideals, Shelley feels compelled to act. But are the harrowing choices he makes really his own, or are they made for him, by the Red? And with millions of lives at stake in a game of nuclear cat-and-mouse, does the answer even matter?

Here’s a round up of some recent reviews of The Red, along with an interview. Links will take you to the full review.

“The Red: First Light is a gripping exploration of the human and technological aspects of next-generation warfare. What sets the story apart is its ability to address the human level of what it is like for soldiers to live with the next generation of battlefield technology and to place it within an action-driven story…”
— August Cole, co-author of Ghost Fleet

“…one of the best pieces of near future Mil-SF ever written. What’s so good about it? The action rocks and the characters are engaging as hell. But this isn’t just adventure fiction, it’s Mil-SF and very well done, straight out of DARPA’s dreambook, not somebody’s fantasy.” — Ernest Lilley, SFRevu

“If ever you hear someone say women can’t write military science fiction, please do me a favor and smack them over the head with this book […] Seriously, it doesn’t get more edge-of-your-seat than this near-future thriller, which seamlessly blends advanced technology and military action with political drama.”
— The BiblioSanctum

And find Ernest Lilley’s interview of me at SFRevu.