My dog is small and has a knack for getting in trouble, so when she asked to go out at 3:45am this morning, I went with her, as always.

The sky was clear, filled with brilliant stars. The motion of a shooting star instantly drew my gaze up. That’s when I noticed a jet, approaching from the west with a trajectory that would take it directly overhead.

The jet appeared as three lights, arranged in a triangle. The weird and interesting thing about it, the reason it’s worth writing up in a blog post, is that the jet appeared to shift slightly back and forth as it passed across the stationary star field. Well, that’s interesting! I thought. Obviously an optical illusion — one that ceased as the jet passed overhead and continued east — but it made me think of the occasional report of a “UFO”** moving back and forth as if unaffected by momentum.

Two other odd bits about this incident: What was that jet doing flying west to east directly over the island at ~3:45am? That is not a usual route. And why was it flying so low? It was low enough that I could easily see the triangle of lights. Also, the sound of the engines very closely tracked the position of the plane, instead of being widely offset (due to lag in the speed of sound), as happens when a jet is flying at a more usual cruising altitude. My guess is it was a military plane, part of RIMPAC maybe, or maybe the crew just needed some hours in the air.

Anyway, this is the sort of thing that occupies my mind at 4am, and makes it hard to go back to sleep. 🙂

** As we all know, UFO stands for “Unidentified Flying Object.” It does not stand for “alien spaceship.” I cringe every time someone assumes the latter. When I was a teen, my dad was licensed to fly small planes. When I flew with him, it was my job to help look out for other planes and helicopters. When you’re in the air, you want to identify all the flying objects in the vicinity, the better to avoid a mid-air collision. 😉

My most recent newsletter went out last week with no mention of COVID-19. I suspected that at that point my readers were saturated with virus coverage and didn’t want to hear even more about it from me. But here we are, a week later, and life has changed a lot. Most of us have been asked to hunker down at home so as to avoid contracting or spreading infection. For how long? No one knows for sure but it’s unlikely life will return to “normal” anytime soon. It’s far more likely we’ll learn to live with a “new normal.”

It’s uncanny how much our current situation reflects the backstory of Sarah Pinsker’s Nebula-nominated novel A Song For a New Day. That story is a hopeful look at American society breaking out of disease-induced isolation. We, of course, are just learning to live with it.

For myself, the daily routine hasn’t changed much. You’ve probably seen the cartoons about introverts who always stay at home anyway… Both Ron and I have worked at home for years. The main change for us is that we’re not going out as often, and when we do, the hand sanitizer gets frequent use. (We have two little bottles left, acquired prior to the emergence of COVID-19.)

Here on Maui, we’ve had only a couple of confirmed cases of the virus. In Hawaii at large, infections are still low and all so far seem to be associated with recent travelers, or those in close contact with recent travelers. In other words, “no community transmission” — so far.

My respect goes out to all those parents who are suddenly finding themselves home with young children. Wishing you patience, strength, and courage!

And my gratitude goes to all those who don’t have the option of staying home: first responders, medical personnel, all those working in the supply chain, the brave clerks and stockers at Costco, Target, and all our local grocery stores — and anyone else whose service is essential to keeping the country (and the world) functioning through this black-swan event.

It’s staggering to think of all the people now out of work, many of whom likely have little savings and who may be losing their health insurance. Here in Hawaii, so many people are employed in the visitor industry — hotels, car rentals, restaurants, tours, entertainment. All that is now shut down, or soon will be.

We’re still at the beginning of this. For myself, it’s already weirdly surreal to see TV commercials made in the days “Before.” They show large happy gatherings — wedding parties, people in theaters, or at festivals, or out on the town, enjoying life with friends. Scenes of a lost existence, at least for now.

On the positive side, there are companies and governments around the world seeking both a vaccine and antiviral treatments for COVID-19. If we keep our collective heads and don’t panic, we’ll get past this. In the meantime, please take care of yourselves and of each other.

Mele Kalikimaka means Merry Christmas in Hawaiian, and it’s also the title to a Christmas carol that begins:

Mele Kalikimaka is the thing to say

On a bright Hawaiian Christmas day…

Too bad today is gloomy! We’ve got heavy clouds with fog blowing through, along with a bit of rain. But at least Christmas Eve was bright and sunny. 🙂

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate, and wishing all of you a joyful day!

Xena Rose does not have the patience to pose for a Christmas photo, so this one will have to do. (Taken today, December 25, 2019)

If you’re in America or if you celebrate Thanksgiving elsewhere, best wishes for a joyful day!

Our family had a mini-Thanksgiving feast last night, and will be sharing a more formal meal with other relatives at a restaurant later today.

It’s traditional for us to say what we are grateful for. For myself, I’m grateful to see the two (so far) Inverted Frontier books done, and to have terrific readers like all of you, who make the work worthwhile. And of course everyday I’m grateful to be part of my small but close-knit family.

Whether you celebrate or not, I hope you have a terrific day.

And tomorrow? For me, it’s back to work and back to the treadmill. 🙂

I just remembered, today is my birthday. As you can probably deduce from that statement, we don’t tend to make a big deal out of birthdays around here. We’ll go out to dinner tonight to celebrate, but for me, it’s the everyday stuff that really matters in life.

That said, I am fifty-nine years old today–one year shy of sixty, a number that looms as a significant milestone to me. In the normal course of a career, I should be carefully calculating for retirement. Instead, I’m still in the hunt for my breakout book. Maybe the next one?

I’ve got a general idea of what the next book will be about. I’ve accumulated lots of notes as I’ve tried to develop the idea. And while I’ve always outlined new projects, this time I’m going to try to do a lot more pre-planning than I’ve managed in the past. Hopefully that will help the actual writing go faster and make it more enjoyable — but by the time the next book is out, I will be sixty. Or sixty-one?

The numbers have become more meaningful to me because I don’t feel as strong and active as I did even a few months ago.

I’ve been blessed with good health for most of my life and as recently as February I was still running three miles on the treadmill, lifting weights at the gym whenever possible, and doing a lot of physically demanding yard work. Since then, lack of time, along with joint issues, have led me to cut way back on physical activity. I need to change that trend and get back into both running and weight-lifting! This avatar is the only one I’ve got. I need to keep it in good shape — or I’m never going to write that breakout book. 😉

Edges is Out Today!

If you pre-ordered the ebook, you should have received it. If you pre-ordered the print version, you should have it soon.

Thank you to everyone who preordered!

If you didn’t preorder, I hope you’ll consider purchasing a copy today.

For those not yet familiar . . . Edges is a new entry point into my classic Nanotech Succession story world.

Here’s a short version of the back-cover description:

Deception Well is a world on the edge, a lone surviving outpost at the farthest reach of human expansion. Now a determined crew resolves to cross the light years to explore the fallen worlds of old and discover what monstrous life might have grown up among the ruins. A far-future space-faring adventure from the award-winning author of VAST. 🙂

A couple of nice reviews came in yesterday. Over at LitStack, Sharon Browning says:

Edges is “a masterful effort, operating both at a slow burn and with a ratcheting intensity that comes to a stunning climax. Linda Nagata has once again given us a future that dances along a razor’s edge—entertaining, thrilling, humbling . . . and hopeful, despite the threat, despite the danger, despite the sacrifice.”

And at Locus, Russell Letson, who is familiar with the earlier Nanotech novels, says:

“In the imaginary coffee-house of my mind, Nagata’s Succession novels are hanging out with thematic and subgeneric cousins by Neal Asher, Iain M. Banks, Greg Bear, Greg Benford, Greg Egan, Kathleen Ann Goonan, and Robert Reed, discussing the post-human condition, how many nanotechnologies can fit on the head of a pin, the nature and place of sentience in the universe, and whether there is a Long Game in which humankind can play and survive. There’s a portrait of Olaf Stapledon hanging over the mantelpiece, along with a long-barreled raygun. Both are icons of the tradition.”

You do not need to have read the Nanotech Succession novels to enjoy Edges! It’s written as a new on-ramp to the Nanotech story world.

Find Edges online:

Amazon US
Amazon UK
Amazon AU
Amazon DE

Barnes & Noble

iBooks

Thank you!

Congratulations to Roland and Stan, who each won a proof copy of Edges!

And thank you to everyone who participated. Your comments are deeply appreciated! I hope you enjoy Edges when it comes out in just over a week. 🙂

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate, and wishing all of you a joyful day!

Xena Rose is looking forward to Christmas dinner…

Thank you to everyone who worked hard and honestly in this election. Thank you to everyone who voted, everyone who voted for the first time, and everyone who voted against the Republican party for the first time. You are appreciated and your vote matters. Thank you to everyone who found themselves victims of gerrymandering and voter suppression efforts, but who stood in line for hours anyway to cast a vote. You are heroes! And you won the House!

I still can’t get my head around the idea that so many Americans want to be governed by liars and hypocrites who are utterly lacking in honor, who are driving the country deeper and deeper into debt, mortgaging the future, denying science and climate change in pursuit of personal power and personal profit, while happily reversing the environmental laws that have made this country so much a better and safer place to live. Unbelievable! And yet here we are.

I’d hoped for better, America. But let’s keep striving to make this country a better, smarter, more well-informed place, with a citizenry resistant to the propaganda of oligarchs both foreign and domestic, and let’s care about the future — not just of this country, but of the entire world. We are living on an utterly amazing planet. We need to act like it, and care for it, before we lose it due to the greed and avarice of a few.

I sent my latest newsletter out today. If you want to view it online, click here. (You can subscribe using that simple form in the right-hand column.)

The newsletter included reminders about two deadlines:

Amazon’s sale is about to end!
Amazon put The Last Good Man on sale at only $2.99 for the month of July (USA and Canada only). If you’re in those regions and haven’t gotten a copy yet, now’s the time. If you know someone else who might enjoy the novel, please pass the word along. Last day for the discounted price is July 31.

Hugo Award voting is about to close!
If you’re eligible to vote for the Hugo Awards, be aware that the last day to fill out your ballot is also July 31. My story “The Martian Obelisk” is a finalist in the short story category. I hope you consider it when you fill out your ballot. If you haven’t had a chance to read it yet, you can find it online at Tor.com by following this link.