“The Multiplicity Has Arrived,” arriving soon at IGMS

Posted on August 18, 2008 by Matthew S. Rotundo

Now it can be told:

Edmund Schubert at Intergalactic Medicine Show had called me just prior to WorldCon, asking for a (minor) rewrite of “The Multiplicity Has Arrived.”  This was the only actual writing work I managed while in Denver.  Looks like it paid off.  I got an email from Edmund today, and it’s a go.

I’m pretty proud of this story.  I struggled mightily with it in the writing, but finally managed to whip it into something resembling a coherent narrative.  Thanks to

[info]blzblack

for his crit of this one.  Much appreciated, Trent!

Look for “The Multiplicity Has Arrived” in issue 11, January 2009.

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Progress Report, in which I relate a fact of uncertain significance

Posted on August 18, 2008 by Matthew S. Rotundo

Post WorldCon, and back in the writing saddle.  Banged out 5200 words on Petra Released.  Here’s the long-awaited return of Magic Meter:


Maddeningly close to the end, as you can see, but not quite there yet. 

Looks like my original WAG on the length is going to be pretty accurate.  This is weird.  I’m usually terrible at estimating how long a piece will be.  But as with Petra, my projection is going to be very close.  Not sure what that signifies, really, but I thought I’d mention it.

I’m not at all certain how well my climax will work, or even if it will work at all.  By contrast, I felt much better about the ending of Petra.  I suspect much heavy lifting will be needed in the rewrite.

But that, of course, comes later.  Right now, I just need to finish the beastly thing.

I have an update for Write Club, but I’ll save it for its own post.

And on that note . . .

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WorldCon 2008 Report, in which every picture tells a story

Posted on August 18, 2008 by Matthew S. Rotundo

Been extremely busy here at Chez Rotundo, so I haven’t had a chance to post a proper report on WorldCon.  By now, you’ve heard all about the big stuff, like the wonderful

[info]maryrobinette

 winning the Campbell Award.  And since I don’t have the time or the energy to recap every little thing that happened over that week, I’ll let a few pictures tell the story.  These were all taken by my wonderful wife, BTW.


So this is where most of WorldCon happened–a huge convention center.  Several other conventions were going on at the same time–but of course ours was the most interestingly dressed.


This is the big blue bear outside the convention center, practical to the extent that he makes a convenient rendezvous point, as in, “Meet at the big blue bear at 6:00 on Friday.”

Here I am on my very first WorldCon panel . . . ever.  Notice how my fellow panelists are kinda not there?  Yeah.  Both of them got held up by travel delays.  An apologetic Craig Miller showed up with about five minutes left in the panel.  For the rest of the time, I had to wing it.  The topic was movie adaptations of SF novels.  Fortunately, I was the moderator for this one, and I had a list of questions prepared.  So instead of asking the other panelists, I just opened it up to the audience.  It actually went very well, I thought, with lots of good discussion.


They’re laughing with me, not at me.  I hope.

Seriously, I walked out of that panel feeling very jazzed.  It ended up being a lot of fun.  And I only said one stupid thing.


So here’s the crew assembled for the Odfellows’ dinner.  Left to right, we have the incredible Carrie Vaughn, the invincible Geoffrey Jacoby, the indefatigable Larry Hodges, the inimitable Lancer Kind, the inscrutable Eric James Stone, the indomitable Becky Roland, the incomprehensible yours truly, and the inevitable Brian Hiebert.  We met at the big blue bear at 6:00 on Friday.

Dinner was great, and the monsoon we had to run through on the way back to the convention center was . . . well, monsoon-like.  Most of us were soaked to the skin.  Hours later, I was still trying air dry.


Picture says it all, really.

This was the “Underrated SF Movies” panel.  Just wanted to show you how crowded this room was.  Cool!  (Note, too, that I am not alone on the panel.)


And in the “Only at WorldCon” category, this.


Met lots of friends old and new, stayed up way too late, ate and drank too much, and basically had a whirlwind time.  In other words, it was a WorldCon.

And did I once say I hoped to get a little work done while in Denver?  Wow.  Silly pipe dream.  Although I did manage a little bit, about which more anon.

So that was WorldCon.  Let’s do it again next year, what do you say?

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