So tonight the LAST reading of THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT world tour goes down four blocks from where I’m writing this, at 7 p.m. Borders Books @18th and L, downtown D.C. Hope to see ya there!
Hope everybody had a good holiday weekend. It’s so hot in D.C. that my cats wish they had no fur, but that’s another story. As to today’s business:
First, a reminder to those of you in the D.C. area that I’ll be back at Borders 18th and L tomorrow night at 7 p.m. reading from MACHINERY OF LIGHT! Hope to see you there…
Second, Cybermage has named Claire Haskell as one of the “Formidable Female Protagonists in Science Fiction”. Can’t say I disagree.
Third, Rico Dostie of TreksinSciFi and I had a great podcast conversation last week about the books, even though I was more than a little jetlagged at the time.
Fourth, the Falcata Times has weighed in with a review of the entire trilogy, calling it a “real treat” and a “top author recommendation for the year.”
See you manyana at Borders…
Captain Zoom here. 
The big moment has arrived.
And I’m pleased to announce the winner of the contest to win the entire Autumn Rain trilogy is . . . .
AJAX! Yes, Ajax has won all three books. Which means he and I can now line our litter box with every single page of the trilogy while we languidly purr and …
What’s that?
Really?
FUCK.
Well, you’re not going to believe this, but Dave has churlishly informed me that BOTH of his household cats are ineligible.
However, non-household cats are fair game.
And Mirik Smit of the Netherlands has a cat. Perhaps this is why he has won the entire Autumn Rain trilogy. Perhaps not. Cats are mysterious that way. At any rate, congratulations are due to Mirik.
As for the rest of you losers, I mean, contestants, don’t despair. You can still always, yanno, buy the books.
Shoplifting is also an option, though you heard ’nuffin from me.
For those of you in Vancouver BC, I’ll be having an end-of-tour party for THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT Sunday night at La Terrazza restaurant in Yaletown! If you’re in the area, send me an email at djwATautumnrain2110.com and I’ll put you on the guest list.
Meanwhile, the cats will announce contest winners announced on MONDAY. Stay tuned.
I’ll be reading from THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT at Powell’s in Portland tonight (Beaverton location) and the UBookstore in Seattle tomorrow (Thursday). Both appearances kick off at 7 p.m.; also, the good folks over at SeattleGeekly have just posted an interview I’ve done in support of my northwest tour!
Meanwhile, the contest is now over, and the winner will be announced as soon as my cats get around to finishing up more important things, like checking out those interesting birds on the balcony and consuming all the turkey they can get their paws on. Stay tuned.
A reminder that the contest to win the Autumn Rain trilogy ends tonight at midnight. . . we’ll say Pacific time, since I’m on the west coast right now.
Rumors that my cats are handling the entries /selecting the winner are of course totally unfounded.
Email djwATautumnrain2110.com to get in on the last-minute action.. ..
I’ll be reading from THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT at the one and only Borderlands Books tomorrow at 3 p.m., so looking forward to seeing you there!
I’ll be returning to the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society tonight. They’ve got me listed on their website as an “author and controversial speaker“; I can’t imagine why. It should be good fun, though; they are of course the oldest running science fiction club, and much history has gone down there. My talk will kick off at about 8:30.
In the meantime, wow, the weather in this town is NICE.
Partially to celebrate THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT going into a second printing, partially because my cats are rejoicing over their sudden new influx of spinach n’ turkey, I have taken leave of my senses and am giving away the entire fricking trilogy! Interested parties should send an email to djwATautumnrain2110.com. You have until end of day Tuesday the 22nd to throw your proverbial hat in the ring, so go crazy!!
It was particularly surreal to be reading from Autumn Rain trilogy finale THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT in Toronto this past weekend; not only is BakkaPhoenix one hell of a bookstore (and its owner, Chris Szego rocks—thanks for helping me find my way back to my hotel Chris!), but Toronto played more than a small role in my getting published in the first place. Having worked on the Homeworld video games together (though never concurrently), Peter Watts and I made sure to have a drink or three whenever I was in Toronto for my day-job (which related to neither video games nor science fiction but did involve a great deal of air travel and more than one lamb-burger at C’est What). I still remember him telling me about this crrrrrrrrrazy idea he had for a novel involving the nature of consciousness, alien contact and space vampires….of course, that became the stunning BLINDSIGHT, which really ought to have won the Hugo back in 2006, in much the same way that his short story “The Island” ought to clean up the Hugo’s novella category this year (along with the Locus and everything else).
But not only is Peter a brilliant writer, he’s a total masochist, which is why he agreed to take a look at an early draft of MIRRORED HEAVENS some years back, and pointed out many invaluable things, not least of which was that it needed a #$# ending. Good point, I said, and set to work to write one as soon as my hangover had worn off. To have him in attendance at Saturday’s reading was an honor that frankly rates as one of the highlights of my career thus far; to see him free and having beaten the bullshit rap that consumed so much of his 2010 means that maybe, just maybe, there’s some justice in this world. The only bars this man should be behind are the ones that serve Toronto’s finest brews. May he be the toast of the town at Aussiecon this August.
