Back to the Future

Continuing our guest blogging by experts in their fields, we are about to enter the science arena. I am considered by many to be a polymath - a modern Renaissance woman who has a broad range of knowledge and expertise. I suppose it's true, though I blush every time someone applies the terminology to me. Still and all, there are things that I prefer to be double-checked upon. One of these specialties is neuroscience. So when I, for instance, dug into the potential effects and reasons for use of drugs such as cocaine by one Sherlock Holmes for my Displaced Detective series, I turned to this man - Dr. Tedd Roberts - to verify my conclusions and add information as to WHY cocaine produced the results it did. Tedd is a fascinating man and you can talk with him for hours; he's very unpretentious and has a great sense of humor. He is also a real, true, deep, knowledgeable science fiction fan. So let's hear what he has to say.

-Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

 

~~~
Back to the Future

By Tedd Roberts, Neuroscientist

My friend Stephanie Osborn asked for some guest blogs, and I was happy to oblige. However, I then was faced with the question of what to write. Unlike Steph, I am not a Rocket Scientist, and I'm not always certain that what I *do* is of interest to those who are not in my field; but the recent passing of Astronaut Neil Armstrong (not "Neil Young", NBC – and not "Lance Armstrong", Facebook) and "the future that never was."

Those of us who grew up reading Golden Age Science Fiction expected that by the 21st century arrived, we'd have cities on the Moon, and maybe even Mars. Earthbound cities would have floating buildings, flying cars, personal jetpacks, and moving sidewalks that could whisk us away in the blink of an eye. We would have computers that talk, and robots that (hopefully) didn't. If you were a bit younger or read exclusively the post-modern cyberpunk futures, you may have expected a Blade Runner future with ten-time-overcrowded cities, scarce resources, homicidal androids and unwieldy pollution. Alas, the former future never came, and fortunately, the latter is not yet upon us.

As I look around, however, I see a future that none of us quite imagined. I don't have Dick Tracy's 2-Way Wrist TV – but only because we 21-cen humans don't like our screens to be that small. Many of us carry a computer more powerful than the entire Apollo program on our belts – complete with videophone. Like Star Trek's Commander Spock, we can ask our computers practically any question and get a near instantaneous response – and we didn't have to wait for the 23rd century to create Google, Yahoo, Bing, Ask or Wikipedia. My music is all digital, and comes from a device even smaller than my pocket phone – or my tablet, computer, or car – and is delivered wireless to tiny earbuds with the equivalent sound of a room-sized stereo system of just 20 years ago. Lasers are no longer mysterious devices that will save or destroy civilization, but pocket novelties to be sold at a convenience store.

Nowhere is the advance of future technology more evident than in the field of medicine. We may not have Dr. "Bones" McCoy's biobeds with an instant readout of the patient's health, but modern medical imaging has advanced well beyond Star Trek imagining. Advances in "Diffusion Tensor Imaging" map water molecules with such precision that doctors can trace the large connection pathways made by the axons of neurons in the brain and determine the precise location (and type) of damage that causes brain areas to no longer communicate with each other. Computed tomography and conventional MRI provide nearly instant 3-D images of the inside of the body, and nuclear medicine provides tracers that can be used with such positron emission tomography to track medicine and chemical flow throughout the body and even identify regions with abnormal activity prior to detectable cancers.

Last weekend I watched an SF movie in which one of the protagonists was a double-amputee. Even 10 years ago, it would be extremely rare to see this even as a peripheral (or aftermath) character – but there was a scene in which this man (a real-life hero, incidently) stood up on his titanium and plastic legs and charged the enemy. DARPA has a program to build brain-controlled prosthetics for arms and hands, but for the past 10-15 years, medical science has been providing advanced leg and foot prosthetics to that provide many of the functions of flesh without the computer interfaces that we used to think were necessary. I was motivated to enter my field 35 years ago by the TV show "The Six Million Dollar Man" (and Martin Caidin's "Cyborg" books [on which “The Six Million Dollar Man” was based -Steph]). While we don't have the bionics imagined by Caidin, we certainly have a good start; especially since a South African double-amputee (Oscar Pistorius) ran in the Olympics this year – not the Paralympics, the Olympics – in the 4 x 400 m relay.

The future is here, we are living it. It's not the future we imagined, but in many ways it is better. Now it's time to go out and imagine the next future – it may not come true, but if the 21st century has taught us anything – it's that the future will sneak up on us before we even expect it.

~~~

Tedd has his own blog, Teddy's Rat Lab, that is very worth perusing: http://teddysratlab.blogspot.com/

I thank him most kindly for a wonderful analysis of where we are, how far we've really come, and where we want to be.

-Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

Updates On Books.

by Stephanie Osborn
www.stephanie-osborn.com


Ok. Books. Let's have a quick look-see as to what I've got going on.

Book 4 of the Displaced Detective series is coming out mid-November if all goes according to plan. It is entitled, The Case of the Cosmological Killer: Endings and Beginnings, from Twilight Times Books. It is essentially the second part of The Rendlesham Incident. My first two stories ended up being too long for a single volume each, hence the double-volume works. The reason is because each contains, not one, but TWO stories, interwoven. Sorry about that, and I can promise that all the rest of the books in the series (and yes, TTB has given the go-ahead on the rest of the series!) will be single-volume works, because I’m already writing them.

Also coming out in November, I believe on Election Day, will be "A New American Space Plan, by Travis S. Taylor with Stephanie Osborn” from Baen Books. This is exactly what it sounds like, a discussion of what we’ve done as a species in space, what’s going on now, and where we as a nation SHOULD be going, but aren’t, and who might beat us to the punch. I put together an especially enlightening “history of space exploration” appendix that projects into the future according to the various plans already in place around the world. It’s very telling. It's also scary as *expletive redacted*.

For those who like poetry, I have an ebook of verse entitled Stolen Moments from Chromosphere Press, available on Nook and Kindle. Also available from Chromosphere (and with TTB’s blessing) is the short novella The Fetish which is set in the Burnout universe; and the popular science ebooks Sherlock, Sheilas and the Seven-Percent Solution, about the effects of cocaine and reasons why Sherlock Holmes may have had ulterior motives in his use; I should note that it is listed as part of the Displaced Detective series even though it is non-fiction. This is because the research was fundamental into my interpretation of Holmes in that series. Chromosphere has also published my The Weather Out There Is Frightful, about solar and space weather and how it does/could affect you personally.

I'm currently working on the fourth Cresperian novel, entitled Heritage. Also progressing slowly on the sequel to Burnout, Escape Velocity. (This one is difficult because of Burnout's disaster scenario so closely replicating the Columbia disaster, and because of the recent retirement of the Shuttle fleet, with which I was intimately involved during my career. Be patient with me on this one.) Travis Taylor and I are trying to shake loose to write the next book in the Point series. I have a steampunk novel, the first of The Adventures of Aemelia Gearheart, entitled The Bellerophon Club, being shopped around, and a children's book, StarSong, coming out soon.

And of course there are the next Displaced Detective books: A Case of Spontaneous Combustion, A Little Matter of Earthquakes, and The Adventure of Shining Mountain Lodge, are all in the works, with ideas for more past that.

There are purchase links to all available formats and known vendors on the links for each book, by the way. Pop on over to my website and see what's there, and what's coming.

And above all, have fun!

-Stephanie Osborn
www.stephanie-osborn.com

And The Last Goes Home

by Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com


Endeavor was the replacement orbiter for the lost Challenger. Many of us in the program (at least in my area of payload flight control) were in favor of naming it Phoenix, “out of the ashes,” but either that was not submitted in the school naming contest, or NASA headquarters was in favor of staying away from references to the lost orbiter and its crew, and the name Endeavor was selected. Endeavor was somewhat different from the other shuttles in the fleet, since previous experience in constructing the others enabled some “lessons learned” to be incorporated into its design, most notably a difference in the shape and application of the heat shielding tiles.

I worked payload control for STS-47, which was Endeavor's second mission and the 50^th mission of the program (flight numbers notwithstanding; launch delays often scrambled the number sequencing, so eventually the numbers became more about the order of manifesting rather than launch). It carried the Spacelab Japan payload, an all-NASDA payload, as well as the first Japanese astronaut, Mamoru Mohri, the first black astronaut, Mae Jemison, and the first husband/wife astronaut team, Mark Lee and Jan Davis. Ground-breaking life- and materials-sciences experiments were performed aboard, and considerable information was gleaned about extremely long duration space flights upon organisms as well as details of materials manufacturing in the microgravity environment.

It was a good bird. It performed well and reliably.

Each final flight of a given Shuttle pained me considerably. Somewhere along the way, I started personifying them. They were almost as much old friends as some of the astronauts were to me. Once they were decommissioned, the process began of stripping them of internal components, preparatory to being sent to their respective sites. Someone sent me newspaper clippings of the process, and others emailed photos, which I have filed for historical purposes, but truthfully I could hardly stand to look at the imagery. It was, for me, something akin to watching a friend's autopsy.

And above all, it was the end of an era. The end of MY era.

Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

The Oft-Misunderstood Art of Book Reviewing

Today we're going to talk about something a little different. Barb Caffrey is a professional book reviewer. After reviewing several of my books and liking them, over time she became a friend and we have had numerous talks about the arts of writing and reviewing. So I asked her to guest blog for me today about the process of reviewing books. Ladies and gentlemen, I present you Ms. Barb Caffrey.

-Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com
~~~

The Oft-Misunderstood Art of Book Reviewing

By Barb Caffrey

Folks, Stephanie Osborn has asked me to discuss with y'all the often-misunderstood art of book reviewing. Because I have reviewed many books in my lifetime, plan to review many more, and have a regular gig reviewing books at Shiny Book Review (http://shinybookreview.wordpress.com), SBR for short, she figured I'd be a good person to explain what goes on in a book reviewer's head – or at least what goes on in mine when I review a book.

Now, you might be wondering, "Why talk about book reviewing at all? Surely it can't be that difficult to review a book – can it?" Well, that all depends on the book.

And the fact that book reviewers are often just as misunderstood doesn't help. Some of the popular misconceptions run the gamut from, "Those who can't write, review," and, "What does she know about books, anyway?" Yet writing a book review isn't that much different, if you do it properly, than writing anything else – the trick is to read whatever book you're planning to review thoroughly, then ask yourself a number of questions.

These questions, roughly stated, are:

1. Did this story make sense?
2. Did this story make me care about its characters?
3. If it's a fantasy, did I believe in the underlying premise, or not? (If not, why not?)
4. If it's science fiction, did I believe the math, physics, and/or other scientific concepts were plausible?
5. If it's a romance, did I believe the two characters could actually be a couple in real life in whatever time period the book in question has set them?
6. If it's a mystery, was the mystery compelling? Difficult? Understandable? Or just weird?
7. If it's intended to be funny, did it make me laugh?

All of these questions may seem incredibly obvious. Perhaps they are. But those are the initial questions I ask as I read – and those are the questions that must be answered in order to get a good or better review.

To give one example not exactly at random, Stephanie Osborn's three novels in her Displaced Detective series answer the relevant questions in this way:

1. Did the stories make sense? Absolutely.
2. Did the stories make me care about their characters? Yes, yes, yes. (I loved modern-day physicist Skye Chadwick, and who doesn't love Sherlock Holmes?)
3. As this is a science fiction/romance, did I believe in the romance? Yes, I did. (I said so, too, in my reviews.)
4. And did I believe the scientific background was plausible? Again, yes – I definitely did.

 [The relevant reviews - http://shinybookreview.wordpress.com/2012/07/13/sbr-2-for-1-special-stephanie-osborns-displaced-detective-series-books-1-and-2/; http://shinybookreview.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/osborns-displaced-detective-book-3-the-cosmos-in-danger/]

All of these questions were answered to my satisfaction, which led me only to one conclusion – these are good books. I enjoyed them immensely, found them internally consistent and highly satisfying, and gave each book an A rating (or better).

In other words, with any book that's fun to read and/or makes its points well, the above-mentioned questions get answered satisfactorily or better – which makes reviewing them much easier. Being able to process these various things in question form helps me as a reviewer to sense the overarching plot, which helps me assess a grade and get the review done and out.

The problem with reviewing a book comes in when the above-mentioned questions cannot be answered satisfactorily. To use another example drawn from one of my reviews at SBR, I had a difficult time reviewing Debbie Macomber's "Hannah's List" (http://shinybookreview.wordpress.com/2010/10/03/debbie-macombers-hannahs-list-contrived-predictable-and-infuriating/) because of its various shortcomings.

Here's how my initial list looked for this book:

1. Did the story make sense? No way. The doctor character was supposed to be happy his late wife "suggested" three potential mates for him via a letter he received on the first anniversary of her death, which I found to be extremely unlikely.
2. Did this story make me care about its characters? Well, while I cared about Dr. Michael (the main character), I was angry that he was letting his dead wife lead him around by the nose. I also wasn't thrilled with any of the three women his wife pointed him toward, as the two good women basically weren't available, while the one flighty, available woman was not worthy of his time.
3. As this is a romance, the next question is whether I believed the two people who end up together could really be a couple if translated to "real life." My emphatic answer was "No." (I'd use stronger language, except this is a family blog.)

The upshot was, I couldn't recommend Debbie Macomber's book because as a widow, I knew that most of how the main (widower) character acted was, if not wrong, highly unusual. And the idea that Hannah, the late wife, was somehow being saintly in giving her husband her little list, when at best Hannah was being meddlesome – and at worst, she was being Machiavellian in the extreme – really bothered me.

Now, the main reason I'm using Ms. Macomber as an example of a negative review is this – she's a well-known romance novelist with over one hundred books out, thus should be able to handle a negative review now and again. Most of her books are good; some are outstanding. But this one just didn't work because I had more than enough knowledge, as a widow, to realize that what was going on with the main characters just didn't make any sense.

So the next time you read a book review, remember that the reviewer is doing her level best to discuss and describe what she saw. Please remember that the reviewer is not "out to get" the writer if she gives a negative review of one of your favorites, because that just isn't the case with 99.999999% of the reviewers out there. And if you want to discuss this blog, or anything else regarding reviews, writing, or life in general, please feel free to say something here, at my own blog (http://elfyverse.wordpress.com), or at SBR (http://shinybookreview.wordpress.com).

~~~
Thank you, Barb. I appreciate your experiences and your knowledge, and thank you for guest blogging for me!

-Stephanie Osborn
http://www.stephanie-osborn.com

Time Management For Writers or How to Herd Cats – Part 2

by Sarah A. Hoyt

Originally posted on her blog “According to Hoyt” on July 30, 2012

* * *

I've been pleased to have famous author Sarah Hoyt as my guest last week and this on Comet Tales! Last month she wrote an excellent blog on time management for authors, and the psychological struggles thereof. I asked permission to reblog, and she graciously and enthusiastically gave it. But since her blogs tend to be very lengthy, much more so than mine, I chose – again, with her permission – to break it into two installments. Here is part 2.

-Stephanie Osborn

* * *

To make things worse, for the last two years my time management has gone haywire by… Freedom. In a way, I’m back to the initial stage, where I had all this freedom and therefore nothing got done. The difference is that now I DO get paid for my writing, and therefore that is a huge incentive to write.

However, it’s not a huge incentive to write on a specific project.

Structure used to be lent to my writing by two things – what my agent chose to green light to send to editors, so if I approached her with a project and she said “Sarah, I can’t sell that” I didn’t bother to write the proposal. OTOH if I approached her and she said, “Yes, ASAP” I worked on that proposal – unless I had a book on deadline. Between those two I was more or less always running (and often not doing anything I wanted to do, but that’s something else again.)

Now I do have my books under contract with Baen. But unless a book roars out with force – and somehow, books under contract never seem to – it’s too easy to hit a snag. And when I hit a snag, there are books I’m doing for indie publishing, or short stories to edit, or work for Naked Reader Press, or the short stories I need to write, like, you know Nuns in Space is selling like crazy, and if I do three more short stories, I can do a five story antho, and then…

Yeah.

The problem is that I can manage to be insanely busy and not get anything FINISHED while at the same time wearing myself down.

Now, I don’t know how much of that was the health issues – which are, fortunately, not fully gone but on the wane.

However, it’s becoming obvious it’s time to start a new attempt at control. I do have a planner – virgin, since January. And a calendar, ditto. (Part of it being it’s too far from my desk, so I keep forgetting it exists.) I do have a write on board which at this point is permanently etched with the November deadlines (I met the first, then I got sick.)

I won’t survive by my wits alone.

So, here is what I’m going to try: I’m going to try the timed thing again, nine to five, no deviation, start with Noah’s boy, because I could use the money. Work on it till finished. Start on another one.

Next: I need a planner that will work. The problem is the planner I have is depressing because it assumes I am in a corporate job. The writers’ planners I’ve bought seem to be for literary writers and designed to do a book every three years or so. They have “inspirational poetry” on the side, and make me want to gag. What I think I need is a project-based planner, with the option of setting deadlines, then setting phases of the project. If any other writer has found something that works, I’d appreciate a tip. If you don’t have one, I might end up designing one. Eh. I can then sell it, so all is not lost.

And then I’m going to try the two groups so I have someone I’m accountable to.

Will this work? I don’t know. But I hope so. With no deadlines and no boundaries it’s too easy to get lost in dolce far niente, with the twist that it’s not even sweet and it’s definitely not far niente (do nothing) but more wasting myself in myriad little pursuits that don’t come to anything.

I shall report. And those of you who have had the same issue and have perhaps found something that works, chime in. We will figure this out.

If it makes you feel better, with more and more of the people who still have a job finding themselves working at home or self-defined jobs, we might be on the vanguard of the way of the future.

Poor future.