OK, it's getting tight. At this rate I'll be satisfied with "topping out" the Saturn V by the 20th even if there are still some details to be painted and the LM completed.

In other news, footage has surfaced of Toni Jerrman and I destroying Pandora's Box:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W9CFeSqIMw

Finally, I see that the issue of Death Ray with my story "Monkey Suit" in it (along with a Bengal Station story by Eric Brown) is now on the shelves.

Posted by voxish at 10:50 PM MEST

Updated: Friday, 17 July 2009 10:57 PM MEST

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Back from Finncon, which was every bit as good as I'd hoped, and then some. The Finns are great hosts and really know how to organise - despite dealing with some 15,000 attendees (Finncon has, at least until now, been run jointly with Animecon) it all went smoothly - or at least appeared so to this participant. Helsinki is one of my favorite cities anywhere in the world and it was good to be back - good also to meet up with old friends like Toni Jerrman, Jukka Halme and Hannu Blomilla, among others. My fellow guests of honour George RR Martin and Adam Roberts were excellent company, as was Finncon regular Cheryl Morgan. I think we all had a superb time.

I'm not sure if the moment was captured for posterity, but on the saturday Toni Jerrman and I ceremonially destroyed the last english language copy of my story "Pandora's Box". I deleted my electronic copies before departure, and by the time of the con Toni had prepared a final print-out. He'd done the translation so there was no need for anyone else to be involved. We fed the story into a cross-cutting paper shredder, on stage, during my interview. Amusingly enough, several members of the audience were then seen grabbing wads of shredded paper. Good luck reassembling it! It's kind of weird to have written a story which is no longer accessible even to me, but I'm glad we did it.

It took most of a day to get back - by the time you've factored in a change of planes in Amsterdam, Helsinki is about as far from Cardiff as New York - but the journey was uneventful. I was saddened on my return to learn of the death of Charles N Brown,  Editor-in-chief and publisher of Locus magazine. I only met Charles on a handful of occasions, but I listened carefully to what he had to say and admired both the length of time he'd spent in the field and the conviction he still brought to his opinions. Only the day before, I'd picked up a Heinlein novel at Finncon and looked forward both to reading it and talking about it with Charles. I took it as read that he'd be at Boskone in February, because I'd met him there once before.

I don't know if he ever became a fan, but I like to think I introduced Charles to Wallace and Gromit. It was Boskone, I think, and we were talking about China Mieville's new book at the time, Iron Council. We were discussing the image in the book of the steam train that puts down its own tracks and lifts them after it's passed through, and I mentioned the scene in The Wrong Trousers where Grommit has to lay down the model railway tracks at breakneck speed while sitting in a wagon. I think the scene in question is itself a fond nod to a Tom and Jerry episode. Remarkably, to me, Charles had no idea what I was talking about. Wallace and what? I made an inept attempt at describing Wallace and Gromit (it's a bit hard when you think about it) but urged Charles to check out some of the DVDs. I hope he did! Everyone needs some Wallace and Gromit now and then.

He was good to me in the pages of Locus - Revelation Space was reviewed there earlier than anywhere else, and I always enjoyed it when Charles would mention in his column that he'd read or had read one of my books. Generally he seemed to like them and I was delighted with that.

I didn't know him well enough to comment on his character. We had a few chats, and I liked him, and that was that. The last time, sadly enough, was a bit of a struggle: it was in a loud, hot room at the Glasgow WorldCon and I don't think either Charles or I could hear each other very well. I remember thinking that I'd much rather talk to him over a glass of wine in the Locus suite. He cared passionately about SF and took it seriously. I still regard Locus as essential reading and rip it open the moment it arrives - I had, in fact, just ripped open the latest issue when I logged on and learned of Charles' death. Fortunately, the magazine will continue. 

Not much progress on the rocket this week due to Finncon, but I'll be back with another update in a day or two. The second stage is more or less done, meaning that I'll be tackling the Apollo spacecraft itself next.

Finally: apropos of nothing, last night's blinding revelation. The popular TV show featuring Hugh Laurie as a doctor in a big hospital is not called "House". It's called "House MD". (Look at the tiny writing on the box sets). But almost no one ever calls it that.

Pendantic, moi?

Posted by voxish at 11:51 PM MEST

Updated: Thursday, 16 July 2009 12:19 AM MEST

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One week on - and not much to show for it, truth to tell. I was premature in thinking that I was nearly done with the S1C, for in fact there was quite a bit more to it, and I've only made a start on the painting of the black patches.

What you can see here is the entire S1C, the interstage ring and the start of the S11 stage.

I'm still fairly confident of finishing this thing by the 20th, but most of the progress will be in the last week, and there may still be a few bits to paint.

The quality of the kit notwithstanding, the Revell instructions (obviously translated from the German) could do with some tweaking. The accompanying notes tell us that the Saturn V reached a speed of 112 km/s (think you might have dropped a decimal point there, guys) and that Neil Armstrong's first words on the Moon were:

"This is only one small step for a man but a great leap forward for mankind."

So now you know, future historians.

Posted by voxish at 11:30 PM MEST

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Here's the fruit of today's progress: most of the S1C stage completed, together with the five F-1 engines. For contrast (below)  is the real thing: this is the horizontal Saturn V at Banana Creek, Kennedy Space Center, captured in October.

The real things aren't anywhere near as shiny (or red on the inside) as Revell's paint guidelines would have you think, but I'd imagine that the engines shown here have tarnished a bit over the years. There's another F-1 at one of the viewing stands which I wish I'd photographed.

It's amazing to think that these engines were originally going to power an even bigger moon rocket, the Nova, which would have used eight in the first stage. The Nova would create so much sound and vibration that it was generally assumed that the only safe place to launch it would be from a platform floating out at sea.

Posted by voxish at 11:19 PM MEST

Updated: Saturday, 27 June 2009 11:41 PM MEST

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And now for something completely different ... I thought it would be a bit of a laugh if, instead of the usual rambling, sporadic blather, I tried to do something truly constructive and useful with this blog. And what could be more constructive - or appropriate in 2009 - than to build this 1/96th scale plastic model kit of a Saturn V rocket so that I can have something really impressive sitting on my desk? It may all end in tears, but I'm going to shoot for assembling it by the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, on July 20th.

Watch this space (rocket)...

Posted by voxish at 12:42 AM MEST

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News of the ten book contract is out there now, so many thanks for the congratulations and good wishes I've received, and the many kind things I've seen here and there on the internet. As some have noted, while it's good for me - no bones about that - it also says something encouraging about the state of the genre. Far from dying on its feet (I've been reading obituaries for SF for about as long as I've been reading them about rock music) it's not doing at all badly, and may even be in the ascendant.

The contract doesn't change much as far as my writing habits are concerned. I've been hitting about a book a year since I started with Orion in 1999 - in fact we've done nine novels and three collections in ten years, or will have by the time the year's out - and all that's really required of me is to keep on the same level of productivity for another ten. It's not to be taken lightly, but at the same it's not too daunting. I've always wanted to be a prolific writer, and so a book a year feels about right to me. The idea of spending two or three years of my life on a single work fills me with existential dread, although that's purely a reflection on my own approach to the craft, which is very much a case of diving in and immersing myself in a book at a level which would almost certainly drive me insane if it lasted longer than six or nine months. To put it in rock terms, I'd rather be Neil Young than one of those artists who only releases work every three years or so. At that same time, I'm aware of the hazards of over-production: there are writers whose work I followed assiduously, until they gradually outstripped my capability to keep up. In many cases I simply stopped them reading them entirely. Obviously I'll be hoping that isn't the case with all my readers, but at the same time I'm mindful of the possibility. Above all else, I'll be working hard to improve my books and stretch my range, while at the same time hopefully delivering the kind of big SF kicks that I'm perhaps best known for. Sitting here now, I can honestly say that the last thing I feel is complacent or smug. Excited and apprehensive in equal measure is more like it - and acutely aware that I've been fortunate on many levels. For all its flaws, my first novel found a readership, and while it wasn't everyone's cup of tea - hell, I'm not even sure it would have been mine - REVELATION SPACE did get me off to a good start. I'm in no doubt that timing and marketing played a massive role in that, but what mattered was that it provided a foundation for the subsequent books. I'm also truly grateful that both my publisher and my readers (or enough of them, anyway) were happy to see me strike off into different fictional universes, be it the faux-1959 of CENTURY RAIN or the near-future spacefaring solar system of PUSHING ICE. I love doing the Revelation Space stories, but - gratifyingly - I've never felt like I was a prisoner of them. Maybe that's why I still like doing them.

I've been lucky in many other ways. I've worked with a supportive and understanding editor - the excellent Jo Fletcher - for all my novels to date, and my agent Robert Kirby has been a genuine star. But I've also had the benefit of a great family, a wonderful and supportive wife, and friends who've been there when I needed them. I had a great job at ESA which involved working with some truly smart people (people who made me realise that I'm actually a bit of a thicko on many levels), and for most of the last fifteen years I've had the financial security to be able to treat writing as a glorified hobby - something I'll do so long as it's fun/challenging/whatever. That's still pretty much my attitude: it almost never feels like a day job. I've also had the benefit in my adult years of stamina and good health - something you can never take for granted. Anyone with a passing knowledge of the current SF and fantasy scene will know of writers who are dealing with issues of personal health that would make almost all the usual writerly grievances - certainly any that I ever have to deal with - look very trivial indeed. So I'm not only lucky, but mindful that there are writers (and readers, for that matter) out there who'd love the certainty of ten years of life, let alone ten years of income. So yes, a very happy camper here.

That's about it for now, I think. Time to mention, if you aren't already aware of it, that there's a new story of mine ready to download as an audio podcast from the Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/audio/2009/jun/19/alastair-reynolds-scales-short-story

See what you make of it - and don't be too put off by the narrator.

Al R

Posted by voxish at 1:55 PM MEST

Updated: Wednesday, 24 June 2009 2:39 PM MEST

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I'm in the US right now. Thanks to my pal Louise, I was lucky enough to get ringside seats for the departure of STS-125 on its way to the Hubble Space Telescope.

It was spectacular, everything I hoped it would be.  For added comedy value, your humble correspondent was looking at the *wrong pad* until seconds before ignition (when his wife pointed out that everyone else had their cameras pointed *that way*). Never mind, I did take some truly awesome photographs as the shuttle cleared the pad and began its rotation. You could see everything, even the shock diamonds in the SSME exhausts. The launch was over incredibly quickly, as Atlantis punched its way into low-lying cloud. We didn't get to see the solid rockets separate due to the cloud cover, but that was a small disapointment. It wasn't as loud as I was expecting: about on a par with the loudest afterburner noise you'll hear at an airshow, which is to say impressive but not physically painful. Actually having felt my stomach being churned in knots by a Vulcan bomber, I'd actually rate the shuttle launch as being somewhat quieter. We were at Banana creek, which is about as close as you can get, but there's still a large body of water between you and the pad, which absorbs a lot of the noise. My wife, who saw the launch of an Ariane 5 from Korou, felt that the Ariane was the more visceral experience.

Afterwards, we went to see the new Star Trek film (liked it) at the KSC IMAX. Which is where, rather frustratingly, I appear to have lost my camera, with all the Atantis photos still on the memory card. I've put out feelers and contacted lost and found, but to no avail. In the unlikely event that somewhere out there did find a Panasonic Lumix FZ-50 with a shuttle launch on the card, do get in touch...

Anyway, enough of that - I'm over it now (sob). No, really. Took a biplane ride to cheer myself up, and tonight we're off to see the new Terminator film, which opens today. Usual lacklustre service will be resumed when I return to the UK.

Posted by voxish at 6:57 PM MEST

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Once again I must apologise for my slowness in responding to both comments posted here and emails sent to the Dendrocopus account. I'm getting there, but slowly. Thanks for your patience...

In the meantime, I've finished a couple of stories. One of them, "Monkey Suit", is a 5000 word piece set in the Revelation Space universe. More on that when I know for sure that it's going to appear where I think it will. The other story, a somewhat longer piece entitled "Pandora's Box", (not set in the RS universe) will be appearing as an original translated piece in Finnish in the SF magazine Tahtivaeltaja, edited by the inestimable Toni Jerrman.

I've always been fascinated by the texture of translated prose, especially that cool, icy detachment that seems to hover around prose that's been translated from a genuinely foreign language such as Japanese. I used to fantasize about paying someone to translate my stuff into Chinese or Russian, then paying someone else to translate it back again, just so that I could obtain some objective detachment on my prose, im the hope that it would turn out to read like the work of Lem or some other brilliant foreign-language SF writer. I also used to wonder if it was possible to be hypnotized into forgetting your own work, so that you could read it afresh. (I don't need to do that now - I get the same affect just by being 43 and reading stuff I wrote 10 or 20 years ago).

Anyway,  a long time ago - 2004 at the latest - after several pints too many in a Helsinki bar, Toni and I came up with the idea of translating a story of mine into his native language, and then destroying all copies of the original english-language version - including mine. So that's what we're going to do, as soon as Toni has a good translation in hand. So I'll have a story that exists in Finnish, and Finnish only, and if I want to read it again, I'll need to pay someone to translate it back into English. Of course the fact that it's Finnish, not exactly a language everyone can dip into with the greatest of ease, only adds to the fun. Again, more on this when it happens. What wackiness, eh?

For me, I'm just about to dive into the rewrites on TERMINAL WORLD, then I need to do a short story for another anthology project, and then it's onwards and upwards with the new book. Currently reading: Azincourt, Bernard Cornwell. Currently listening: Ali Farka Toure: Savane. And the new Yeah Yeah Yeahs album, of course, which is very good.

Posted by voxish at 12:13 PM MEST

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