A speculative mind

  My novella, The Methane Sea, launched last week, so I thought I would give you another excerpt from it. Scientists are on a planet with a methane and ammonia atmosphere. In lakes of liquid methane, they search for life in a specially made submersible. In this scene Lin and Fenista are in the submersible when things take a turn.   A warning light came on. “Oh-oh,” Lin said. “Now we have a warning light on engine number one.” “Well that’s . . . different." Fenista said. "Engine two has always been the problem.” “Right” He shut the engine off. “That makes it less likely it’s instrumentation since we are looking at a different instrument. Unless they use the same wiring to the lights or partway to the lights or . . . you know it could be that we have just been overtaxing engine one after we lost number two and it is perfectly reasonable that . . . I’m sorry. I tend to run at the mouth when I am nervous.” He looked at her. She seemed smaller, somehow fragile. “Are ...

  My Novella, The Methane sea, launches on October 30th. here is the first chapter: Marco Lin and Kami Fenista moved down what passed for a trail between the rock formations. The methane ice was treacherous, and Lin had already fallen three times; Fenista, only twice. Their suits could survive an industrial meat grinder without much damage, but the descent to the lake was still tricky. Lin had walked this route every day for the last week, and it never got any easier. He still had a bruise on his backside from the day before yesterday. Fenista held up her hand and Lin eased to a stop. They were at the frozen waterfall, the most treacherous spot on the trail. Fenista grabbed the rope that had been pitoned into the ice wall and cautiously made her way around the frozen ice formation before starting her descent. Once she was clear of the rope, Lin followed, trying to keep one hand on the rope at all times. Fenista’s legs flew out from underneath her. She was hanging from the rope with...

  Likely The tree is there. Likely, it will be there for years. Likely. There are no guarantees. A storm could erase it tomorrow. It stands so tall and firm with others of its kind. It has been there for decades. It will likely be there for decades to come. Likely. It is here now. That is what matters. We see and enjoy it. We smell its essence. We breathe its air. Likely, we will enjoy it for years. Likely. Things we love can leave us Even though they were likely to stay It happens Live, love, breathe Likely you will appreciate it Likely The Methane Sea

  I just finished Beloved by Toni Morison. You don’t need me to tell you this is a good book. It is a Pulitzer Prize winning novel from a Nobel Prize winning author. But this is a story about people dealing with terrible situations and trying to make the best of it. The main focus of the story takes place in 1873, after the Civil War has ended, but black people still find their world in conflict (they still do 150 years later). The main character, Sethe, is a woman who escaped from her slaveholder and abuse, only to have to make a terrible decision afterward that left a rip in the fabric of the world. There is a supernatural element to this book starting with the ghost of Sethe’s dead child. But despite a ghost and other speculative things, this story is grounded in a stark reality. This family has gone through a lot. We occasionally get flashbacks to slavery days. And in 1873 they continue to go through difficult times, yet they do find happiness now and then. They find things...

  I have done some stupid things in my life. But only once have I been chased by the police for one of those stupid things. One night my college roommates and I were sitting around. I mentioned this thing I had heard somebody say, about how you could take two lengths of surgical tubing, attach them to a funnel and use them to shoot water balloons over a long distance. You needed three people: one to hold the funnel and balloon and the other two to each hold an end of the tubing. Roommate one (we’ll call him D) said he knew about it but said you didn’t want to use surgical tubing because after a few shots it would break and snap you in the face. But, he said he had some rubber tubing that would work. Roommate number two (let’s call him V) said, “Let’s do it!” Cautious me thought, maybe I didn’t think this through before mentioning it because this is something we could get in trouble for, I mean depending on where we shoot them, and if we were actually shooting them at people, this...

  Some authors are prolific, writing more books than many people will ever read in a lifetime. Isaac Asimov and Ursula Bloom each wrote over 500 books. But they are not even close to the record. Jozef Ignacy Kraszewski – 600 books John Creasey – 600 books Barbara Cartland – 723 books Kathleen Mary Lindsay – 904 books Jacob Neusner – 950 books Ryoki Inoue - 1075 books Yes, some people write lots of books. That doesn’t mean they write good books. The authors on the list above might be good writers. I don’t know. I have only heard of a couple of them and have only read Asimov. In contrast, some authors make an incredible splash with only a single book. In the music industry they have one-hit wonders. That’s not really the same thing because in the case of musical one-hit wonders, it is not because the artist didn’t try to produce more. They often produced many other songs, it’s just that only one caught on. When I am talking about books, it is the author that only produced one novel...