Let’s see…
Kitchen: almost done. Dishwasher working. Rice cooker reinstalled. Broken cupboard was fixed this morning.
Living room: furniture almost in their final locations, except for my desk which will possibly move around a bit. Not yet unpacked: my computer, misc. papers, and books.
Bedroom: my clothes unpacked and sorted. The H’s are still in boxes.
Bathroom: most of the stuff is elsewhere, because the cupboard isn’t installed yet. But the washing machine is working (we had a bit of a fright because it wouldn’t restart–turns out it was a plugged filter).

Missing: a dresser for holding the excess dishware and cutlery. Sorting out the duplicate materials in the cellar.

All in all, a most profitable weekend 🙂

Oh, and I did manage to finish editing Foreign Ghosts, as well as tentatively plotting two sequels, Unwelcome Spirits and Revered Ancestors. One thing down, several billions to go…

Sorry about the lack of news–it’s not that the internet has been lacking, but we’ve been spending a lot of time unpacking boxes…

The piano has arrived, though sadly it had a big gash, and we’re seeing with the movers about that. And I’m re-discovering the joys of line 13, our most (in)famously packed subway line: basically, you don’t need to hold onto anything to be able to stand throughout its run between stations, you’re propped up by the other passengers…

This weekend, it’s put-the-books-away, and put-the-boxes-away. What fun 🙂

Meanwhile, I’m off to finish edits on Foreign Ghosts before shipping it off to my agent.

… I have seen the draft versions of the illustrations Larry Rostant did for the French translation of Harbinger of the Storm and Master of the House of Darts.
This would be the point where I go all Gollum and say “my precious” over and over. All I’m allowed to say is that they’re as pretty (or maybe more pretty) than the first one.

In other news, had a pleasant week: saw Chaz Brenchley and his girlfriend Karen Sunday; had dinner with James Patrick Kelly and his wife Pam today; and got my French translation of Harbinger of the Storm to peruse. Also, trying to sort out a synopsis. Almost there…

The move went well, even though the piano didn’t make it (the movers hadn’t foreseen the lift wouldn’t be large enough, and it takes special people to move a fragile piano upstairs). The H is a little sad, but normally we should have it on Monday.

Our flat has been completely done over, and it’s very pretty (parquet floor, nice kitchen with all-new appliances, and the suppression of a wall that cost us space in the living room).

I’m also close to the new job (about half an hour, as opposed to the hour I used to commute before), which definitely feels nice.

Computer’s still in storage, so I’m typing this from the small laptop–and, of course, we’re in a room full of boxes (they’re winning, trust me). And yeah, writing has been pretty much not happening in this corner of the woods…

And our move has been under the sign of Doctor Who: we finished up the Tennant specials during the packing of boxes (nothing extraordinary, though I can’t quite understand the bile against them. They’re pretty average episodes with nothing special, except perhaps “Waters of Mars”, and “The End of Time”, which doesn’t have a fantastic scenario, but is worth it just for Timothy Dalton as a Time Lord 🙂 ). And our new, mini living room setup was christened with the first few Matt Smith specials (so far, I like Smith more than Tennant, and I have to say “The Eleventh Hour” was a terrific ep).

Now, if only we could have a TARDIS to move things around…

-Athena Andreadis has two posts on “Safe Exoticism”, where she tackles the challenge of representing concepts that you don’t master (both on the science front, and on the culture front).

There is nothing wrong with writers using other cultures than their own, especially if they’re good storytellers with sensitive antennae. But when such works are taken for the real thing, the real thing often gets devalued or rejected outright, just as real science gets rejected in SF in favor of notions that are false or obsolete and often duller than the real thing.
(…)
There’s another equivalence between science and non-Anglo cultures in speculative fiction. Namely, the devil’s in the details. You need to have absorbed enough of your subject’s essence to know what counts, what needs to be included for verisimilitude. You may get the large picture right by conscientious research; you may get by with bluffing – but small things give away the game even when the bigger items pass cursory inspection. The diminutive of Konstantin in Russian is not Kostyn, it’s Kostya. Hellenic names have vocative endings that differ from the nominative. The real thing is both more familiar and more alien than it appears in stories written by cultural tourists. And often it’s the small touches that transport you inside another culture.

(I’ve lost count the stories set in France which got the first names completely wrong, so no argument there. Though tend to be more unforgiving of stories that get the details right in obsessive minutiae, and then completely fail on the mindset. I’ve read stories set in Ancient China where the main character insulted their father to his face, which is pretty much, er, fail?)

Read more here and here.

-Bryan Thao Worra on Lao steampunk (funnily enough, Minh Mạng’s reign was one of the possible turning points I envisioned for Việt Nam’s history in the Xuya continuity , but in the end I decided to dispense with the ill-fated Nguyễn dynasty altogether).

Packing up the boxes in the cellar tonight, and then perhaps an episode of Doctor Who (1st ep of S5), or, if we have more time, Trần Anh Hùng’s The Vertical Ray of the Sun, which looks nice.

A bit late, as those were awarded in Shanghai on August 27th, but only just saw this. The Sky Awards are “fan/judge-voted awards for Chinese science fiction and fantasy literacy. These awards are initiated and administered by the Sky Award Organizing Committee composed of a number of senior SF/F fans, and the Judge Panel consists of writers, editors, critics, and professionals in the SF/F field in China.” (stole the definition from the World SF blog, on which it appears to have quotes, so I’m leaving them…)

Best Novel:
Three Body III: Dead End, Liu Cixin (Chonqing Publishing House)

Best Short Story
“Algorithm of Simhuman”, Chi Hui (Science Fiction World, May 2010)

Best Translated Novel
The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman, translated by Hu Yaqian (Sichuan Science and Technology Publishing House)

Best Translated Short Story
“Turing’s Apples”, Stephen Baxter, translated by Cai Yu (Science Fiction World, May 2010)

Special Contribution Award:
Liu Cixin – science fiction writer, author of the Three Body trilogy

Here’s wishing some of those get translated in a language I speak… (speaking of which, Clarkesworld recently published “The Fish of Lijiang”, a Chen Quiufan short story translated by Ken Liu. Well worth a read)

(via Elbakin.net)

In other news:

Heaven and Earth, Overturned

14k words, and I think I’ve sorted out the ending. Now to lay the groundwork for it…

I spent a fascinating afternoon looking up the history of the Nguyễn dynasty–which went downhill pretty fast (for those who don’t know, the Nguyễn are the last ruling dynasty of Việt Nam, with a significant portion of their reigns happening under French protectorate and over reduced territory). Of particular interest, the posthumous names of the Emperors–especially the gaps, which correspond to Emperors who were forced to abdicate (Hiệp Hòa, who signed the infamous treaty of Huế, which basically handed Việt Nam over to the French, said treaty being so restrictive even the French Metropole refused to ratify it; a bunch of Emperors who were deposed and/or exiled by the French for refusing to collaborate, and the last Emperor, who abdicated). It tells… a story that is very much not pretty (not that I’m surprised, I knew about this in a large sense, but not the precise details).

Also, Dục Đức. Shortest posthumous name ever (Lily Emperor, if my Vietnamese dictionary didn’t screw up the translation). It probably doesn’t help he ruled for only 3 days, but still, what a way to signal a total lack of achievements…

(in case you were wondering, none of this is actually useful for the story, except in the sense of improving my Vietnamese history and making me realise I really should have kept up with my Vietnamese lessons–yup, once again Mom and Grandma are absolutely correct, I’ve forgotten pretty much everything except basic pronunciation…)

In more personal notes, I think we’re almost done with the packing of the boxes. All but the essential necessities have been boxed, and we’re looking at a particularly balanced diet this week (ie takeaway, ’cause most of the kitchen stuff is in the boxes)

Here’s a link to the US tropes post in my LJ mirror, which has a very interesting comment thread, particularly on the way Hollywood and the US functions in exporting movies and other cultural items; on the history of the US as a technological process; and on the fact the tropes I mention seem to be particularly associated with retreating empires (such as Britain in the mid-20th Century). Well worth checking out. Again, thanks to everyone for commenting, clarifying, disputing and discussing. It’s been very illuminating.

Meanwhile, we’re running out of boxes, and will be packing the eletronics next…

… I posted my blog post, packed some boxes, and went to bed–only to find out when I woke up this morning that my blog, its LJ mirror and my twitter had gone nuclear in my absence (and, indeed, are still active). Many thanks to everyone who boosted the signal on this one, and to everyone who commented and discussed. I will catch up with comments, but it’s obviously going to take me a while…
(especially since I’m really supposed to be packing more boxes)

Dario Ciriello’s third novella anthology, Panverse Three, can now be pre-ordered, either from the Panverse website or through Amazon.

I’m hardly neutral in this (Dario’s a friend, and I blurbed the antho for him), but the novellas in there are well worth a look. In particular, Ken Liu’s “The Man who Ended History: a Documentary” is a terrific work, and deserves many awards nominations. It’s an unflinching look at Japanese actions during the invasion of China in WWII, and asks hard questions about what history is, and whether it belongs to the victims or the historians.

You can read an excerpt here (I’m not a big fan of the pseudo science that opens the story; in fact, I almost skipped to the next one when reading the ARC; but trust me, the story gets infinitely better after that, and hits really hard). Pretty much worth the price of the antho on its own; and you also get all the other cool stories when you buy 🙂

If you’re a SFWA member, you can also read it here in the fiction forums.