…nese culture != Vietnamese culture, though they of course share a bunch of common tropes/myths/etc.). But I still have a fondness for the story; it’s not every day you get to write a story with multiple reincarnations of the protagonist. Do tell me what you think of it. (if you were at WFC, this is the story I read the first third from at the EPIC group reading–I know some people asked me if they could find it elsewhere, and I apologise for comple…

…(and sign books–Obsidian and Blood sold out within the dealers’ room, much to my delight). Can’t wait for Brighton to come around!…

…r in a surprisingly large room–no idea what’s in store for today, but it sounds like fun. I’m not the only one to have a November birthday: fellow authors Lavie Tidhar, David Tallerman and Lee Battersby are also November babies, and to mark the occasion Angry Robot is offering 50% off ebooks–see here for details, but you can basically net yourself all three Acatl books and the short stories in a handy ebook format. And to tide you over while I, er…

…rn powers eating into its hegemony–whereas in fact Vietnam had been independent of China for a while and the power balance in the region was a little bit more complicated), and I had no means of judging which bits were accurate. Mishra also quite obviously does not understand how Chinese society worked–to suggest that Confucianism is an alien and artificial ideology (that he grants was deeply embedded in Chinese minds, but in a tone that suggests…

…s Samarkar, the wizard who was once a princess, and her relationship with Edene, Temur’s fiancée). The ending is heartbreaking and wonderful. –The Grace of Kings, Ken Liu (ARC from publisher): epic fantasy using Ancient China as its foundation. A cross between the Iliad, Three Kingdoms and Lord of the Rings. But it’s also very adult and very modern in its handling of power–who gets it, who is worthy to handle it and how you cling to it. And very v…

…–lie dead while Houyi cradles the curve of her bow, her fingers locking around the taut hardness of its string. The tenth sun, the last, has fled. Chastise them, Dijun said, a father’s plea. But there is the land and the horror and the dryness, desiccated corpses in empty dust trenches that were rivers not long ago. There are dead dragons, too, and snake women with bright eyes–and is it not right to bring down the suns, is it not what Houyi is mea…

…ed Along the River of Heaven”, Clarkesworld also has consistently strong fiction: my favourite pieces include Yoon Ha Lee’s “Ghostweight”, Theodora Goss’s “England under the White Witch”, and Xia Jia’s “A Hundred Ghost Parade Tonight”, among many other fine pieces….

…shiny new MacBook Air 13.3″. Just set it up now. Wow. The keyboard is very comfy, and it makes a nice change from my old 10″ eeePC (which is a nice machine for writing on and a crap one for making revisions on). This weekend I have a blog post to write, a story to revise, and various other things to consider that I had no brain-space for during the week, in addition to accompanying the H on a supply hunt to Chinatown (aka, where are my 5kg of rice…

…but it has ninjas and multiple references to samurai honour and losing face as some sort of ultimate deterrent in Japanese culture. Arg arg arg). Bonus points for his mention that he gave her a Chinese grandmother because he wanted her to combine Chinese sensibility with Japanese efficiency. Arrrrgggg racial stereotyping much, anyone? [1] Asian geek with a spaceship who was smarter than the boys, the first time I’d seen that kind of character aro…

…Sky, the anthology of feminist space opera story edited by Athena Andreadis and Kay Holt. It’s courtesy of Eleni Tsami (that link leads to Eleni’s blog, where you can see her discuss the evolution of the cover and show the full wraparound). Isn’t it pretty? The anthology has my Xuya story “The Waiting Stars” as well as stories by Ken Liu, Alex Dally MacFarlane, Christine Lucas… (see the full TOC here as well as a mini-widget with excerpts). Quite…