David D. LevineScience Fiction Author

Word count: 784 | Since last entry: 409

I got absolutely pummeled at the day job today. Being in a separate user interface design group means I get to work on a lot of different projects, but it can sometimes create a slightly adversarial relationship with the developers. Today I really missed being part of the development team — we did have our arguments, to be sure, but I had a better idea of what the issues were, and neither I nor the developers got blind-sided the way I did today. It wasn’t too bad, really — no hard feelings, but a very intense discussion.

I filled out one of those census forms the other day — how many people live at this address, where do you work, how much do you make, how did you get to work last week. Boy, do I feel lucky. I own my home, I drive my own car, I work every week. This survey really made me think about just how much of a privilege those simple things are.

Meanwhile, in fictionland, I’m developing the setting and introducing the rather large cast. One recent volunteer to join the cast (you know who you are) hasn’t appeared yet, but I’ll find a way to fit him in soon. I’ll get the plot rolling within another few hundred words, I hope.

Word count: 375 | Since last entry: 375

It has taken me entirely too long to get started on this story. I’ve been researching, outlining, and thinking thinking thinking… entirely too much. I’ve been paralyzed, I think, by the responsibility of writing a fictional story set in a real situation with characters based on people I know. I want to be true to their experience, but at the same time it has to be a proper story, with a plot, and that means conflict. So I’ve been trying to find a way to inject conflict into the situation without offending anyone.

I’ve written three complete cast lists, some more recognizable as the real people and others less so, each around a different central conflict. The final cast list is the closest to the originals, because the conflict I’ve settled on is mostly an internal one, and internal to one of the people I don’t know as well. So I’m less likely to step on toes because I don’t know his real problems — anything I come up with will be entirely mine, not his. I’m hoping that the resemblances between my characters and the real people will be seen as homage rather than appropriation.

The other big problem was finding a viewpoint character and a grammatical person/tense. I’ve settled on the second-in-command rather than the leader (though the real-life person he’s based on is not really the second in command) because for some reason I feel that leaders are best seen from the side, and I’m writing it in first person past tense. I’m a little concerned that I’ve been doing a lot of first-person stuff lately, because I know it’s kind of restrictive. But given the internal conflict and the source material, I think this story has to be driven in first.

This story scares me. I’m concerned I may not have the chops to pull it off. I suppose this is what Kelly Link said we should be trying to do. (I had an interesting discussion with Jay Lake about this topic at his birthday party yesterday, and we came to the consensus that the author’s truly unique voice is something that can’t be invoked consciously, though there are things you can do to encourage it.)

Whatever. At least I have begun.

Back from Wiscon. And what a treat it was.

This was the 30th annual gathering of the fans and creators of feminist science fiction, and for this special anniversary they pulled out all the stops. Just about all of the previous guests of honor were present, including Ursula Le Guin, Samuel R. Delany, Nalo Hopkinson, Mary Doria Russell, Emma Bull, and many more. This surfeit of wonderfulness brought the fans out in droves, so that the convention (usually about 600 people) had to be capped at 1000 members.

1000 members was a good choice for this hotel, the always-wonderful Concourse, giving the rooms and corridors a bustling and energetic feel without being overcrowded. Even the Tor party offered a reasonable amount of oxygen to its attendees. The one event that seemed to exceed the hotel’s capacity was the Guest of Honor speeches, where I found myself in a back corner.

My own personal Wiscon began on Wednesday, when we flew to Milwaukee to have dinner with my parents at Mader’s. This turned out to be excellent planning, because when the spectacular thunderstorm hit we were lying in a hotel room gawking at the lightning instead of running through a duck-drowning rain or sitting in an airport lounge somewhere wondering whether we’d ever arrive in Madison, both of which happened to far too many people.

First thing Thursday morning we drove to Madison, taking picturesque back roads to avoid freeway construction. This provided some bucolic views, but made it surprisingly hard to find a good place for breakfast. But we arrived in plenty of time for the writers’ workshops, where I served as “guest pro” for four talented new writers. It was interesting to see how much I’ve learned about critiquing in the past five years. It’s not that the other participants didn’t have useful comments to share, but I found that I was the only one to mention some problems that seemed really obvious to me. I hope they found my comments useful.

Friday morning we blew off the con for the morning to visit Taliesin West, Frank Lloyd Wright’s home and school, along with Australian bookseller Ron Serdiuk. Some of the spaces were really spectacular, particularly the theatre and the student drafting room; I was particularly intrigued how intimate these spaces felt considering how large they were (the living room in the Wright residence, for example, felt no bigger than mine though it could easily have seated fifty people). On the other hand, Wright’s signature low ceilings and lack of doors/walls made me feel rather uncomfortable in parts of what was supposed to be a private home, and the level of craft (as opposed to design) was surprisingly low. Wright’s buildings were often built on the cheap, and Taliesin in particular was built by apprentices working for free. No wonder Wright’s roofs always leak.

On the way back to the con from Taliesin we stopped for lunch at a hippy-dippy general store and organic cafe, then hit Candinas Chocolates in Verona for a box of their amazing truffles. Somehow there were still three truffles left in the box when we got back to Portland. They really are best when they’re fresh.

We arrived at the con in mid-Gathering, and this is where things start to get a little fuzzy. I deliberately decided not to take notes at this con, in deference to being in the moment, so I can’t tell you all the panels I attended or who I had dinner with.

I can tell you that I didn’t attend much in the way of programming, per se, nor did I hit the dealers’ room or art show until the second or third day of the con. Mostly I engaged in conversations, in hallways and at parties. For some reason this con most of my conversations were one-on-one rather than in groups, and largely with people I hadn’t met before (or hadn’t seen for years, or knew mostly from the net).

The programming I did attend was definitely up to Wiscon standards, but none of it stands out. Most of what I remember was the programs I was on.

Saturday was my big program day, beginning with a reading at 8:30 in the morning. I had put up posters all over the con encouraging people to attend in their jammies. Only a couple people came in sleepwear — and I’m not sure it wasn’t their normal hall costume — but an amazing (for that hour on Saturday morning) 18 people came to hear me and Meg Turville-Heinz and P.C. Hodgell read. I guess the posters paid off. Saturday afternoon I had back-to-back panels on class mobility (with Chip Delany) and animals (with Ursula Le Guin) which were sprightly and well-attended. Sunday morning I appeared on a Battlestar Galactica panel at which I may have been trying too hard to be funny.

Saturday evening was the Tiptree auction, which only Ellen Klages and I knew was a program item for me. I can’t believe I let Ellen talk me into appearing in a chicken suit, but it was for a good cause and I got money stuffed into my drumsticks by Elizabeth Bear, Freddie Baer, Jane Yolen, and I’m-ashamed-to-admit-I-don’t-know-how-many others. Plus a kiss from Geoff Ryman. (Pictures here.) The auction itself was a hoot too, especially the part where Mary Doria Russell chased Geoff Ryman around the hall with a bright pink underwire bra.

Having started off Saturday in my jammies and ended it in a chicken suit, on Sunday — the night of the guest of honor speeches and the traditional Wiscon fancy dress party — I wore my tux (the whole deal, with tails, vest, black tie, starched shirt, and collapsible topper). This got me up on stage again, to help with the singing of the traditional Tiptree song, and another kiss from Geoff Ryman. The tux also got a great deal of (quite welcome) attention at the parties afterwards, easily repaying the discomfort of wearing it and the hassle of carting it back and forth across the country. Truly is it said that a tuxedo is the sexiest thing a man can wear.

I kept hoping that the tux and the chicken suit would cancel each other out and everyone would think I spent the whole weekend in ordinary clothes. But no such luck — it was chicken jokes the whole evening.

By Monday I was in a befogged state combining equal parts “I’m not ready for the con to be over” and “I’m ready to go home now.” I packed up in a rush in order to make the “Writers in Mid-Career” group session, which turned out to have been rescheduled to another time, but enough people hadn’t gotten the memo (including Ursula Le Guin, Vonda McIntyre, Terri Windling, Elisabeth Vonarburg, and Naomi Kritzer) that we still had a valuable discussion. Ursula said that the publishing business was worse than she’d ever seen, but it had never been good, which was curiously reassuring.

Lunch. Hugs. Drive to Milwaukee. Plane to Minneapolis. Another plane to Portland. No problems on any of these — which, I learned the next day, was a miracle — but didn’t get home until after midnight.

Sleepy now.

One week until Wiscon. Must do critiques for writers’ workshop. Must double-check on plane, hotel, and car reservations. Must reinforce hat box. Must remember to breathe. The final convention program has been posted. There are so many cool people! on it. My own personal schedule is:

Saturday, 8:30-9:45 a.m.: General Reading Session 6, Capitol A

Patricia C. Hodgell, David D. Levine, Meg Turville-Heitz

Saturday, 1:00-2:15 p.m.: Myth of Class Mobility?, Wisconsin

Research indicates economic mobility decreased in the United States between the 1970s and 1990s, and that France, Canada, and Denmark have more mobility than the United States. Software programming used to be a clear career choice for people looking to move into the middle or upper-middle class. But in an era of outsourcing and offshoring, is it anymore?
Avedon Carol, Matthew H. Austern, Samuel R. Delany, David D. Levine, Victor Jason Raymond

Saturday, 2:30-3:45 p.m.: Animal, Human, Alien, Wisconsin

Let’s talk about books which explore animal/human boundaries as a way to explore gender and, often, race. Books where women become animals, or animals take on a narratively feminine gender role. Examples would be Carmen Dog, Troll, Mister Boots, books like that. What roles do we project on animals? The trope of the telepathic companion animal as perfect Wife, or as the externalization of the heroine’s object position and disempowerment. What are the boundaries of sentience? In fact, animals, aliens, and AIs all explore this idea.
Elizabeth Bear, Liz Henry, Tom La Farge, Ursula K. Le Guin, David D. Levine, Lisa Tuttle

Sunday, 10:00-11:15 a.m.: Battlestar Galactica: Starbuck Ain’t a Boy Now!, Capitol A

Battlestar Galactica (the new series) has taken scifi TV by storm. Let’s talk about the mythology (Greek Pantheon, the dying leader, a cost in blood) involved along with the religion (monotheism vs. polytheism) and the fact that women play key roles in this series (President Laura Roslin, Starbuck as a woman).
Bill Humphries, Heather Galaxy, David D. Levine, Juliana B. Perry, JJ Pionke

Yes, my reading is at eight thirty in the A-freaking-M. Please come anyway. I will be in my jammies and I encourage everyone else to do the same. Will probably also have coffee and donuts if I can swing it. In other news: my story “Tk’tk’tk” is now available as an MP3 file for your listening pleasure. Thanks to the fine folks at Escape Pod for creating audio versions of all the Hugo nominees on such short notice.

Just got back from a delightful long weekend in Vancouver BC, staying with square dancing friends Grant and Will.

It was a weekend filled with serendipity. For example, our morning amble along the shore turned into a trip to Granville Island when we happened to notice the water taxi. This kind of thing happened over and over — it was wonderful to be so free of agenda that we could indulge the fates. It was also a weekend filled with ducks — flying in the air, paddling on the water, stuffed and mounted on the wall, floating in the soup. Wherever we went, there they were.

The weekend began on Thursday night, when we got out of Portland right after work and hit the McMenamins’ Olympic Club Hotel & Theater in Centralia, just in time to see the movie Inside Man and have a bite to eat. The next morning we zipped up to Vancouver and avoided both the border crush and the rush hour traffic we meet when we leave Portland first thing Friday morning.

We usually only visit Vancouver, which is one of our favorite cities, for the square dance fly-in on (US) Thanksgiving weekend, and it was a real treat to a) not have to try to cram in visits and touristing around the dancing, b) have more opportunities to sample Vancouver’s fine restaurants (the fly-in provides several meals), and c) visit during warm dry weather.

The weather was, in fact, even better than we could have hoped, with record high temperatures making for shirtsleeve weather almost all weekend. We walked on the beach; we walked in Stanley Park (twice); we browsed antique stores; we took a water taxi to Granville Island and browsed the market there, also taking in an outdoor orchestra concert. And we ate — oh my, how we ate. Fine French cuisine. Excellent dim sum. Marvelous gelato (two different places). Singaporean. Japanese. Pub grub. Fresh bagels (of the Montreal rather than New York variety).

We got to spend more time than usual with Grant, though Will was away much of the weekend due to various responsibilities. We seem to amuse them. We also met square dancer Jan and her partner Deb for dim sum, which we might have missed out on (due to Mother’s Day brunch crowds) but for Jan’s persistence and familiarity with the staff. Thanks, Jan!

We introduced our hosts to the joys of polenta. We had a nice conversation with a vendor of intriguing knitted items (would you believe a knitted seaweed hat, knitted vegetables and flowers as brooches, and knitted teapot and French press cozies with such patterns as skull and crossbones?) at Granville Market. We met various dogs and cats. We walked through Mole Hill and other neighborhoods we’d never visited. We selected from among 218 flavors of gelato at La Casa Gelato, an amazing Disneyland of frozen treats, with an international clientele, hidden away in the middle of an industrial wasteland. We dropped in on Grant’s weekly knitting group. I picked up a couple of CDs at a rummage sale.

I didn’t blow off the writing completely. I spent a half-hour here and a half-hour there and completed the edits (after a month of work, jeez) on my “Heaven as bureaucracy” story from Clarion, now titled “Joy is the Serious Business of Heaven.” It goes in the mail to F&SF tomorrow. I considered sending it to my critique group to get their feedback on the revisions, but after spending so much time revising it I just want it out of my hands.

And, speaking of serendipity, my next writing project just fell in my lap. I got a long email from a friend last week, describing a recent adventure of hers, which had almost everything — curious incidents, rich setting, telling details, unusual characters — all it needed was a fantastic element and a little plot structure to be an incredible story. She’s given her permission for me to turn it into a story, and I’ll start in on that tomorrow.

I haven’t blogged properly in weeks. Sorry about that. Life’s been busy but not particularly interesting. Or, actually, interesting but not notable in a blogworthy way. I went to a square dance in Palm Springs. We saw Assassins, the musical, which Kate commented was a mixed bag of a play but the production was top-notch. We saw guitar god Richard Thompson’s “1000 Years of Popular Music” show — teriffic. We hosted a Tupperware party, of all things; silly fun, much plastic was purchased. At the day job, we lost one person (gone off to get his MBA), hired another, and interviewed several more… we have at least one and possibly as many as three more positions to fill. I looked for a copy of the soundtrack CD of Star Trek II, without success so far.

As for the writing, I’ve been grinding very slowly away at rewrites of one of my Clarion stories (the “Heaven as bureaucracy” story, for those with long memories). Should have this one ready to submit within a week. It was amazingly painful to read over the critique comments and remember the emotions of that time, but I’ve gotten past that point and am diligently trying to make the story the best it can be. I now think that 17 critiquers is too many… you get too many comments pulling the story in different directions, and any problem so obvious that half of more of the people comment on it makes you really feel hammered, no matter how kind the individual comments. I may produce an essay about “Clarion as viewed from six years later.”

Must sleep. Early meeting tomorrow.

Last weekend some people went to Norwescon, some to Minicon, some to Eastercon. We went to Sacramento for my uncle Ben’s memorial gathering. Ben had a big family — six kids, most with spouses and kids of their own — and many friends, so that there were nearly a hundred people in attendance. It was an occasion with more laughter than tears, and I got in some good conversations with my parents and cousins (special shout-out to my cousin Adam Levine of GamerAndy.com). Not to mention some very good food. Our hotel had a noisy disco, but on the second night they moved us to a different room with a view of the lake, which offered a pair of geese with fuzzy little goslings and, as a special bonus, flittering bats. (Bats = good.)

Since then I’ve mostly been revising. I got a reply back from Gordon Van Gelder about my rewrite of “Titanium Mike,” and he liked the new fifth scene I’d written in which I put Mike on stage. So I revised the story one last time, to integrate the new scene and punch up the ending, and sent it in. I think this is the final version.

I also finished revising the Jupiter story — now titled “The True Story of Merganther’s Run” because “Merganther’s Drive” suggested a stardrive to some readers — and put it in the mail to Analog. (Okay, technically it’s still sitting on the sofa. But it’s in the envelope and will go in the mail first thing tomorrow morning.) It took me almost two full weeks to revise it, because I spent only half an hour or so per evening on it. I think I needed a break after completing my novella.

Speaking of the novella, I got it critiqued yesterday. The crit stung quite a bit, because I was pretty emotionally involved with the story and the comments, harsh though some of them were, were generally on target. But one critter pointed out that it wouldn’t have gotten such intense crits if it hadn’t touched a nerve in the readers. This story has considerable potential if I can just smooth out the rough bits. Also, it does seem to be the right length for the material, and I’ve identified four pro and five semi-pro markets that will take stories of this length. I’m going to take a little time away from it before attempting to revise it.

Also this weekend I had coffee with Jay Lake, visited the Portland Farmers’ Market (where we acquired lovely tomatoes and basil for a tomato-bread salad, plus a small container of ladybugs for the garden), and attended a bit of Wordstock, Portland’s annual “festival of the book.” We only went to one reading and barely bought anything at the book fair, but it was still nice to be in a space with thousands of people all of whom cared about words.

What next? First, I’m going to revise at least one of my older stories and either get it critiqued or put it right in the mail. Then I’m going to start in on a new story. It will be a fantasy, it will be set in the present or the past, and it will be short.

Spent the last two writing days revising “Titanium Mike” according to comments received from Gordon Van Gelder (he’s already paid for it, but he had some line edits and suggestions), including writing a complete new scene at the end in which the legendary Titanium Mike actually appears on stage. But then, at the last minute, I pulled the scene out again because it changed the whole flavor of the story to have Mike be a character. I included the scene in my cover letter so that Gordon can tell me if it’s a better ending, because I am a waffler nonpareil.

Also, tonight I was interviewed by a high-school student (child of a friend) for a science fiction class he’s taking. All kinds of questions about “what’s the first book you remember reading” and “what was the most memorable thing that happened while you were trying to sell a story.” I feel so professional.

At work I have been learning Photoshop. Now I find myself looking at book covers and seeing the masks and layers that might have been used to produce them.

I’ve been meaning to mention what we’ve been having for dinner, because we’ve been cooking and eating very well lately. Käseschnitzel with gnocchi and red cabbage; sloppy joes (entirely improvised, and they turned out great); tandoori chicken with Gujerati cabbage. I like cooking with Kate, and the new kitchen is still wonderful over a year later. She also fixed me chocolate pudding, in a shallow dish so it would have plenty of the yummy skin on top, but, alas, it failed to set properly. Will have to try again soon.

Very tired. To bed now. Tomorrow: revisions on the Jupiter story.

Word count: 20919 | Since last entry: -52

A relaxed but fairly productive weekend. Got a bunch of mundane chores done, watched Neverwhere, looked over the galley proofs of “Primates” for Asimov’s, and did a quick editing pass over the novella and sent it to my critique group. I didn’t make a lot of changes (other than changing several names); I’m still very very close to it. Which is why we do critique. Amazingly, despite the thing’s length I have a long list of additional stuff I wanted to get in but couldn’t find a place to do it. Maybe this thing does want to be a novel.

Also, I just got word that UK webzine Infinity Plus has accepted “I Hold My Father’s Paws”, and it should be available online in about June. If you can’t wait until then or you’d rather have it on paper, you can order a copy of Issue 31 of Albedo One.

Word count: 20971 | Since last entry: 573

First draft’s done. (Throws confetti.) Almost twenty-one thousand words — that’s three or four normal short stories. The next one will be shorter, I swear.

A snippet:

“Peri and I leaned on each other, watching her go. ‘We’d better haul in that parasail before it blows away,’ Peri said to me after a while. ‘Start setting it up as a tent.’ Her arm was warm across my shoulders. I’d forgotten how much taller she was than me.

“‘In a minute,’ I said. ‘I’m enjoying the view.’

“We stood side by side, watching the sun rise over our new home.”

The panel tonight at the Mt. Hood Community College library with Jay Lake, M.K. Hobson, Ken Scholes, Doug Lain, Josh English, David Goldman, and Damian Kilby went off well. We were very nearly outnumbered by the audience, who listened attentively and asked perceptive questions despite being mostly non-genre readers. I did too much of the talking, as usual. If you’ve been following Jay’s LJ you’ve gotten a good taste of the kinds of things we talked about.

One of the questions was about the difference between writing novels and short stories. As it happens, I just wrote a couple of paragraphs on that very subject for the Clarion alumni newsletter, which I quoted, and I include them here in hopes you will find them worthwhile.

For me, writing short stories is like building intricate little puzzle boxes. I can put them together out of little scraps of whatever wood I happen to have lying around, and if a piece doesn’t fit I can take the time to file or carve or sand it until it’s right. It doesn’t require a detailed plan, just a general idea of what I want it to turn out like. And if it doesn’t work — if the chisel slips or the wood has an unexpected knot, or I think it’s fine but no one wants to buy it — I can sigh and set it aside and move on to the next.

Writing a novel is more like building a house. It takes months or years. You don’t have to have a detailed plan when you start, but if you don’t, you must be aware that you may find yourself having to rip out the foundation and re-do it before you can move in. Whether or not you have a plan, you’ll have to order large quantities of wood and nails and glue and paint — probably more than you will be able to use (but, with luck, you can use some of the leftover bits to make puzzle boxes). It’s so big that you can’t possibly get all the little fiddly bits perfect, so you shouldn’t even try, but there is plenty of cabinetry and finish work where you can show off your craftsmanship skills. But if it doesn’t work — and there are a million ways it can fail, many more than for a little puzzle box — you’ve wasted a year of your life and you’re stuck with this enormous eyesore that no one wants. Even if it does work, after you’ve moved in you’ll constantly be hitting your head on the doorway that’s too low or catching your clothing on a railing that needed more sanding. Either way, you’ll vow that either you’re never going to do this again or that you’ll get it right the next time. Maybe both.