So it’s been six days since I last posted. My apologies for that. What’s happened? Well, as per my last post, I went to see a doctor on Monday because I had flu symptoms. I’d been in a swine flu area and other people there had had H1N1, so I wanted to be sure I wouldn’t be contagious. The doctor checked me out and basically quarantined me for a week. This involved feeling sick, wearing a face mask, and staying indoors.
Normally this would have driven me nuts, but it proved to be something of a blessing. When I got back from San Jose I was deeply panicked about how I possibly was going to get through all of the editing I needed to do if I was going to make deadline. I have a book due November 27, another due December 5, and am late or near late on some others. So, panic.
I spent the week reading and getting things done. A long delayed book proposal is out with editors. (Yay!). I have a year’s best table of contents. The Locus Recommended Reading short fiction list is well progressed. I’ve also got some work done on some other book projects and its possible I might make it (whew!).
So, apart from a return to the day job what do I need to do by November 30? Let’s see. Write the introduction and story notes for The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of the Year: Volume 4. Write the introduction and notes for Legends of Australian Fantasy. Edit the stories and get the intro, notes etc done for my young adult SF anthology, Life on Mars. Do the copy-edits for Swords and Dark Magic. Follow up the introduction for The Best of Larry Niven. Complete the story invites for Eclipse Four. Get the manuscript together for The Best of Fritz Leiber, and do the running order for The Best of Kim Stanley Robinson. Enough to keep anyone busy!
Oh, and I will release the table of contents for The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of the Year: Volume 4 in a while. I need to arrange permissions and see if I can get the stories I want. It’s possible one or two stories may be problematic. However, once things are all legal I’ll post here.
Exciting!
Great to see you’re back, and that it’s business as (almost) usual. Hope this also means that the illness has receded to the point where your family has let you out of the cage.
I am, indeed, out of the cage. Back to the day job this morning, and on with life as normal in the run up to Xmas.