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LICENCE EXPIRED is now available!

LICENCE EXPIRED is now available!

It’s here! It’s finally here! If you’re in Canada, you can now buy LICENCE EXPIRED: THE UNAUTHORIZED JAMES BOND. Why only in Canada? Well, copyright is a funny thing. This year, Ian Fleming’s Bond novels entered Canadian public domain, because in Canada, and until the Trans-Pacific Partnership is ratified, copyright is death-plus-fifty years. In the US and the UK, copyright is death-plus-seventy years, because those countries have powerful media empires with the money to pay very good lobbyists to convince…

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New story, “Permacultures,” available now

New story, “Permacultures,” available now

Today sees the release of Cautions, Dreams, and Curiosities, another anthology from the Tomorrow Project at Intel Labs. I was asked to write a story pertaining to the White House Grand Challenges, and I focused on food security. I watched a lot of TED talks (Netflix helpfully organizes the subject headings, and there have been a lot on the subject of farming, food security, food science, genetic modification, and so on) and a lot of documentaries like Food, Inc. and…

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About my next Tomorrow Project story, “Permacultures.”

About my next Tomorrow Project story, “Permacultures.”

This month, I finished work on a story called “Permacultures,” which I wrote for the Tomorrow Project. This one’s pretty special, because it was inspired by the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy Grand Challenges. Here’s an introduction I wrote (which may not make it into the final book): I focused on the food-security Grand Challenge because I know that the issues of food production, nutrition, and health are important to the Obama Administration, and the Obama family….

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Escape from LA: the rest of the story

Escape from LA: the rest of the story

Does anyone else remember The Rest of the Story, radio personality Paul Harvey’s daily syndicated segment? It started in 1976 as a collaboration between Harvey and his son, who wrote all the bits. They were a trifle over-wrought, but Harvey’s voice had a way of making them seem colloquial, like he was a neighbour relaying a bit of town lore over the back fence. I have vivid memories of listening raptly to each segment beside my mother in her white…

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vN is out, today.

vN is out, today.

How this day began Me: Your coffee mugs are self-replicating. Him: Sorry, I missed them. Me: (Blinking sleep out of my eyes, noting the surprising lack of pain in my knees, considering a skirt, suddenly realizing why I made that joke) Hey, doesn’t my book come out, today? Him: (smiling) Why yes, yes it does. So yes. vN: The First Machine Dynasty is out, today. It’s been available in some stores for a few days now, but that’s because they’re…

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The Reputation Society

The Reputation Society

I’m in another book this year, and it’s called The Reputation Society: How Online Opinions Are Reshaping the Offline World. I wrote a chapter in it based on what I’d learned from fan studies, what I’d learned in foresight studies, and my experiences as a science fiction writer. In fact, I wrote a little story for the book, in addition to the essay I included. Because the book is about reputation, I wrote about Japan, fallen women, and high school….

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Story: “The Education of Junior Number 12”

Story: “The Education of Junior Number 12”

I apologize for the lack of posts, lately. I’m wrapping up edits on vN, a process that’s been complicated by a 1.5-week-long battle with the flu, bronchitis, and an allergic reaction to meds. (Thankfully, I was well cared-for throughout all of it.) But to make up for it, I have a new story available (for free!) for you: The Education of Junior Number 12. Here’s a taste: It started with a meal. It usually did. From silent prison guards in…

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So, I have some books coming out.

So, I have some books coming out.

Damn, it feels good to type those words. My first novel, vN, will be published by Angry Robot Books in August, 2012. They summarize it far more concisely than I’ve ever been able to: vN introduces us to Amy. She’s been grown in a stable family environment, with her robot mother and human father. But alone of all her kind, her human-protecting failsafe has stopped working for some reason. Soon she’s on the run from the law, and worse –…

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“The Chair” is now publicly available

“The Chair” is now publicly available

A story of mine originally published in Nature is now available online, and you can read it here. The bathroom. The toilet whines: ketone and oestrogen levels of the day’s users, medical flowcharts of drugs and dosage, the most recent ex-wife’s ovulation schedule. The chair had liked the most recent ex-wife: so fixated on the politics of accessibility that she’d signed over unprecedented amounts of control, convinced that the illusion of autonomy could somehow compensate for the frailty of her…

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I've been Boinged!

I've been Boinged!

I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw what Cory Doctorow wrote about my story: This week’s Escape Pod podcast story is Madeline Ashby’s ?oyfriend, a marvellous, sweetly romantic science fiction story about teenagers who use clever artificial intelligences as “training wheels” on the way to their first real love, but who quickly find themselves substituting the warm companionship of their imaginary friends for the confusing and fraught people around them. It’s got Ashby’s sly humor, heart and it’s got…

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