I got a call last night from Tim Mullins, the creative vision behind the semi-prozine The Dream Engine, saying that not only will he be using "One Big Crunch" for his "Horror" issue in Spring of 2003 (to be illustrated by Jamie Bishop), but that he's also going to publish "Shiny Diner Blues" in the Winter "Adventure" issue. It's a small magazine, and will only pay in contributor copies, but you have to start somewhere. Yay! If anyone out there will want a copy of either or both issues, let me know so that I can tell Tim how many copies to send me when they're finished.

In some upsetting news, I found out this morning that my domain name (jasonlundberg.com) has been snatched up by someone in Australia. I've emailed them to inform them of my problems, that the name expired and no one told me, and hopefully we'll be able to work something out so that I can get it back. Otherwise, I'm going to have to get a new domain name, either jasonlundberg.net, or jelundberg.com, or jasoneriklundberg.com, though that last is lot to have to type in. Damn stupid domain name people. Grr...

Going to see The Two Towers tomorrow afternoon and am quite excited. Unlike many folks out there, I haven't read The Lord of the Rings, and in fact am probably one of the only speculative fiction writers out there who has not read it. Actually, I did read the prologue for The Fellowship of the Ring when I was around twelve years old and visting my godmother in Georgia, and after getting so bogged down in the prose and the density of the description and the fact that we hadn't even gotten to the story yet, I put it down and have never picked it up again.

In fact, Janet and I were having a discussion about this last week, that your attitude toward a book changes depending on your age. Kids can read LoTR at 8 years old and absolutely get into it, not caring about the prose style because they want the story. But then, after just a few years, what was fun and exciting takes more work. Twelve is the age where many kids who will grow up to read SF and Fantasy find that one book that pushes them in that direction, that opens their minds to how wonderful speculative fiction can be. Gene Wolfe calls this the Golden Book.

Mine was Prelude to Foundation by Isaac Asimov. Yeah, I'd read the Narnia books and Bridge to Terabithia, but nothing got me really excited until I read Asimov. I was actually ahead of the curve, picking up the book when I was ten. And ultimately because of Asimov, I wanted to become a writer myself. So thanks, Isaac, wherever you are now.

Now Reading:
The Alchemist's Door by Lisa Goldstein

Stories Out to Publishers:
10