A 1970’s artist depiction of a ringstation (from https://settlement.arc.nasa.gov/70sArt/art.html).
Becoming a published science fiction author was a jubilant moment for me, and I coasted on that high for a long time.
But of course everything that goes up must come down. I’ve found my mood and attitude regarding my nascent writing career to be significantly less jubilant now that I’ve struggled with the problem of how to sell more books.
I’m fascinated by how one aspect of an author’s writing process can influence others. Brian Pinkerton writes first drafts by hand, which is probably why he doesn’t do any revisions until his first draft is complete. He maps out his novels using note cards, which is something I’ve always wanted to do but I never seem to have enough table space.
Word Craft is a deep dive into writer’s methods and practices. Please welcome Brian Pinkerton, author of The Gemini Experiment!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR – BRIAN PINKERTON
Brian Pinkerton deep in plotting mode.
Tell us a little about yourself and what inspired you to become a writer.
I’ve always been fascinated by stories and storytelling. My earliest aspirations were to be a cartoonist and book writer. I wrote my first novel when I was very young. I enacted the entire plot with the Fisher Price Little People Village and then wrote it all down as quickly as I could remember it. I still have that manuscript somewhere. It was written on lined, three-hole-punch paper. The pages were tied together with string.
Keep your eyes on the watch…
During the most recent SFWA Nebulas Conference I had the opportunity to speak with author Lawrence Schoen about hypnosis. One of the conference events is something called “office hours” during which authors, publishers, and other conference attendees share their time and expertise in scheduled fifteen-minute one-on-one conversations. Lawrence was offering to share his knowledge in regards to hypnosis, and I signed up out of curiosity, and because I already knew and liked Lawrence from last year’s SFWA conference in Pittsburgh, where he was my conference mentor.
Going into the conversation I knew very little about hypnosis. I knew that therapeutic hypnosis could be used for a variety of applications, everything from smoking cessation to wart removal, and also that some susceptibility to hypnosis might be related to dopamine levels in the brain, regulated by activity of the COMT gene. Lawrence confirmed the former and strongly disagreed with the latter, a position which appears to be backed by fairly recent scientific research (susceptibility to hypnosis appears to be unrelated to dopamine levels and the ability to focus attention).
Yesterday I sent my editor Don D’Auria a very-close-to-final version of the manuscript of The Guardian, sequel to The Sky Woman and Book 2 of the Reclaimed Earth Series. I’ve been working on revisions for the past couple of weeks, and it’s been gratifying to re-immerse myself in the minds and lives of the characters (including Tem, the ten-year-old son of Car-En and Esper, and Umana, aka the Squid Woman, the novel’s archvillain).
Here’s the cover!
You can preorder the book here, or at your local bookstore (most Barnes and Noble locations carry the Flame Tree line). The novel (hopefully) stands on its own merits, regardless if you have read The Sky Woman, so you can jump in wherever.
Please feel free to share the word on social media!
In the year 2737, Earth is mostly depopulated in the wake of a massive supervolcano, but civilization and culture are preserved in vast orbiting ringstations.
Tem, the nine-year-old son of a ringstation anthropologist and a Happdal bow-hunter, wants nothing more than to become a blacksmith like his uncle Trond. But after a rough patch as the only brown-skinned child in the village, his mother Car-En decides that the family should spend some time on the Stanford ringstation.
Tem gets caught up in the battle against Umana, the tentacle-enhanced ‘Squid Woman’, while protecting a secret that could change the course of humanity and civilization.
The Guardian, the sequel to the The Sky Woman, is a story of colliding worlds and the contested repopulation of a wild Earth.
Over the last few days I’ve gone down a rabbit hole while researching the use of various amino acid supplements to modulate neurotransmitter levels, improve mood, and influence mental states in specific ways (increase concentration, motivation, reduce anxiety, etc.). One supplement that’s of particular interest to me is acetyl-l-carnitine (often abbreviated as ALCAR). I first became aware of ALCAR from this now-famous 2002 anti-aging animal study in which old mice regained their youth after being fed a combination of acetyl-l-carnitine and alpha-lipoic acid with their chow.
But there are possible risks to consuming supplemental acetyl-l-carnitine. Low blood levels of acetyl-l-carnitine are associated with negative outcomes, including depression (according to this recent Stanford study), so we want to make sure we get enough. Can we just eat more read meat (which contains substantial amounts of l-carnitine) or take supplemental ALCAR to bolster our blood levels? There’s always a catch. In this case it’s TMAO, a dangerous chemical that promotes hardening of the arteries. Various pathogenic gut bacteria convert dietary and supplemental l-carnitine to TMAO.
Well that’s a drag.
So are there ways to kill off these bad bacteria, or inhibit their metabolic processes so that l-carnitine can be absorbed into the bloodstream, and less TMAO is created?
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