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You may or may not be aware that I’ve updated the site to the new Squarespace version 6 in order to take advantage of all the new features they’ve added. Unfortunately, as a result, subscriptions to the old feeds at the Squarespace V5 version of the site no longer work. This will be the last post you receive on this feed.

The new site design can be found at http://www.fictionimprobable.com just like always. 

Thank you!

The Great Standing Desk Project

Who knew a desk could hold so much crap?

For a few months now I’ve been considering how to go about making my desk a standing desk. Mostly my thoughts revolved around raising my displays, mouse and keyboard, but that always seemed precarious and inconvenient. Finally I took a look at how the desk was built (it has been a while) and realized that the legs are extendable. A quick trip to Ikea’s website to look up my desk’s legs confirmed that they will rise to exactly the level I’d need.

So for the last few weeks I’ve been trying to get prepared to make the change. I’ve found though, and I repeat, damn, a desk can hold a whole lot of stuff.

Wish me luck on this, I hope to have the legs extended in the next few days. Then the period of great adjustment kicks in as I find myself unable to sit and work anymore.

Across Interstellar Spaces

One of the benefits of writing science fiction, as with all speculative fiction, is the freedom you have to break rules of convention that would confine you, if you were writing of the real world. One of the drawbacks is that there are some rules that can only be broken after they’ve been thoroughly throught through. And there are some rules you just have to adhere to.

In The Ship of the Unforgotten, I decided early on that 500 years of travel time for the Rose Dawn was a rough estimate at best, and that I’d likely have to rewrite that piece after doing some research on how long interstellar flights would actually take using a variety of propulsion systems. In light of how the story has gone so far, I’m thinking 500 years might be too short, but I don’t want to get it up too much longer. If I do, it’ll risk a collision with the time frame of the farther-future sci-fi stories I’ve written (and am working on.) This is intended as a sort of prelude or to them.

The other stories:

• Deck the Hulls
• An Improbable Journey
• Untitled Captain Koell Story (Work in Progress)

The nice thing is that while there is a risk of timeline collision, there is a lot of play, as by the time those other stories take place, Earth has long since been lost and become depopulated.

So now I suppose I need to figure out just exactly where the UTS Rose Dawn and the UTS Eden River were headed, how long it would have taken each of them, and then I’ll be able to adjust bits of the story as need be.

Chain of Command

I’ve been thinking more about the rapidly-upcoming Camp NaNoWriMo August, and I’m not so sure I’m going to do the rewrite of The Quick and the Dead for it. The more I think about the story and plan it, the more I think it really is a short story and not a novel. So I need to go with a different idea for the coming month. Luckily at this point I almost literally have ideas pouring out my ears, so it’s just a matter of sifting through them and choosing one.

For today’s update, at last I reach the end of the chapter, and the pieces are all in place for the final confrontation. The question of who will go and who will stay is decided, and a niggling issue of the chain of command is dealt with.

The Ship of the Unforgotten, Chapter 32, Part 4

Crossing the Line

Cobb crosses the line and draws out the heroes in tonight’s short but tense update.

The Ship of the Unforgotten, Chapter 32, Part 3