My younger son and I brought books for Water Dragon Publishing and Small Publishing in a Big Universe (SPBU) to Readercon33. It was the first time we’ve tried to sell books at that convention. We did alright. Many of the other vendors said that sales were down from last year, which was a little strange as the number of attendees was higher.

I’ve now run — or helped run — a dealer table at a convention perhaps a dozen times. At most conventions, the dealer tables are much more diverse. Often, there are t-shirts, jewelry, gaming supplies, artwork, etc. But Readercon is almost exclusively book-focused. Since we’re also (almost) exclusively book-focused, it seemed like an opportune moment for reflection on our process: what we’re doing right and wrong. I thought I’d share my thoughts here.

As my first step, I decided to walk around and photograph all of the other dealer tables in the bookstore to reflect on differences between what we’re doing and what other groups are doing to gauge effectiveness and assess what we’re doing right and what we could improve.

It’s hard to make too many generalizations because a lot of decisions are site- and con-specific. In this case, our tables began second along the main aisle people took into the bookstore. The tables made an L with two tables along the main aisle and one at 90 degrees forming an aisle to right. Since people were entering and walking along the main aisle — and couldn’t see our banners at a distance — I put some signage at the end of the table that people would be facing as they came in the door. And, where there was a gap where tables abutted at the corner, I had a small aluminum table I could fit in the gap that gave us some extra space.

I also made some site-specific decisions about organizing books. In general, I put a book in front on a bookstand, a second book behind on a stack of books, and a third book on a taller stack of books at the back. I put the books by attending authors in the front along the section people came to first. I put the rack with the “Dragon Gems” short fiction books in the corner, and I put the anthologies just around the corner in a group. Finally, I tried to put authors with multiple books in a row so you could see book one, book two, and book three in a series in a row. I kept a two-book wide space open in the back for a spot where authors could sign books. And placed giveaway items (cards, ribbons, stickers, etc) in the front. Each book has a colored price tag tucked in between the pages sticking up where it’s easily viewed.

A few observations…

It makes a huge difference for an author to be there. There’s almost no point in having books available from authors who aren’t at the con. And certainly it doesn’t make sense to feature their books. Speaking of which…

I think we may have too many books on display. People seemed to be daunted by the sheer number of titles: we had around 50 Water Dragon titles (spread over 2.5 tables) and more than 20 SPBU titles on one table. It was a cacophany of different authors and genres. People couldn’t decide what to focus on. And, looking at other booksellers that have shelves, we didn’t get many people that would stay to browse, perhaps because people felt self-conscious with us just standing there. Having bookshelves might really help so people can more comfortably browse. I also wonder if we might do better having more books simply spread out on the table and fewer books on bookstands: so the books on bookstands stand out more. Currently, people seem overwhelmed. I think we’d do much better to feature a handful of books: the books by authors at the con and a handful of the newest books. But the others should be much less prominently displayed: people should be able to browse them, but they shouldn’t be set up in parallel with the books we’re featuring. Ideally, they should be in bookshelves. But see below…

We’re limited by the scale of our operation. It would be great to have bookshelves, but we need everything to fit in a volunteer’s car: we don’t have a package truck to move rolling bookshelves like the other book stores. Similarly with respect to signage: it would be great to have some kind of lighted overhead sign, but with only one or two people setting up — and needing to fit everything in a regular passenger vehicle, there are limitations.

Signage: We have banners hanging from the tables. Behind the table, we have a tall standing banner and I bring the covers of two of my books printed on foam board that stand up on easels. Other places have table-top signs, computer displays, or overhead frames with lighting and signs. I think our signage is pretty good — I saw someone taking a picture of my book covers and the standing banner, which made me feel pretty good. Our banners are 8 feet long which is too long when the table is only six feet. It might be worth getting 6 foot banners which will fit better on a 6-foot table, but still look OK on an 8-foot table.

Some of the vendors use QR codes extensively. If we had signage with QR codes, it might be helpful to make it easier for people to visit our websites. At first, I put QR codes on my book covers with the links for Kindle, Barnes & Noble, and the publisher. One guy used them. But with the book covers farther back, behind the table, it didn’t seem worth it. But maybe its worth putting up more QR codes.

I almost didn’t see anyone else using visible price tags on books. I have some inkscape files with price tags at the edges of paper. I print them on colorful card stock, cut them up, and stick them in between the pages of our books. A few groups that had books laying flat on the table (like the Clarkesworld table) had some price tags laying on the covers. I remember at Rhode Island Comic Con, having price tags was really important as everyone kept asking how much stuff cost. I keep meaning to make sure I get enough of each price printed (every time I end up having to write a bunch by hand which is not difficult, but annoying). Just having different colors is good, as it adds visual interest.It would also be good to have a consistent color scheme so that the different colors of tags “mean” something. If we used colors consistently and had a key (e.g. blue for fantasy, orange for scifi, pink for romance, etc). Still, it would be hard to pigeonhole the books since it might also be nice to mark which are LGBTQIA+ and what do you do about “romantasy” and other cross-genre books?

Some groups have various giveways or raffles where people can sign up. This would be a really good idea to get people onto our mailing list. One table had a kind of gumball machine that had little plastic containers with prices — maybe on slips of paper? At Boskone, MIT press had people fill out slips of paper for a chance to win a boxed edition of a beautiful, colorful edition of a D&D book. We need something like that. Alternatively, a tablet computer where people could enter their email address directly might be good. But that might need power.

Depending on how one could set up the bookstore, it might be fun to have some seating. People might look at books longer if they had a place to sit down while browsing. That couldn’t work in some setups, but it might sometimes be possible.

Sometimes, we’ve had some kind of display on the tables. Lisa had a treasure chest once. And Jay Hartlove had a mermaid mannequin for his Mermaid Steel books. I’m not sure it always makes sense, but something that adds visual interest is always worth considering.

The most important part of running a book table is having effective pitches for the books. As people walk by the table, I usually ask people either “Would you like to be an airship pirate?” or “May I tell you about my books?” People are usually amenable to letting me make a pitch. It only works about 10% of the time. But nearly all of the sales I make are directly the result of me making a pitch. If you don’t have some kind of pitch there’s no way for someone to pick your book out from all of the others. I would pitch all of the books except most of the authors haven’t provided a pitch for me to use for their books.

Almost everyone has now heard of CRISPR — the miraculous new technique for editing DNA. But few people are aware of where it came from. It’s a story that everyone should know, because it speaks to the importance of basic research.

Before I tell the story, you should be aware that the United States basically doesn’t fund basic research anymore. Only about 10% of grants are funded, so scientists waste 90% of their time writing proposal after proposal hoping to get funded. In order to get funded, most scientists are forced to twist their research interests into some kind of applied-science pretzel to make it seem like their research is about some hideous disease that affects orphans in order to get funding.

So, CRISPR… there was this guy in Spain who got little trickles of funding now and again to study a weird bacterium that lives in salt marshes. In studying this bacterium, he eventually got it sequenced and discovered it had these weird sequences that didn’t make sense. He showed them to people and nobody could explain what they were doing there. Eventually, he discovered that the bacteria could snip out sequences from viruses and include them in its own DNA as a kind of primitive immune system to recognize if it had seen a virus before. But it was this ability to copy-and-paste these sequences of DNA that led directly to the development of CRISPR.

Nobody could ever have predicted that funding a guy to tromp around in waders in a salt marsh would lead to the most transformative genetic engineering technique thus far discovered. That’s the magic of basic research. But you can say goodbye to these kinds of discoveries because, as I say, the US basically doesn’t fund basic research anymore.

It’s been sad to watch BayCon happening and to not be there. Last year, I traveled to BayCon and got to meet my publisher and a bunch of the other authors with Water Dragon Publishing. This year, I decided I couldn’t attend because they no longer required masking.

Due to my health conditions I need to cautious of respiratory infections. Up to now, I’ve only attended conventions where masking was required. (Except for Rhode Island Comic Con early in the pandemic, where I ended up getting the respiratory infection that put me in the hospital.) Unfortunately, ReaderCon, which I’m attending next week, may be the last convention where full masking is required. I decided to attend WorldCon in Glasgow in August before their COVID policy had been established, but they adopted a policy of “masking recommended”) and I suspect that is going to be the trend going forward — until we have the H5N1 pandemic or something.

So I didn’t go to BayCon this year. And now I’m watching my fellow authors attend and feeling sad that I’m missing out.

Partly, I’m just remembering the wonderful trip that my son and I took to drive all across the country. That was amazing! We saw so many wonderful things and visited a lot of people along the way.

I do have WorldCon coming up in just a month. That’s going to be exciting, although I’m not really looking forward to the trans-Atlantic flight. And all of the rigamarole of crossing an international border. I still remember the misery of going through the hideous check point at Heathrow. It was in a gymnasium-sized room with a line that snaked back and forth 8 or 10 times until it reached a line of booths. We spent at least an hour shuffling back and forth across the room until we finally got to the booths. It was horrible.

I learned a long time ago that I have a lot of inertia. When I haven’t traveled for a while, I don’t want to go. I’m comfortable not going anywhere. But, once I start traveling, I’m happy traveling and then I don’t want to stop. So I know that once I start going, I’ll have fun.

That said, it’s hard watching everyone enjoying themselves at BayCon and not be able to be there.

Oh, well. There’s always next year.

Last winter, during Intersession, I was inspired to write a short story. It was accepted for publication in Romancing the Rainbow, an anthology by Enrapturing Tales. I wrote a little author’s note to describe it.

This weird little story weaves together a bunch of imagery that has played out in my imagination for many years.

The setting is an island, strongly influenced by my many visits to a Caribbean island. The time is vaguely in the future, after an apocalyptic war that has left the remaining humanity sheltering in arcologies due to persistent bioweapon spores.

And the characters are artificially constructed organisms: one is the embodiment of an elite weapon that used to be treated with great respect and privilege. She is now viewed, not unreasonably perhaps, with distrust and suspicion. The other was constructed to serve people—but now all of the people she used to serve are gone.

Thrown together by circumstance, these two very different characters must try to understand each other—and themselves.

Author’s Note: Always a Destroyer

The book is a fundraiser in honor of an editor, LJ Hachmeister, who passed away recently. She had just organized an anthology fundraiser for a good cause, but didn’t live long enough to see the fruition of her work. I submitted my sotyr knowing that at least half of the proceeds would go to her family. I donated all of my share of the royalties, as did several others, so more than 80% of the proceeds will go to the cause. I hope folks will buy the work to support her family in their grief. And I hope they enjoy my weird little story. I think it’s one of my better pieces of short fiction.

When my brother Philip attends a party he invariably comments, “Am I not the socialest of all possible butterflies?” This week, I felt like a socialist butterfly my own self.

When my wife was involved in local politics (chiefly 2002-2022), she loved attending social events. It was an important part of why she was so effective. I occasionally got to attend as arm candy, though it’s not really my thing. I joke that when we first arrived, she was my wife. But after she became one of the most well-known people in town, I became her husband. It’s nice to attend events with her because she knows everyone and can remind me who is who. I’m terrible with faces and names.

For Pride, I went to a flag raising at Town Hall. It was fun to see all my queer friends. After the flag raising there was a presentation by Justice Roderick Ireland, one of judges that decided the constitutional question that enabled same-sex marriage in Massachusetts 20 years ago, followed by a panel discussion. Unfortunately, the event was indoors, so I was unable to attend. But my friends who were there said it was very moving.

Next, we attended a giant party that was a fundraiser for the Family Outreach of Amherst. They run two events annually, Warm Up the Night in the fall and Light Up the Night in the spring. They’re huge events that have a number of vendors that bring samples of beverages and foods and attract hundreds of people to eat, drink, mingle, and chat. We saws dozens of people, including the UMassAmherst Chancellor whom I have been in meetings with dozens of times, but had not been able to meet face-to-face (since I can’t attend indoor meetings).

My union held a get together for a co-president who’s stepping back after many years of service. It was a smaller event, but still with a lot of people and social interaction.

Finally, the Amherst town council president holds a “garden party” at her home every year that, also, attracts many of the politically active people from the town and University. Once again the Chancellor was there, so I got to hang out with him for the second time in a week. Our state rep was there. And our former state senator. After the long isolation during the height of the pandemic it was nice to catch up and reconnect with people we haven’t seen in a year or more.

My wife had even more events, but that was enough for me for a while. Now I’m ready to stay home and get back to my writing.

Since 2002, I have been teaching the course Writing in Biology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Every major is obligated to offer a course of writing in their discipline for juniors. Different instructors are offered broad latitude to teach the course as they want. But my focus has always been on scientific writing.

Most students come into the course having recently taken a creative writing class, the Writing Program’s College Writing course. Most of them believe the they already know how to write well and are skeptical that my course is going to teach them anything. Frequently they’re surprised. I describe my course as “Uncreative Writing.”

By their junior year in college, most students have written a vast number of review papers. And I’ve found that if students have sources to draw from, they can write amazingly well — especially with the spell-check and grammar-check that modern word processors offer (provided they use them which, sadly, not all students do.) But in my course, I invite them to do projects where they have to describe their own actions scientifically. And, all of a sudden, they don’t have models for the language they need to write. When that happens, you hear *their* voice. And it’s not scientific at all. That’s what I want them to work on.

I found an excellent resource many years ago that I use to help support them learning the characteristics of scientific discourse. Talking Science, by Jay Lemke, is actually a study of the semiotics of science classrooms. On page 133 is a list of stylistic norms of scientific language: Be verbally explicit and universal. Avoid colloquial forms of language. Use technical terms. Avoid personification. Avoid metaphorical and figurative language. Be serious and dignified. Avoid personalities and references to individuals. Avoid reference to fiction or fantasy. Use causal forms of explanation and avoid narrative and dramatic accounts.” Lemke comments this is a recipe for “dull, alienating language”. In fact, the chapter of the book is actually about constructing educational environments that could demystify science and reduce dependance these norms. But I provide them to my students as a set of heuristics, or hacks, to help their writing pass muster with other scientists.

By the end of the course, many students tell me how surprised they are to have learned so much. And, after the course, I’ve had students tell me in subsequent years how what they learned has helped them get better grades and prepare them for work in science. One student told me he had a “love/hate relationship” with my class: he hated it because it made him do something difficult that he could tell he wasn’t good at, but — at the same time — he recognized the importance of improving his abilities.

I will get to teach this class four more times before I retire and wrap up my career.

My father passed away last year, just short of 90 years old. He had been suffering from dementia for several years and he could no longer recognize me or remember who I was. But, even before then, we were not close. He maintained contact with me out of a kind of weird sense of obligation. When we spoke, there was an implicit understanding that I would tell him things about his grandchildren — not because he was genuinely interested in them, but because he needed to know things about them to fend off his wife who believed he should take an interest in them. At least, that was how it felt to me.

My father did not like me as a child or, especially, as a young adult. He was always clever with a quip or turn of phrase, often at the expense of other people. As a child, when he turned this form of “humor” on me, I felt compelled to do the same to him. But where he could be clever, I was merely offensive and he was often furious with me for being obnoxious and rude. Once he angrily told me to get out of the car on the side of the road miles from anywhere, driving a short distance ahead, and then stopping and angrily telling me to get back in the car.

He lamented that I was lazy and fat and a poor student. He made it clear that I did not measure up. As a teenager, I became withdrawn and antisocial. When I started smoking, he was livid and told my mother he was writing me off. My mother said she would be glad to take me. My relationship with my mother was probably what saved me: she always loved both her children unconditionally and without qualification.

As a child, I craved approval and wanted to be closer to my father, but he only accepted interaction on his terms. He was never interested in learning about or doing any of the things I wanted to do. But there were places where our interests aligned. He spent a lot of time in the field as a biologist. And, as I expressed an interest in herpetology, I could go with him into the field and — while he looked for birds — I would scour the ground for reptiles and amphibians.

When I finished my PhD and was hired for a faculty position at a prestigious university, I remember he took me aside and grudgingly admitted that I had turned out OK. I think that was the first time I ever felt like he had given me any real measure of approval.

He was pleased when I had children. As a biologist, he was very interested in the idea of children carrying forward his genes. He wasn’t actually interested in the children themselves, however. He didn’t really like children and wasn’t interested in getting to know them as people. He had always seen his own children as objects and his grandchildren were objects too. I tried to get him to spend time with his grandchildren and invited him to take them on outings. But he never did. He would say, “Well, if you need me to watch them sometime, I guess I could do that.” And I would reply, “We don’t ever need you to ‘watch’ them — but if you’d like to spend time with them or take them somewhere, that would be great.” But, as I say, he never did.

It was a surprise to me that, when my father died, many of his former colleagues and students remembered him at his funeral as an extremely attentive and devoted friend and mentor. It sounded like he maintained a network of close collegial relationships where he checked in with a vast number of people on a daily or weekly basis. It was a side of him I never would have predicted based on my own personal experiences.

So, on Father’s Day, I reflect on my “relationship” with my father. I intentionally strove to be a different kind of father. I tried to see my children as people from an early age and to not try to live my life through them. I tried to take an interest in things they liked to do and to find ways to relate to them through their interests. But I know also that I’m not a perfect father either. And so I’ve tried grant my father a certain amount of understanding by acknowledging that he was doing the best he could with what he had in terms of his native personality and the experiences he had growing up.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad.

At the 2024 Nebulas convention, I attended of the very last sessions, Planning Your Own Publicity Campaign presented by KC Grifant, Jaye Viner, Eva Elasigue, and Robyn Dabney. It was a great presentation but, as I said in my earlier post about the Nebulas, I didn’t feel like there was a whole lot here that was new to me. It was still nice to know that I wasn’t missing anything obvious. Since I took relatively detailed notes, I thought I’d summarize them here.

The first question for the panel related to the timeline for planning a publicity campaign. Aim to start at least a year out: establish an online presence for yourself: set up a website, start a newsletter, identify people to help and support your campaign, and make a plan. Three to six months out, you should start trying to schedule in-person events (readings, book signings, etc.) You can find a lot of resources on the internet about running a book launch and you should educate yourself. And make sure to have fun.

Another question asked what can you expect your publisher to do. The short answer, of course, is doodlysquat. In the past, trad-pub’ed authors could expect a publisher to mount a publicity campaign for you, but that’s pretty rare now. Small presses mostly don’t have the resources to do very much. They might contact some of the higher-tier trade reviews and provide ARCs, but you mostly have to do the rest. Reviews are critical. The panels suggested reaching out to book bloggers, bookstagrammers, and booktokkers and the like: familiarize yourself with their work to make sure they review stuff like yours, politely send a message with an ARC, and don’t follow-up or expect a response.

Several people talked about planning joint events with other authors, which can increase the draw for readings and signings.

Most panelists agreed that your local indy bookstore is, after your publisher, the most important relationship to foster. They are generally supportive of genre fiction and can help you organize a launch event. Local libraries can also be effective partners.

The moderator asked how people spent money in support of their campaign. Few panelists found advertising to be very effective. It’s an artform and requires a lot of expertise to pull it off effectively. This is consistent with my experience as well. One mentioned boosting some posts at Facebook for $15. But swag was a popular thing to spend some money on: stickers, bookmarks, and other promotional materials. And events: conferences, conventions and, in particular, local comicons, which would often have an “authors alley” where you sell books and meet with fans.

One potential way to spend money is to hire publicist. Nobody on the panel had worked with one. One suggested that they tended to be outrageously expensive (e.g. a $10k monthly minimum).

They mentioned some expenses that didn’t really sound like “publicity” to me. One mentioned the importance to a cover when selling on the internet and not cheap out. Also it might be worth paying for a developmental editor to help sharpen your story. Or line editing. These are definitely important, but seem like they should be part of the publishing process. But perhaps important to remember for self-publishers.

They finally offered a few closing thoughts: Don’t try to do everything. Go for it, but remember to be happy with your book. And, finally, always be writing the next thing.

campus during the summer

For the first time, in many, many years, I’m actually free this summer.

When I began my career at the University, I was hired on a 12-month appointment to direct the Biology Computer Resource Center (BCRC). After the first year, the chairman — with some help from the dean — rewrote my job classification to put me on a 9-month appointment so that I would be able to apply for grants to supplement my salary during the summer. But, with the understanding, that I would not “vanish” during the summer and would be available to provide support to students and faculty that needed it.

In point of fact, the summer was indispensable for running the BCRC because it was then that I could update software, replace hardware, and build the server infrastructure that made running the facility possible. It was the only period when I had the uninterrupted blocks of time needed to really accomplish significant projects. And I did: setting up instructional materials and resources, engaging in curriculum design, and writing papers.

Perhaps eight years ago, I proposed to develop an online version of the writing class I teach to be taught during the summer. Most summer classes are taught only over a 6-week period. I tried the class that way but found it unsatisfactory: students can’t write enough in 6 weeks to get a full-semester’s worth of writing experience. So I taught the course over the full 13-week period spanning both summer sessions. And that worked pretty well. It was a pretty light load spread out that way, but it was still an obligation.

When the Biology Department closed the BCRC and rewrote my job description during the pandemic, I no longer had the obligation to spend my summers working on infrastructure, but I continued to teach the writing class. This year, however, I decided to stop. Mostly, I just wanted to have the time to write, but the fact that I would have had to migrate all of the teaching materials to a different LMS played no small role in my decision as well. I notified the Department back in October I wouldn’t be teaching it, so they could find someone else, if they wanted to. But nobody stepped up.

But, for the first time in nearly 30 years, I’m free of obligations during the summer. I can’t say I don’t like it, because it’s glorious. It’s not like I’m not “working” in that I’ve already written tens of thousands of words of fiction. But it’s great to be able to focus without distractions — and to let serendipity guide how I spend each day.

I’m looking forward to retirement.

For the second year, I proposed myself as a participant for the Nebulas Science Fiction/Fantasy Writers Association (SFWA) convention, but wasn’t selected. I was on the fence about attending and agonized for several days but, at the last minute, decided to register for the online track. I’m glad I did.

In point of fact, I don’t feel like I learned all that much. I attended panels about novellas and novelettes, short fiction, genres, making a collection, religion, microfiction, LGBTQIA+ characters, and book promotion. The panels were fine, but I’ve been involved in publishing and marketing my own books now for long enough that these topics are mostly familiar. Even if I didn’t learn much new, that’s useful too: determining that there isn’t something obvious that I’ve been missing.

I spent a fair amount of time networking with people via Zoom. I met a bunch of new people and reconnected with a number of people I’d met before. Being unable to socialize much due to my health circumstances, I really value the opportunity to meet with people remotely.

One person I saw was someone I had clashed with in a different, text-based, online environment. I was somewhat concerned that it would be awkward but, as has typically happened with me, when you’re dealing with people face-to-face, someone that’s happy to flame and deride you in text, will instead be nice as pie. I like to think I’m pretty much the same person regardless of context and circumstances, so I’m always surprised when other people who will slam you in writing, will turn out to be perfectly nice to your face. Weird.

I would have liked to stay up the award ceremony, especially to hang out in the Zoom session to chat with people while it was going on. But the event, running on Pacific Time, didn’t start until 11pm and I just couldn’t make myself stay up that late. So went to bed early.