New York Times takes a look at role-playing games

The book section of the venerable New York Times takes a lot at the present-day literary influences of the 1980s RPG boom. Link >>>

Blog update schedule

For a few months I have maintained a steady schedule for the Dream Forge with new posts every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. That pace suits me under regular circumstances. However, it looks like August will be a hectic period for various reasons, so postings will be irregular for the next few weeks. I intend to be return to the normal schedule in September.

One Significant Step Forward

I self-published my dieselpunk adventure The Ice War as a PoD book in 2011 after having received a bundle of rejections from Swedish publishing houses. After all, alternate-history dieselpunk is not a well-known SF subgenre in tiny Sweden.

After the publication, readers and reviewers provided plenty of useful feedback and I learned what clichés and tropes ought to be avoided. So this spring I revised the story, putting a stronger emphasizes on action and adventure. After all, I am in the entertainment business and will always do my best to give the readers an exciting ride through blizzards and turmoil.

Today I got the English translation of the story. That felt like a major step forward to me as a writer, even though I immediately saw the need for polishing for it to meet my standards. When that has been done, I will self-publish the story as an e-book.

I arrived at that decision after some pondering in June: I am in my mid-fifties and I do not feel like spending the next few years receiving more rejection letters. I may have ten years or so ahead of me as a fiction writer and I want my stories to be read instead of “fermenting in the desk drawer”. The self-publishing revolution benefits authors like me, people who move ahead from one tale to the next and who enjoys getting tasks completed all the way to the end. Everyone who is familiar with me, knows that I am persistent and that I dislike getting stalled on the way to a goal.

Western IV på upploppet

Åskfågeln HB, dvs Tove & Anders Gillbring, crowdfundar nu den nya utgåvan av Western. Dessutom har de bett mig vara med på ett hörn. Kul, det är det fjärde spelprojektet på tolv månader som jag blir ombedd att delta i. Länk >>>

The whole story

Apollo 11, July 1969

Forty-five years ago this week. A great feat — pathfinders to an alien world.

Oriental Steampunk

Skywhale Dock by Mark Bulahao (click on the picture for a bigger version)

The Economics and Logistics of Space Flight

The Space Economy is a blog that discusses technological and industrial aspects of space exploration, such as how to manage secure food and water supplies. It is worth a visit — link >>>

Airborne Exploration of Venus

Well, planning for colonizing Venus seems pointless, because that planet is an inferno. Still, there are people who study how feasible it would be to built human-crewed balloon craft for exploring that planet. It appears that there is a “sweet layer” at a certain altitude. Also, the engineering issues seems to be solvable with current or near-future technology — link >>>

Jonathan Goff’s Venus colonization blogging takes a closer look at the notion — link >>>

Welcome to the dream worlds

By chance I recently heard of the late illustrator Peter Elson, when someone (thanks Alexander) directed me to a site with his works, mainly book covers. Top-notch craftsmanship — link >>>

To me, this dreamy landscape by Peter Elson depicts Leigh Brackett’s Mars with canals and cities older than Uruk. (Click on the picture to get a larger version.)

Atomretro Mars: Peter Elson’s depiction of a car chase on Mars in Robert A. Heinlein’s novel “Double Star”. If I remember correctly (it was years since I read that book), the car is a Rolls-Royce. (Click on the picture to get a larger version.)