Monday, May 12, 2014

Random Tech Bits

Here is an interesting interview with Nolan Bushnell, who was the founder of Atari along with Chuck E. Cheese restaurants (and many other ventures). The history he shares is fascinating. He also shares several anectdotes and tips.

In the video there is also a mention of the STEAM carnival, which will be coming to Los Angeles on October 25-26 of 2014. It is a carnival that focuses on Science (S), Technology (T), Engineering (E), Art (A), and Math (M). It also will hit the road (via train no less) sometime in the future. More details on their site.

In space news, researchers are proposing plans to test a small greenhouse on Mars. The greenhouse could arrive with the next planetary rover in order to test how plants grow in such an environment.

Finally, here is some recent stormchasing footage I found from Louisville. I can't imagine getting much closer than this.

Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Series Update

At the risk of turning into a blog that publishes nothing but book updates, here's one more update. I'll start posting more regular content soon, but I've been slowed down as of late by trying to write and teach an all-original Bible study on world religions with little advance notice. Some of the material will actually help out with the next book in line, Race the Sky, but more on that later.

As far as the Chronopticus series and specifically Book III, I am about a quarter of the way through the rough draft but should have the initial version done before the end of the month. If you factor in editing, vacation, and a few other things, that means I will likely have the book done by early August. This book will be the longest of the three (Fractal Standard Time and Ionotatron being the first two books). I'd like to post an opening chapter at some point, either in written or audio form, but with most novels I write the opening chapter is one of the last things to get finished since virtually everything in the story depends on it working "just right".

This book will also be the close of the trilogy, and will tie together several themes that have been developed across the prior two books. As much as I try to make this a stand-alone novel that still belongs to a series, there is a pretty important cliffhanger at the end of Ionotatron that, if read first, will make this third book a lot more meaningful. Essentially, the big theme here will be someone seizing control of a system so powerful that it can see into the past and use that information to predict the future. It's that ability that one character takes to its fullest extent...with tragic yet uplifting consequences.

In the meantime, I will be moving epub versions of the first two books out to Barnes and Noble and iTunes over the coming weeks. Also, the paperback versions are starting to arrive on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I will also start adding some of the paperback versions of my older books to those same sites over the coming weeks. The paperbacks have always been available on Lulu, if you are interested.