Linguistics & Science Fiction Network Online Bulletin
**NOTE: This bulletin is mailed only to members of the L&SF Network, and only by request. If you receive a copy by mistake, please let me know and I'll take you off the list immediately, with my apologies.
Greetings! If the tornados are willing, this will reach you today; my fingers and toes are crossed. It will be brief this bimonth because I am up to my eyebrows here in multiple interacting deadlines and detritus. And although I can sometimes wangle an extra day or two from an editor or publisher (especially from those who think nothing of making me wait for months or years for *them* to do something), plants are different. You either do the garden things when it's time to do them or you have no gardens that year. So, in unseemly haste.....
1. First, a correction. The site that is alleged to provide translations not into languages but into dialects is at <www.rinkworks.com/dialect/> -- not "ringworks." My apologies for the error.
2. Next, four miscellaneous sf weblocalities that I want to call to your attention. At <www.wildsidepress.com> you'll find Kim and John Betancourt's site; it has many excellent links, especially small-press links, and is very well organized and easy to use. For those who are as fond of Real Musgrave's art as I am, there's the Pocket Dragon Web Ring; go to <http://earth.vol.com/~mirage/ring.htm.
For information and excerpts relating to the new QUANTUM SF project -- described as science fiction humor -- go to <www.quantumsf.com/>. And there's a sample chapter from Orson Scott Card's new novel "Enchantment," plus an interview with Card and a list of upcoming bookstore signings all around the country (*really* all around it!) at <www.randomhouse.com/delrey/ext/enchantment.html>.
3. I don't know what your experience with the Y2K thing has been so far; I do know that it's been hitting us since April 1st. Nothing truly serious so far, but numerous small annoyances like almost an entire day with no long distance service (thus no Internet), computers down at the post office, stores that can't tell us what they have in stock because their computer shows their inventory as *zero* ... that kind of thing.
I've been keeping tabs on the phenomenon online -- not only because we're about as rural as you can get, but also because of the connection to millenialism and millenial fiction, and because my current newsletter at <www.abbeville.com/grandmother> is about grandmothers and Y2K. While I was checking the Y2K nets and rings I stumbled over something useful even in ordinary non-Y2K times. It's called the "How-To Survival Library," and it's a marvel. It has complete diagrams and instructions for all kinds of construction projects -- solar water distiller, small chickenhouse, homebrew power generator, hobo stove, and more.
[I had George check a sample -- the hand water pump -- and he says it passes his quality control tests. He says the pump in question would be no use to us, our well being 186 feet down, but that the design is sound and the instructions appear to be accurate and adequate.] All kinds of information about preserving and storing food, about gardening, about emergency water purification, about medical emergency selfcare, about woodscraft.... (And it has good links to other Y2K sites as a bonus.) It's like having a whole shelf of "preparedness" books.
The quality varies a bit from entry to entry, which is to be expected from something that tries to provide information for everyone from the total beginner to the person capable of building an earth-sheltered house all by her/himself, but that makes it no less useful. You just have to browse the links until you find your own level of expertise. Very well constructed site; works fast; easy to use.
http://forums.cosmoaccess.net/forum/survival/prep/survival.htm
4. One of our members has stopped behaving like most of the rest of us -- that is, just talking -- and has set up a genuine project to help science fiction writers get around the current (and perhaps future) publishing bottleneck. He's up and running and has found an acceptable way to handle the printing end of the operation. But he's run into one of those penalties of success: He suddenly is ready to go with the books he's signed but has no cover art for them. Desperately Seeking Cover Art at <www.StoneDragonPress.com/Art-Style-Sheet.html>.
5. The next print issue of the newsletter will be the verbal self-defense issue. If you want anything specific included or addressed in that issue, now's the time to let me know.
6. And to close with -- good news! (1) I've signed the contracts with Feminist Press for reprint publication of "Native Tongue" and will in the course of time have a publication date to pass on to you. (The contract reads "within 24 months," which tells us it can't be much more than two years away.) (2) And -- to my absolute delight -- the University of Arkansas Press has agreed to do a reprint publication of my "Ozark Trilogy." I am so very pleased. When I have more details, I'll pass them along.
My best wishes to you one and all, and many thanks for all the help you've been giving me.... I'll see some of you at WisCon in late May, some at Conestoga in June, and some at the Feminist Rhetorics Conference in Minneapolis in October. (To which I go in a state of stark terror; when they invited me to do a plenary session they did *not* tell me there'd be hundreds of Intimidating-to-the-Max Big Names on the program; if I'd known that I would certainly not have had the courage to accept the invitation.)
If you need details, let me know (or check them at <www.sfwa.org/members/elgin>, where you'll find links to all three gatherings).
Suzette
BTW, if you want to register an url with search engines (such as registering a great url such as http://www.abbeville.com/grandmother) you can visit http://adrr.com/adr0/submit.htm and use the links. The registration page of that type is http://www.siteowner.com/ (which has a great link to a good free submission service). Remember, to be sure your favorite link has not been lost by a search engine, you should resubmit the links at least once a month.