Category: News

AI Portrait and Interview

Lex

I am punchy AF this afternoon, and in a fit of optimism I gave AI Portraits my most pre-Raphaelite hair photo, hoping I would turn out looking like Dante Gabriel Rosetti’s hand painted selfie or something and instead I think we have more of an Elisabeth Vigée Le Brun look. Or maybe Angry Rembrandt.

I love this picture, don’t get me wrong. And Angry Rembrandt would do nicely as a name for my imaginary Mighty Mighty Bosstones cover band.

Because we’re the lead-up to Gamechanger’s release (!!!) I am beginning to get some reviews and interviews. Here’s a profile from My Entertainment World. I’m not going to link you up to every review—that would be tedious—but my unhumble brag of the week would definitely be Kirkus saying:

A thought-provoking cautionary tale that will, hopefully, compel readers to see the condition of our civilization and our planet with more clarity and understanding.A visionary glimpse into the future—the narrative equivalent of a baseball bat to the skull.

Kirkus Reviews, 2019

I am pleased with this—if Gamechanger can be a clue-by-four or a wake-up call for anyone at all, that’s terrific. (It seems likely that most of the people who read it will share my feels about the planet and where we’re going as a society… but one can’t know, and one can always hope to do good.) The only thing that could have been better was if they’d said something like The narrative equivalent of a really really fun baseball bat to the head.

But hey- you can’t have it all, right?

(If you can have it all, I would like it delivered, and I will need at least two weeks to arrange storage.)

Awards Eligibility 2018

Lex

I spent 2018 beating up more manuscripts than ever before, and so as a result I have one publication to boast—my first novella, “Freezing Rain, a Chance of Falling,” which came out in the July/August issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. The story can be read by SFWA members by checking the links here. If you’re reading for the Hugo, and you want an electronic copy, drop me a note on Twitter, where I’m @lxbeckett or at the same name on Gmail.

“Freezing Rain, A Chance of Falling” is the story of Drow Whiting, who gets into horrific trouble when his social media accounts go into a nosedive, and who therefore makes some Very Bad Decisions. He also appears in my upcoming September novel, Gamechanger, which will be out in less than a year from Tor Books.

Dreams come true! I sold a novella to @ccfinlay at Magazine of F&SF – @FandSF

Lex

I am thrilled, so thrilled, to finally announce my first sale to C.C. Finlay at the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. “Freezing Rain, a Chance of Falling” is a novella set in what I sometimes like to call my Nice Things universe. It’s also a prequel, of sorts, to a Nice Things novel currently titled Goldilocks Conditions. (I’ll tell you a little more about that in the not too distant future.)

I have dreamed of selling a story to F&SF for as long as I can remember, which is a damned long time… the more so, because this particular novella had a long journey to the finish line. Charlie requested first an expansion and then an extended rewrite before we both agreed it was the best story it could possibly be. It is now slated to appear in the upcoming July/August issue of the magazine.

“Freezing Rain, a Chance of Falling” is about a talented young music journalist, Drow Whiting, who gambles all his social capital on what turns out to be a gloriously ill-judged expose. Idealistic, ambitious, and more naive than he cares to admit, Drow is ruined when he covers a diva musician’s plagiarism scam, and her reaction blows up into a full-bore online shame cascade. Soon Drow is a pariah, ready to do anything to recover his reputation, not to mention his career and his rock-bottom credit score. But desperation is like blood in the water, and Drow finds himself in bed with an elderly performance artist, an ancient GenX crone who’s offering to sponsor his investigation into a story everyone says he should leave alone, a first-person look into Toronto’s recreational chemotherapy dens.