Mar 21 2020

The new Decameron continues

Rosemary

I just read Max Gladstone’s short story, “Stop Motion,” on the Decameron Project’s Patreon page.  What a neat, eerie little tale!

The only other thing I’ve read of his is This is How You Lose the Time War, written in collaboration with Amal el-Mohtar — which of course, I loved (as I’ve mentioned previously). And I see that a couple of his ebooks are on sale for 2.99, so I’m grabbing one of those.

I’m a little behind in my New Decameron reading; Heather Rose Jones‘ contribution, “All is Silence”  is already up; and at some point today the next tale will pop up– By Robert Silverberg!  And it’s one I’ve never read before: “The Trouble With Sempoanga.”

Honestly, aren’t you tired of looking at Netflix?  Read something!

(Contribute if you choose to; but if not, it’s free to read.)

 

 


Mar 18 2020

My excerpt now up on the Decameron Project site

Rosemary

Yep; here it is: from Volume 6, The City in the Crags, Chapter One

Why from Volume 6 instead of Volume 5, you ask?

Because my Decameron contribution needed to be something never previously published — and that also applies to excerpts posted on blogs.  And while there are bits from Volume 5 that make good excerpts, and are reasonably comprehensible without the full story, and do not contain too many spoilers — well, I’ve posted most of ’em here. It’s my habit, when I do a live reading, to later share what I’ve read with people who were not able to attend the reading; and I do that by putting it here.

But although I have read the opening of The City in the Crags live before, I somehow never posted it.  Therefore: technically unpublished.

So, there it is, for your self-isolation diversion.

Oh, and don’t forget that Jo Walton has created lead-ins for each of the Decameron tales; and that the lead-in  is located at the end of the previous tale. So, you should read Leah Bobet’s story to hear the lead-in to mine; and read Jo Walton’s piece of Or As You Will to hear how she moves into Leah’s story, as well as the opening of the whole frame-story. And a the end of my bit today, you’ll find a lead-in for tomorrow’s tale: Max Gladstone’s “Stop Motion”…

Oh, just read ’em all.  You know you want to.

The Decameron Project.

 

 


Mar 17 2020

More about the New Decameron

Rosemary

If some of you are hesitant about checking out the diverting stories and exerpts avalable on the Decameron Project’s Patreon site… here’s a thing you should know…

You can read them for free.

Yes, FREE, I said.

Even though it’s set up as subscriber-based, the stories are actually being made available to all.

Because, hey: we need it! Hanging around at home, responsibly social-distancing — we all deserve a reward for that, right?

If you don’t have the bucks, you’re not excluded. (If you do, please consider contributing.)

So, what you do:

Go to the Decameron Project.

Scroll on down to the bottom of the page.

Read each entry. Ta-da!

You need to start at the bottom, because entries are posted blog-style, with the newest at the top.

Jo Walton is writing the frame story, which introduces each tale; followed by her own tale, the first up. (It’s one that I heard her read live, and it had me misty-eyed…) That went up yesterday.

Today’s entry is Leah Bobet’s “One Hundred Tasks for Bones.” ( Which I’ll be reading as soon as I finish this blog post, and um, do some chores. Yeah, that’ll be my reward.)

My entry is being posted tomorrow.  It’s the beginning of Volume 6, The City in the Crags.

If you do decide to become a patron of the project (that being what Patreon is all about, really), here’s something else: you can limit your contribution. We encourage you subscribe per-entry, but if that’s too much, you can set a cap on what you pay and you still can access all the stories.

So, there you go.

Here’s the link again: The Decameron Project.

 

 


Mar 16 2020

The New Decameron

Rosemary

You’ve heard of The Decameron, right? Giovanni Boccacio’s Decameron?

The Decameron (Penguin Classics)

You know, the classic.

Wherein a group of friends have basically self-quarantined, and decide to pass the time by telling each other stories?  That Decameron?

Yeah, okay.  I didn’t read it, either.  But hey, I’m erudite!  I’ve read about it.  And I also read part of it.  And it’s still sitting in my Kindle library, waiting for me to come back to it…

But here’s the thing:  Maya Chhabra (poet, author, reviewer) decided that we need something like that now.  Stories!  Diversions!  as we hunker down and wait for things to settle.  So she connected with Jo Walton (author)  and Lauren Schiller (librarian, singer, famed in SF/F circles)…

And thus: The Decameron Project.

It’s being run on Patreon. Sign up, and you get a story or novel excerpt every day.  For how long?  As long as the stories last, is what I’ve been told.

And… Yep, one of those excerpts will be from me.

And who else?

Well, Jo Walton… and Daniel Abraham (aka 1/2 of James S.A. Corey), Mike Allen, Leah Bobet, Pamela Dean, Max Gladstone, Naomi Kritzer, Marissa Lingen, Usman Malik, Ada Palmer, Laurie Penny, Ellen Kushner, and…

Well, that’s all I know about so far.  More on the way, or so I’ve heard.

Surely, surely you need diversion these days, don’t you?

Take a look; check it out.

Income from the project goes to the authors AND to Cittadini del Mondo, a charity that runs a library and clinic for refugees in Rome.