March Question
How long will you continue to write books in the Recluce Saga? Will you ever write a book about the arrival of colonists from the Rational Stars? Obviously, with two Recluce books forthcoming, I...
View ArticleReligion and Civilization
From reading some of my posts, readers might get the impression that I’m not extremely fond of religion. In some ways, I’m not. I’m especially skeptical of organized religions that, in their attempts...
View ArticleMoby Dick Is Missing
Moby Dick is indeed missing, but it’s the asteroid, not the Herman Melville book, which, I have to confess, I could never get around to finishing, one of the handful of novels I chose not to struggle...
View ArticleHeroism?
In the early to mid-1970s, a Jesuit priest began a quiet, indeed almost unknown [at the time] effort, to help political refugees, liberals, and reformers, escape incarceration or liquidation by...
View ArticleProfit?
Over the past several centuries, all manner of ethical and practical questions have been raised about the necessity of economic profit, its role in a society, and even whether it is necessary. Most...
View ArticleAnything Will Work at Harvard – Or Similar Institutions
Decades ago, I read a study that compared the abilities and success of teachers in public secondary schools to those of teachers in elite private schools. The conclusion back then was that the overall...
View ArticleTantor Interview
Tantor Media has just posted an audio interview with me. For those who are interested, here’s the link. https://soundcloud.com/goodlistens/l-e-modesitt-jr-interview The interview covers a range of...
View ArticleArticle 0
I’ve just turned in the manuscript for the next Imager Portfolio book – Madness in Solidar, which takes place some 380 years after the Wars of Consolidation. There’s no official publication date, but...
View ArticleReminders
As a writer, for most of every day I work alone, at least in terms of human companionship, although what I do is observed by our three dogs and two cats. Thankfully, in regard to my professional...
View ArticleThe Illusion of Choice
The other day, a reader commented that I’d chosen to live in the semi-sovereign theocracy of Deseret, otherwise known as Utah. In the abstract, and in the fact that we did move from New Hampshire to...
View ArticleThe BLM Grazing Mess
This past week, what amounted to a small scale range war erupted just across the Utah border in Nevada, and in a spirit of misguided “idealism,” compounded by greed and ignorance, Iron County [Utah]...
View ArticleCrisis/Short-Term Funding
We’ve all seen it, over and over. A bridge collapses, usually over a river. Or here in Iron County, a landslide closes a state highway, and it takes eight months moving a huge chunk of mountainside...
View ArticleApril Question
Do you see any other books following in the Haze or Archform:Beauty story-lines? Flash is effectively set in the same “future” as Archform:Beauty, but not with the same characters. At present, I...
View ArticleCivilization
Why do civilizations or nations fall? There are many specific reasons, but, in the end, they all boil down to one point – the inability or unwillingness of the majority of inhabitants to pay the price...
View ArticleBook/Author Buzz
Over just the past few years, I’ve gotten the general impression that the reading public’s attention span in dealing with new books has shortened, but that impression was gained mainly from my...
View ArticleLosing Democracy?
What most people in the United States accept without thinking about it too much is that American democracy – or our representative democratic republic, if one wants to be technical about it – rests...
View ArticleSpacecraft Speed
As a science fiction writer, I’ve generally tied to keep my “space drives” at least tenuously related to scientific reality as we currently know it, but that distance is likely more attenuated than...
View ArticleStuff
At our house, after twenty years, we’ve finally decided to remodel and add to the dining room and kitchen. Given that the so-called dining room is scarcely larger than an extra-large walk-in closet...
View ArticleEBooks and Paperbacks… and Backlists
The other day I was talking to my editor, something I attempt to do weekly, and in discussing the industry he made the observation that hardcover sales were largely holding on, overall, although this...
View ArticleShort Stories
As at least some of my readers know, I began my career in science fiction by writing short stories, initially primarily for ANALOG when Ben Bova was the editor. I still have a love of short stories,...
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