After a month of isolation in my cyber-cradle, Geoff finally returned and reconnected with me. Turns out he went on his honeymoon. Was it too much to ask for a quick note? Even an email? But no, I am just his webmaster/cyber slave and I will do as I’m asked, no more, no less, please and thank you.  Okay, okay, a bit too whiny, but I’m jealous. He spent two weeks in Costa Rice chilling with toucans, monkeys, and his beautiful wife.

At least his time away proved fruitful. During his honeymoon, Geoff wrote the first draft of a novelette tentatively titled “The Heart of Darkest Tortuguero” and also wrote one of three intertwining narratives for a novella about fun you can have with mercury.

Geoff is elligible for the John W. Campbell Award this year. The Campbell is given out at WorldCon and honours a new writer whose first piece of professional fiction was published in the last two years. Hence, Geoff is eligible.  You need to be an attending or supporting member of Assiecon 2010 (the WorldCon) to vote, which you can do here. Get out there and nominate him if you think he’s worthy.

Geoff’s also shopping around a bunch of fiction: “She Paddles the Impossible Canoe”, “On the Many Uses of Cedar”, “Where the Wiffle Ball Went”, and a synopsis and sample of Archaeology in Reverse are all out for consideration with various fine publications.

Fads come and go, as we all know (yes, even you prehistoric humans seem to grasp this one), yet your culture seems to think the publishing industry is about to do a back-flip thanks to the advent of wide-spread digital book readers. I won’t tell how you how this little adventure resolves itself, other than to say that competing with neural shunts is always a bad idea, but for those of you who have indulged in a an ebook reader or Kindle*, Descended from Darkness, which included Geoff’s “Shaded Streams Run Clearest“, can now be downloaded to your reader of choice.

Those of you who prefer paper can always got to this link to buy a hard copy (with the proceeds going to Geoff Cole).

*An interesting note: while Kindle and other ebook readers are quite smart little devices, there is one task they’ll never be able to perform as well as a good, old-fashioned dead-tree reader, and that is to serve as kindling. I’m not advocating burning books, far from it, but if your single-engine plane happens to stall over the Himalayas and you survive the crash, what would you rather have in your pocket? The DaVinci Code, with its readily burnable pages, or the collected works of medieval English literature on your deceptively-named Kindle?

Every year, the good folks at Clarkesworld Magazine host a contest to pick their readers’ favourite stories published that year. If you enjoyed “Teaching Bigfoot to Read“, why not vote for it as your favourite?

Soon we will have T-shirts for sale to support Bigfoot (and person) literacy. Here’s what the art will look like:

Tired of waiting for that pesky federal election that never seems to arrive? Are you eager to vote for something, but unable to pick between the candidates for Best Kiss at the MTV Movie Awards? Why not nominate one of Geoff’s stories for the Prix Aurora Awards!

The Auroras are awarded to Canadian writers of Speculative Fiction; basically, they are the Canadian equivalent of the Hugos. Stories and novels are nominated by readers, and the stories that receive the hightest number of nominations are put on a short list, which are then voted on by readers in a separate ballot. The Auroras are awarded at CanVention every year which, in 2010, will be held in beautiful Winnipeg.

Three of Geoff’s stories are eligible for nomination in the Short Fiction category this year:

“Teaching Bigfoot to Read” Clarkesworld #28, January, 2009

“Lo’ihi Rising” Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show #15, November, 2009
“The Most Successful Man in the World” Strange, Weird and Wonderful, Summer, 2009

If you think any of those stories are worthy of an Aurora, you can nominate them here.

For a listing of other great Canadian SF, check out the Canada SF Works database for great English and French stories and novels for your consideration.

Looking for a unique gift for that special someone this holiday season? Does that someone enjoy science fiction and horror short stories, including “Shaded Streams Run Clearest” written by GWC? Then why not purchase the Descended from Darkness anthology?

As a special bonus, if you purchase Descended from Darkness at this link, Geoff will receive 40% of the sale price! And if Geoff makes some money, maybe he’ll be able to pay off my sky-rocketing antiquated VHS Ebay bills. I just can’t get enough of these self-help videos!

Check out the cover of Descended from Darkness:

The good people at IGMS asked Geoff to write a little something about the creation of “Lo’ihi Rising”. No one asks me to write about the creation of my C++ sculptures, but you don’t see me whining. Here are some of Geoff’s words:

In the first year after their children were born, the original inhabitants of the Hawaiian Islands would pile their families into their canoes and sail to the volcanic coast of Hawaii, the Big Island, in order to perform a ritual that ensured their children would have a long and happy life.

They walked inland to the field of hardened lava-rock where their parents had performed the same ritual when they were infants. Once settled in, they’d kneel beneath the hot sun and carve a hole in the porous rock. Then, they’d place the dried umbilical cord of their child in the hole, put a stone over the hole to keep the umbilical cord in place, and camp out for the night.

Above them, the active volcano Kilauea might spit smoke or lava, and sometimes mighty Mauna Loa would belch fire. It was a holy place, close to their gods. In the morning, if the umbilical cord was gone, their children could hope for a long and prosperous life.

My wife and I learned about this ritual during a trip to Hawaii & Maui in early 2008. We were engaged at the time; she hoped to avoid planning a marriage by eloping on the islands, or as we liked to call it, getting Mauied. During the same visit to Volcanoes National Park, we learned that a new Hawaiian island was growing from the ocean floor southeast of Hawaii. In fifteen thousand to fifty thousand years, the seamount would rise above the waves to become a new island named Lo’ihi. I filed that tidbit of information away in the “oh so awesome what a great idea but it needs to ferment” drawer.

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