J.H.McMullen Posted April 9, 2012 Report Share Posted April 9, 2012 Hi, all. Middle-aged Canadian reader with wife, two kids, two dogs, house, and job. Interests include...uh...what were they again? There's so little time... Reading, writing, tabletop roleplaying games (currently adore ICONS but reading through the Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Game; hope to buy Mistborn RPG some time). Hmmm. Had a couple of nonfiction books and a couple of short stories published, then got a brain tumour, haven't really written much besides work stuff since then except enough to discover that I am nowhere near where I used to be. So, have to relearn things. *sigh* Other than that, looking for a chance to critique stuff and learn (though why I think this is a good time, I dunno, since I'm bent for a tough deadline at work: maybe it's a month to see how the board works before I really join--yeah, that's it). Some talking. And I look forward to getting to know (at least some of) you. Oh: Brain tumor. Acoustic neuroma. Was kinda big by the time they discovered it, maybe tangerine sized, so surgery was kinda necessary or I'd die. Fun fact: My wife's grandfather was the first man in Canada to survive the kind of surger that I had, about fifty years earlier. And my surgeon was trained by his surgeon. Minimal physical side effects--deafness, some facial paralysis. (I never know whether to talk about it or not: on one hand, it does color nearly everything; on the other hand, I don't want people to think it's my main crutch or excuse. I dunno. So I'm still trying to say that I have it. If that doesn't work, well, on the Internet no one can tell you're a dog, right?) 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lyssie95 Posted April 9, 2012 Report Share Posted April 9, 2012 (edited) Hey there, welcome to the forums! Out of curiosity, have you read all of Sanderson's books? Also, do you write Fantasy as well as non-fic? I'd assume, since ou are here and stuff, but stil *shrug* figure it doesn't hurt to check About your tumor, wow, that sounds like some scary stuff! Glad you got through it My mom had a nice baseball sized tumor -9cm- pressing on her brain stem just before thanksgiving last year. It wasn't cancerous, docs said it was a meningioma, but still.. brain surgery is kinda scary! But mom is fine now, just a bit slower of a reader. By the way, watch out for the admins, they spike people... you probably don't need anyone to poke MORE things into you (and... hopefully you don't hate me forever for that jest ) Edited April 9, 2012 by lyssie95 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.H.McMullen Posted April 10, 2012 Author Report Share Posted April 10, 2012 (edited) Hey there, welcome to the forums! Out of curiosity, have you read all of Sanderson's books? Also, do you write Fantasy as well as non-fic? I'd assume, since ou are here and stuff, but stil *shrug* figure it doesn't hurt to check About your tumor, wow, that sounds like some scary stuff! Glad you got through it My mom had a nice baseball sized tumor -9cm- pressing on her brain stem just before thanksgiving last year. It wasn't cancerous, docs said it was a meningioma, but still.. brain surgery is kinda scary! But mom is fine now, just a bit slower of a reader. By the way, watch out for the admins, they spike people... you probably don't need anyone to poke MORE things into you (and... hopefully you don't hate me forever for that jest ) Thanks for the welcome! I've only read some of Sanderson's books. And I've never read any of the Wheel of Time books. Haven't been able to get the Alcatraz books either, but now that it's not under construction in front of the library, I'll try again. I write fantasy, SF, and horror. Theodore Sturgeon is like unto a god to me, though I also like the Heinlein juveniles, Arthur C. Clarke, James White, Alan Nourse, James Alan Gardner, James Morrow, Joe Lansdale, Ramsey Campbell, H. P. Lovecraft, Brian Keene (sometimes), Mira Grant (though I'm not as fond of the works I've read so far under the other name), Carrie Vaughn. Yeah--brain surgery is scary. Apparently they had the OR booked for 14 hours for me. They didn't need all of it; I guess they had 90 minutes to spare. (Well, I found it easy--I just had to go to sleep. But scary.) And now I have this nifty plastic plate! Edited April 10, 2012 by J.H.McMullen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe ST Posted April 10, 2012 Report Share Posted April 10, 2012 Hey there JH great to have you aboard, that is some scary stuff there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.H.McMullen Posted April 10, 2012 Author Report Share Posted April 10, 2012 Hey there JH great to have you aboard, that is some scary stuff there. Glad to be here. And it's mostly in the past now, so it makes for good conversation. And, of course, I now have lots of squicky stories to tell. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shivertongue Posted April 12, 2012 Report Share Posted April 12, 2012 Welcome J. I know what you mean about never knowing whether or not to talk about it. I had a head injury about five years ago, that, while it's definitely not as bad as a brain tumor, has affected many areas of my life. I worry sometimes that I use it as a crutch, so I do my best not to, but... I lost my train of thought. Happens sometimes. Anyway, glad to have you here! Anywhere we might be able to find some of your published work? Also, have a waffle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.H.McMullen Posted April 12, 2012 Author Report Share Posted April 12, 2012 Let's see... I don't know if you can find any of my published work. I have a rather short bibliography. For non-fiction, it's all UNIX books. I think two of them are still in print but I didn't get a royalty cheque for them last December so I'm not sure... (Which makes me think: did I let the publisher know I moved? Hmmm. Better check.) For fiction, two stories have been published under a pseudonym because they're erotica (yes, I had a fling--so to speak--at writing erotica, about fifteen years ago). If genre fiction goes out of print fast, erotica goes out of print faster: I think I have the only copies extant. I was a semifinalist in Writers of the Future the year that I entered. And last September, Dark Moon Digest released an anthology of zombie stories which includes one of mine ("Thicker Than Law"), under my name and everything. (It was, in fact, the last thing I wrote before the tumour was discovered.) But for stuff written post-tumour operation, no, there isn't any of it in print. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrazyRioter Posted April 13, 2012 Report Share Posted April 13, 2012 Nice to see more Canadians around here, there aren't enough of us, we must recruit others so we can take over the world spread joy and happiness. And I've had about as many surgeries as I've had years of life (I'm 25, lost track of exactly how many surgeries)due to numerous birth defects, and a few other things that are definitely TMI. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.H.McMullen Posted April 13, 2012 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2012 Nice to see more Canadians around here, there aren't enough of us, we must recruit others so we can take over the world spread joy and happiness. Yes! We are as fond of fantasy and the fantastic as anyone else in North America. (You know Tor editor David Hartwell's stated position on Canadian authors, right? ---At least I think it was Hartwell; it might have been PNH.) And I've had about as many surgeries as I've had years of life (I'm 25, lost track of exactly how many surgeries)due to numerous birth defects, and a few other things that are definitely TMI. Someday I'll PM you and we'll compare birth defects. I'm in Ontario, between Toronto and London. Do you mind giving a rough location? (Young women have to be careful handing out that kind of info.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrazyRioter Posted April 14, 2012 Report Share Posted April 14, 2012 South BC. And no I don't know what David Hartwell said about Canadian authors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.H.McMullen Posted April 15, 2012 Author Report Share Posted April 15, 2012 (edited) Clearly we are unlikely to meet: I rarely get out to visit those friends and relatives. Anyway, Hartwell noticed that SF books by Canadian authors did exactly the same in the US market as books by American authors--but they sold roughly ten times better in Canada than those by American authors. So he buys from Canadian authors if all other things are equal. I assume (I don't know) that normal Canadian sales are roughly one tenth of those in the US, that being the ratio of population sizes. So a book from an American author sells X in the US and X/10 in Canada, making a total of 1.1X. But a book from a Canadian author sells roughly X in the US and X in Canada, making a total of 2X. (And the X value isn't consistent from one author to another, of course.) Certainly I see a number of authors who are Canadian and who are willing to state it, as opposed to the old days, when authors like Gordon Dickson or A. E. Van Vogt or later Judith Merrill (to name 3) had a Canadian connection but didn't really talk about it. Edited April 15, 2012 by J.H.McMullen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Windrunner Posted April 16, 2012 Report Share Posted April 16, 2012 Hi J.H.McMullen! Welcome to 17th Shard, and sorry that this welcome was so late. I'm glad your brain surgery went well, from the sound of what you went through, you experienced my worst nightmares. I hope you like it here! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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