Publishing the Best of Wishes

[captainsblog]

Two of my favorite people to read here are celebrating birthdays today.

Our own LJ man is mabfan, who, at least by the Gregorian calendar, is XXXVIII today. (Cheer up; that's as long as the Roman numerals get for another 50 years;) Michael is celebrating the day, in part, with this announcement from earlier today:

Apex Publications and award-winning writer Michael A. Burstein are pleased to announce that in September 2008, Apex will be publishing the book "I Remember the Future: The Award-Nominated Stories of Michael A. Burstein."

"I Remember The Future" will be the first bound collection of Burstein's fiction. It will contain all of Burstein's Hugo and Nebula nominated stories, plus two new stories: "Empty Spaces," the fourth, never-before-published story in the "Broken Symmetry" series; and "I Remember the Future," which lends its title to the collection. The book will contain Burstein's two most well-regarded stories, "Kaddish for the Last Survivor" and "Paying It Forward," as well as his two Analytical Laboratory Award winners, "TeleAbsence" and "Sanctuary."

Michael's writings, his range of interests, his unparalleled integrity and his devotion to his faith are all things to emulate on the day he celebrates. Plus he's a Met fan, which, as they say, never hoits.

----

Not to be done with February 27 as a notable date, one of my other Best Beloveds here is Going to L....in exactly 10 years:

The Girl Who Stopped Swimming is beginning to show up in stores, and today, I turn 40.

TGWSS, as it's known (tugwuss? turgidwish? ghoti?), is the third novel by the truly amazing Joshilyn Jackson. It is not only to win a contest (which also wouldn't hoit) that I now offer the following:

 Aboot the book (description refers to Canadian edition):

Laurel Gray Hawthorne needs to make things pretty, whether she's helping her mother make sure the very literal family skeleton stays buried or turning scraps of fabric into nationally acclaimed art quilts. Her estranged sister Thalia, an impoverished Actress with a capital A, is her polar opposite, priding herself on exposing the lurid truth lurking behind middle class niceties. While Laurel's life seems neat and on track--a passionate marriage, a treasured daughter, and a lovely home in suburban Victorianna--everything she holds dear is suddenly thrown into question the night she is visited by the ghost of a her 14-year old neighbor Molly Dufresne.

The ghost leads Laurel to the real Molly floating lifelessly in the Hawthorne's backyard pool. Molly's death is inexplicable--an unseemly mystery Laurel knows no one in her whitewashed neighborhood is up to solving. Only her wayward, unpredictable sister is right for the task, but calling in a favor from Thalia is like walking straight into a frying pan protected only by Crisco. Enlisting Thalia's help, Laurel sets out on a life-altering journey that triggers startling revelations about her family's guarded past, the true state of her marriage, and the girl who stopped swimming.

If this new book contains a fraction of the warmth, conflict, genuineness and spit-take humor of its predecessors, you would do well to get thee to an Amazonery and fast before they're all damn gone.

Especially today, cause c'mon. She's 40. I vaguely remember that.

(PS: telling the contestmistress that you heard about it here increases my chances of winning.)

Comments

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the birthday wishes!

Just dove into TGWSS...

[(Anonymous)]

Got my book in the mail today from Dee and Dee...thanks for the heads up, it made my day!

tammy/knittinginmysleep