I pick up a mention in the beta of the new on-line Science Fiction Encyclopedia, in the entry on Redstone Science Fiction:
“Like a Hawk in its Gyre” (February 2011 #9) by Philip Brewer delivers a soft but effective punch in portraying a future that’s not all it seems.
The story itself is available at Redstone: Like a Hawk in its Gyre.
An article I wrote for the Makin’ Money blog at American Public Media’s Marketplace went live last week. Check it out: Four steps to managing personal debt.
My Wise Bread post Live Where It’s Cheap was featured on MSN Money’s Smart Spending blog as Live where it’s cheap- MSN Money.
It’s always nice to see my work get a bigger audience.
Of course, with the Dow down 500 points again, I doubt if anyone noticed.
Lois Tilton seems unconvinced by the economic scenario implied by my story “Watch Bees.”
I got my contributors copies of the August Asimov’s! It’s a treat to see my story in print.
I haven’t read it yet, but of course I flipped through it. Seeing the “next issue” section of the new issue prompted me to check out that section of the previous issue, which turns out to be available on-line. It mentions my story, saying:
Another new author, Philip Brewer, gives us a stinging tale about how to recover from the end of life as we know it in “Watch Bees.”
I hadn’t noticed that before; it’s sure fun to see.
The new issue should go on sale June 21st.
SFScope has the first mention I’ve seen of the table of contents of the August Asimov’s including my story “Watch Bees,” and an image of the cover.
Looking over the ToC is a treat. I’m in some great company!
They say it’ll go on sale on June 21st.
Cat Rambo had kind words to say about the character of the bicycle in my story “Like a Hawk in its Gyre.”
Lois Tilton had some very kind words to say about “Like a Hawk in its Gyre” in her Locus Online reviews for early February.
Back in July I got a note from J.D. Roth, who was lining up some guest posts to run on Get Rich Slowly while he and his wife were on vacation in France and Italy. I was pleased to be asked once again, and wrote a piece that I ended up being rather pleased with. It went live this morning: Why Now is the Time to Think Long-Term. (Spoiler alert: low interest rates are the reason that now is the time to think long-term.)
About twenty-five years ago (as an example of long-term thinking), I had a whimsical investment idea: Buy some cheap land and plant hardwood trees. The trees wouldn’t be ready to harvest for 100 years or so, but it would have been a cheap investment with (eventually) a fairly large payoff.
It takes a certain perspective to make such a long-term investment. I call it a whimsical idea because I’d never have been able to enjoy the financial return. I was already in my mid-20s at the time. Even if I’d selected the hardwoods for quick maturity, they wouldn’t have been ready until I was well into my 90s.
It’s a topic I’ve been aware of since the early 1980s, when very high interest rates produced a spate of very short-term thinking. (In particular, my dad’s publisher tried to weasel out of a book contract, because it seemed more profitable to invest their money in the money market at a guaranteed 14% than to invest it in a book that might not make so much.)
When rates are high, it doesn’t make any economic sense to think long-term. But when rates are low, long-term projects are suddenly reasonable. Since just now rates are at multi-generational lows, Now is the Time to Think Long-Term.
My Wise Bread post Buy Your Groceries European-Style picked up mentions at both the Discovery Channel’s Planet Green and Lifehacker.
Jason Fitzpatrick had kind words for my post in his piece Shop European-Style for Fresher, Cheaper Food.
Lloyd Alter was especially generous, saying (in a green-living piece subtitled “I thought I was a lonely failure as a frugalista, but I am not“):
I thought we were pretty much along among the frugal living types to do this. However, one of my favourite writers on frugal living, Philip Brewer at Wisebread, agrees…
Thanks guys!
