Scott MacHaffie

Trinity Library

Image courtesy of Irish Welcome Tours (CC-licensed)
Trinity Library, Digital Edition

Here are tentative dates for upcoming sci-fi and urban fantasy releases from some of my favorite authors. If I missed any authors, I’m sorry. (K. A. Stewart has a new book coming out, but I couldn’t find a release date for it. I’m not sure what John Scalzi has coming out next).

Sept. 2011

• The Lost Fleet: Dreadnaught, (paperback), by Jack Campbell

Nov. 2011

• The Alloy of Law, by Brandon Sanderson
• Magic on the Line, by Devon Monk

Jan. 2012

• Of Truth and Beasts, (paperback), Barb and JC Hendee

March 2012

• Raven Calls, by CE Murphy

April 2012

• Tricked, by Kevin Hearne
• Magic Without Mercy, by Devon Monk

May 2012

• Andrea (spinoff from Kate Daniels series), by Ilona Andrews

Feb. 2013

• Kate Daniels 6, by Ilona Andrews

It’s a sad that Borders is closing. There is a large Borders near us, serving as the main bookstore for Tigard, Lake Oswego, and Tualatin–somewhere between 80,000 and 100,000 people.  According to our local newspaper, our Borders was the most profitable in the whole country.

Hopefully, other bookstores will step up and take over some of the Borders sites. Rumor (aka the newspaper) says that both Barnes and Noble and Books-a-million are looking at some of the sites.

Perhaps the closing of Borders will enable smaller local bookstores to thrive.

This is a gluten- and dairy-free adaption of a recipe by Gayle Jolee, who Nancy and I took cooking classes from. We learned a lot from her. One of the key ideas is mixing a variety of tastes and textures.

For the ingredients, I will list the ingredients as I actually made it, with the original version in parentheses.

Ingredients

Fondue

• 1 tablespoon coconut oil (unsalted butter)
• 3/4 cup Daiya cheddar or mozzarella cheese (Italian Fontina cheese, cut into 1/4 inch pieces)
• 1/2 cup coconut milk (regular milk)
• 2 large egg yolks

Crostinis

• 4-8 slices GF bread (four 1/2 inch thick slices for a crusty bread, or sliced baguettes)
• 1 large garlic clove, halved
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 4-8 pieces of bacon (1/4 pound thinly sliced prosciutto)
• 1 pound thin asparagus

Directions

Ideally, these will be timed to all be ready about the same time.

Cook the bacon (I microwaved the bacon between paper towels for a couple of minutes).

Toast the bread (toaster or under the broiler for 1-2 minutes per side). Rub the bread with garlic, add a little salt, and brush with the olive oil.

Cook the asparagus. I stir-fried it in a wok with some olive oil. You can also boil the asparagus in water. Either way, it takes about 5 minutes.

Make the fondue. This is the part with the most steps. Heat up a double boiler (if you don’t have one, fill a soup pan with some water and stick a metal bowl on top). Melt the coconut oil (or butter). When it melts, add in the cheese and the coconut milk. When the cheese begins to melt, whisk in the two egg yolks. Continue whisking until the mixture is smooth and thickened. It should take about 7 minutes. Let the mixture cool off the heat, stirring occasionally.

Make up the crostinis: break up the bacon (prosciutto) into pieces and put it on the bread. Cut the asparagus into bite-sized pieces and place on top of the bacon. Pour the fondue over the bread.

Here is the basic writing process:

1. Write novel #1
2. Put novel #1 on shelf, start writing novel #2
3. Decide novel #1 has been on the shelf long enough and start editing it
4. Give up editing novel #1, go back to writing novel #2
5. Finish novel #2, put it on the shelf
6. Edit novel #1 again
7. Start writing novel #3
8. Start editing novel #2
9. Give up editing novel #2, go back to editing novel #1
10. Write some more on novel #3
11. Decide novel #1 is finally ready to start querying
12. Query agents with novel #1
13. Edit novel #2
14. Finish writing novel #3
15. etc.

Here are three quick and easy gluten- and dairy-free banana desserts.

Ingredients

• Bananas
• Brown sugar
• Cinnamon
• Vanilla
• Dairy-free chocolate syrup (Onalaska is a good brand)
• 1 can coconut milk (regular, not lite)
• 1/2 cup sugar

Directions

Slice up the bananas and add one of the following toppings.

Chocolate syrup

Brown sugar and cinnamon to taste

Coconut cream. Open the can of coconut milk and drain off the liquid, keep the more solid parts. Refrigerate the coconut milk and sugar for 24 hours. Refrigerate a bowl and spoon for three hours. Mix the coconut milk and sugar together–you’re looking for something the consistency of whipped cream. Pour this over the bananas.  Add vanilla or cinnamon to taste.

Take inspiration where you can find it. It’s a common saying, but really, being inspired helps any kind of creative expression. It could be nature–birds singing on a summer’s morning, waves washing away the beach, or the whisper of a breeze through a greening spring forest. Or it could be people–going to hear your favorite author speak at Powell’s, listening to a concert, watching people dance.

What inspires you may not inspire me, and vice versa.

Take the time to renew your creativity.

For ebooks, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Borders are all middlemen. Unlike printed books, however, publishers could easily handle selling ebooks directly to customers. At some point, I think price pressure will force publishers to start selling ebooks themselves.

Ideally, publishers would sell at a lower cost than the bookstores and pay a higher absolute royalty to their authors for those sales. If authors can make two dollars selling an ebook directly through the publisher’s web site, or one dollar selling through Amazon, which one are they going to link to?

I keep a number of useful or inspirational books on my shelf for writing.

• A dictionary
• The First Five Pages by Noah Lukeman
• Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne and Dave King
• The Enchanted Forest And Its Family by Mavis Tofte
• Designing Disney: Imagineering and the Art of the Show by John Hench and Peggy van Pelt
• Fantasy Encyclopedia by Judy Allen
• Shrines and Temples of Kyoto by Shizuya Paul Satoh
• Forensics and Fiction by D. P. Lyle
• Cause of Death by Keith D. Wilson
• Forensics by D. P. Lyle
• The Imagineering Field Guide to the Magic Kingdom by The Imagineers
• The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy, Vols. 1-3
• The Writer’s Complete Fantasy Reference
• Making a Literary Life by Carolyn See

Here is a pie crust recipe which is gluten- and dairy-free. This recipe creates one 9 inch pie crust.

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups gluten-free flour, measured after sifting (I like Bob’s Red Mill all-purpose GF baking flour)
• 1/2 cup shortening (we use Spectrum which is dairy- and soy-free, I believe)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 8-10 tablespoons cooled (refrigerated) water. If making this using wheat flour, cut this to 3-4 tablespoons

Directions

Put the flour, salt, and shortening in a big bowl. Use a pastry fork (looks like a couple of capital Ds made out of wire stuck together). If you don’t have a pastry fork, use a couple of regular forks.

You need to blend the flour and the shortening. Basically, you want to break up the shortening into pieces no larger than a pea. Do the best you can, but you may not get all of the pieces that small. By the time you get there, the flour should be pretty well mixed with the shortening.

Next you need to add water. How much you add depends on whether you’re using wheat flour or gluten-free flour. Gluten is sticky. It is a protein which forms long chains (that’s what gives white bread is ability to bend). If you’re using gluten-free flour, you don’t have that same stickiness. To get pie dough which rolls out without cracking, you need to make up for it with something. I use water.

Thus, the recipe calls for 3-4 tablespoons of chilled water for wheat flour, and 8-10 for gluten-free flour. Mix the starting amount of water in with your hands, then check the consistency.

Wheat flour: you’re looking for slightly stick dough.

Gluten-free flour: you’re looking for very sticky dough. You will need to put lots of GF flour on whatever you’re rolling the dough out on, the rolling pin, and the top of the dough.

When the dough is the correct consistency, form it into a ball with your hands. Place it on an appropriate surface (I use a large plastic mat designed for rolling out pies). Put flour on everything (mat, rolling pin, and dough).

Roll the dough out to the size you want (9 inches or so, depending on your pie pan). If the dough cracks (especially GF dough), put it back in the bowl and add more water.