musings

New Glenn & ESCAPADE

Fantastic launch (and landing) today by Blue Origin - there's another reusable rocket on the table.

Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket, in its second official launch, sent NASA's ESCAPADE mission on its way to Mars. The Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (NASA makes such great acronyms) mission will use two small satellites (built by another private space company, Rocket Lab) to study space weather conditions at Mars.

In only its second try, Blue Origin executed a perfect landing of New Glenn's booster on their drone ship, "Never Tell Me The Odds."

As awesome as SpaceX's achievements are, we need MORE private space companies doing amazing things, so Blue Origin's success today is great news. Like SpaceX, Blue Origin will be headed to the moon as part of Artemis, and they have grand plans for orbital stations and beyond.

Learn more about the launch today here.

Image Credit: Dave Limp (link) and Blue Origin.

Dune Part 3

‘DUNE: PART THREE’ has wrapped production. It stars Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Florence Pugh, Anya Taylor-Joy, Robert Pattinson and Rebecca Ferguson, and will hit theaters December 18, 2026.

As wonderful a book as Dune is, I did not love Dune Messiah. It will be interesting to see if and how much they change the story. Is your average moviegover ready for the hero to become the villain - and not in a "The Dark Knight" way, but a mass-murdering way?

The Milky Way Shines in Radio

This is what the Milky Way would look like at night if your eyes could see radio waves. It's a new image created by the Murchison Widefield Array, which scanned the sky in 20 radio "colors" over frequencies from 72 to 231 megahertz.

What do I think when I see an image like this? Space isn't cold, dark and silent at all. It's vibrant, busy and fiercely, chaotically alive. Which makes it a fantastic place for stories.

Learn more here.

Choose the Form of Your Destruction

Is the universe doomed to suffer a Heat Death (which means cold) or a Big Crunch (or possibly Big Bounce)? Which is it, dammit? For the last 3 decades, scientists have insisted the expansion of the universe was accelerating; that one day no more galaxies would decorate our sky, then no more stars. Then the universe would grow still and cold.

Now some pretty reputable research says...oops? Maybe not? Maybe the expansion is slowing, will eventually stop, then reverse?

You don't need to read the article unless you're into astrophysics. The point is that, for a science fiction writer, all the things we DON'T understand can be very frustrating - but possibly nothing is more frustrating than when we're confident we DO understand something...until we don't.

The fact that the universe is expanding, and that the expansion is accelerating, is baked into the Amaranthe worldbuilding, and not just as background - it's actually somewhat important to the Rasu/Dzhvar shenanigans. If scientists eventually decide that, no, they're now definitely sure it's doing no such thing, that flip is going to painfully date my books for future readers.

And I'm going to be ANNOYED.

https://thedebrief.org/a-potential-paradigm-shift-in-cosmology-scientists-uncover-evidence-the-universes-expansion-is-slowing-down-not-accelerating/

P.S.: For the record, I actually prefer the Big Bounce scenario. If all life in the universe is going to end, better for it to do so in an exciting rush of colliding galaxies and stars into a dramatic singularity, then an explosion to start all over again. No one wants to die cold and alone in the dark.

P.P.S.: A reader on X pushed back a little bit on my take, pointing out that science is not frozen into a fixed, unchanging doctrine like religion; instead it bends and changes as our knowledge grows, and that’s a good thing. And it IS a good thing; in fact, it's one of the most admirable aspects of science. It's just frustrating when you're trying to make your scifi grounded in scientific plausibility & the foundations keep changing. But, that's what I get for writing out on the far edge of what we know!

Happy Halloween

Two years ago, I wrote this little flash fiction ghost story for Halloween. If you've finished Liminal Space, you know that the events underlying the story are now Official Amaranthe Canon. Because I never can leave well enough alone....

***

Proele.

The word whispered through her dream, carried along by an eerie, haunted wind. Wisps of fog obscured any details of where she was, but everywhere she turned, there was only the word.

Proele.

Nika awoke with a start. Silvery moonlight drifted into the bedroom, and she turned to see Dashiel sleeping peacefully beside her.

Taking care not to disturb him, she eased out of bed and tip-toed to the kitchen, where she poured a cup of coffee and took it over to the windows looking down upon Mirai One.

Proele. She knew the word, though not from where. It took only a fraction of a second to delve the history banks and she had her answer, though not her ‘why.’ Proele was the name they’d given to the planetoid where, near the end of their two-century-long Exodus away from the Anaden Empire, they’d first discovered kyoseil. Though the rock wasn’t fit for habitation, they’d paused there for several weeks while a team set up a camp on the surface to extract and study the mineral. After loading up sizeable samples in the holds of their generation ships, they’d continued their journey, and only after settling on Synra had the first experiments integrating kyoseil into their biosynthetic bodies began.

She wondered. Had Magnus Forchelle known as he stood on the planetoid’s surface what he had found?

Proele.

She jumped in surprise. She wasn’t dreaming any longer, was she? She pinched herself. No, she was not. Yet the ghostly voice had echoed anew in her mind nonetheless.

She sighed, sending ripples through the steaming coffee held at her lips. It appeared she was going to Proele.

Read the rest at the link: https://www.gsjennsen.com/news/2023/10/31/ghosts-of-proele

(Image Credit: Adam Block/Mount Lemmon SkyCenter/University of Arizona)

Book and Character Art Banner

A new header image went up on the social media profiles this week, and I thought you all might enjoy seeing it. The theme: “The people who will save the universe - if it can be saved.”

You can see high-res versions of the character art - and some additional characters - on my concept art page: https://www.gsjennsen.com/concept-art/. Click to expand a pic, then right click to download it if you like.

Binary Black Holes

This is our clearest look at two supermassive black holes in orbit around each other. The primary one is 18 billion times the mass of the Sun. The image was created using a space-based antenna that created, in effect, a radio telescope 190,000 km wide.

Incredible. Just 6 years ago we directly imaged a black hole for the first time - now here we are casually snapping pics of binary black holes. ...Okay, maybe not "casually." I'm sure it was a ton of work. But these days, we can just do things.

Learn more here: https://www.utu.fi/en/news/press-release/scientists-capture-an-image-of-two-black-holes-circling-each-other-for-the-first

We're #1

Well, Nika is, anyway, as she should be. All the thanks to BookBub for featuring EXIN EX MACHINA on Wednesday! Well over 10K copies have been downloaded already; I hope this means we'll be welcoming a bunch of new people to the Amaranthe community soon.

MACHINA will remain free through the weekend, if you know anyone who needs it in their life. Info and retailers are HERE.

P.S.: I’ve switched to a new newsletter provider, so let me know if you have any problems or see any glitches with this email. Thanks!

Not So Science Fiction

Guys, "pulsing" is on the way, and much faster than I was expecting.

A startup called "Alter Ego" is releasing a product by the same name that detects what you want to say and transmits it. It picks up on the downstream subtle signals your brain sends to your speech system, before words are spoken aloud, and it captures only what you intend to say (not your random thoughts).

Now we just need to get the device inside our skull (though, honestly, a little dot behind the ear would be close enough).

Here's the full article: https://thedebrief.org/mit-linked-startup-unveils-near-telepathic-wearable-device-for-silent-communication/

Watch it in action here: https://x.com/alterego_io/status/1965113585299849535

A Dragon Con Tale in 2 Pictures

Dragon Con Day 1. 10 am, as the Vendor Hall opens. I’ve got the books (and many, many more books under the table). I’ve got the banner. I’ve got the first of 4 geeky tshirts. I’m ready to sell some books.

Dragon Con Day 4. 45 minutes left in the convention. The table is clear, all books safely in the hands of new owners. And I get to rest. ;)

Many other, non-table adventures were had over the course of the long weekend. I spoke on 4 interesting panels, sold yet more books at a SFF gala party Friday night, and hung out with other authors in the Westin bar every night. I got to meet my narrator, Pyper Down, in person for the first time! She was simply fabulous. All in all a great, and exhausting, time.

Even More Scenic Summer Fun

Last year, we were finishing the house and getting ready to move and moving, and we missed a lot of the summer. This year, we are making up for lost time!

Last weekend, we went to see Mumford & Sons at The Gorge Amphitheatre in George, WA. 2 hours west of Spokane, 2.5 hours east of Seattle, it's in the middle of absolute nowhere - that happens to be on a ridge above the beautiful Columbia River.

The comparison to Red Rocks Park (in Colorado) is immediate and deserved. Is it a better or worse venue than Red Rocks? Oh, why judge! The important thing is, I used to get to go to concerts at Red Rocks, and now I get to go to concerts at The Gorge!

It bills itself as having the most beautiful sunsets of any concert venue in the world, and THAT may well be true, for the sunset was indeed breathtaking (the clouds cleared enough in time to be an accent rather than a hindrance).

Oh, right, the concert itself. Incredible. Easily Top 5 of shows I've seen, and I've seen *a lot* of shows. 9 band members, with a full horn section, an upright bass, and of course the omnipresent fiddle, and their sound was as crisp, clear and in sync as a studio recording. In person, they sounded better than their released live albums.

But let's be honest. While the show would've been a shadow of itself without the ensemble, Marcus Mumford is the indisputable star. He has a strongly charismatic stage presence that I wasn't expecting, and a perfect voice.

10/10, would recommend.*

*Except the exfiltration system. It was a disaster. Never build a venue that can hold 30,000 people at the end of a 3-mile 2-lane road.

More Scenic Summer Fun

It being summer, some friends took us rafting down the Spokane River this weekend! It was hot and sunny, and the water was cool and delightful (yes, we spent almost as much time swimming as we did rafting).

Since this was our first time, we used a cheap little raft we named “Rubber Ducky.” But we enjoyed ourselves enough that we’re thinking of upgrading to 2-person kayak, which is much, much more maneuverable.

Murderbot

I'm honestly not sure where the consensus has formed on this, but I *really* enjoyed Murderbot!

I was concerned about the slapstick, over-the-top comedic feel of the trailer, and yes, to some extent the humor was over the top (and definitely beyond the books). But I laughed A LOT while watching the show (and I'm not typically easily amused). Sometimes, that's enough. Not every show has to be "Capital M" Meaningful. It can just be fun.