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The Twelve-Fingered Boy - mesmerizing YA horror novel

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 20 May 2013 13:02:07 +0000

The Twelve-Fingered Boy is John Hornor Jacobs's debut young adult novel and it's amazing. It's a horror novel about Shreve, a kid from a tough background who is stuck in juvie and makes the most of it by running a black-market candy dealership; and his new roommate Jack, a quiet kid with twelve fingers and twelve toes. Jack is not the kind of kid who thrives in juvie, and Shreve takes him under his wing, trying to teach him how to get along on the inside -- but he's not very successful. Jack's extra fingers mark him out among the kids, and the worst of them smell blood when they see him and begin to circle.

But that's the least of Jack's problems. Far more worrisome is Mr Quincrux, a strange man from an unnamed government agency who seems to have the power to make the omnisuspicious guards and wardens go into a trancelike state. He's very, very interested in Jack, and particularly in how Jack landed in juvie -- an unexplained attack on his foster siblings that we quickly learn had something to do with telekinesis. Shreve quickly discovers that Mr Quincrux is an emissary for something much darker than any mere government agency, and as things escalate and Jack's powers come to the fore, it quickly becomes necessary for the pair to break out and hit the road.

Great horror novels demand likable characters -- people whose danger we can't help buy empathize with -- and Twelve-Fingered Boy has a pair of two of the most likable characters I can remember meeting. Shreve is fast-talking, tough-as-nails, thoughtful and honorable; Jack is quiet, gentle, scarred but indomitable. Their adventures hopping trains and sneaking across the country to unravel the mysteries of the plot are part Huck Finn, part X-Men. The scary stuff in this book -- and there's some really scary stuff here -- goes beyond the usual scares of kids' horror, and is truly the stuff of nightmares. This is a book that mesmerizes like a venomous snake, and while it comes to something of a conclusion at the end of 264 too-short pages, I was delighted to learn that it is only book one of a trilogy. I'll be on the watch for the next two volumes.

The Twelve-Fingered Boy

Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong: YA graphic novel about robots, romance and school elections

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 07 May 2013 12:45:52 +0000

Back in September 2012, I posted about Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong, a fantastic YA graphic novel about robotics, cheerleaders, and school council elections adapted by Faith Erin Hicks (a favorite of mine, thanks to great comics like Zombies Calling, Friends With Boys) from a YA novel by Prudence Shen. Hicks and her publisher, the ever-excellent FirstSecond, serialized the comic on the Web through much of 2012/13, and now they've published the book between covers.

Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong is a beautifully told story about a pair of unlikely friends: Charlie, a jock who is nevertheless rather uncompetitive, and Nate, a high-strung roboticist and head of the school robots team. The story kicks off with a conflict: the cheerleaders and the robots kids are squaring off to convince the student council to allocate crucial budget to each of them, and there's only enough for one. Nate decides he's going to solve the problem directly by getting himself elected council president. The cheerleaders retaliate by running Charlie against him, bulldozing him into the job with their military discipline and formidable organization. After the elections shenanigans get out of hand, they make an uneasy peace, predicated on the idea that if the robotics kids use some of the cheerleaders' money to militarize their prized robot, they can win enough at the robot games to pay for both teams' necessaries.

What follows is the most epic robot battle in comics history. Seriously. Screw the Transformers. Hicks's illustrated robot war makes use of every one of the comics creator's tricks to accomplish something genuinely pulse-pounding. It's like a killer mecha ate a copy of Understanding Comics.

Woven into all this is a series of relationship stories that are well-told, and provide richness and texture and depth to the story, reaffirming Hicks's position as an awesomesauce dispenser of great skill and reliability.

Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong

Pirate Cinema up for Canada's Aurora Award

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 17:36:51 +0000

The 2013 Prix Aurora Award ballot has been announced, and I'm delighted to see that my novel Pirate Cinema is up for the prize in the Young Adult category. The Auroras are a people's choice award given for Canadian science fiction and fantasy, and I'm delighted to be recognised in the land of my birth! The whole ballot is a great signpost to some wonderful Canadian literature, and the young adult section is particularly strong:

Best YA Novel – English
Above by Leah Bobet, Arthur A. Levine Books/Scholastic
The Calling by Kelley Armstrong, Harper Teen
Dissolve by Neil Godbout, Bundoran Press
Mik Murdoch, Boy Superhero by Michell Plested, Five Rivers
Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow, TOR Teen
Under My Skin: Wildlings Series (Book 1) by Charles de Lint, Razorbill Canada

2013 Aurora Ballot Announced

Audio from my Homeland tour presentation

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 16:00:46 +0000

Thomas "Command Line" Gideon came out for the DC stop on my Homeland tour, at Busboys and Poets, and mic'ed me up for the event. He's mastered the audio and posted it. It's a 40 minute talk about the promise of technology to improve our lives, the risks from allowing technology to be used to surveil and control us, and the contributions Aaron Swartz made to this cause and to the book. There's also about 20 minutes of Q&A.

TCLP 2013-03-13 Cory Doctorow on the Themes of “Homeland”

MP3

Subscribe to Command Line podcast (RSS/XML)

Legal issues in Pirate Cinema analyzed by IP lawyer

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 15:18:31 +0000

IP lawyer Stuart Langley wrote a fantastic analysis of the legal issues raised in my novel Pirate Cinema a guest-article for the wonderful Law and the Multiverse site. Langley does a very thorough job of looking at the real laws and legal problems behind the plot points in the book.

The McCauley’s internet access has been disconnected consistently with what appears to be an implementation of the United Kingdom Digital Economy Act 2010. Implementation of this act has been slow, but is expected to lead to notices and service disruption as early as 2014. The implementing code of this act obligates ISPs to respond to copyright infringement reports by notice to subscribers, maintain a list of subscribers that have received notices which can be disclosed to copyright owners under court order, and degrade or deny service to repeat offenders. The technical measures imposed by the law will be appealable; on paper the appeal processes appear designed to protect subscribers, however, the regulations on the appeal process have not yet been published. This foundational scenario in Pirate Cinema is plausible.
But whether it is acceptable to cut off internet access as punishment for violating how that service is used is another question. Because of the disconnection Trent’s father cannot find work, his mother cannot find medical care, and his sister’s schooling suffers. Is internet access is a public utility that should be more difficult to disconnect than summary and unilateral administrative action? As explained in Jim Rossi’s article Universal Service in Competitive Retail Electric Power Markets: Whither the Duty to Serve? 21 Energy L.J. 27 (2000), common law principles express a public utility having a higher obligation to provide service—to provide extraordinary levels of service, especially to small residential customers. These obligations include the duty to extend service, provide continuing reliable service, provide advanced notice of disconnection and to continue service even though a customer cannot make full payment. Public utilities can have terms of service and can terminate service for violations, commonly payment and safety related transgressions. One U.S. city proposed to cut off utility service for failure to pay speeding tickets, although using utility service as a tool to enforce other regulations seems very unusual and inconsistent with the common law “duty to serve”. The question posed by Pirate Cinema is timely as governments try to regulate internet access, they do so by treating it as a public utility. This will be a double edged sword in that one treated as a utility, society should, perhaps, have a higher duty to provide internet access and similarly higher barriers before disconnecting service, including greater due process and evidentiary protections for subscribers.

Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow

A boast

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 22:07:37 +0000

My latest novel Homeland just hit the New York Times bestseller list for the fourth week running. That is all.

Homeland interviews

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 05 Mar 2013 06:19:05 +0000

A pair of nice interviews about my new novel Homeland hit the Web today: this fun chat with Rob "CmdrTaco" Malda on the Washington Post, and this one with David Klein at Las Vegas City Life:

It’s about conveying your enthusiasm. My readers like that enthusiastic voice. The dirty secret about geeking out is that it becomes a meditation. What starts as a frivolous “whatever” and people go, “whatever, look at that guy with too much time on his hands” becomes a meditation. Thinking about anything and doing it well becomes meditative.

Impulse: At long last, a new Jumper novel from Steven Gould

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 16:30:46 +0000

After a delay of too many years, Steven Gould has penned another Jumper novel. Impulse picks up where the excellent Reflex left off, with Davy and Millie -- a couple who possess the power to teleport -- living in exile, hiding away from the sadistic, power-hungry plutocrats who would enslave them and use them to increase their corrupt power.

But now Davy and Millie have an adolescent daughter, Cent (short for Millicent), and she's not happy living in an isolated cabin in the Yukon with a pair of teleports who are her only means of getting to civilization. Though there are some perks: when Mom and Dad take her shopping, it's as apt to be in Tokyo or Sydney as at the local Sears.

Cent's parents are understandably (over)protective of her. They've been hunted like animals, tortured, gassed, shot, by the conspiracy of wealth and privilege that would turn them into property. The last thing they want is for their daughter to be hunted too -- especially since Cent can't teleport.

And then she does. Once Cent comes into the family gift, things change. Her demand to be put into a regular school, to have friends, and a semblance of a normal life, is finally taken seriously by her parents. After all, if Cent doesn't get what she wants, she might just jump away and take it.

What proceeds is a book with the twin geniuses of Steven C Gould novels: first, a plot that roars along at 150mph without a pause for breath (I read Impulse over the course of about three hours, without a break); second, a fantastic, fresh, thoroughgoing explanation of the untapped possibilities of a old science fictional idea made new by an imaginative approach. As with the other Jumper books, Gould plays out the possibilities of teleportation with a combination of physics tutorials and spycraft that is absolutely enthralling.

Watching Cent get into (and out of) trouble, fall in love, battle bullies, and even intervene in humanitarian disasters is a pure delight. Gould shows us that with the right mixture of creativity and rigor, any idea can be spun out in a thousand fascinating ways.

This is a marvellous, if long overdue, installment in a series that I love to pieces. Now, if only Gould would return to his (equally wonderful) Seventh Sigma world!

Impulse

Cory coming to Lawrence, KS tonight!

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 14:11:47 +0000

Hey, Lawrence, KS! I'm giving the Richard W. Gunn Memorial Lecture tonight at Alderson Auditorium, University of Kansas Student Union at 730PM. Tomorrow, I finish the Homeland tour in Toronto, with a 7PM appearance at the Merril Collection. Come on out and say hi before I go home to London!

Akata Witch: young adult hero's journey of a Nigerian witch

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:51:57 +0000

World Fantasy Award-winning novelist Nnedi Okorafor's debut young adult novel is Akata Witch, a beautifully wrought hero's journey story about Sunny, a young girl with albinism born to Nigerian parents in America, and then returned to Nigeria, where she discovers that she is a Leopard Person -- a born sorcerer.

The structure of Sunny's journey to mastery of her wild talent is familiar enough, the stuff of much-loved Rowling and Duane novels. But the world of Leopard People, beautifully presented by Okorafor, makes it sing with freshness. The increasingly difficult challenges that Sunny and her three friends -- a coven predicted in legend and come to Nigeria just in time to save the world from a murdering sorcerer bent on apocalypse -- are each more fascinating and pulse-pounding than the last, and the magic they practice has that dream-logic plausibility of the best fantasy.

Young readers and adults who try Akata Witch will find it a marvellous and uplifting read, heartwarming in its portrayal of true freindship, heartbreaking in its portrayal of headstrong youth and the perils of pride. Woven throughout is an implicit commentary on America's relationship to Africa, the distinct identities of African Americans, Nigerians, and other West Africans, and the adolescent pain of trying to please your family even as you are discovering yourself. Highly recommended.

Akata Witch

Coming to Albuquerque today!

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 14:09:54 +0000

Hey, Albuquerque! I'm at the South Broadway Cultural Center tonight at 6PM. Tomorrow, I'm in Lawrence, KS and then my final stop, Toronto. Come on out!

Cory in Cambridge, Mass tonight!

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 14:02:56 +0000

Hey, Cambridge, Mass! I'm speaking at Harvard Books tonight at 7PM! Tomorrow I'll be in Albuquerque, then in Lawrence, KS and Toronto. Come on out and say hi!

Cory in Washington, DC tonight!

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 12:06:41 +0000

Hey, DC! I'm speaking at Busboys and Poets tonight at 7PM! Tomorrow I'll be in Cambridge, Mass; then Albuquerque (and more!)

Cory coming to Concord, NH today!

Cory Doctorow — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 14:08:05 +0000

Hey, Concord, NH! I'm at Gibson's Bookstore today at 3PM. Tomorrow, I'm in DC, then Cambridge, MA. Come on out!

Cory in Portsmouth, NH tonight

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 23 Feb 2013 13:54:59 +0000

Hey, Portsmouth, NH! I'll be at RiverRun Books tonight at 7PM (I'll also be at the Liberty Forum in Nashua). Tomorrow, I'm in Concord, before heading to DC. There's plenty more to come, too! Tell your friends!

Cory in Austin tonight!

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 13:32:49 +0000

Hey, Austin! I'm in town today, doing an event at Book People at 7PM, and then an EFF-Austin benefit. Saturday, I'm in Portsmouth, NH, then on Sunday I'm in Nashua, NH.

Cory in Houston today!

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 13:46:40 +0000

Hey, Houston! I'll be at Brazos Bookstore tonight at 7PM with my new novel Homeland. Tomorrow, I'll be in Austin at Bookpeople and then a benefit for EFF-Austin, and then I'm heading north to New Hampshire where I'll be at RiverRun Books and the Liberty Forum. And there's still many more cities!

Cory in New Orleans today!

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 14:11:30 +0000

Hey, New Orleans! At this very moment, I'm flying your way for an event tonight at Octavia Books at 6PM. Tomorrow, I'll be in Houston, and then to Austin for a bookstore event and a benefit for EFF-Austin. I'm not done, either: there's plenty more cities left! Come on down and say hi!

Free CC-licensed ebook of Homeland is live!

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 16:43:31 +0000

After nearly two weeks on the road, I've finally resolved the niggling technical issues I was having with the free, CC-licensed electronic edition of Homeland. Many, many thanks to Nat Torkington and Ralph Amissah for their invaluable assistance. You can download and share the free ebooks from the official Homeland site. Go nuts!

Cory in Memphis tonight!

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 13:37:31 +0000

Hey, Memphis! I'm appearing tonight at The Booksellers at Laurelwood at 6PM! Tomorrow, I'll be in New Orleans, followed by Houston on Thursday. And lots more to come!

Cory in Oxford, MS this afternoon

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 18 Feb 2013 13:37:50 +0000

Hey, Oxford, MS! I'm coming to town today, and signing at Square Books at 5PM on the tour for my new book Homeland. I'll be in Memphis tomorrow, and then I go to New Orleans on Tuesday. Though I can hardly believe it, the tour is only halfway along, and there's tons more stops to come.

Cory in Decatur today

Cory Doctorow — Sun, 17 Feb 2013 14:20:40 +0000

Hey, Decatur! I'm coming to town today on the tour for my new novel, Homeland; I'll be at the Decatur Library at 7PM. Then, on Monday I'll be in Oxford, MS, followed by Memphis on Tuesday. There's many more cities to go!

Video from my book tour: Cincinnati presentation

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 16 Feb 2013 17:00:33 +0000

Kevin Loughin came out to my Homeland tour-stop in Cincinnati on Valentine's Day and made a great video of the presentation and Q&A. He was kind enough to post it to YouTube -- thanks, Kevin!

Cory Doctorow talk on Homeland.

Cory in Miami tonight!

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 15 Feb 2013 13:49:25 +0000

Hey, Miami! I'm about to head to the airport for my appearance tonight at Books & Books. Tomorrow I'll be in Chapel Hill at Flyleaf Books, and on Sunday I'll be in Decatur at the Decatur Library (sponsored by Little Shop of Stories). There's still plenty more cities to go, too!

Homeland just made the New York Times bestseller list!

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 22:08:01 +0000

Indiebound list, too! Life is good where I am.

Cory in Cincinnati tomorrow

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 13:38:36 +0000

Hey folks! Just a reminder that I'll be in romantic Cincinnati tomorrow night at 7PM at Joseph-Beth for the next stop of my Homeland tour. From there, it's Miami and Chapel Hill (and tons more).

Interview with Rick Kleffel about Homeland

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 01:11:51 +0000

Last week I sat down for an interview with Rick Kleffel at KQED in San Francisco. He's put the whole interview -- a long one! -- up in his Trashotron podcast feed. We talked about Homeland and other things. Rick, as always, was a very astute interviewer.

MP3 link

Letter from a young Homeland reader

Cory Doctorow — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 20:50:46 +0000

As you've no doubt gleaned, I'm on tour with my new novel, Homeland. A lot of people commiserate with me about the grueling pace -- and it is! a new city practically every day and nowhere near enough sleep and continuous interviews and presentations from o-dark hundred to late at night -- but for all that, it's actually something I love. That's because I get to meet readers, especially young readers (I do a lot of school presentations) and readers tell me about how my books have affected them, and it's generally both humbling and delightful.

But every now and again, I hear from a reader whose description of her or his experience with my work leaves me, well, speechless. This is one such letter, from a young man named Brian, who emailed me this morning, and graciously gave me permission to post his letter. I'm posting it to let you know -- and to remind me -- that for all that touring is sometimes a lot of work, the end result is that my books end up in the hands of people for whom they can be revelatory. It's such an awesome responsibility, and such a wonderful one. Thank you, Brian.

I started reading Homeland the day it came out, and finished it the day after. I had it on pre-order on my kindle, which I proceeded to bring with me everywhere for the following two days. I have read Little Brother, For The Win, Pirate Cinema, and Chicken Little. Each one amazed me (though Chicken Little is slightly less related to my point). By the time I got to the last page of Homeland, I was incensed. I didn’t have time to read the afterword, I was going to get started right away!
I looked up TrueCrypt, and was shocked to find it actually existed. Immediately downloaded. I had known about TOR before, but hadn’t thought much about it. My next move was to install it into my TC drive and begin using it. I found out about the CryptoParty movement, and I’m trying to figure out a Party in my hometown.
My point is, your book introduced me to practical cryptography and to a side of the movement for “freedom of people,” as you called it, that I had never before seen.
And then I read the afterword.
Related to my cryptography search, I had recently re-read some of the news articles and documents pertaining to Aaron’s suicide. The moment I saw his name on the afterword, I put the book down and started crying. I’m not normally a person to cry, but I couldn’t take it right then. Slowly, I picked my kindle back up and started reading again. As I read, tears welled in my eyes. I was very moved by your book, but (with all respect), these words from beyond the grave – from a real person beyond the grave – affected me more than any book ever could.
I didn’t know Aaron personally, but even so that passage made me cry. I can’t say I know how you felt, but I can say that I think it would have been hard for me to include his afterword. I’m damn grateful you chose to keep it. It is even more important now. When I read it, I was touched, but I was also pissed. My immediate, gut reaction was that no one has the right to do that to someone. The attacks and case against him were ridiculous, and I hope those who targeted him feel ashamed. My ensuing reaction was to do something, to really get out and do something. What, I’m not quite sure: I don’t know many internet activists, and my hometown isn’t exactly the center of internet activism, but that’s what the internet’s for, isn’t it? The internet lets anyone anywhere join in global movements that impassion them, and now I’m ready to join in a global initiative toward freedom on the internet across the world.
So, to summarize: your book worked. I read the Huffington Post article of an excerpt of their interview with you. Well, I am your ideal kid: I’m 14, here in 2013, and I my reaction was to “rush to a search engine and figure out proxies, free/open operating systems, freedom of information requests, local makerspaces, campaigns for political accountability…the whole package.” (Well, really I’m still working on some of those.)
Anonymous

Cory in Tempe, AZ today on the Homeland tour!

Cory Doctorow — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 16:24:32 +0000

I'm heading to Tempe, AZ today for a 2PM appearance at Changing Hands Bookstore on my tour for Homeland, the sequel to Little Brother. Next I'll be in NYC for the Tools of Change publishing conference, then in Cincinnati for a romantic Feb 14 presentation at Joseph-Beth Booksellers at 7PM. There's plenty more stops on the tour: here's the schedule for the whole odyssey!

Instructables based on Little Brother and Homeland

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 09 Feb 2013 22:41:22 +0000

The awesome people at Instructables have launched a series of HOWTOs based on my novel Homeland, written from the point of view of Marcus, the novel's hero. They previously posted 11 of these for Little Brother, and the new Homeland ones should be kicking off any day. Watch this space!

m1k3y's Instructables