So It Begins

The last month has been filled with “You’re going to do what?” moments. I won’t bore you with them. I’ve got a few more things happening this week and next before they start the actual treatments on June 13.

Status

Everything is on hold. I have put the Cat on the side beside me in my chair to keep my company.* If I can write at all, I’m going to work on the three new Ishmael books. I have zero expectations that I’m going to be able to focus on them.

What Am I Reading?

I ripped through the latest Backyard Starship books from Chaney and Maggert, discovered some interesting paranormal work – Afterlife Academy from Arizona Tape, and found a quirky space opera from M. R. Forbes called Starship for Sale. I may get back to that in a bit so I’ll hold off on it for the moment. All these are really good, and about what you’d expect me to be reading.

Then there’s T. Thorn Coyle’s Bookshop Witch. It’s completely outside my normal envelope and perhaps that’s why I enjoyed it so much. Paranormal mystery. Short-ish. Lots of Oregon coast vibe. Thoroughly engaging characters. I sucked it up with a straw and went looking for the next book in the series.

You can read the description but do yourself a favor and grab a sample. See if you’re as enchanted by this story as I was.

Looking Ahead

That sounds a lot better than “Last Words,” doesn’t it?

Treatment will take 7 weeks starting on Monday the 13th. It’s going to be chemo and radiation in tandem and I’ve been warned that it’s rough. I’ve been told to expect a few weeks – possibly, a couple of months – of recuperation after. One piece of advice I got was to focus on what I’ll do afterward. I’ll be looking forward to getting it all behind me, certainly, but my main focus will be “survive today.”

I do plan to keep up posting my monthly updates. I don’t know if I can do more than that. I’d rather under-promise and over-deliver over these next few months.

Thanks to all the people who’ve offered well-wishes. It’s greatly appreciated.

Until next month, safe voyage.

*Ginger Lonergan noted – correctly – that cats are a comfort.

23 thoughts on “So It Begins

  1. Lots of love and you-will-get-through-this vibes for you and your support network. My bff has just gotten to the other side of his chemo/radiation/recuperation year. He kept a list of his “afterwards” plans. On his lowest days, he found it helpful to add an item or two to the list.

  2. Your job now (and it is a job) is to get better, not write books, much as all of us want more books. We love your writing, and frankly, we love you. Anyone who can write the Ishmael books has proven to me that they’re someone worthy of love and caring. When I read of your diagnosis, I started a re-read of the Share books, and it’s given me hope and a positive attitude in a time of stress. So I’d like to remind you to “Trust Lois”, and focus on doing what you need to do to get better.

    Take care, my friend.

  3. Nathan,
    I’ve been listening since the podiobooks days (and then reading). Your works mean a lot to me – thank you so much for them.
    I wish you a fruitful treatment and a swift recovery!

  4. My sister was diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer at the beginning of February 2021. Chemo was tough. She lost a lot of weight (and her hair, and eyebrows, and probably a layer of skin). Radiation was slightly easier. Surgery was a relief. She completed immunotherapy in February ’22. From watching her survive last year: just focus on getting through and getting well. The outside world may have to survive without you for a while.

    She’s in remission, by the way, and no cancer seen in the sentinel nodes post-treatment. Regaining weight (and hair). I wish you the same.

  5. I wish you the best and easiest treatment and convalescence. In 1986, my wife had to undergo six weeks of radiation and 11 months of chemotheraphy. She used several mental support mechanisms to cope with the discomfort. She used visualization in which the radiation and chemotherapy were little white-clad men with brooms, sweeping out the bad cells. She also relied heavily on humor. She said laughter was the best medicine. She must have rented Airplane 20 times in that year.

    I have the greatest respect for people who persevere through the adversity of invasive medical treatment. Give it your all, and you should come out the other side whole, hale and hearty.

  6. Best of luck.
    For your reading list take a look at Victoria Goddard’s Greenwing and Dart series. They are my current comfort rereads.

  7. When you feel down just think “I’ve got a lot of even better writing ahead of me and this is just a temporary interruption.

  8. Do what you need to do, Cap’n. If cussing something out works, do it. You are definitely permitted to say this sucks raw sewage. The writing can wait until you feel ready, we’ll be patient. I hope you find lots of good new books to read during the treatments. I’ve been enjoying Becky Chambers, who started her series with The Long Journey To a Small Angry Planet.

  9. Wishing you all the very best for a speedy recovery. Hope you have some good shipmates by your side helping you through it. Concentrate on yourself for now, we’ll still be here when you are ready to write again

  10. Don’t stress the writing! Take care of yourself, and do whatever gives you a laugh or provides a nice distraction. I hope you feel better soon!

  11. Remember Heinlein did his best work in these similar circumstances. sometimes the best way to get the devil off the porch is to use your creativity to battle this!

  12. As penance for not contributing way back there in the Podiobook days, I’ve now purchased just about every one of your books from Amazon. You are truly a great writer. Please hold on and give us more Ishmael especially. I love the way you give us the basic life of ordinary people who become extraordinary in the story. No interstellar Wars, just friendly people who are helpful to others. I keep wishing when this is all over, I’ll wake up from this bad dream on one of the “Share” solar clipper type ships. What a great universe. Wishing you the very best and Please keep us informed!

  13. “The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men.” I’m so sorry to hear that you’ve been hit with the big C, Focus on healing and getting better, we’ll all still be here when you are ready.

  14. I hope it’s going well. I thought you might be amused by this article on real world saving data to glass.

    War, disease, division—things aren’t looking too rosy for humanity at the moment. But thanks to Microsoft, at least we’ll be listening to Stevie Wonder after the apocalypse. The tech giant is partnering with Elire Group to etch the world’s music onto glass plates, and bury them in a remote arctic mountainside to ride out the end of the world.

    The Global Music Vault will share space with the Global Seed Vault (better known as the Doomsday Vault) in Svalbard, Norway. The Doomsday Vault houses the largest collection of agricultural seeds on the planet. The Global Music Vault aims to match its neighbor seed for song.

    Whereas seeds are prepackaged, music is not. So if eternity is the goal, what’s the best medium for the job? Your laptop or smartphone won’t do. Hard drives last about five years before they start to fail; tape is good for no more than 10 years; and CDs and DVDs last 15 years.

    Microsoft was already working on a long-term storage solution—a technology critical for purposes beyond music—known as Project Silica, when they partnered with Elire. The team can encode music with super-fast laser pulses that etch 3D nanoscale patterns into thin three-inch quartz glass wafers. Each wafer holds 100 gigabytes of music, or a little over 2,000 songs. They may soon hold a terabyte and eventually 10 terabytes or more. To retrieve the data, the team shines polarized light through the glass, and a machine learning algorithm translates the patterns it picks up in the glass back into music.

    Now, about eternity.

    The plates can survive baking, boiling, scouring, flooding, and electromagnetic pulses. (No word on shattering or zombies.) Microsoft estimates the plates, and the data they house, can live up to 10,000 years. “The goal is to be able to store archival and preservation data at cloud scale in glass,” Ant Rowstron, distinguished engineer and deputy lab director at Microsoft Research in Cambridge, told Fast Company.

  15. I hope the chemo works so well and you recover so quick you scare the doctors.

  16. Wishing you a speedy recovery!! (And not just because I can’t wait to read more of your books lol!)

    My Dad said listening to his favorite music helped when he was going through all of his cancer treatments. Maybe put on some tunes and open the curtains/blinds to let the light shine in to your home during the rough patches. Best wishes for you and yours during this time!

  17. Sorry to hear of your diagnosis, glad they have a path forward for you.
    Hoping you recover quickly (and get back to Ishmael. :))
    I have always enjoyed your writing.

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