/ / News, Podcast

Here’s part twenty-six of my new reading of my novel Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town (you can follow all the installments, as well as the reading I did in 2008/9, here).

This is easily the weirdest novel I ever wrote. Gene Wolfe (RIP) gave me an amazing quote for it: “Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town is a glorious book, but there are hundreds of those. It is more. It is a glorious book unlike any book you’ve ever read.”

Here’s how my publisher described it when it came out:


Alan is a middle-aged entrepeneur who moves to a bohemian neighborhood of Toronto. Living next door is a young woman who reveals to him that she has wings—which grow back after each attempt to cut them off.

Alan understands. He himself has a secret or two. His father is a mountain, his mother is a washing machine, and among his brothers are sets of Russian nesting dolls.

Now two of the three dolls are on his doorstep, starving, because their innermost member has vanished. It appears that Davey, another brother who Alan and his siblings killed years ago, may have returned, bent on revenge.

Under the circumstances it seems only reasonable for Alan to join a scheme to blanket Toronto with free wireless Internet, spearheaded by a brilliant technopunk who builds miracles from scavenged parts. But Alan’s past won’t leave him alone—and Davey isn’t the only one gunning for him and his friends.

Whipsawing between the preposterous, the amazing, and the deeply felt, Cory Doctorow’s Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town is unlike any novel you have ever read.

MP3

/ / News, Podcast

When my daughter Poesy was four, her nursery school let us know that they were shutting down a day before my wife’s office closed for the holidays, leaving us with a childcare problem. Since I worked for myself, I took the day off and brought her to my office, where we recorded a short podcast, singing Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (a frankly amazing rendition!).

We’ve done it every year since, except for 2016 when I had mic problems. Now she’s 12, and we’ve just recorded our eighth installment, and as always, it was a highlight of my holiday season. She says that singing is way too cringe, so instead she’s got a ten-minute tutorial on how to ride a horse.

Here’s this year’s recording, and here are the years gone by:

/ / Podcast

Here’s part twenty-five of my new reading of my novel Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town (you can follow all the installments, as well as the reading I did in 2008/9, here).

This is easily the weirdest novel I ever wrote. Gene Wolfe (RIP) gave me an amazing quote for it: “Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town is a glorious book, but there are hundreds of those. It is more. It is a glorious book unlike any book you’ve ever read.”

Here’s how my publisher described it when it came out:


Alan is a middle-aged entrepeneur who moves to a bohemian neighborhood of Toronto. Living next door is a young woman who reveals to him that she has wings—which grow back after each attempt to cut them off.

Alan understands. He himself has a secret or two. His father is a mountain, his mother is a washing machine, and among his brothers are sets of Russian nesting dolls.

Now two of the three dolls are on his doorstep, starving, because their innermost member has vanished. It appears that Davey, another brother who Alan and his siblings killed years ago, may have returned, bent on revenge.

Under the circumstances it seems only reasonable for Alan to join a scheme to blanket Toronto with free wireless Internet, spearheaded by a brilliant technopunk who builds miracles from scavenged parts. But Alan’s past won’t leave him alone—and Davey isn’t the only one gunning for him and his friends.

Whipsawing between the preposterous, the amazing, and the deeply felt, Cory Doctorow’s Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town is unlike any novel you have ever read.

MP3

/ / Attack Surface, News, Podcast


The Attack Surface Lectures were a series of eight panel discussions on the themes in my novel Attack Surface, each hosted by a different bookstore and each accompanied by a different pair of guest speakers.

This program is “Tech in SF” hosted by Interabang Books in Dallas, TX, with guest-hosts Annalee Newitz and Ken Liu. It was recorded on October 20, 2020.

Here is the original Youtube link for this program. Please consider subscribing to Interabang’s Youtube channel for access to all their outstanding author events!

MP3

/ / Podcast

How to Fix the Internet is EFF’s amazing new podcast: nuanced discussions of tech law and ethics with incredible experts, interviewed and contextualized by EFF executive director Cindy Cohn and strategy director Danny O’Brien.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/11/13/said-no-one-ever/#fix-it

I devoured the first three episodes. I mean, I started working with EFF nearly 19 years ago (!) but I was learning SO MUCH from them.

Today, the episode I recorded dropped. I’ve never been in such august company.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/11/podcast-episode-control-over-users-competitors-and-critics

Our discussion is about the role interoperability plays in helping technology users exercise self-determination, giving them alternatives to bad moderation, abusive lock-in, and poor security choices.

And about how companies love interop when they’re trying to eat another company’s lunch, but then they love to take it away once they win, because without interop, companies can control their customers, critics and competitors.

You can get How to Fix the Internet in your favorite podcatcher. Here’s the RSS:

https://efforg.libsyn.com/rss

and here’s the MP3 for my episode:

https://ia601407.us.archive.org/10/items/eff-podcast-episode-4-interroperability/EFF_Podcast_Episode4_Interroperability.mp3

/ / Attack Surface, News, Podcast

The Attack Surface Lectures were a series of eight panel discussions on the themes in my novel Attack Surface, each hosted by a different bookstore and each accompanied by a different pair of guest speakers.

This program is “Sci-Fi Genre” hosted by Fountain Books in Richmond, VA, with guest-hosts Sarah Gailey and Chuck Wendig. It was recorded on October 16, 2020.


Here is the original Youtube link for this program. Please consider subscribing to Fountain Books’s Youtube channel for access to all their outstanding author events!

MP3

/ / Podcast

Here’s part twenty-four of my new reading of my novel Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town (you can follow all the installments, as well as the reading I did in 2008/9, here).

This is easily the weirdest novel I ever wrote. Gene Wolfe (RIP) gave me an amazing quote for it: “Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town is a glorious book, but there are hundreds of those. It is more. It is a glorious book unlike any book you’ve ever read.”

Here’s how my publisher described it when it came out:


Alan is a middle-aged entrepeneur who moves to a bohemian neighborhood of Toronto. Living next door is a young woman who reveals to him that she has wings—which grow back after each attempt to cut them off.

Alan understands. He himself has a secret or two. His father is a mountain, his mother is a washing machine, and among his brothers are sets of Russian nesting dolls.

Now two of the three dolls are on his doorstep, starving, because their innermost member has vanished. It appears that Davey, another brother who Alan and his siblings killed years ago, may have returned, bent on revenge.

Under the circumstances it seems only reasonable for Alan to join a scheme to blanket Toronto with free wireless Internet, spearheaded by a brilliant technopunk who builds miracles from scavenged parts. But Alan’s past won’t leave him alone—and Davey isn’t the only one gunning for him and his friends.

Whipsawing between the preposterous, the amazing, and the deeply felt, Cory Doctorow’s Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town is unlike any novel you have ever read.

MP3

/ / Attack Surface, News, Podcast

The Attack Surface Lectures were a series of eight panel discussions on the themes in my novel Attack Surface, each hosted by a different bookstore and each accompanied by a different pair of guest speakers.

This program is “OpSec & Personal Cyber-Security: How Can You Be Safe?” hosted by Third Place Books in Seattle, WA, with guest-hosts Runa Sandvik and Window Snyder​. It was recorded on October 22, 2020.

Here is the original Youtube link for this program. Please consider subscribing to Third Place’s Youtube channel for access to all their outstanding author events!

MP3

/ / Articles, News, Podcast

The Attack Surface Lectures were a series of eight panel discussions on the themes in my novel Attack Surface, each hosted by a different bookstore and each accompanied by a different pair of guest speakers.

This program is “Little Revolutions,” hosted by Skylight Books in Los Angeles, with guest-hosts Tochi Onyebuchi and Bethany C. Morrow. It was recorded on October 21, 2020.

Here is a link to this presentation in Skylight’s archive of author events. Please consider subscribing to Skylight’s feed of these videos to see other outstanding author events!

MP3

/ / Attack Surface, News, Podcast

The Attack Surface Lectures were a series of eight panel discussions on the themes in Cory Doctorow’s novel Attack Surface, each hosted by a different bookstore and each accompanied by a different pair of guest speakers.

This program is “Cyberpunk and Post-Cyberpunk,” hosted by Anderson’s Books in Naperville, IL, with guest-hosts Bruce Sterling and Christopher Brown. It was recorded on October 19, 2020.

Here is the original Youtube link for this program. Please consider subscribing to Anderson’s Youtube channel for access to all their outstanding author events!

MP3