Plugging into the geek world

Have to keep up, otherwise my view of SF/F could look like this.

OK, that was some excitement yesterday, what with The Daedalus Incident now available for pre-order and the unveiling of the cover and all. You know what’s distracting? Amazon sales rankings. The book doesn’t come out for another six months, but there I am, looking and going, wow, someone is actually BUYING MY BOOK.

Now that the shock and awe have worn off, I’m back to reality, which includes revising a short story, considering revisions for a second, and pondering just when I’m going to get the sequel to The Daedalus Incident off the back burner. These are, of course, good problems to have, considering that I’m a soon-to-be published novelist. Someone wants to read my fiction, and that’s a beautiful thing.

I’ve also been spending time becoming better immersed in geek culture and getting myself up to speed on what’s happening and who’s doing what. Yes, I’m a proud geek, but I also have limited time in which to geek out. I’ve had to do some refreshing. So without further ado, here are some of the sites I use to keep up to date on all things SF/F and geek, particularly those things with a literary bent.

• io9.com: When it comes to a single source of aggregated geek-inflected news, io9 is the best I’ve found. If it’s in the geekosphere, it’ll be on io9, generally sooner rather than later.
• SFSignal: The 2012 Hugo Award winner for best fanzine, so you know it’s got to be good. Very good about aggregating news about the latest SF/F books, with other treats thrown in there, and their book reviewers are great. I just participated in a mind meld on the site, and I’m looking forward to going back for more.
• Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America: SFWA is an excellent resource for any writer, let alone SF/F scribes. Their blogs specialize in issues that affect writers, from warnings about sketchy publishers to advice on managing taxes on freelance income. Yes, I will be joining them soon as I’m able. And then I will squee like a little girl.
• Whatever: If you don’t know who John Scalzi is, then go check out his blog. Scalzi is the president of SFWA and an outstanding SF/F writer, but he’s equally adept at commentary on just about anything that catches his eye, whether it’s geek culture or issues of national importance or something about cats.

If I hit those sites regularly, I’m pretty much up on whatever I need to consider myself versed in the world in which I participate as a writer. There are plenty of others out there, and I will occasionally stumble upon them thanks to all the good folks I follow on Twitter. Also, the links at the right on this page — and all my blog pages — are worth perusing, in my opinion. And I also regularly follow sites that have nothing to do with SF/F or geekery. Heresy, I recognize.

That said, I need to do better in getting my geek on. I should be listening to more podcasts, and I know there are sites that have great material that I’m missing out on. So I’ll throw it out to you, gentle readers: where do you go to get your fix of SF/F book news, geek culture tidbits and general awesomeness? Got a favorite author site? How about a fanzine? Short story venue? Comment below and share with the class.