Some interesting developments recently, of an unexpected sort. I’ve finally decided to start working on volume two of my alternate history, which will be called Oculus. It didn’t occur to me for the first volume to check blogs on historical research. This time it did. Occur, that is.
So I typed in Germaine de Stael to see what popped up. I found this about an upcoming conference at, of all places, Washington University here in St. Louis, May 8 – 10, 2009.
Anyway, I promptly emailed Prof. Szmurlo, who is organizing the conference, with a query as to whether or not she would be willing to answer some questions about Madame de Stael. I honestly didn’t expect a response. I explained what I was doing, so immediately I thought I could be dropped in the Crank File (science fiction writer, oh my, one of those) and decided to keep tabs on the blog to see if the results of the conference ended up online.
(Lots of other blogs on de Stael, by the way, but mostly quotes from her writings and excessively short biographies which told me nothing I didn’t already know.)
To my surprise I received a reply that expressed interest in my project, recommended a number of newer books on the subject, and asked if I’d like to attend the conference. Well.
I finished the rough outline yesterday. Donna will go over it this weekend and, if she’s not too tired, will attack it with her usual red pen verve, and the process will commense.
I won’t be needing as much detail as I would get from this conference till the third volume, which will be largely historical, but I’d be a fool to not go.
Other minor details have fallen into place recently regarding this project, so while I am not one to subscribe to any kind of “fate” notions, it seems that the time has come to start this project. What a relief to know what I’ll be doing for the next year or so!
