The postcard has come back! I now know for sure that my manuscript has arrived at DAW Books. Now begins the period of waiting while they analyze its potential. Obviously I’m hoping for a phone call instead of a rejection letter. Keep your fingers crossed!
In the meantime, I’m working hard on editing the second book in my Skytrain series, The Magdalita, and finding out fascinating little factoids in the process. In my fictional world (400 years in the future), all Human spaceships are in the same ‘time zone’, so to speak, to aid in coordination and communication. I had thought to make this common time zone Greenwich Mean Time, but in a foray to Wikipedia, I discovered that Greenwich Mean Time, as an officially observed time, has been replaced by Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). I think Coordinated Universal Time has a snappier ring to it, as far as being future-sounding, so I was quite excited at the discovery.
I know, it doesn’t take much to get me excited!
I felt a similar thrill when I was doing a little research on the first moon landing. In my first book, The Brigand, I have a scene where vandals defile the landing site of Apollo 11 on the 400th anniversary of the first moon landing. I had thought to have one of them destroy the American flag left on the moon by Armstrong and the others, but it turns out there’s a strong possibility it’s not there anymore, or at least no longer standing. General wisdom has it that the flag was most likely blown over by the engine blast of the ascent module as it took off, and that whatever was left has since been destroyed by the degrading affects of the sun. I found that to be a fascinating tidbit, as I’d always thought the flag would still be standing exactly as they’d left it. (No doubt I got this idea from the opening scene of Independence Day.)
SandyWierman 