Scrivening

 "Don't bug him about the blog," writes a commentor with the mysterious and ominous name of Unknown, "he's busy WRITING stuff for you."

For those who may be wondering what TOF is writing, the following is a some-ary; that is, some of what is in progress. Several of them have appeared intermittently as Opening Passages here in this vast wasteland known as the TOF Spot. 

• The Shipwrecks of Time. Set in Milwaukee WI during the early 1960s. This concerns the search for a mysterious medieval text known as the Peruzzi Manuscript. The danger does not so much lie in finding it as in being known to be researching it. Somebody may not want it found.
  This novel is complete and has already been rejected by one publisher. 
• In the Belly of the Whale. Set in a multigenerational starship two centuries into a thousand-year transit to Tau Ceti. The challenge was to find an approach to the subject that has not been over-done. They forgot they were on a ship? Aldiss did that wonderfully in Starship, FTL makes their trip meaningless? Done and done again.
  This novel is also done and is now in the hands of the publisher who requested it. 
• "Adventures in Mythistory." Fact article. How history is recast as myth, with special attention to the Hypatia Myth and to fiction-writing. This article is complete, but languishes in uncertainty as to what to do with it.
• "The New World." Short Story. A small flotilla of junks, sent by Srivijaya to find the southwest passage around Africa to the fabled land of Tai Ch'in. This is complete, but as it is a section in a longer, collaborrative work that may or may not see daylight, needs a little tweeking to enhance a standalonr, Currently steeping.
• "The Journeyman: On the Mangly Steppe." Teodorq sunna Nagarajan accompanies a scouting party setting out to the 'serving tray' to assess its suitability as an observation post to keep an eye on the mangos of the steppe. The party is led by an imperial from the Nooby Empire and includes a troop of imperial rangers, as well as a handful of settlers from the frontier settlement of Stubborn Man plus one local [i.e., pre-settlement] who is unafraid of the ghosts said to haunt the serving tray. Nooby has more advanced technology than Cuffy or Yavalprawns: cap pistols, chuffers anf the singing wire. In Progress.
  
•  "Red Clay Man" A short story in which a H. erectus discovers how to think. In Progress.
• "The Laws of Science and the Ignorant Chicken." A fact article on the Dappled World of Science. In Progress.
•  "Hunter's Moon." Mickey, the POV from "In Panic Town on the Backwards Moon," finds a mysterious death at the Hadley Ran above Falcon's Landing on the Moon. Idle.
• "Mayerling." Kronprinz Rudolf contemplates suicide at his hunting lodge near Mayerling. Idle.