Listed!

Big news! I am now on the active waiting list for a single lung transplant! This would be at the Brigham in Boston. It means I can expect a phone call at any hour of the day or night: today, next week, next year, whenever a donated lung becomes available that’s a good match for me. The matching algorithm is quite complex, all designed to optimize outcomes for the maximum number of people. This is both exciting and scary. And the wait is likely to be nail-biting.

When the call comes, I will drop whatever I am doing and vanish from the grid for a while: a few weeks in the hospital, and then home if I am lucky or to rehab if less lucky. My support staff is gearing up: wife, daughters, son-in-law, dogs…and numerous friends have offered to pitch in with meals, etc. The total recovery time is measured in months.

I am keenly aware that my good fortune, when it comes, will be due to someone else’s misfortune. I will be getting the lung of someone who generously decided to become an organ donor upon their premature death. It’s a sobering thought. When the time comes, I hope the family of the donor will take comfort in knowing that as a side effect of their loss, someone else was given life. A hard comfort, perhaps.

Cue the Moody Blues: “Watching and Waiting.”

 

 

Time for another special: The ebook of The Rapture Effect is available on BookBub for $0.99 for a limited time! (Subscribe to BookBub for free to access amazing ebook deals from your favorite authors.) Snag The Rapture Effect while the sale is hot.

And don’t forget: I have a bundle of audiobooks from the Star Rigger Universe on sale now at Chirpbooks! And–hey!–The Rapture Effect is in there, as well! You can’t lose!

 

Almost Listed! (So Close)

I’ve been waiting for a couple of months now to see if I’ll be listed as eligible for a lung transplant. I got the news this week—I’ve been approved! Yaaaay!!

Er, almost. I’ve been approved, pending (what now?)… an allergy consultation to see how allergic I really am to certain antibiotics that over the years have given me rashes or sneezing fits or whatever. Why do they care about this, of all things? It’s because a transplant means immunosuppression to prevent rejection of the new lung. And that means they need all the tools they can get to treat any infections that might come along. So, a couple more weeks, to see what the allergist says. And then, hopefully… then we can wait to see if the insurance company signs off on it. And then be listed.

So close…

Rig to the Stars!

Rig the starways with a cantankerous catlike alien named Cephean, in Star Rigger’s Way—now available in a brand-new audiobook narration by Stefan Rudnicki, wherever you like to buy your audiobooks!

Star Rigger’s Way was my second published novel, but the first by a widely recognized SF publishing line, Dell SF. It was the book that put the Star Rigger Universe on the map for a lot of readers. Though there was previously an audiobook version available on Audible, I took that one down a while ago, to make room for a much-improved narration.

You can get it steeply discounted, right now, at Chirpbooks, for a limited time. And not just this book; I’ve got others, as well:

Do you want to rig the stars with a dragon named Highwing? As part of the same special, you can get a crazy discount on Dragons in the Stars, narrated by the remarkable Gabrielle de Cuir. Fly now! The stars are waiting!

No Kings (Patriots at Work)

posted in: public affairs 10

A few hours ago, we were standing at the edge of Battlefield Green in Lexington, Mass., where the American Revolution began. This time, it wasn’t King George we were fighting, but the man whose obsession with destroying everything that makes America great is crushing the life out of our democracy. We stood with a large crowd, in one of the countless No Kings rallies being mirrored in cities and towns across the country. It was completely peaceful, and in a quiet way, uplifting.

An important study shows that democracies can stand strong when just 3.5% of a population nonviolently protests authoritarianism in a sustained manner. That is, taking to the streets, peacefully, for as many times as it takes. Three and a half percent. It is time that the true patriots and believers in the common good do just that. Stop the madness! No more fascism.

Here are some views of the Lexington No Kings rally. Let’s hope this is just the beginning.

 

Speaking of Audiobooks: Panglor Breaks Loose

My third novel, Panglor, sets the stage for the discovery of starship rigging—the very heart of my Star Rigger Universe. Panglor has been unavailable in audiobook for a while, since I withdrew an earlier version from circulation. Well, that’s all changed. A new edition, narrated by Stefan Rudnicki, has erupted from an interstellar foreshortening field to burst into view. The book is well reviewed by Kindle readers, and this is a great reading. It’s already in most audiobook stores, and will be in Audible shortly.

Come take a ride with Panglor, Alo, and LePiep the ou-ralot!

Purchase from Apple Audible (soon) Chirp Scribd/Everand Spotify and others.

Huge Sale at Audible!

Audible Audiobooks is running a sitewide sale for the next few days, with all audiobooks discounted, and some  discounted a lot. Two of mine that are steeply discounted are Neptune Crossing and Dragon Rigger, at just $7.49 each. Other books have something knocked off the regular prices. This is a great opportunity to stock up—not just on my books but any of your favorite authors.

Note: If you search on an author’s name and see all their titles lined up, you won’t see the discounted prices. You have to click each title to see the sale price.

Time for some serious listenin’.    

Home from the Hills

I’m home from the Brigham after six days in the hospital for lung-transplant evaluation. I survived all the tests they could throw at me, ranging from neuropsych to colonoscopy to arterial catheterization… to trying to sleep in a hospital room with lights going on and off all the time, and beep! beep! beep!  As far as I can tell, I passed all the tests, with the exception of getting a decent night’s sleep. That one I failed. The only test outstanding is an esophageal swallowing test, which they had trouble scheduling. I scheduled it myself after I got home. Also, I need to meet with a surgeon. When those are done, The Committee will meet to decide my fate—i.e., whether I get listed for a lung transplant, and what ranking.

There was a contingent of docs that wanted me to stay in the hospital through it all, right up through actually getting a lung (or two). Their reasoning was that I could suddenly go downhill at any time (an exacerbation, they call it), and become acute. While acknowledging that risk, I declined to stay, on the grounds that sitting in a hospital doing nothing is a terrible way to stay healthy, and that I would be safer, healthier, and in a better mental state at home where I can exercise, do my work, and live life. And not wear out my support team before anything has even happened.

I am hopeful about getting listed and about having the operation. It’s a daunting prospect, most daunting of all (in my mind) a lifetime of immunosuppression to avoid rejection. I like my healthy immune system. But those are the breaks. I like even better the thought of breathing freely, and no more oxygen machines. I credit folks on various support groups who have enthusiastically embraced their lung-transplant experiences for turning me around on this. Thanks, guys.

I’m ready. Bring it on.

What look? It’s the only one I’ve got.

 

Next Up—Lung Transplant?

Maybe. Here I sit at Brigham Hospital, waiting for an “expedited evaluation” for a lung transplant operation. This is based upon a meeting with the medical director of the lung transplant program, who suggested that the time is right for me now, before I get any worse and while I’m strong enough to get through it in good shape. (If you’re just joining us, I have pulmonary fibrosis, a kind of scarring of the lungs, and my choices are to undergo a slow decline until it kills me, or risk a lung transplant—if I qualify.)

I checked in twenty-four hours ago for a battery of tests, but unfortunately, not much has happened yet. I am sitting here, bored, typing on my tablet. Got tired of watching TV on my tablet. I should be reviewing the new recording of Panglor on my phone, but I couldn’t concentrate.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow it’s going to start happening. That’s what they tell me. I hope they’re right.

 

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