The Functional Nerds Podcast

The Functional Nerds are back as Patrick Hester welcomes his new CoHost – Tracy Townsend! Tracy is the author of The Nine and The Fall (books 1 and 2 in the Thieves of Fate series), a monthly columnist for the feminist sf magazine Luna Station Quarterly, and an essayist for Uncanny Magazine. She’s the former chair of the English department at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, an elite public boarding school, where she teaches creative writing and science fiction and fantasy literature. She’s been a martial arts instructor, a stage combat and accent coach, a short-order cook for houses full of tired gamers, and now (apparently) a podcast co-host. When she’s actually sitting still, she lives in Bolingbrook, Illinois with two bumptious hounds, two remarkable children, one goblin cat, and a very patient husband.

This week’s picks:

* Tracy: Everdell (Board Game)

* Patrick: Beyond The Trope Podcast

Links:

* Tracy Townsend on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

© 2020 Patrick Hester

In John Anealio’s last regular episode, he and Patrick reminisce about how they got started while commiserating about staying home during the Coronavirus pandemic, how it’s impacting everyone, about the future and more.

Links:

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.

On this week’s Functional Nerds podcast, Patrick and John chat about some big life changes affecting the podcast, including some fantastic news from John, as well as the coronavirus, working from home, Journey and the attempted coup from the drummer and bass player, life, and… You just need to listen to this one, okay?

Links:

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.

This week, Patrick and John welcome Shannon Lawrence, author of a SLEW of horror short stories (see what I did there?), published all over the place and links to which can be found on her website www.thewarriormuse.com.

About Shannon Lawrence: A fan of all things fantastical and frightening, Shannon Lawrence writes in her dungeon when her minions allow, often accompanied by her familiars, Cleopatra and Nefertiti. She writes primarily horror and fantasy. Her stories can be found in several anthologies and magazines, including Space and Time Magazine, Once Upon a Scream, The Literary Hatchet, The Deep Dark Woods, and Dark Moon Digest. Her short story collection, Blue Sludge Blues & Other Abominations, came out March 2018. When she’s not writing, she’s hiking through the wilds of Colorado and photographing her magnificent surroundings. Though she often misses the ocean, the majestic and rugged Rockies are a sight she could never part with. Besides, in Colorado there’s always a place to hide a body or birth a monster. What more could she ask for? Find her at www.thewarriormuse.com.

This week’s picks:

* Shannon: Dark Matter: Reading the Bones edited by Sheree R. Thomas

* Patrick: Hunters (Prime)

Links:

* Shannon Lawrence on Twitter

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.

This week, Patrick and John welcome KB Wagers, author of the Indranan War trilogy, the Farian War trilogy and the new book – A Pale Light In The Black.

About KB Wagers: K.B. Wagers is the author of the Indranan War trilogy as well as There Before the Chaos, the start of the Farian War trilogy with Orbit Books. They hold a bachelor’s degree in Russian Studies and a second-degree blackbelt in Shaolin Kung Fu. A native of Colorado, K.B. lives at the base of the Rocky Mountains with their partner and a crew of recalcitrant cats. In between books, they can be found attempting to learn Spanish, dying in video games, dancing to music, and scribbling new ideas in their bullet journal. They are represented by Andrew Zack of The Zack Company.

About A Pale Light In The Black: For the past year, their close loss in the annual Boarding Games has haunted Interceptor Team: Zuma’s Ghost. With this year’s competition looming, they’re looking forward to some payback—until an unexpected personnel change leaves them reeling. Their best swordsman has been transferred, and a new lieutenant has been assigned in his place.

Maxine Carmichael is trying to carve a place in the world on her own—away from the pressure and influence of her powerful family. The last thing she wants is to cause trouble at her command on Jupiter Station. With her new team in turmoil, Max must overcome her self-doubt and win their trust if she’s going to succeed. Failing is not an option—and would only prove her parents right.

But Max and the team must learn to work together quickly. A routine mission to retrieve a missing ship has suddenly turned dangerous, and now their lives are on the line. Someone is targeting members of Zuma’s Ghost, a mysterious opponent willing to kill to safeguard a secret that could shake society to its core . . . a secret that could lead to their deaths and kill thousands more unless Max and her new team stop them.

Rescue those in danger, find the bad guys, win the Games. It’s all in a day’s work at the NeoG.

This week’s picks:

* KB: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (TV – Disney+)

* Patrick: The Temeraire books by Naomi Novik

* Patreon Pick 1: OMNI Magazine (Amazon) Picked by JT Evans (Note: I couldn’t find a link…)

Links:

* KB Wagers on Twitter

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book:

On this week’s Functional Nerds podcast, Patrick and John chat Star Trek Picard, Discovery, birthdays, music, not having a plan (we’re looking at you, Disney), The New Universe, Brandon Sanderson and more…

Links:

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.

This week, Patrick and John welcome author, Sarah Kozloff, whose Nine Realms epic fantasy quartet is complete and will be released by TOR one a month starting today, February 18th, with A Queen in Hiding!

About Sarah Kozloff: Sarah has spent her life immersed in literature, narrative, and film.

After a degree in English at Dartmouth she worked in film production in NYC. She earned a Ph.D. from an interdisciplinary program at Stanford University, joining the Film Department of Vassar College in 1988. In 2009 she was awarded the William R. Kenan Jr. Endowed Chair.

In 2012, while teaching a senior seminar on American Women Directors, she realized that neither the books nor films of Lord of the Rings could pass the Bechdel Test. That summer, she grabbed her laptop and started imagining a world that awaited the return of the queen.

She didn’t know then that this leap into creative writing would spark a new career. Her epic fantasy quartet, The Nine Realms, is forthcoming from TOR. All four books, A Queen in Hiding, The Queen of Raiders, A Broken Queen, and The Cerulean Queen, will be published January through April 2020.

She lives in the Hudson Valley with her husband and a shifting menagerie of pets, who mistakenly believe they are suitable replacements for grown sons.

About A Queen in Hiding (The Nine Realms Book 1): Orphaned, exiled and hunted, Cerulia, Princess of Weirandale, must master the magic that is her birthright, become a ruthless guerilla fighter, and transform into the queen she is destined to be.

But to do it she must win the favor of the spirits who play in mortal affairs, assemble an unlikely group of rebels, and wrest the throne from a corrupt aristocracy whose rot has spread throughout her kingdom.

This week’s picks:

* Sarah: For All Mankind (Apple TV+)

* John: Reader Come Home:The Reading Brain in a Digital World by MaryAnnE Wolf

* Patrick: Weather by Huey Lewis & The News

* Patreon Pick 1: Locke & Key (NETFLIX) Picked by Paul Jackson

Links:

* Sarah Kozloff on Twitter

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.

On this week’s Functional Nerds podcast, Patrick and John chat about building community, writing music and lyrics, writing fiction, collaborating, patrons, time, Babylon 5, business, family, conventions, Mama’s Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up To be Cowboys, anthologies and more…

Links:

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.

This week, Patrick and John welcome long time listener, supporter, writer and musician, Stace Johnson!

About Stace Johnson: By day, Stace Johnson is a mild-mannered IT guy for a Colorado 9-1-1 facility, but at night, he transforms into a mild-mannered writer, poet, and musician with an affinity for the Oxford comma.

Stace has written more than thirty non-fiction articles for computer magazines such as ComputorEdge and Rocky Mountain TechLine, and his fiction has appeared most recently in Martian Magazine and Edward Bryant’s Sphere of Influence. He received an Honorable Mention in the Fall 2009 Writers of the Future Contest, and his short story “Sphere of Falling” was chosen to be presented orally at Stories for All Seasons, a Denver literary series, in 2003.

His poetry has appeared in numerous places, including Tales of the Talisman, the Apex Book Company website, and cream city review‘s inaugural I/O issue. He is a long-standing member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Poetry Association.

This week’s picks:

* Stace Pick 1: 5,000 Words Per Hour: Write Faster, Write Smarter by Chris Fox

* Stace Pick 2: Soundbrenner Core smartwatch designed for musicians

* John: Dispel Illusion (Impossible Times Book 3) by Mark Lawrence

* Patrick: The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold

* Patreon Pick 1: Daisy Jones & the Six

By Taylor Jenkins Reid Picked by Robert Junker

* Patreon Pick 2: Clockwork Angels by By: Kevin J. Anderson, Neil Peart Picked by Pat Smythe

Links:

* Stace Johnson on Twitter

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.

On this week’s Functional Nerds podcast, Patrick and John chat about everything under the sun, including but not limited to, Rush, The Dragon Prince, Doctor Who, The Witcher, Journey, Dracula, The Eagles, Willie Nelson’s guitar (Trigger), Salt N’ Pepa, Whitesnake, The Expanse, Travelers, Lost In Space 2, Queen, The Beach Boys, The Dresden Files, and more…

Links:

* John Anealio on Twitter

* Patrick Hester on Twitter

* The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

* Patrick Hester on Instagram

* Patrick’s Book: Into the Fire (available everywhere)

© 2020 Patrick Hester and John Anealio

This podcast contains original music by John Anealio.