We like to keep an eye on the progress of members of the Futurismic gang who have moved on to bigger and brighter things, and there’s no one who fits the bill better than Tobias Buckell, the former Futurismic blogger who’s just finished writing his fourth novel at around the same time the third, Sly Mongoose, hits bookstore shelves. [image from Tobias’ blog]

Tobias is a great writer and a lovely bloke to work with, and also a poster-boy for the “work hard and earnestly and your dreams will come true” approach to life. There’s an interview with Tobias up at the Nebula Awards website that’ll give you an insight into his mindset:

From 15 to 25 I wrote during the time that everyone else played games or watched TV. The average American watches 20-30 hours of TV a week. That’s almost watching TV like a full time job. By swapping out writing, I worked at writing.

Of course, one can question the sanity of working a part time or near full time job for 10 years that hardly started paying anything until recently. I could have started a business on the side. But that’s where my hard work comes from, choosing to make a hard choice about how I spent my time. As a result, I never felt like I worked hard, just that I missed a lot of the stuff people around me seemed to be spending *their* time on. Do I regret not seeing 10 year old TV shows (what’s a ‘Buffy?’) and spending a lot of money on alcohol? In the big picture, not a bit.

Congratulations, Tobias – hope one or more of those awards comes through for you. Hell knows you’ll have deserved it. 🙂