Happy Book Day to Me

However long y’all have been waiting for this book, I think it was even longer for me. 😛 But at last all our impatience is rewarded, for The Tropic of Serpents is out today!

It’s ended up on several “anticipated books coming out soon” lists, which I have to admit makes me exceedingly pleased: Ranting Dragon, BuzzFeed, Kirkus, and at least one other I’ve misplaced. If you are looking to obtain your very own copy, I’ve got a list of places you may buy it without leaving your chair (though this note about buying from a store does still apply).

And now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go treat myself to a nice lunch . . . and maybe also a visit to the local B&N, to make sure it’s on the shelf/pester them to put it there if it’s not. 😉

A Year in Pictures – Dragon of the Tower

Dragon of the Tower
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Sometimes people miss out on the most amazing opportunites for merchandising.

This dragon stands in the Tower of London’s armory museum, and is constructed almost entirely of weapons and armor. Had their gift shop been selling a miniature replica, I would have bought it in a heartbeat. But whover’s in charge of that stuff is apparently an idiot; there was no such replica, and so alas, all I have are photos.

(Also? Happy Book Day to me.)

Posting makes the Internet go ’round

I’m not doing a giant blog tour like last year, but I have contrived to be in a few places around the Internet recently:

1) On the Tor/Forge blog, These Are a Few of My Favorite Dragons. Can you guess which ones I picked? (Before you click on the link to see, of course.)

2) On Tor.com — not to be confused with the Tor/Forge blog — I participated in a series called “That Was Awesome! Writers on Writing.” The point of the series is to talk about awesome moments in other people’s books, perfect little twists or amazing scenes that just blew you away. Head on over to see what I chose. (Many of you, I think, will not be surprised in the slightest . . . .)

3) On Lawrence M. Schoen’s site, another post series, this one with the ominous title of “Eating Authors,” and the much less ominous theme of “writers talk about the fabulous meals they’ve had.” I chose to discuss the kaiseki meal Starlady took us to in Kyoto. Eight tiny courses of phenomenally good Japanese food, enough to make a gourmand weep for joy. 🙂

4) Okay, this one’s old, but I realized I’d forgotten to link to it when it first went up: Timing is the bane of existence” at SFNovelists. On the unexpected pitfalls of figuring out, not what will happen in your book, but when it will happen.

5) Not a link, but a reminder: I’ll be at FOGcon this weekend, and at Borderlands Books on Sunday at 7 p.m. I hope to see one or more of you there!

A Year in Pictures – Sravanabelagola Bell

Sravanabelagola Bell
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The main structure at Sravanabelagola centers on an enormous statue of Gommateshvara Bahubali, which stands in a courtyard that frankly seems too small for it. The inner edge of the portico ringing that space is surmounted by a series of splendid carvings, and I quite liked this angle, which silhouettes the dark bell against the warm colors of the stone.

A Year in Pictures – Apostle in Kraków

Apostle in Kraków
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This is one of several statues of the Apostles of Jesus outside the Church of Sts. Peter and Paul in Kraków. We happened to wander by it around sunset, when the light on the front was warm and lovely. And this fellow amused me because he seems to be saying, “C’mon, guys. You can trust me!”

A Year in Pictures – Interior of the Hagia Sophia

Interior of the Hagia Sophia
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The Hagia Sophia is unfortunately not in the best of condition, and when we were there, fully a quarter of the interior was filled with scaffolding as they worked to conserve and restore the site. Still, I was able to get this shot of the medallions that ringed the chamber, each bearing an Arabic inscription; you can also make out some of the other decorative elements.

More reasons to hate Google Hangouts

Dear Google,

I’m so glad you decided to link all of my settings to my Google account, rather than to device on which I’m using that account. Because of your decision, I don’t get to say that I would like chat notifications on my tablet, but not on my phone. I either get notifications in both places, or in neither. This is perfect! I get to choose between never seeing chat messages unless I’m on my laptop (where I use Pidgin, a wonderful program that does all the things Hangouts won’t), or having my phone pester me with pinging and buzzing every single time somebody sends me a chat message. Which is fabulous when I’m, y’know, in a public place.

This is such a brilliant move on your part. Even better than that time you decided to take away the nice Talk app and replace it with Hangouts, where I don’t get to see whether somebody’s status is Active or Away or Do Not Disturb. I just love having companies strip away utility and force me into some marketer’s pre-determined idea of how I’m going to use the program, rather than the way I was using the program. You’re doing a bang-up job of understanding your audience; if you didn’t have such a firm grasp of what we wanted, you wouldn’t be so successful at giving us the exact opposite.

No love,
Me

Five Things Make a Post That Is Not About Supernatural

1) The funny thing about having a release date early in the month is that it sneaks up on you. After all, we’re still in February. That means The Tropic of Serpents won’t be out for a while yet, right? Wrong — it’s out next Tuesday, i.e. March 4th. (For those of you in the U.S. and Canada, at least. UK folks, your street date is the 20th of June. After that, Tor and Titan should be publishing more or less simultaneously, so you won’t have the added wait.)

Kirkus, by the way, not only gave Tropic a starred review; they listed it as one of their Best Bets for March. They even used the cover art as the top image for the post, which is yet another sign that Todd Lockwood and Irene Gallo are awesome.

2) If you are in the San Francisco Bay Area, you’ll have a chance to hear me read from The Tropic of Serpents at 7 p.m. on Sunday, March 9th, at Borderlands Books. It’s my intent to also publicly announce the title for the third book there, as an added treat for my hometown peeps. 😉

3) Also for Bay Area types, I’m going to be at FOGcon weekend after next. I unfortunately had to back out of one of my panels because of a karate belt test on Friday night, but I’ll still be doing several things that weekend:

  • Friday, 3-4:15 p.m. Narnia, Hogwarts, and Oz, Oh My!
    What are our favorite secret worlds? What do we love about them? Why is a secret world so useful for storytelling? What can we learn from the ways used to access these places? What about worlds which exclude some people from accessing them, such as adults or non-magical people–are these worlds problematic or necessary? Or somewhere between the two?
    M: Tim Susman. Marie Brennan, Valerie Estelle Frankel, Naamen Gobert Tilahun
  • Saturday, 10:30-11:45 Secret History and Alternate History; their similarities, differences, and how to write them
    Tim Powers, in books like Declare and The Drawing of the Dark, has brought us into the realm of secret history — the events that really took place around known historical facts. Harry Turtledove, Philip K. Dick, and many others have brought us into the realm of alternate history — the what-if-things-had-been-different. (Indeed, one could argue that Mary Gentle’s Ash is secret alternate history!) What about these works fascinates us, and how do we put them together?
    M: Bradford Lyau. Marie Brennan, Tim Powers, Tim Susman
  • Saturday, 4:30-5:45 Reading
    Marie Brennan, Alyc Helms, Michael R. Underwood

4) In non-Tropic-related news, I participated in the Book of Apex blog tour over at Books Without Any Pictures. There’s a review of my story “Waiting for Beauty,” a brief interview, and a guest post wherein I talk about how writing historical fiction helped me become better at worldbuilding in general.

5) And Now For Something Completely Different: I really love both of these art sets, one of Disney princess in historically accurate costumes (the last image is the best!), and one of celebrities cosplaying as Disney characters.

Supernatural Re-Watch: “Faith” and the Dumber Than Dean Award

I promise I’ll post something other than photos and Supernatural analysis eventually. 😛 My brain’s a little wrung out from revision, so right now I’m just kind of coasting along, recovering.

Also — speaking of a wrung-out brain — ignore what I said last post about discussing “Scarecrow” some more. I managed to get my wires crossed, and mashed “Scarecrow” and “Shadow” together in my head. (They’re both one word starting with S, and they both have Meg, okay? And I don’t have much functioning grey matter at the moment.)

Instead, we will talk about “Faith” and the Dumber Than Dean Award.

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A Year in Pictures – Fushimi Inari

Fushimi Inari
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This is pretty much the classic photo to take at Fushimi Inari. The site is famous for its torii, the red-orange wooden arches you see in abundance here; they are all. over. the mountain, in a dozen branching paths, leading to small shrines crammed onto every vaguely flat surface (and some that aren’t so flat). In most places the torii aren’t quite so closely packed, but when they are, they make for a very striking view.

A Year in Pictures – Ceiling Emblem at Vincennes

Ceiling Emblem at Vincennes
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This is from the other Sainte-Chapelle, the one at the Chateau de Vincennes. (There are probably lots of other Sainte-Chapelles, but those are the two I visited.) It’s a wildly different space, with cream-colored walls painted in very few places, apart from this emblem painted on repeatedly on the ceiling high above. I, er, have a possibly obsessive tendency to photograph interesting ceilings, so of course this detail drew my eye.

Supernatural Re-Watch: Pilot

As I said before, I won’t be blogging each episode individually. That would be way too much work, not to mention that I don’t have something interesting to say about every. single. ep. But the pilot, being the thing that launches the whole series, does get its own post.

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A Year in Pictures – Kannon atop Fukusaiji

Kannon atop Fukusaiji
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Remember that turtle head from a while ago? Here’s more context for it. I don’t have any especially good shots of the whole temple, but envision that head sticking out over the front door, the entire roof shaped like the back of a giant silver turtle, and at the top . . . this. A statue of Kannon huge enough to be seen from a mile away, with children arrayed adoringly at her feet.

I told you it was a weird place. 😛

This is one of the few photos where I haven’t just done normal editing to it. The sky was very cloudy that day, which made for very boring light; at my father’s suggestion I dropped the “aged photo” filter over it, giving the whole thing the sepia tinge you see here.

A Year in Pictures – Rose Window of La Sainte-Chapelle

Rose Window of La Sainte-Chapelle
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This is Sainte-Chapelle again, this time looking the other way in the upper sanctuary, toward the rose window. As you can see, a few of its “petals” are missing; they’re doing restorations on the stained glass elsewhere, so I don’t know if those will eventually be replaced, or whether the absence of the original glass means they’ll be left as they are. Doesn’t stop it from being absolutely lovely, though.