It doesn’t have to be pretty; it only has to work

Welcome to the thing I’ve been meaning to do for, oh, two years now? By which I mean, I am posting to you from my new WordPress installation, which is hosted on (nearly) the same server as my website, putting all of this more properly under my control. (How can it be nearly the same server? It’s a server administered by my brother, who also runs the server that has my site, but at the moment they’re separate due to technical issues that will be solved when he has a spare moment to run the upgrade he’s been meaning to arrange for the last two years.)

Anyway, if all goes well, this will also crosspost to Dreamwidth and LJ. We’ll see what happens when I hit “publish.”

You may notice that the actual WordPress page isn’t very pretty yet. That will be fixed — hopefully soon — but right now, the priority was to get this up and running. In fact, you might say that was one of my New Year’s Resolutions. πŸ˜› Let’s see if it works!

Interview on Sword and Laser; also, looking back at 2013

I think I mentioned before that Sword & Laser chose A Natural History of Dragons for their book club this month, and that they were also planning on interviewing me. That’s gone live now, so you can listen to me in all my rambling ridiculousness. πŸ™‚

I have to say . . . 2013 has been a pretty good year for me, and A Natural History of Dragons deserves a lot of the credit for that. It’s done really, really well: good sales, good reviews, multiple hardcover printings, made some year-end “Best Of” lists (NPR! Slate!). I think what’s made me the most happy, though, is the number of people who seem to have gotten the book — by which I mean, they’re picking up on the stuff I tried very hard to put in there. Things like the effect of contrasting Isabella’s older perspective with her younger actions, or the way in which the book is kind of science fiction, or the finer points of the gender commentary (like how those expectations constrain Jacob as well as Isabella). Every time I read a review that calls out an aspect like that, I glow a little, because really: as an author, that’s pretty much what you hope to achieve. And this time, I seem to have done it.

I hope The Tropic of Serpents does equally well. And whether 2013 was a good year or a bad one for you, I hope that 2014 treats us all even better.

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Yuletide!!!!!

Travel and working on the book have kept me busy (and quiet) around here, but I should say something about Yuletide!

I got a lovely gift this year: “Ninth Life,” which is a Chrestomanci filling in the details of how Christopher stole his life out of Gabriel’s safe before the events of Conrad’s Fate.

On the writing side, I produced four full-length stories — my assignment, two pinch hits, and a treat — and four stocking stuffers for Yuletide Madness. If anybody wants to try and guess what they are, I can offer the following hints:

1. Two of the full-length stories were for books; one was for a video game; and one was for a play.
2. Three of the stocking stuffers were for movies; one was for a comic book.
3. I’d written for one of the full-length fandoms before, but the other three were new.
4. The same is true of the stocking stuffers.

Any guesses?

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Half-Off PRACTICALLY EVERYTHING

Okay, I exaggerate — but only a little.

Did you get an e-reader for Christmas? Or a little extra cash to blow where you please? Or are you just hungry for new things to read? Book View Cafe is having an ENORMOUS sale from now through January 6th. No, seriously: there are five pages of things on sale right now, in genres ranging from fantasy to science fiction to romance to mystery to nonfiction.

Including three titles of my own! Lies and Prophecy, Deeds of Men, and Writing Fight Scenes are all half-off right now — that’s half off the price listed on those pages, as the way we’re handling the back end of the sale is just to apply the discount at checkout, rather than changing every book page.

As mentioned before, this lasts through January 6th, so you have plenty of time to browse the whole slate. (Nice thing about ebooks is, we don’t run out of stock.) There are things to cater to many tastes in there; you might find more things to enjoy.

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light against the darkness

I’m not very religious. Growing up, I remember my family going to church occasionally; I was confirmed Methodist, for all the good it did.. Then it became Christmas, Easter, and whenever my grandparents were in town. Then my grandparents stopped traveling, and it became Christmas and Easter. Then Easter fell by the wayside and it was just Christmas. These days, I’m pretty much just an agnostic . . . but Christmas has stayed.

Because the Christmas Eve service is sacred to me, in a way that has nothing to do with Christianity or even necessarily with religion. Not the whole service, really — just the end. Where they light the candles from the central one and come down the aisles to light yours in turn, and then you light your neighbor’s candle and they light their neighbor’s and so on, and the sanctuary goes dark except for those little flickering flames, and everyone is singing.

That’s sacred. Sharing light in the midst of darkness.

(The only way it could be more perfect is if it happened on the winter solstice.)

So I’ll keep going to Christmas Eve service, because I need that moment in the depths of winter. I need the candles and the darkness and the sharing and the singing. I will keep resenting the church we go to in Dallas, where they don’t turn off the stupid LCD screens at the front of the sanctuary that advertise upcoming events or what hymn you’re supposed to turn to next, because dammit, I want the only light around me to be the little flickering flames. I will keep sharing that flame in the depths of night.

Whatever religion you celebrate — or lack thereof — I wish you light in the darkness, and the company of neighbors.

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Now’s your chance . . . .

Bit of a belated announcement, but in an hour and a half (4 p.m. PST), I’ll be interviewed on the Sword & Laser podcast. If you have a question you’d like me to answer, you can post it here! (A Natural History of Dragons is the general topic, but there are already questions about other things, too, so I don’t think you’re confined to only that book.)

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odds and ends

I’m still face-down in the book, plus trying to get ready for Christmas travel. In the meantime, have some random stuff!

Like this month’s SF Novelists post: “I’m not allowed to tab away until this post is done,” in which I talk about distractions.

Or a very wise post from Rachel Manija Brown and Sherwood Smith, on “Who Gets to Escape?”

Or some frickin’ amazing tattoos.

Or an explanation of this poll. My family and I had been speculating that guys were more likely to have scars on the underside of their chins, due to exactly the kinds of hijinks various people described in the comments. But it turns out the data, at least as collected from my readership, does not support the anecdata; a slightly higher percentage of the women who responded have such scars than men.

Or, um . . . okay, I don’t have a fifth thing. Feel free to suggest #5 in the comments!

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‘Tis the season of good news, after all . . . .

I’ve been scarce around here because I’m head-down in the third book of the Memoirs, but I do feel compelled to brag a little bit more. πŸ™‚

The big thing is the Sword and Laser podcast (also posted here), which gives a brief but glowing review of A Natural History of Dragons. Why is this a big thing? Well, apart from the fact that they’ll be interviewing me soon, check out the URL on that first link. They’re partnered with BoingBoing, which means that for a little while yesterday, their review was posted on the front page of BoingBoing.

I don’t know what that did to my sales, but I bet it was pretty good. ^_^

And then you’ve got Mary Robinette Kowal saying exceedingly nice things over on Book Smugglers, and Liz Bourke singled it out as one of her favorite books of the year, and so did Juliet Kincaid, and y’all, this is so totally the best thing I could have when we’re nine days from the solstice and I’m in the Middle of the Book and everything is conspiring to make me have no energy and just want to sleeeeeeeeep. (Well, that and caffeine. Of which I have some in the fridge.)

Now if you’ll pardon me, I have to go chop a character’s hand off.

(No, I’m not telling you whose.)

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in which the author is quite chuffed

A number of you probably know about this by now, but: NPR has included A Natural History of Dragons in their Best of Year . . . Venn diagaram . . . Oort cloud . . . not-actually-a-list . . . thingy.

Basically, although it looks like a list, what they’ve done is go the tag route. That’s the “science fiction and fantasy” tag, but if you click on ANHoD there, you’ll find it’s also tagged “love stories,” “for history lovers,” and “it’s all geek to me.” (You can also read Annalee Newitz’ recommendation.) Anyway, this is pretty awesome — like, “it has apparently had a measurable effect on sales” levels of awesome.

Plus there’s also this: A Natural History of Dragons was picked as one of the top 15 books of the year by Slate.com’s book editor Dan Kois. Put that together with the Goodreads semifinalist thing, and the fact that there are still new reviews coming in at a steady pace, and, well, see the title of the post. Quite chuffed. Quite, quite chuffed. It’s good encouragement to have as I tackle the dreaded Middle of the Book for #3.

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two copies left

In the course of contacting people who had bid in the Philippines disaster relief auction, I realized that most of the mad rush had been for the ARCs of The Tropic of Serpents (surprise!), with only some going toward A Natural History of Dragons. There are two copies of that left; the asking price is $10, but thus far people have been paying $20 and up. It’s a good cause, so I have no compunctions about using peer pressure to encourage you to donate more than the baseline. ^_^ (Really, I should have had the good sense to list them at $20 to start with. I just plugged in my usual “I’m looking to get rid of some of this stock” prices without thinking it through.)

So yes: two copies left. Signed and personalized, if you wish! And good causes. So go forth and bid.

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Hear ye, hear ye! . . . Again!

Seven and a half years with my books being only ink on the page or pixels on the screen, and now I have two audiobooks landing atop one another. πŸ˜€

Remember me mentioning that giant deal Book View Cafe signed with Audible? Well, now you can listen to Lies and Prophecy, too! Different narrator than A Natural History of Dragons (and by the way, I’ve listened to the sample for that one now, and it’s fabulous), and it’s likely that my other project will get yet a different reader — especially since the pov in that one is male.

Did I mention that I have a third project with them? No? Well, you’ll just have to wait and see what that one is. πŸ™‚

I do, by the way, still have plans for a print edition of Lies and Prophecy. I’m dependent on the assistance of others for that, though, so it will have to wait for a moment when somebody can spare the time and energy to help. In the meanwhile, the ebook isn’t going away. πŸ™‚

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Hear ye, hear ye . . . .

A Natural History of Dragons is now an audiobook.

Actually, it’s been an audiobook since Friday, but I was busy running around doing other things and didn’t manage to post about it right away. And then it was the weekend, so I waited. Mondays need fun things to liven them up, don’t you think?

I haven’t yet heard the thing myself, but I did correspond with the narrator beforehand, and based on that I expect she did an excellent job. She asked all the kinds of questions you’re supposed to hope your narrator asks, like how to pronounce things and whether you have any models in mind for what the voices should be like and so on. (In fact, her pronunciation of the names is probably better than mine, since my instructions included a lot of things like “this is how I say it, but it’s supposed to sound like French and I’m terrible at that so ignore me if I’ve got it wrong.”)

So if you’ve been waiting for the chance to listen to the book — those of you with driving commutes or gym workouts or such — now you can!

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Things I did not know (before tonight)

You know how I said that A Natural History of Dragons was in the semifinal round for the Goodreads Choice Awards?

Apparently it wasn’t in the first round. It was, instead, one of the top five write-in candidates during the first round, and thus got added for the semifinal.

That? Is really cool. I don’t know how the write-in votes stacked up against the ones cast for first-round nominees, but the fact that people remembered it well enough to vote for it off their own bat is very flattering.

I think voting ends tomorrow, so if you want to cast your vote, you still can.

In other news, I was trying to make a paper shell for my inflatable globe so that I could finally work out where all the continents are in Isabella’s world, when it occurred to me that what I really needed was a spherical whiteboard. So there’s a white beachball that should be arriving here in the next few days, and I’ll be putting the water-soluble markers we bought for drawing on the D&D battle map to an exciting new use. πŸ™‚

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FandomAid fundraiser for the Philippines

The death toll and destruction in the Philippines have been nothing short of horrific. The LJ community FandomAid has put together a fundraiser — not an auction but just a “Buy It Now” sale. Since my time is limited, I’m offering stuff that already exists, to whit, books.

Offer #1: signed ARCs of A Natural History of Dragons

Offer #2: signed ARCs of The Tropic of Serpents

There are five copies of each on offer (because that’s all I have left of ANHoD, and about all I can spare of TToS). The ARCs have full-color covers and all the interior illustrations, but not the maps; inscriptions can be personalized on request. The price is $10 in the US, $15 overseas, and the books will go on a first come, first served basis. You just make a donation to one of the approved charities — there’s a list here.

If you want to donate more, please do. They need it.

And if those offers don’t float your boat, browse the post for more. There’s eleven pages of comments already, and more to come, I’m sure.

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An open letter to dog owners

This post has been brought to you by the behavior of a very large dog at the post office today.

***

Dear Dog Owners of America:

Please train your dogs.

To those of you who actually do, I say, thank you! I appreciate your effort, and your dogs are probably lovely creatures. Unfortunately, you are in the minority, and the other dog-owners and their pets are making you look bad.

It used to be that whenever the Great Pet Debate came up — dogs vs. cats — I found myself wondering, why don’t I like dogs more? After all, the qualities ascribed to them sound great. I liked Platonic Dogs very well, but Actual Dogs much less, and I didn’t know why.

Then I realized that was because the majority of the Actual Dogs I meet are badly behaved.

They bark. They bite. They chew on stuff. They jump on anything and anyone they can get near. No, their “enthusiasm” is not adorable. In small dogs, it’s annoying; in large dogs, it can be outright dangerous. You know what’s adorable? A dog who knows how to express his enthusiasm in a socially acceptable fashion. Which is to say, a dog who is trained.

And no, a dog who brings the ball back when you’re playing fetch and sits (sometimes) on command is not “trained.” If you have to drag your dog down off the counter of the post office, your dog is badly trained and badly behaved. If he barks for a minute straight every time the doorbell rings, he is badly trained and badly behaved. If you have to bribe him with treats to get peace and quiet during dinner, he is badly trained and badly behaved. If he draws blood through my clothing because he tried to jump on me and his claws went raking down my thigh, he is badly trained and badly behaved.

A well-trained dog is one who knows how to behave like a civilized member of society.

I have met far too few of them in my life.

So please. For the love of god. Train your dog. Teach him when it is and is not okay to bark. Teach him to show enthusiasm with tail-wagging and jumping in place, not on people. Do not reward his bad behavior by giving him commands and then, when he ignores them, rewarding him with whatever it was he wanted. You owe it to your dog to be consistent, to give him a framework within which he can operate and be happy. And the rest of us would appreciate it very much.

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catching up on the (fiction-related) news

It’s taken me about a week to regenerate much brain, with most of what I could spare going to working on the next of the Memoirs. But I have some now, and so you get a news batch!

First of all, A Natural History of Dragons is in the semifinal round for Best Fantasy of 2013 over on Goodreads. I’m not saying you should go vote for it or anything. I’m just, y’know, mentioning.

you should totally go vote for it

Next up, Book View Café has a fun new anthology out: Mad Science Café. This debuted while I was out of the country, so I’m a bit behind the curve in announcing it, but it’s pretty much what the title would lead you to expect, i.e. lots of stories about Science Gone Wrong (Or Very, Very Right). It reprints my story “Comparison of Efficacy Rates for Seven Antipathetics As Employed Against Lycanthropes,” aka the Werewolf Fake Academic Paper story, so if you missed it when it first came out in Ekaterina Sedia’s Running with the Pack, here’s your chance!

I’m also in another anthology! Apex Magazine has put out The Book of Apex: Volume 4, which collects fifteen issues’ worth of the magazine, including my own “Waiting for Beauty.” That one’s available in print as well as electronic formats.

Speaking of anthologies (no, we’re not done yet), there’s an excerpt from “Centuries of Kings” up at Bookworm Blues. Because I was out of the country when that went up, the Kickstarter linked is over and done with (after successfully raising its target and more). But still, you can get a taster of the story, which will be in Neverland’s Library.

And finally, not about me: Mike Allen ([profile] time_shark), editor, poet, and fiction writer, has a novel out! The Black Fire Concerto, about which people have said many good things. It has a blurb from Tanith Lee! “A prize for the multitude of fans who relish strong Grand Guignol with their sword and sorcery.” Mike is, of course, the fellow who has brought you all four Clockwork Phoenix anthologies, not to mention Mythic Delirium and other such projects. If you dig horror, you should definitely check this out.

. . . did I mention that A Natural History of Dragons is up for a vote? ^_^

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