Monthly Archives:

November 2009

Defiance, Site Updates

Site update, and more on Defiance

In honor of the shiny new anthology Defiance being released, I’ve updated the site to celebrate the new cover. Y’all should see both of my works listed on the sidebar of my site now, and the color scheme’s been flipped back to blue to go with the new banner.

Also, I’ve shifted all my works in progress off to a new In Progress subpage of Books, because I wanted to spruce up the Books page a bit now that there are two things on it!

Please to note that so far Defiance is only available via the Drollerie bookshop, but we have it in all our usual formats: PDF, ePub, Microsoft Reader, Sony, and Mobipocket, so any of these should hopefully suit your ebook-reading needs! I will of course post further link updates as the book makes its way out into the wild. I have added the book to Goodreads, but if any of you out there who are LibraryThing users want to add it on that site, please feel free!

And oh yeah–I’ve been sent my personal copy and have gotten my editor’s leave to do a promo or two. So y’all be out on the lookout for another drawing forthcoming!

Drollerie Press, Polls, Short Pieces

Now taking requests for next FB-universe short story

My fellow Drollerie author has cordially invited me to submit something for the pair of anthologies he is editing along with , Trafficking in Magic and Magic in Trafficking. I will not be able to tackle writing something for them until after Nanowrimo is over, but December is looking potentially interesting! So all I need to do is figure out what exactly I’d like to write for them.

This is where you folks come in! I’m really rather liking the idea of using short stories to explore other glimpses of the Faerie Blood universe as I’ve already done with “The Blood of the Land”, but I’m not sure yet what sort of story might fit into the requirements for this pair of anthos. Want to help me decide? Then answer the following poll! (Readers on LJ or LJ-clones, please come on over to my WordPress site to vote!)

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Defiance, Drollerie Press, Short Pieces

The Civil War anthology is OUT!

Ooh ooh ooh, the anthology I’m in with and has just come out, people! Now available for sale on Drollerie Press’s store is the Civil War anthology Defiance, featuring our three pieces set during that time frame, each with supernatural elements in it.

My story’s “The Blood of the Land”, in the same universe as Faerie Blood. The slave woman Dorcas, who is gifted with healing powers, is escaping along with her beloved Caleb and fleeing north to Canada. But when they reach their first stop on the Underground Railroad, a farm owned by the Warder Elias Sutherland, they find Elias’ wife has been murdered by the men hunting them–and Elias’ Warder wife Jenny is not taking her slaying kindly.

Laura Anne Gilman and Joely Sue Burkhart also have excellent stories in this release, y’all, so I highly encourage you to check it out!

Writing

PSA for my fellow e-pub writers: Carina Press!

Word is going around the Net this morning that Harlequin, the grande dame of romance, is opening up a brand-new, electronic-only imprint that’s taking all genres. Points of interest about this:

  • They are specifically DRM-free.
  • If you write romance, they’re taking not only same-sex pairings, but also romances involving more than two people. All levels of sensuality are under consideration.
  • They’re taking all genres, not just romance. More interesting to me in particular, they’re accepting SF/F submissions of several varieties. SF/F with or without romantic elements to the plot is mentioned in their guidelines.

So if you have any interest in being electronically published and if in particular you’re anti-DRM, you may consider checking Carina Press out. Props to the fine ladies of Smart Bitches Trashy Books for spreading the word!

Bone Walker

Nanowrimo up through Day 8: Catching up

So yeah… running short several days, but I’m still making a big point of trying to write at least a little something every night. A couple hundred words is the absolute bare minimum. Next level I’m okay with is my traditional non-Nano quota of 500 words. And, of course, there’s the actual Nano quota. Over the last three days, I’ve hit one of each of these. Which means I’m still dreadfully behind by the Nano count, but it also means I’ve written new words for each of the last eight days running. That’s a big improvement over most of the year.

Chapter 3 is a good way towards done at this point. Melisanda has dropped a little bomb on Kendis, who really does not care for her arrival in the slightest. Team Kendis is about to figure out in the meantime exactly what to do with the Unseelie bard who’s pretty much fallen back into their laps.

And speaking of whom, for giggles and grins and in particular for , I’m going to give y’all another snippet. But this one’s bigger and spoilery if you haven’t read Faerie Blood yet, so I’ll stick it behind the fold!

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Bone Walker

Nanowrimo Days 3-5: Running short, but still running

The last three days I’ve been running short on the word count–mostly because of the huge overnight release we had to run for work, which meant staying up until two last night. Tonight, I’m just running so short on brain that I’m lucky to get any words out at all, but I’m making a point of writing at least a couple hundred just to keep some momentum going. We’ll see how much I can make up over the weekend.

Good news is, though, Chapter 2 is done and I’ve brought another couple characters on camera. Millicent gets to make her first appearance, as well as another character who showed up in Book 1 and who will be back for more this time around.

Written on Tuesday: 777
Written yesterday: 901
Written tonight: 235
Chapter 2 total: 2,906
Bone Walker total (first draft): 5,464

Bone Walker

Nanowrimo Day 2: Oh hey look, Chapter 2!

As predicted, Chapter 1 turned out to be a bit short as my chapters tend to go. But that’s all good, because it also meant I was able to put a serious dent in Chapter 2 tonight as well. Elessir is now on camera, much to the consternation of Christopher and Kendis.

For amusement value, here’s a bit of a snippet from yesterday!

Christopher’s favorite band had come to town, and the audience was having the time of its life.

And I had to admit, so was I. The good humor and boisterous energy of the performers were infectious, and the music, irrepressible. I didn’t know the words to most of the songs, but on the strength of rhythm and melody alone, I was thrilled to clap and bounce along with everyone else. I didn’t mind that mine was the only brown face in sight, or even that half of the white girls in range were paying more attention to the man at my side than they were to the stage. Not that I could blame them. At six-two, clad in a black T-shirt emblazoned with the blue, red, yellow, and white of the Newfoundland flag and cheerfully bellowing lyrics he knew far better than I did, Christopher MacSimidh was difficult to miss. He’d spruced up for the concert, with a new shorter haircut that’d traded off his ponytail for front locks that dangled along his brow. For once he’d even shaved properly, baring an intriguing little dent in the line of his chin that I was certain was drawing the gaze of every straight woman and gay man at the show. It certainly kept drawing mine.

I am up a bit later than I like, but I did manage to meet tonight’s word quota and therefore preserve the small padding that I’d built yesterday. We’ll see if I can do this again tomorrow. And tomorrow’s plan? Finish Chapter 2!

Written tonight: 1,675
Chapter 1 total: 2,558
Chapter 2 total: 993
Bone Walker total (first draft): 3,551