All Posts By

Angela Korra'ti

Faerie Blood

My iPhone's official name: Mnemosyne!

The poll to name my iPhone officially closed last night, and the winner of the poll was Mnemosyne! This means is the winner.

The companion contest is also therefore officially closed, and wins that for the in-character Petalwing portayal.

Y’all please to send me email at annathepiper AT gmail DOT com and let me know whether you would like a free copy of Faerie Blood, or else a free copy of the book of your choice from the Drollerie Press bookshop.

If you’d like Faerie Blood, please let me know your preferred format. If you’d like a different book, please let me know which one you’re interested in from the shop and I’ll set you up with a Drollerie gift certificate for the correct amount!

Thanks all for participating, and I’ll do another contest some time soon!

Short Pieces

Out of brain. Stupid heat wave

I slept very poorly last night, which has meant that the words are not flowing like they should be tonight. But I was determined not to let this heat wave beat me–certainly not when it’s only just getting started–and so I wrenched out a couple hundred words anyway.

But now I desperately need sleep, and I’m off to get some.

Written tonight: 211
The Blood of the Land total: 1,671

Book Log

Book Log #50: Beyond Heaving Bosoms, by Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan

If like me you’re enough of a romance fan that you enjoy a periodic romance novel, yet you like a hefty dose of snark with your lovin’, then you should absolutely pick up a copy of Beyond Heaving Bosoms: The Smart Bitches’ Guide to Romance Novels. This is the beloved child of Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan, better known as Smart Bitch Candy and Smart Bitch Sarah over at Smart Bitches Trashy Books.

What do you get if you look past the heaving bosoms? A fairly decent overview of the modern romance genre, actually. Sure, there’s plenty of poking fun at the standard romance tropes, but there’s also very up-front and straightforward looks at things like how rape used to be prevalent in the genre (and glossed over as “forced seduction”), and how the arising of the No Means No movement rolled out into the books being written. (Needless to say, I’m much more a fan of modern romance novels than I am of the ones y’all are probably thinking of every time you think “bodice-rippers”.) There’s a review as well of the massive firestorm that the Smart Bitch ladies kicked up when they revealed on their site that Cassie Edwards had plagarized material for her novels.

So yeah, there’s plenty enough serious material here to make the book worth a read if you have any interest in the genre at all. But really, what makes it worth the price of admission? Five words: “Choose Your Own Man Titty”. Four stars.

Book Log

Book Log #49: Underground, by Kat Richardson

It’s official: Underground, Book 3 of ‘s Greywalker series, is ten pounds of fun in a five pound jar. And I say that not just because the ‘ship I was hoping for in this series sets sail as of this installment, either.

Now, zombies are the up-and-coming thing in urban fantasy these days, it seems. So I’m seeing more and more established series spend at least a little time doing a zombie plot, and this book is the Greywalker series’ turn. That said, it’s less of a zombie plot than you might expect, since what you get is a lot more supernatural of origin than it is viral or chemical, which seems to be where most zombie plots get started. Plus, as the plot really gets its feet under it, there’s a lot involving Native American mythos of the Pacific Northwest–and this in particular helps anchor the story well and firmly in this locale. I’ve read my share of urban fantasy where the setting isn’t terribly vivid, books you could set in any American city and have them still work as plots; this one, not so much. And I love it.

And like I said above, the ‘ship I was hoping to see launch does indeed launch in this book, which fills my little heart with glee. It’s not without a bittersweet note to it, since it’s in the wake of Harper having to go through the deeply unpleasant experience of someone else she cares about being unable to deal with the life she’s chosen to lead. Yet it’s all for the good. Look for the tasty, tasty background revelations that come out about a certain mysterious hacker-type of Harper’s acquaintance, which was for me by far the best part of the book. Five stars.

Short Pieces

Two days in a row!

It was a little bit less like pulling teeth today, getting the words out of my brain.

I’m learning all over again the same lesson I learned writing “The Disenchanting of Princess Cerridwen”, though, which is to say: writing short is hard. I keep having to rein myself in every time I catch myself thinking “but but but I should explain–” No, I tell myself, I shouldn’t. Not when I want to keep this word count down as much as possible. has given me a wide range of word count to play with, but I still want to come in closer to 5K than 25K if at all possible. Just to see if I can.

I’m already thinking I may not be able to, though. I’ve got this story more or less planned out, and if I write it according to my notes, it’ll come out longish anyway.

But first I have to write it. Two days in a row at 500+ words though does not suck.

Written today: 530
The Blood of the Land total: 1,460

Short Pieces

More on the Civil War story

Tried to get myself in gear on the Civil War story today, since there’s a deadline coming up for this. And for the first time in some while, I’ve actually managed to write 500 new words on something. This feels good. Hope I can do it again tomorrow.

Written on Thursday: 252
Written today: 509
The Blood of the Land total: 930

Events

Seattle-area authors/publishing types, know about this?

Any of you have any experience with Northwest Bookfest, which I’m given to understand keeled over in 2003? I ask since pointed me at this article, describing rumblings about resurrecting it in 2010, as well as an attempt to do an unrelated event in 2009 by a gentleman who is calling back to the whole Bookfest thing.

I notice a distinct lack of SF/F-oriented names in the article, but I don’t know if that was part of the original Bookfest. Can anybody fill me in?