This summer I’ve decided to start a new series of still lifes. The beer will continue on, but instead of dwarfs, I will feature a badass instead. If you’re wondering if I’ll do this on the road while sampling the beers in Colorado on my Book & Beer Tour, the answer is YES. I fully expect to get strange looks while setting up my still lifes in the brew pubs, and I will document them if I can. :) Behold:

Mace Windu, Jedi Badass of the Long Purple Phallic Symbol, defends my sandwich and beverage from the depravity of the Sith. A bit more about the beer, and then we’ll focus on Mace.

The beer is Polygamy Porter from the Wasatch Brewery in Park City, Utah. The ad tagline for this brew is “Why have just one!” and I could not agree more. Aside from the hilarious name, this is the BEST porter I’ve ever had in terms of taste and drinkability. That silver medal in the World Beer Cup ain’t no lie. If you like porters and have a good specialty store in your neck of the woods that carries this, I cannot recommend it highly enough. Failing that, the T-shirts for this beer will get you lots of curious stares, and you can order them online to stick it to the Man in Utah.

But now, back to Mace. Remember Mace? He’s seriously hacked off about something, and perhaps you didn’t notice that from the wide angle. Sorry about that. Let’s take a closer look, shall we?

Now I don’t know about you, but Mace is really talking to me here, and it’s obvious what he’s saying. “WHY ain’t there a muthaeffin’ BEER in my muthaeffin’ HAND?” He can’t be saying anything else…can he?

Remember that my Colorado Book and Beer Tour begins next week, so check back every stinkin’ day— starting Sunday—for photos of beautiful trees, beautiful beer, and (hopefully) some fans saying howdy to me in the Rockies! Cheers!

Oh, my, what a day! Great time with fabulous people!

I’ve long been a rabid fan of Cherie Priest’s Clockwork Century series as well as her urban fantasy for Del Rey, Bloodshot. So I geeked out a bit (okay, a lot) that I not only got to meet her, but hang out with her a bit. I was on two panels with her today, The Big Idea and Urban Fantasy Authors. And I HAVE PROOF!

Cherie was so kind as to sign a copy o’ Boneshaker for me. Sam Sykes was a wee bit upset that I didn’t ask HIM to sign Boneshaker for me. I’m not sure why; he didn’t write Boneshaker.

The Big Idea panel was quite a bit o’ fun—admission was free with a sacrificial can of Coke Zero. John Scalzi was a bag full o’ spiffiness, as were all the other panelists. Here they all are:

But enough of these people who write things! I know what you really want to see—people in costumes! There were some fabulous ones there and I ran out of space on my memory card before I could get all I wanted. I’ll share a few here and then provide a link to my Facebook album of the Comicon, where you can check out plenty more.

There’s plenty more in the album, so go check it out right here.

SO MUCH FUN!

And I only got to stay a little while. I had dinner plans with friends so I had to jet out of there at 5 pm, but wow, what a good time! Tomorrow I’ll have a proper camera and lots more time to spend, but there’s still plenty to show n’ tell!

GEEKOUTS: I got to meet Robert J. Sawyer! And John Scalzi! While I was in full fanboy mode, I may have drooled on Mr. Scalzi when I asked him to sign Old Man’s War for me. Both authors were super nice. Also met some other spiffy authors whose work I’m ashamed to say I haven’t yet read: Aprilynne Pike, Jordan Summer, Gini Koch, and Janni Lee Simner.

SCUTTLEBUTT: Heard some film/tv stars might be selling their autographs for as high as $65. Letting you all know now: you can have mine for free. Always. I can’t imagine a universe in which I’d charge someone money to watch me scribble on a piece of paper.

COSTUMES: I didn’t nearly as many pictures as I would have liked—and again, these are going to be kinda low quality since my camera phone doesn’t rock very hard. In general, though, I saw some really cool stuff—lots more video game gear than I was expecting, honestly, and some of the stuff from manga was really well done but I didn’t know what I was looking at aside from impressive costumes. There was some awesome steampunk going on—I snapped a pic of this one fella with a spectacular hat and goggles, but it didn’t come out all that great so I didn’t include it below. You should be able to click on all these bad boys to enlarge ’em.

Above: fangs and steampunk. Girl to the right was told by several people, including me, that she looked like she stepped off a Gail Carriger cover.

Queen Amidala and her servant thingie. The headgear is really puzzling when you think about it. It’s almost like it’s intended to be a service ladder or something. I’m wondering about the backstory on that now.

These kids were super spiffy and asked me to sign a copy of my book for them. The girl on the right says she was supposed to be something called Gir. I didn’t write down what the girl on the left was supposed to be, except that it was a manga character that started with the letter P. Petaluma? Petsmart? Sorry, I’m rubbish at remembering these things.

OK, wow. The Darth Maul dude went all the way and stained his teeth. The cyborg ladies on a leash were wearing really tall platform shoes and wore some impressive ink as well. Right before this pose, Darth Maul was kind of carrying a girl in either arm, and they were smooshed against him. After he set them down, he turned apologetically to the girl on the left and said, “I may have gotten some makeup on your breast.” Only at Comicon.

More tomorrow. :)

I’ve always loved that bit in The Princess Bride where Westley (as the Dread Pirate Roberts) tells Prince Humperdinck, “Drop. Your. Sword.”  Best. Bluff. Ever. It just sort of occurred to me that Atticus is kind of doing something like that on the cover of Hexed. There he is, staring at you, with Fragarach coming around to point at your heart…but you really don’t want to mess with him. He’s worse than the Dread Pirate Roberts. He’s totally badass, and I happen to know what he’s facing because I wrote the book. But the immature part o’ me mind (to which I admit I give far too much freedom) wants to maybe have a bit of fun with this. Unlike the other two covers in The Iron Druid Chronicles, this one really lends itself to a kind of caption contest. A photobomb kind of thing. What is Atticus doing here? Protecting something? Attacking something? Posing pointlessly? Let’s mess around with this! I just want to see my book in some crazy pictures. I’ll give you some time to think about it, and then you’ll have about a week to get ‘er done once the book comes out June 7—let’s make the deadline for entries June 15. I’ll repost the contest rules on June 7, and you can send me your stuff at that time—either JPEGs via email or post a link to your photo(s) in the comments. The prizes? I’m going to give away five (5) signed author copies of HAMMERED. Is this international? HELL YES. Two winners will be picked randomly. Three winners will be picked because they amuse me. Please shoot your photo and provide a title or caption or both. Here’s my sample, which is not stunningly original but is rather intended to set the bar very low (including in photo quality, because my camera phone sucks) for your own creations:

So what do you think? You can come up with something better, right? Atticus is TALKING to you on the cover of Hexed…what’s he saying? Have fun thinking stuff up!

OK, I’ve put this together super-duper fast—parts of it are still up in the air (and maybe you can help with that) and I sure hope more than two people show up—but here you go: I’m going to drive through Colorado because I want to. For a guy who likes beer, it’s a good place to visit. There are lots of trees there and I haven’t hugged them since 2007; I miss them. I’m also hoping to either meet or acquire some new Atticus O’Sullivan fans while I’m at it. Here’s a map of my route, starting down at the bit near Arizona:

Times and places I’m attempting to sign books:
June 5, Durango

Maria’s Books downtown — drive-by signing
Waldenbooks at the Durango Mall — drive-by for sure, possibility of an actual signing (still in the works)

June 6, Ouray

Not sure if Buckskin Books in Ouray will have any copies of Hounded, but if they do, by golly, I’m going to sign ’em!

June 7, small towns plus Colorado Springs

I will do drive-by signings at any bookstore in Ridgway, Montrose, or Gunnison you tell me to visit! This is the release day for Hexed, so I’ll be all excited n’ stuff.
Colorado Springs — Borders at 2120 Southgate Road, 3-4 pm, bring all your homies for the release of HEXED! Call ’em ahead of time at (719) 632-6611 if you’d like to reserve a copy!

June 8, Denver

HUGE thanks to Nina at Who Else! Books in Denver for putting together something for me on short notice! Can’t remember the last time I talked to someone so nice on the phone. I’ll be there at 7:30 pm signing both Hounded and Hexed, and I hope to see lots o’ folks there!

June 9, Fort Collins

Old Firehouse Books, 6 pm Great people here helping me out on short notice too! They’ll have both Hounded and Hexed in stock!

Places I will attempt to drink beer and blog about it:

Durango: Carver Brewing Co.
Ouray: Ouray Brewery
Gunnison: Gunnsion Brewery
Colorado Springs: Bristol Brewing Company. I’ve been to Phantom Canyon a couple of times in the past, so I wanted to try something new this time.
Denver: Great Divide Brewing Company and probably some other places. Mario Acevedo from The League of Reluctant Adults will be with me. Could be a legendary night.
Fort Collins: New Belgium. Duh! :) I won’t get to take the tour—it’s already booked full—but I intend to make the pilgrimage anyway.

So—if you are in any of these places on my route, I really hope you can come see me (or help me arrange a place to be seen)! If you aren’t on my route but know someone who is, please coerce them to come see me and get a book signed for you! And if you don’t live in Colorado and don’t know anybody who does, then I hope you’ll still visit my blog during the tour for pictures of books and beer! If there are any additional places I should visit—for either the book or the beer part of the tour—please let me know! Looking forward to this so much!

I’ve been informed that one is not allowed to run contests on Facebook to give away things like signed author copies. It is, apparently, Against The Rules. I haven’t read said rules, nor do I intend to, because every time I read a rule a little piece of my soul flies away. I do think someone’s wit is diseased, however. You make a social thingamabob like Facebook and then tell people they can’t have contests on it? That’s like giving a child a toy and then telling them they can’t play with it. Super mean poopy heads!

It’s the sort of thing the Man would do, that’s what it is. So we are going to stick it to the Man. We are going to be ninjas and have a contest without Facebook ever knowing we had one. It will be a Shadow Contest. It’s easy. On Wednesday, May 25, I’m gonna randomly select three (3) NEATO PEOPLE WHO READ BOOKS from the giant list of folks that Facebook calls fans or friends or WHATEVER it says in their rules I never read. I will attempt to contact those people and ask them to send me their addresses. And then I’m going to mail them each a signed copy of HEXED, the second book in The Iron Druid Chronicles. They’ll win it before they can buy it (as long as they’re in the US or Canada)! And the Man will cry.

If you already have gotten all clicky on the button that says “like” on Facebook and you are therefore a NEATO PERSON WHO READS BOOKS, you are already entered. If you are not already a NEATO PERSON WHO READS BOOKS, allow me to give you some reasons why you should join the illustrious ranks:
1) You will stick it to the Man.
2) I put some content on my Facebook author page that I don’t share on my blog. The Iron Druid Wallpapers, a bunch of photos from my upcoming tour of Colorado, and the priceless picture of my editors in a Luchador mask are just a few of the goodies you’ll find there.
3) It’s kinda easy to talk to me there, since I actually check it. My blog is spiffy and I love it, but since the comments can become riddled with spam I have a security question thingie that involves math and I think that discourages people from commenting. (Reason #637 why spammers should be sterilized.) I’ve talked to more folks on Facebook in the past couple of days than I have in the past month on my blog.
4) You can win a signed copy of HEXED!
5) You have always wanted to be a part of something with “Shadow” in the name of it. Shadow Council, Shadow Contest, Shadow Fish Fry—they are all cool because of the Shadow. It’s axiomatic. And now’s your chance to be shadowy!

Seriously, thank you to all the people who are already following me on Facebook—I appreciate your support and the chance to connect with you. :) I wish you the best o’ luck in the Shadow Contest! Cheers!

Since Atticus O’Sullivan is about 2,100 years old, he has one hell of a backstory. (That’s most of our recorded history, right? At least the parts that were recorded without hieroglyphs?) Though his adventures are firmly rooted in the modern day, occasionally his past has to come up, and when it does, I have to make sure it’s at least somewhat plausible.

Without giving anything away, I had to do quite a bit of research on the World Wars for HEXED. I was trying to confine it to WWII, but then found out that certain details required going back to their roots in WWI. Most of that research didn’t make it into the book, but I enjoyed educating myself nevertheless.

One of the things I learned in the course of doing research is never to tell people it’s for a novel. They never react like you hope they will.

If you’re a nerd who’s into fantasy, you hope they’ll find you vastly interesting and want to buy you a beer in exchange for a story. And I mean a good beer, too, not “the Banquet Beer”—I’m talking something with a craft name like Chocolate Oak Aged Yeti from the Great Divide Brewing Company in a flagon.

Sadly, no one ever does that. I will cling to the fantasy that it could happen, but experience has shown me that the odds against it are pretty high. You will never get a free beer for telling someone you’re doing research for a novel. You will get polite indifference, outright disbelief, or glazed eyes. On the upside, you do get all of those for free. Free is good!

I think I was talking about backstory.

Researching a huge backstory like Atticus’s can take an inordinately long time. It’s so easy to get distracted. Did you know that the ancient Celts used to charge into battle naked? The idea was that they’d terrify their opponents because they weren’t afraid to let their naughty bits go flappity-flap. It’s not a bad idea, honestly. If I saw a few hundred naked men charging me, I would RUN. But then the Celts ruined the effect by wearing golden torcs around their necks; it was concentrated wealth and it tended to focus one’s gaze. Dudes would squash their terror of floppity man meat long enough to get a shot at scoring the gold.

Wait. Was I talking about backstory or distraction?

Once you realize that you’re sinking time into research you should be using to write, you might think it would help to ration your research or schedule it. You can do that, sure, but you might wind up missing something that way. Free association can lead one to spiffy discoveries. I recently discovered this band called Dark Moor on Pandora, by the way. They do this rocking version of Vivaldi’s Winter and their album cover has a bitchin’ squid dude sitting on a throne with a Corinthian helmet. I’m going to put a link to the video on YouTube below. Only about the first 3:36 or so is the real song…bunch of bonus track nonsense after that, but it’s brilliant up to there.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txwlKqt01TQ[/youtube]

Anyway. Backstory. It’s tough stuff. Rewarding, though, if you don’t let the research consume you. :)

How cool is this! The incredibly spiffy Rane Aria sent me some fan art of Atticus O’Sullivan! She’s kindly given me permission to post it here, so of course I’m going to do it! Behold:

I want to thank Rane for taking the time to do this—I love it! I’m also going to post this into an album on my author Facebook page called Fan Art. If you ever feel inspired to send me some (use kevin (at) kevinhearne.com), please make sure you give me permission to post it and I’ll add it to the gallery on my Facebook page!

And while I’m at it, I suppose it would be a good time to re-mention that I have a gallery of Iron Druid wallpapers on my Facebook page that you’re free to download and use if you feel like it!

ALSO while I’m at it, thank you very much to all the folks who have contacted me to say they’re enjoying HOUNDED! It makes me smile. :)

TWENTY THOUSAND NERDS IN ONE PLACE! That’s going to be Phoenix Comicon, and I can’t wait! It will be a good warmup for San Diego, where I hear it’s supposed to be just like Phoenix except with a HUNDRED THOUSAND BONUS NERDS and some extra famous people.

Here’s my schedule for Phoenix—hope to see you there!

Friday, 3-4 pm, Room 124A: Being a Newbie Writer
Definitely my panel. Think I’ll be the newest of the newbies. Gini Koch, Jordan Summers, Marcy Rockwell, and yours truly.

Saturday, 10:30-11:30, Room 122: The Big Idea
John Scalzi, Cherie Priest, James Owen, Jordan Summers, Sam Sykes, and moi

Saturday, 1:30-2:30, Room 124A: Urban Fantasy Authors Go to Town
Allyson James, Cherie Priest, Jordan Summers, Yvonne Navarro, and me

Saturday, 4:30-5:30, Room 124A: Using the Southwest as a Setting for Stories
Allyson James, Gini Koch, Janni Lee Simner, Weston Ochse, y yo

I’m also going to have a table thingie in the exhibit hall that I’m sharing with Sam Sykes. Table 632. Sometimes I’ll be there! Sometimes I won’t! Sometimes Sam will be there and you might be confused, so just remember that he is very tall. Actually, I can be quite specific on when I’ll be there. I’ll be there for a little while on Friday about four-ish to see if anyone wants to chat. Then on Saturday afternoon I’ll be hanging out there between my afternoon panels from 2:30-4:30. Mysterious Galaxy will be sellin’ my book nearby, I’d be happy to sign one, five, or ten copies that you’d like to give as gifts… :) Seriously, come on by and say hello. I’ll probably be staring at my laptop otherwise. :)

“Aftermath” is a very strange word. It has vaguely negative connotations, doesn’t it? I find that odd, because to me it should be a word of unbridled joy. Any time aftermath is a good time. I often experience dread beforemath and existential horror duringmath, but aftermath is a time for frolicking with hummingbirds and singing show tunes with denizens of the forest.

Well. Here I am in the aftermath of my first week of bein’ published, my first book signing thingie, and I haven’t posted any pictures yet. I feel badly about this, but I haven’t had the time. The Day Job has been swamping me since it’s getting darn close to finals. I’ll do my best to squeeze in some time somewhere…

In the meantime let me say how grateful I am to everyone who came to Changing Hands to see me. It was a lovely night and it seemed that everyone was entertained. I’d also like to thank the spiffy people who have contacted me either on Facebook, Twitter, or the blog here to say how much they’re enjoying HOUNDED. It gives me warm fuzzies!

I will be at the East West Exchange in Payson this Sunday at 12:30. It’s a neato little bookshop with free wifi and what I believe to be the best darn fancy-schmancy coffee drinks in town. I’d love to meet you there if you’re in northern AZ or wouldn’t mind a nice drive up to visit a place with trees.

May your aftermath be serene and full of joy. :)