Tag Archives: Hexed

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Delivery!

I received super cool news today: my super cool agent, Evan, loved HEXED and told me to deliver it without any changes! I’m fairly well gobsmacked because I just assumed I’d be changing something, if not quite a few somethings, before it was ready to send…but I guess I must have learned something after writing that first book, eh?

I know I said I probably wouldn’t write again for a while, but I confess that I’ve already cheated. I’ve begun HAMMERED with Chapter 3, where Atticus and Jesus have a beer in Rula Bula. And the fish and chips, of course.
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Two books down, one to go!

This morning I just finished writing HEXED, the second book in my series. Right now it’s 82,256 words, and I’m quite smug.

Of course, once my agent and editor take a look at it, it’ll probably change significantly, and the revision process is like that, but it’s also entirely enjoyable, just tinkering around the edges. What I’m grooving on is the fact that I managed to bang all of that out in less than five months while still holding down a day job. I didn’t know I had it in me!

I’ll probably start messing around with HAMMERED soon, but for now I’m going to take a couple weeks or so off from writing and enjoy the sense of completion while it lasts.

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Skipping ahead

I just finished writing the epilogue to HEXED. It came to me just before I nodded off to sleep last night, and I wrote a quick, rough version before I forgot it. I polished it up this morning.

It’s odd because I haven’t finished the actual climax of the book yet. Sometimes I do that, though: I skip ahead in the sequence of events, then go back and fill in the gaps later. Chapter 18 was like that; I wrote chapter 17, then 19 and 20, and only then did I go back and write 18.

I’m at 74K now and I’m going to start the climactic Chapter 21 momentarily. Blood and guts, baby, blood and guts.

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Progress Report 2

HOUNDED was formally accepted on Dec. 9, and now it’s going to the copy editing stage. I’ll be receiving the copy edited manuscript on Jan. 14, and I have to return it with my corrections/amendments by Jan. 27.

I’m at 70,000 words on HEXED, and I’m hoping to finish it up this week. Right now there is coffee to drink and presents to unwrap, and later there is Sherlock Holmes to enjoy. :)

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Progress Report

Today I reached 50,000 words on HEXED. I also went through a whole box of tissues because I’m ill, but at least I’m getting some writing done in between the sniffles.

Thank goodness for Day Quil.

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Pulchritudinous Poland

I used a five-syllable word in the title just to freak out one of my students. He thinks that words longer than his fingernail should not be allowed. I think that they should be cherished, like the halcyon days of his youth. (I used halcyon to freak him out even more.) Plus, alliteration is always a good time, right?

Right now I love Poland, population 32 million or so. Never been there, but you know, maybe someday.

The reason I love Poland is that it’s the first country to buy translation rights to my urban fantasy series. That’s right, my first foreign sale is to…POLAND! Not to Germany or Italy or China or even the UK: Poland.

I am grateful to them and of course I hope they enjoy the Polish witches in my series. Malina Sokolowski, the leader of the Polish coven, is one of my favorite characters, and I always delight in writing about her. The Polish coven, as a matter of fact, is quite involved in the plot of HEXED.

I’ve learned quite a bit about Poland in the course of my research for the novels. The primary thing I’ve learned is that I have no idea how to pronounce anything in Polish. I look forward to learning much more, of course, and now I’m quite excited to know that my books will have an international audience.

Thank you, Poland!

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Disco Fries!

Today I learned about Disco Fries. It’s not something you can routinely find in Arizona, or I would have heard about it by now.

Disco Fries are french fries with gravy and cheese on top. In Canada they call it poutine. Here’s the link, son!

I learned about Disco Fries from my agent. I think I’ll have to try some when I go to New York next summer, just to say I’ve had them.

But I have other excellent news: HOUNDED, HEXED and HAMMERED will be audio books published by Random House Audio! Since Random House owns Del Rey, the opportunities for synergistic marketing are strong, and I’m so happy that people in the publishin’ world seem to dig Atticus and Oberon.

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Writer’s Playlist

I tend to listen to music while I write, and it’s usually the instrumental sort, mostly guitar music of one kind or another.

Here are the artists I listen to most frequently:
1. Rodrigo y Gabriela, anything they’ve recorded
2. Yngwie Malmsteen’s Concerto for Electric Guitar
3. Vinnie Moore, anything I have
4. Six Parts Seven, Casually Smashed to Pieces

Of course, this means I’m often plugged into headphones while I’m writing in public. I’ve discovered that I don’t write well at Starbucks, because they play some awful music at times and they play it loud. Plus they turn on the blenders and the coffee grinders and auuugh! It’s cacophonous.

Yes. I wrote this whole post just so I could write “cacophonous.”

Word Count on HEXED: 37K.

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On HEXED and burly squirrels

My work in progress is called HEXED and I’m just about halfway through it. It features Coyote (not a coyote or the coyote but Coyote, the trickster), a fallen angel, some Bacchants, a nasty coven of German hexen, a tall priest and a short rabbi…amongst other colorful characters.

I have to say that so far I’m kind of cracking myself up during the funny bits. I hope other people will think it’s funny too. I’m also kind of grossing myself out during the gory bits, but I’m not sure if it’s okay to hope other people will be grossed out.

Anyway, HEXED is supposed to be finished in the spring, and HAMMERED, the third book in the American Druid series, will be finished in the summer, featuring nobody’s favorite squirrel, Ratatosk.

“But Kevin,” you may ask, “how can  a squirrel be nobody’s favorite?” According to Norse mythology, Ratatosk lives in the World Tree, Yggdrasil (which isn’t on my daughter’s spelling list this week) and he regularly chats with a great wyrm named Nidhogg. Any squirrel that a wyrm talks with instead of eats has to be a mighty burly squirrel, right? Ratatosk is the kind of squirrel that bench presses guys like Charles Atlas. Ratatosk is the kind of squirrel that would steal nuts from Chuck Norris. Ratatosk will never appear in a Disney movie because he frightens small children and large dogs. I really can’t wait to write about him…but I need to finish HEXED first.