Tag Archives: squee

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Welcome to the new site!

Hello everyone! Whether you followed me before on Blogger or are new here, I’m happy you stopped by!  I hope you’ll take time to explore the site and come back here to the blog often!

Commenting is super easy. Go to the permalink for the post (if you’re not already there) by either clicking on the post title or on the link at the bottom of the post. The comment field will appear. Type in your name, do a basic math problem to prevent spam, and you’re good to go. You don’t have to register or fill in those fields with your email address and website. If someone gets ridiculous I may have to tighten up the rules, but right now the optimist in me prefers to believe that people are inherently good and I’ll never have to do that.

The blog will continue to be tweaked/expanded; I need to put in some links to my compatriots in The League of Reluctant Adults on the sidebar, and of course I’m going to play around with fonts and colors and so on, but at least right now we’re functional.

I gotta give a shout-out to my site designer, Sean Akers. He’s done a stunning job here and he’s been tremendously helpful. Here’s what it’s like to work with Sean:

Me: Can we do that one thing with the doohickey to make it cool and then do (incoherent babble) with the other page?

Sean: Yes.

See? He’s awesome! If you want/need a spiffy website, head over to check out his portfolio and tell him I sent you.

The Goodies page will be expanded in the coming weeks and months because I like providing free goodies. One thing that will show up there for sure is a free short story. That will come out prior to the release of Hounded. There will be more reviews on the Reviews page as we get closer to publication; you can laugh at the picture of five-year old me on the About Kevin page (and wish YOU had a vintage Spider-Man shirt like that); and there are a couple of new email addresses you can use on the Contact page if you’d like to shoot me a message. Again, welcome! Hope to hear from you soon!

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Copy Editing Day

Today I am supposed to receive the copy-edited manuscript for my second book, Hexed. I’m incredibly excited about this—so much so that I might indulge in excessive superfluous exclamation points!!!!!!

You might wonder why.

Why would any sane person want to see their written work all marked up by a stranger 3,000 miles away?

Because there will be a title page with my name on it that the publisher made up all special just for me. There will also be an ISBN number assigned specifically to my book. It’s all proof that my dream of getting published will be real someday…in just a wee bit over a year from now. *tiny groan*

April 26, 2011…*another tiny groan.* It’s a long time to wait. Nineteen months and one day after the deal was struck, Hounded will finally hit the shelves. That is a bit longer than most deals, but since it’s going to be followed in quick succession by Hexed in May and Hammered in June, the extra time is built in there for me to actually write two books.

It will be bearable, of course, because the day will eventually come. I get to wake up every day and know I’m twenty-four hours closer to my goal. Eventually I’ll get to see my covers and do a little dance. I’ll get to hear the reader of the audio version attempt to do all the accents in the books (Irish, Polish, Tamil, Russian, Finnish, Mandarin, Icelandic, and German) and grin until my face hurts. And maybe, in the interim, I’ll get some good news from overseas, or some news about dramatic rights. It could happen anytime, and that makes waiting more fun.

As far as progress goes, I’ve taken a step backward, but I think it’s more of a course correction. I’ve been writing about these vampires recently and not digging it at all. I wrote about four thousand words, had this huge imbroglio set at University of Phoenix Stadium, and it didn’t feel right. So I highlighted the lot of it and pressed Delete. It wasn’t really a subplot; it was more of a derailment, a complete tangent, and it’s better that I wait on the vampires until I can develop them properly in their own story. Hammered isn’t about vampires. It’s about Ratatosk and Yggdrasil, Thor and Odin, and How to Tempt a Frost Giant.

O frabjous day! There shall be many words to cuddle, plus hot chocolate with marshmallows! I raise my mug to you, and hope you have some lovely words to cuddle up with too.

Uncategorized

Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit

My editor is THE COOLEST editor ever! Behold Exhibit A:

Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #1

All of this was sent to me by my editor, except for the fruit. Here’s what you’re looking at, left to right, front row: Robert Redick’s The Red Wolf Conspiracy; a Braeburn apple; Daryl Gregory’s Pandemonium; another apple; Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett’s Have Mercy; and then moving to the back row, an Advanced Reader Edition of Peter V. Brett’s The Warded Man; a NEW! AWESOME! copy of Mr. Brett’s latest novel, The Desert Spear, two weeks before it’s available in stores (Whoops! I just drooled on the keyboard in nerd ecstasy!); bananas, because this shit is bananas; Richard K. Morgan’s The Steel Remains; and a final apple.

And now we pause for a celebratory squee. Squeeeee!!!

I had no idea how cool it would be to get free books until I got them. I mean, when I was a younger nerd with more hair, I’d get “free” books from those book clubs, but we all know they weren’t really free because you had that commitment hanging over you to buy only six more books in the next year at regular club price and you had to return that card on time or they’d send you a crappy book of the month instead of something you wanted. These books are free. I don’t have to buy anything or “just pay shipping and handling.” And yes, I’m bragging about it. I’m having a nice brag right now, because this is the coolest perk I never expected for getting published. I didn’t expect any perks, to be honest; getting published is satisfactorily perky all by itself. It doesn’t need perks. But they are there, and this is one of them.

In coming days, weeks, (months?) I’ll be reviewing these. I’m reading The Warded Man first because I’ve heard nothing but stellar things about it and I’m fond of reading stellar books. But after that and The Desert Spear, I’m digging into Richard Morgan’s book. His Altered Carbon was awesome stuff and so were the sequels, so I can’t wait to see what he’s done here. Oh, and you know what? I almost bought that book over the weekend! I picked it up, all excited, and then I checked the publisher on the spine and went “WHOA!” kind of like that loud man in the Staples commercials but several decibels quieter. Richard Morgan’s with Del Rey, too! I had no idea. I put the book down—very reluctantly—because I thought maybe, just maybe, Tricia would surprise me with it. And she DID! So that is Exhibit B. The books & authors in the front row are unknown to me, but I’m looking forward to this particular introduction and I’ll share the experience when I get to them.

I really need to write an effusive missive o’ thanks to my editor now.

School’s keepin’ me busy and it’s tough to find the headspace to write, but I’m at 30K on Hammered now and deep in research on the Kabbalah for my Kabbalist warriors. Happy Passover to all my Jewish friends.