Stephanie Burgis - Magical Books for Ages Ten to Fifteen

Full-on Crazy

July 28, 2010, 7.21 pm

Here's the thing about having a lot of author friends, people whose novels were published long before mine:

I have seen Publishing Crazy. To be specific, I have seen Publication Day Crazy. And I always, always shook my head over it. Of course, I didn't do it in front of them - I was their friend, and they were suffering! - but I shook my head to myself. I said to myself: if I ever get published, I will not succumb to Publication Day Crazy. I will be happy and zen and centered. I will remember that this is all good! I will not be crazy.

You guys will have already guessed the ending to this story.

My book will be out in the UK in four days...and I have sooooo succumbed to Publication Day Crazy. Every time I think about the fact that A Most Improper Magick will officially be out on Sunday, my breath speeds up to hyperventilation levels. (Which is crazy! It might not even be in bookstores yet by that point. I won't have author copies by that point. Sunday is only a day, not a TERRIFYING EVENT. Right?)

Every time I look at the space on the bookshelf where my book will appear (and of course I do this, with pinpoint accuracy and unstoppable magnetism, every single time I visit my local library or Waterstones), I feel sick with panic. This is real. What if EVERYBODY HATES IT????? (It doesn't even matter that I've gotten some really nice reviews. What if they were ALL, EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM, FLUKES?)

Yesterday I realized that a period (full stop) had accidentally been replaced by a comma, incorrectly, at one point in the first chapter of my book...and I had a full-on meltdown. (EVERYONE WILL THINK I'M A GRAMMATICAL KNOW-NOTHING WITH NO SENSE OF STYLE! OTHER WRITERS WILL BURN MY BOOK!)

Back on Monday, I was planning to cut down on chocolate this week and start a new regime of healthy eating.

I am in full-on Publication Day Crazy mode...but even I, it turns out, am not quite that crazy.

Today I ate half of a large chocolate-chocolate-chip cookie and drank a strong dark hot chocolate. (Heat one small cup of milk on the stove. Melt in four squares of really excellent dark chocolate. Drink. Experience heaven.)

It helped. But I am still crazy.

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Random Sunday Questions and Luxuries

July 25, 2010, 3.36 pm

As I type this entry, I'm listening to my Celtic Music from Wales CD, which I really like*, and I'm thinking again about how I really need to learn Welsh soon. It's easy to get by without knowing any Welsh, especially in our area of Wales (only an hour from the English border), but it feels silly not to learn it, and even a bit disrespectful. Unfortunately, the classes offered locally won't work for me for various practical reasons.

Does anyone know of a good online Welsh-language course, or a really good set of Welsh language CDs? And have you guys had any luck learning languages that way? I've never used CDs to learn a language - I've always relied on in-person classes - but I'm starting to think that that might be the more practical way to go, this time...

Actually, as long as I'm asking the internet random questions: does anyone know how to make Twitter backgrounds out of novel covers? What size do they need to be? Is there a set of directions somewhere? I'd love to make two alternate backgrounds, one with my UK cover and one with my US cover.

(I'd also really love to make a good LJ icon from my UK cover, the way I have from my US cover, but I haven't had any luck with that so far - it always ends up looking wrong. Sigh. I do not have an artistic eye for cropping and resizing.)

And can you guys do my homework for me, please? Pleeeeeease? I'll trade you my peanut butter-and-jelly sandwich AND my chocolate milk... ;)

Ahem. Stopping now!

It's been a really lovely, sociable weekend. We've had lots of time hanging out with people who are, in a huge stroke of luck, both family members and really good friends. We've eaten homemade crumble made from berries freshly picked from the local mountains; I've drunk hot chocolate every single day, in celebration of the fact that finally, after nearly two years, I can! (Of course I did drink coconut hot chocolates, and they were incredibly yummy, but they weren't quite the same.)

What about you guys? How are your weekends going?

__

*It's by a local group, Ffynnon, from Carmarthen, but the CD is actually from an American label, so it's just as easy to buy in the US.

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The return of a lost love

July 19, 2010, 9.59 pm

Today was a red-letter day. Not because I had a great revision session (although I did! 4 chapters revised, woooooooot!); not even because our bathrooms are now astonishingly, sparklingly clean (for which, alas, I can take no credit). It was because:

Today I cooked macaroni 'n cheese!

OK, I guess I'll understand if that doesn't immediately sound like such a mind-blowing event. But here's the thing: this was my first macaroni 'n cheese in almost two years. Because of MrD's dietary restrictions, I'd been officially refused dairy ever since the autumn of 2008. As a vegetarian, you'd think I'd have practice at this sort of thing. After all, I've happily done without meat for 14 years now, with very little difficulty even at the very beginning.

Giving up dairy, on the other hand, almost killed me. So much comfort food is dairy! Hot chocolates, milk chocolates, cheesecake, milkshakes, and, oh, yes...macaroni 'n cheese, my top comfort food of ALL TIME.

I really, really missed it.

Thank goodness, MrD's dietary restrictions have been gradually easing off over the last few months, and today I finally took the plunge.

Insane amounts of yummy Welsh cheddar cheese, melted into whole milk, baked with steaming-hot macaroni and minced garlic under a bread-crumb topping...when I took it out of the oven, the smell alone nearly sent me into shock, after so long without. As I ate it, I consciously took the time to savor every single moment.

Going without macaroni 'n cheese (and dairy in general) for so long...well, it was kind of like having a long-distance relationship. Sometimes you have to do it, because for important reasons you and your partner just have to be in different parts of the world for a while; the one truly wonderful side-effect is that it feels SO GREAT to come back together afterwards, because you missed each other SO MUCH and you appreciate each other now on a WHOLE NEW LEVEL...

But really, you just never want to leave each other ever, ever again.

I'm so happy to have you back in my life, mac 'n cheese.

What about you guys? What are your favorite comfort foods? And/or: what small pleasure have you enjoyed most, lately?

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Life shifts, music and chocolate chip cookies

July 11, 2010, 5.21 pm

Today I am thinking about two things: music and chocolate-chip cookies. And how I can get more of both! ;)

I had a big musical crisis (no, really) three years ago, when I resigned from my job at an opera company, officially dropped out of my music history PhD program, and lost all professional musical ties. Add in the fact that I'd started out as a performing musician (I went to the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music for undergrad and got a B.M. in French horn Performance as well as Music History), originally planning to play professionally as my dayjob...and you can maybe guess what a big life shift this was for me.

I wish I could say that I always react to big life shifts with grace. Unfortunately...no. No, no, no. Take this as one example: the week I got my degree in music performance, having accepted a Fulbright scholarship based on music history and having officially decided that I would not be a performing musician after all...I stopped playing the French horn. Period.

I'd been playing it for 12 years, devoting most of my waking hours to becoming a better and better musician, loving playing even after I realized it wasn't what I wanted as a career...but when I finished my degree and realized that I was now officially off the professional track, I just couldn't play anymore.

I wanted to play. I still miss - really, physically, painfully miss - playing the horn. I LOVED it. But every single time I've tried to pick it up again since 1999, all I can hear is the difference in how I sound now from how I sounded back when I was practicing 5 hours a day.

Not good. And I haven't found a way around that yet.

So. I resigned from my job at the opera company in 2007 because of the CFS, and I dropped out of the PhD program because, with my CFS-limited energy, I could either try to finish the PhD or I could write my fiction...and I'd already decided that I didn't want to be a professor (even if the CFS had allowed it). I've never regretted giving up the PhD except in the feeling that I was disappointing my supervisors. It was definitely the right decision to focus on the career I loved and wanted - writing - instead of the career I thought I should follow - academia - but, but, but...

For about a year afterward, I couldn't listen to classical music. And when you consider I'd been listening to it and loving it since I was tiny (my parents are both fans), playing it on one instrument or another since I was six, going to classical concerts or opera performances regularly ever since, and I was thirty when I made that second big life/career shift...

Big loss. Big, big loss. Luckily, unlike the French horn issue, I managed to mostly get over it within a year or so. I listen to it regularly again now, although I still find it painful to listen to the operas I was writing about for my PhD thesis, or to go to live orchestra concerts. (Back to the French horn again...) But for some reason I still have a hard time persuading myself to buy CDs - persuading myself that it's "worth it" - even though listening to music I love is one of the best feelings I know.

Well. This weekend, I bought a new CD. It's not classical, for once, but I adore it: Eva Cassidy's Wonderful World. (I used to own, and absolutely loved her album Songbird.) I bought it yesterday and have had it on nearly constant repeat ever since.

What about you guys? What's the most recent CD that you've bought? Have you had any major life-shifts that changed your identity? And do you have any good chocolate-chip cookie recipes to share? :)

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Giveaway winner and chocolate problems

July 1, 2010, 4.33 pm

It's Thursday, July 1st, one month before A Most Improper Magick is released in the UK - and according to Random.org, Tim (tjinkerson) is the winner of a signed cover proof!

Tim, please send me a message with your mailing address, and I'll put your signed proof in the mail ASAP.

And now that the business segment of this entry is taken care of...we need to talk about a problem. A serious problem.

A problem that Tricia Sullivan caused. This: 

Divine Chocolate's Fruit and Nut Dark Chocolate bar.

Here's the thing: I've always eaten a bit of chocolate every day. For the last year or two, I even ate some of a Divine Chocolate bar every day, usually their dark chocolate-mint flavor. (As far as I'm concerned, Divine is the Willy Wonka of the chocolate world - and not only is it the yummiest chocolate I've ever found, it's even fair trade, too! Irresistible.) But I always had self-control. I never ate more than six (small!) squares in a day.

Then Tricia came to visit, and brought me a bar of their fruit & nut chocolate.

I've never liked chocolate with fruits inside. I had Dire Suspicions. But it was a gift, and I wanted to properly appreciate it, so I took a bite, shrugged, took another...and devoured half a bar in the next five minutes.

I haven't found my self-control since.

There has GOT to be something addictive in those bars!

Sadly, although I've tried going back to the old mint-dark chocolate bars I used to like (and be able to control!), I can't stop myself. Now I always choose the fruit & nuts bars when they're available. And then...

Sigh. Something Must Be Done. But not until I finish this current bar, obviously...

What about you guys? What are your favorite chocolate (or just candy) treats?

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Happy Saturday

March 20, 2010, 11.25 pm

WHEW. We've been approved for the new house! There are still lots of reasons to cross our fingers (for instance, we hope to be able to move in April 1st but have been told that the house might not be ready yet on that date - and our current tenancy expires March 27th!), but right now I'm just massively relieved to have that next stage figured out. And if we end up having to put all our stuff into storage and go hang out in a holiday cottage somewhere in the Welsh mountains for a week or two...well, darn, is all I can say. ;p

(I really, really like the Welsh mountains. Have I mentioned that before?)

This morning we went out to the local market, where we followed our recent Saturday tradition of buying fabulous curries and baghlava from the Persian food stall. The nice thing about being regular customers is that my "small" tray of delicious, fresh-made baghlava gets stacked higher and higher every time! (I have become a VERY loyal customer because of developments like this.) I also found out that today is Iranian New Year. So: happy New Year! :)

The CFS is doing a lot better. I feel a little nervous writing this publicly - I don't want to jinx myself! But I've been holding off on saying this for a few days now, and I'm starting to feel confident again. I really am feeling much better. WHEW.

And best of all, I wrote 1530 words today and finished Chapter Three of the dragon novel. Yay! I am having so much fun with this book. My neurotic back-brain - the same part that made me give up Kat1 for a year because it convinced me I could never, ever pull it off - keeps trying to waylay me with regular panics about my competence as a writer (this one is too hard for you! you'll never pull it off!), the idea's inherent marketability (it will never, ever sell, and people will sneer at you for even imagining it could!), etc., etc., ad nauseum...but what keeps me going through all the assorted panics is just how much fun this book really is to write (combined with fabulous cheering-on from Patrick and my beta-readers, Tiffany and Jenn).

Today I managed to make Patrick laugh out loud when I read the chapter to him. Score!!!

So it's been a happy Saturday. :) How about you guys? How is your weekend going?

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I R Serious Writer (TM), and a gruesome TV side-effect

March 7, 2010, 4.47 pm

OK, there are some days, ever since I signed my first book contracts, when I can actually pretend to myself that I am a Serious Professional Writer...and then there are days when I just can't.

Here is the most recent evidence, from my Friday night of prewriting play for the Austen-y dragon novel:

Erm, yes. Well. Um... ;)

Of course, as hopelessly silly as it is, playing with the novel also really, truly works. The more playful I am, the more productive I am and the easier the novel flows. My evening of pre-writing play resulted in me finishing Chapter One today and feeling total happiness about it...

...but, well. It's not exactly the kind of thing that looks like an impressive, grown-up job, does it? Oops.

In other breaking news, dark chocolate also helps writing, in a pinch. And vegan hazelnut brownies are full of super-delicious WRITING MAGIC.

Also, I may have been watching just a few too many episodes of "Castle" lately. I keep finding myself imagining all my surroundings, wherever I am, as the setting for one of the gruesome victim-discovery scenes that open every "Castle" episode.

Eep.

Then, of course, I need more chocolate...

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Monday comfort list

February 15, 2010, 11.20 pm

Tonight I'm having a hard night, beating myself up over a lot of things that are out of my control. Things I want to do with MrD but just can't because of my health; things I want to do for our family that I can't manage either, right now...no fun at all to confront these issues.

Add to that the itching discomfort of being between books (and it really does feel like that; the downside of an addiction to writing is that when I'm between major projects I feel miserably uncomfortable)...and, well, it's one of those nights when I really miss all those dairy-based comfort foods I used to eat at times like these. (Ohhh, hot chocolate; ohhh, macaroni & cheese...)

Since I can't eat dairy for at least another eight months, though, I have to resort to other measures for comfort. So I'm going to talk about my weekend, because that really was wonderful, and just thinking about it makes me feel a lot better.

MrD and I went to the local market on Saturday morning, for the first time in a long time. We both love the market, which is full of a huge variety of different kinds of stalls, selling everything from antique matchbox cars to used paperbacks to handcrafted jewelry and fresh fruits and vegetables. This time I found Patrick a Sharpe novel for £2 and discovered a Persian food stall that was amazing - and which even had tons of dairy-free, meat-free options. MrD and I were both offered samples and were both equally enthusiastic about everything.

Better yet, when I asked to buy some baghlava (the Persian version of the "baklava" I grew up with), it turned out that the baghlava could only be bought by the tray, not as individual pieces...so what could I do but martyr myself with a whole tray? ;) I was very, very strong and saved a third of the tray to give away to our babysitter on Sunday...but I REALLY enjoyed the two thirds of the tray that I ate Saturday afternoon with a cup of tea, celebrating Kat3's completion.

And then Sunday was Valentine's Day, and Patrick and I both love that holiday despite all the commercial hype. Actually, I think we love it even more now that we're parents. It's a celebration of romantic love...which means it's a guaranteed day to be offered free babysitting! ;p It felt like total decadent bliss to go out to our favorite coffeeshop and sit and just talk to each other for two whole hours, then wander hand-in-hand up to the local castle. Truly wonderful and romantic - and then genuinely wonderful to get MrD back afterward, too. He'd had a great time, and so had we.

Just to make the day perfect - remember that amazing Kat-related compact I drooled over at the Jane Austen Centre? Well, I have a husband who pays attention. :) It was a really special Valentine's gift, and I've been playing with it ever since, keeping it by my side during all my writing sessions as I've dabbled with three different short stories at once.

OK, writing this all out has made me feel a lot better. What about you guys? What were the highlights of your weekends? Or alternately, what do you do to make yourself feel better when comfort food isn't available?

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Halloween, disillusionment, and good recipes

October 31, 2009, 2.22 pm

Happy Halloween, everybody! For the first time in years, it actually feels like a real Halloween to me, because we're finally living in a neighborhood with lots of kids who trick or treat. (Two of them already arrived, fully costumed, last night, so we're expecting even more tonight, on the day itself.)

It's been over ten years now since I experienced a real Halloween, since I moved to Vienna when I was 22 - no trick or treat'ers there - then to a neighborhood in Pittsburgh that was full of Russian immigrants who hadn't adopted that particular piece of American culture. England has, by and large, adopted it, but my neighborhood in Leeds didn't have any kids of the right age, so for year we bought bags of Halloween candy in a hopeful way, then ended up donating them all to Patrick's office unopened.

In honor of a real Halloween, we even bought a real pumpkin, which my brother Dave and I carved last night. It was the first pumpkin I've been involved in carving since I was in high school, which makes it about 15 pumpkin-free years...and yet, pulling out the pumpkin goop was EVERY bit as gross as I'd remembered! Of course, Dave and I had always helped our parents do the carving, but we weren't the ones who had done the real work...which led to some seriously uncomfortable revelations this year.

First: wow, the carving is MUCH harder than it looks! And second: we couldn't believe that the pumpkin goop had to be thrown out! Both of us had been convinced that the goop was the part that went into pumpkin pie. Neither of us even likes roasted pumpkin seeds, so we'd confidently assumed that the goop was going to be the big cooking bonus! As it turns out: nope. The goop is just yicky. It's sad to be disillusioned on a major holiday.

But so it goes. Today, Patrick's promised to bring me back a can of pumpkin purée from town so that we can still make Halloween-style vegan pumpkin spice cookies, using the recipe that Deva Fagan recommended.

What about you guys? What are your favorite Halloween foods? (And if the answer is chocolate...well, who can blame you? ;p );

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