Rose, the heroine, is a young woman who had to become a grown-up very fast when her parents both (in different ways) abandoned her. The family that she does have left - made up of her two younger brothers and her grandmother - is her main focus in life, the thing she'll give everything to protect.

They're all fabulously well-drawn characters, but when I finished the book this time round, I found myself really missing my grandma in California, because Rose's own grandma is such a great character. She's strong, she's smart, she's loving, she never lets Rose get away with lying to her or to herself...and in my favorite scene of the two of them together, she gives Rose heartfelt, perfect advice that is ABSOLUTELY WRONG for her granddaughter. It's such a perfect family moment: two people loving each other, trying to protect each other, and sometimes screwing up anyway for all the right reasons.

Families: strong, believable, flawed (because they're made up of humans, who are never perfect), and fiercely loving. They're my favorite things to read about.

Looking at my list of comfort books made me realize that that's the big constant, for me, in almost all of my favorite books. I looooove reading about families, whether they're bohemian and eccentric, like the family in Hilary McKay's wonderful Casson family novels, or aristocratic and repressed, like the central family in Loretta Chase's Carsington novels...the main point is, I just love reading about how families interact with each other. I find it endlessly fascinating when it's done well.

And it's the one theme that keeps popping up in my own writing, too, which I guess is not surprising. Even in the dragon book, where I physically separated my heroine from her sisters before the book ever began, that same old family theme keeps coming back again, like an irrepressible force. I just can't stop exploring it.

What about you guys? Do you prefer reading books where the heroines/heros are safely isolated from any family influences, free to have adventures without interference from any interfering relatives, or do you prefer the ones where they're pushing and pulling against their families (whether loving or not) throughout the adventure?

And what are your favorite family books?

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It all started when Christine Johnson realized that YA authors seem to have one big thing in common - an obsession with sweets and baking.

That gave her an idea. She started calling (well - okay, emailing) around and ended up with more than a dozen kind, sugar-loving authors on board to bring you one amazing contest.

Here’s the deal:

To enter, simply leave a thoughtful comment on an author’s Bake Sale blog post, or tweet about the contest with the hashtag #YABakeSale10. Voila! You’re entered.

When you enter, you become eligible to win any one of the Personal Prize Packs (i.e. a comment on Saundra Mitchell’s blog may net you the Cyn Balog prize pack. You’re entering the whole contest, not just that particular author’s part of it.) You also become eligible to win the humongonormous Grand Prize Basket.

What’s in the Grand Prize Basket?

Each author has hand-written two copies of a favorite sweet-treat recipe. One copy has gone into a beautiful recipe book that is part of the Grand Prize Basket. In addition to the (hand-written! Did we mention that?) recipe collection, the Grand Prize winner will receive:

• A signed copy of Cyn Balog’s SLEEPLESS Bookmarks for A MOST IMPROPER MAGICK (aka, KAT, INCORRIGIBLE) by Stephanie Burgis
• Signed bookmarks for THE CRESCENT and HALF MOON, pencils, and a crescent moon and crystal-studded star necklace from Jordan Deen
• A (signed?) copy of THE BODY FINDER, a THE BODY FINDER tote bag, sticker and bookmarks from Kimberley Derting
• An EVERLASTING-themed notebook, bookmark and pin from Angela Frazier
• A signed copy of CLAIRE DE LUNE, signed stickers and a silver, moon-themed bookmark from Christine Johnson
• A signed copy of SHADOWED SUMMER, matching chocolate candies, Twilight-themed heart candies, bookmarks and THE VESPERTINE dance card from Saundra Mitchell
• A signed copy of THE PACE, by Shelena Shorts, along with bookmarks and THE PACE pencils
• A signed hard-cover of SHADE and a Keeley Brothers pin from Jeri-Smith Ready
• A signed copy of PERSONAL DEMONS, a PERSONAL DEMONS tank top, temporary tattoos, and bookmarks from Lisa Desrochers . . .
• AND MORE!!! All for one lucky winner!

But that’s not all!

Each author has one other handwritten recipe that will be part of each author’s own Personal Prize Pack.

The prize packs include:

• Cyn Balog - Signed copy of SLEEPLESS and a handwritten recipe for Coconut Bread.
• Stephanie Burgis - UK paperback copy of A MOST IMPROPER MAGICK and a hand-written recipe for Apple Muffins
• Kay Cassidy - Hand-written recipe and giveaways
• Megan Crewe - Hand-written recipe and giveaways
• Shannon Delaney - Hand-written recipe and giveaways
• Jordan Deen - Basket with Pampered Chef baking gear and a recipe for Orange Pineapple Cake
• Kimberley Derting - Signed copy of The Body Finder, stickers, a totebag, bookmarks and a recipe for Best Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Lisa Desrochers - A copy of PERSONAL DEMONS and a recipe for Sunday Coffee Cupcakes
• Angie Frazier - A signed hard-cover copy of EVERLASTING, bookmark, and a recipe for Butter Rum Cupcakes with Coconut Buttercream Frosting
• Judith Graves - Copy of UNDER MY SKIN, a character card, and a recipe for Dead Lady Fingers
• Christine Johnson - A signed hard-cover copy of CLAIRE DE LUNE, stickers, a silver moon-themed bookmark and a recipe for Chocolate-Chip Butterscotch Blondies
• Saundra Mitchell - Recipe and giveaways Jennifer Murgia - ANGEL STAR swag, Octogram earrings, and a hand-written recipe
• Shelena Shorts - Signed copy of THE BROKEN LAKE and bookmarks and a hand-written recipe
• Jeri Smith-Ready - SHADE UK paperback edition and a recipe for Scottish Oat Scones

Fine print: The contest entries must be posted by midnight eastern time on September 20th. This contest is open to the U.S., U.K. and Canada. Questions? Leave them in the comments or email Christine - christine(at)christinejohnsonbooks.com

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And speaking of books...

Most of the time, being a writer and a reader go together like...well, like birthday cake and ice cream! You can't have the first without the second, right? (Well, OK, some very strong people may be able to eat birthday cake and NOT eat ice cream with it, but...not me.)

Every so often, though, there's a hiccup. And it's weirdly unpredictable which books - or whole genres - turn out to be off-limits during particular writing projects.

When I was writing A Most Improper Magick, you might have thought that the genre I wouldn't feel able to read would be Regency romances. On the contrary! I loved reading them even more than ever and felt no conflict or discomfort whatsoever as I wrote my own Regency-set adventures, which (gently and lovingly) teased some of the biggest literary conventions in Regency romance.

Books about sisters, though? They felt like poison. I COULD NOT read any of them, no matter how good they were. They could be set in pioneer America or 23rd-century space; they could be gritty realism, even. None of that mattered. As soon as I realized that a book centered around the relationship between sisters, my whole body screamed RED ALERT! RED ALERT! DANGER! and I had to stop reading...

Because what I really cared most about in my own novel, it turned out, was the relationship between Kat and her sisters. That was the most important part of the book, for me, and it felt way too vulnerable and raw to let myself get influenced or thrown out by anyone else's literary sisterhoods.

Now I'm writing a dragon book that's yet again set in the Regency (although about 13 years later, after the Napoleonic wars are finally over). Again, I'm happily reading other Regencies. I'm fine reading other books with dragons, too, because for all the million different representations of dragons in literature, I feel perfectly comfortable and secure in my own interpretation. I'm perfectly happy to read about someone else's 2-ton dragon even as I write about my own heroine carrying her small, decorative (and troublesome) dragon on her shoulder. No problem.

But last week I tried picking up the newest novel by one of my favorite Regency authors for adults, Eloisa James. As usual, it's witty and romantic...but this time, it's a retelling of Cinderella.

As I read, I felt discomfort creep slowly but steadily through me. It got worse and worse, to the point where it actually felt painful. After two (really excellent) chapters, I had to give up and admit that I CANNOT read this novel right now.

This is a book I've been eagerly anticipating, because I LOVE the way Eloisa James writes. But guess what? It turns out that, at its essence, my dragon book is a Cinderella story. One of my beta readers pointed this out a couple of months ago, but I didn't take any notice, because that wasn't how I thought of it at all. I never conceived the novel as a fairytale retelling - Cinderella has never even been one of my favorite fairy tales, so why would I? - and I had no plans for any glass slippers to get involved.

But it turns out...well, my beta readers are really, really smart. Because at its essence, yes, for all the differences between my story and the original fairytale, I really am writing a Cinderella story about loss and transformation and romance...and right now, I cannot bear to read anyone else's version.

What about you guys? If you're writers, are there any genres you've had to give up reading while you wrote a book? If you're a reader, what are your favorite fairytale retellings? Or the genres that you could NEVER give up reading, no matter what?

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And for the yummy portion of the post, here's the teaser that's appearing on several YA author blogs today:

COMING SOON:

It just may be the most delicious contest that’s been run this year. More than a dozen of your favorite YA authors, an obsession with sweets, and a stunning array of prizes. On September 4th, details will be announced here and on Christine Johnson’s blog.

Until then, here’s a hint:

(ETA: Actually, because of international time-zone differences, it will probably get announced here a day later...but you can find out on Christine's blog in the evening of September 4th, if you're in the US!)

***

Why is it that so many kids' authors are obsessed with baked goods? Does it say something about us? Or is it true of everyone? Hmm.

Today I was good and did not buy a baked good at the café, even though the chocolate cheesecake looked INCREDIBLE. Unfortunately, I can't take too much credit, since I was busy melting all over the floor in chocolate bliss - yes, I gave in to temptation and ordered another Hot Chocolate Milano...

And then, in a weird coincidence, the book I found at Waterstones that ended up in my shoulderbag (a book I'd never heard of before, but which looks great) was Cathy Cassidy's Sundae Girl.

There's definitely something edible in the air right now...

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First, Tracy at Tall Tales and Short Stories just interviewed me about the writing/submission process for A Most Improper Magick. You can read the interview (and her review of AMIM) here.

Second, Jocelyn at Book Babblers interviewed me here.

And for anyone with kids who's going to be within driving distance of Newport, Wales on October 27th: you can check out the full programme for Big Read Day online, including the worldbuilding writing workshop I'll be leading for kids aged 10 and up, "How to Write Your World Real". You can also find a booking form here.

Whew! Now on to the real entry. :)

***

A long time back, I posted here asking what people's favorite e-readers were. Over the past year, a toxic combination of exhaustion and CFS has made it almost impossible for me to read long manuscripts on my computer screen...which has struck a fatal blow to my (very important) habit of critiquing novels for close friends and crit partners. Not only does that suck for me (because getting to read great novels before they're published is a huge gift!), it means I'm really letting down everybody who critiques my novels by not helping them out in return.

So, after months of indecision, I am finally breaking down and spending the money on an e-reader. From everything I've read and heard, the iPad seems like by far the best one out there, but...well, sadly, we don't have that much free money! The prices on the new Kindles have finally dropped to a point where we can justify the expense, though, so Patrick and I are going to buy a joint Kindle this month.

This is something I wouldn't be doing if I didn't want to do critiques - I definitely prefer reading books on paper - but I'm getting excited about it already. Last week, as I was re-reading a favorite book for the umpteenth time (a Regency novel for adults, Loretta Chase's Miss Wonderful), I thought about how great it would be to have extra e-copies of all my very favorite comfort books stored on my Kindle so that they were always available, no matter what. I started making a list in my head of all the books I would want to ALWAYS have on me for comfort and fun.

Then, of course, I looked on Amazon...and, curses! Those are almost all books that were published pre-kindle (or just without kindle rights), so of course there aren't any electronic versions available of my favorite comfort books. Wahh!

Still, it was fun making the list in my head. Here's a quick sampling from it (I'm going to save you guys the whole list, because it was LONG!):

• Ilona Andrews, On the Edge (adult rural fantasy)
• Loretta Chase, Miss Wonderful, Mister Impossible, and Lord Perfect (adult Regency romantic comedies)
• Joan Bauer, Squashed (YA comedy)
• Georgette Heyer, The Talisman Ring (18th-century romantic comedy)
• Virginia Euwer Wolff, The Mozart Season (lovely MG novel about family and music)
• Linda Urban, A Crooked Kind of Perfect (quirky MG comedy)
• Lois McMaster Bujold, Paladin of Souls (high fantasy adventure for women, with a great quasi-historical setting)

...aaaand so many more!

What about you guys? If you could stick extra copies of any books in the world onto an e-reader, which books would you carry around with you all the time?

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I have discovered a whole new reason to love life, and it is the Hot Chocolate Milano served at Caffé Nero.

As you guys know, I am a hot chocolate addict, and since our Caffé Nero is amazingly child-friendly (they offer special free drinks - "babaccinos" - for toddlers and even keep a collection of toys for them to play with in-store), I've been drinking my hot chocolates at Caffé Nero at least once a week for the last couple of months. This time, though, for the first time, I noticed a second kind of hot chocolate on the menu, one that was described as "extra-rich".

Ooh. Extra rich. Of course, I ordered it.

The baristo (is the job title baristo when it's a man serving the drinks? or is it still barista?) said, "Ah. Ahem. So have you ordered the Milano before?"

"No," I said.

"Ah," he said. "Well, it's a...well, it's very intense. A lot of people don't like it. It's basically melted Belgian chocolate, you know."

"Ooh," I said. "Sounds good."

He sighed, looking worried. "How about this," he said. "I'll make it for you, but if you don't like it, just tell me, okay? And I'll make you an ordinary hot chocolate for free. Because a lot of people...well, I like it, personally, every once in a while, but it is very intense."

"Okay," I said. As Patrick pointed out later, when I told him this story, the barista/o had NO IDEA what effect he was having on me with this description. He thought he was warning me off. Little did he know...

It looked incredible, served in a tall glass with whipped cream on top. Pure chocolate bliss. I told myself not to have too-high expectations, though, even as I lifted it up to my lips. It couldn't really be that intense, that chocolatey...

OMG. It really was. It was incredible.

I drank every drop. I would have licked the dregs if I could have reached them at the bottom of the glass.

Hot Chocolate Milano. Hot Chocolate Milano. Hot Chocolate Milano...

I can't wait to order another one. I wonder if they would think I was too weird if I got it again tomorrow...

What about you guys? What are your favorite, most decadent café treats?

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(You can click on the photo to see the larger version.)

The handmade chocolate truffles are divine. The picture on the champagne label comes straight from my beautiful UK cover, and it reads: A MOST IMPROPER CHAMPAGNE. DRINK ME!

Just like Alice in Wonderland, I followed orders.

I really, really love my friends. :)

Sadly, I have to warn everybody that - believe it or not - in this coming week, I am going to be even WORSE and even MORE slow at replying to emails and other messages than usual (beating even my previous terrible record!), because we've just started a period of 10 days without any childcare at all. (Curse those August holidays!)

I'm fighting hard to find the time and energy for fiction-writing...but personal emails may just not happen at all in the next week or so. :( I feel really guilty every time I look at my inbox and see so many messages I need and want to respond to...but between exhaustion, CFS, and sheer lack of typing time, it's just not happening at the moment.

My hope is that if I can keep on posting here fairly regularly, at least all my friends will know a bit of what I'm up to...and I promise to try to make up for my email lame-ness once life goes back to normal!

In the meantime, though, I'm having lots of awesome adventures with roaring dinosaurs, tigers, horses, and other animals, both inside our house and at our local park. In the evenings, Patrick and I have been watching Season 4 of Gilmore Girls (our joint anniversary present to each other this year - so great to have a long-running show we both completely enjoy!). And every so often, I manage to find time for my dragon novel, which makes me very, very happy. :)

How are you guys doing? And what's the coolest gift you've either gotten or given in recent times?

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And of course, as the parent, you have to look cheerful and unconcerned by the whole thing, to help your child stay calm and make sure they have a good time even if they have just been casually punched or kicked by a much bigger kid who really should have known better...

And then there's The Big Playhouse Issue, the one I'd forgotten might even come up (possibly because I'd worked so hard to blank it out of my memory?) after all these years away: rope bridges.

I really, really hate ropes courses. And when I say "hate", I mean "pathetically fear". I mean, I used to be the little kid crying and shivering with panic at the head of the bridge, the one who nearly threw up afterward if she ever did manage to cross them.

You know how people always say to kids that once they go ahead and DO that scary thing, they'll enjoy it? I never, ever enjoyed it. Not once. When I was 21, I nearly quit a job I'd just taken - a good job, a job I needed badly - when I found out that as a "bonding" thing, we had to have a day out at a ropes course. Because I was an adult, I didn't cry where anyone else could see me, and I managed to force my way through the day with muscles and teeth gritted to hold back my real reactions, while everyone around me seemed to be having fun.

Then afterward, when no one else could see me, I cried and shook with decompression, because I am so physically petrified of those things.

It's irrational. It's stupid. It's deeply humiliating. I hate this weakness I have, which no one else I know has ever shared. It makes me feel small and really dumb.

Today, I had to encourage my tiny son to cross those ropes, because it was important for him and I really, really don't want to pass on my panic to him. Today, to help him, I had to cross those ropes. Twice. I kept a smile on my face. I kept my voice chirpy. After the second time across, though, I had to call Patrick to pick us up, half an hour earlier than planned. I kept my voice chirpy the whole way back to the house, and waited until Patrick and MrD left for their own trip out.

Then I walked inside the house and cried and shook. Because not only had I had to cross those rope bridges, but the stupid, irrational panic was multiplied a thousand times as I watched - and helped! - my son cross them, too. I know in my head that they're perfectly safe, but my body refuses to accept that, and the feeling of watching my son put himself in mortal danger (untrue though I know that scenario to be) is just lethal.

I hate that I'm still so scared of something so babyish, at the age of 33. I am baffled by the fact that this morning, which should have been fun, turned out to be one of the hardest mornings I've ever spent as a parent (outside of a medical situation).

I came very close to not posting this entry, because I am so humiliated by my fears. But I think - I hope - that there must be other people out there who have "childish" fears that they're embarrassed by, who might be willing to share them here or at least be glad to see that someone else has them, too.

Do you guys have any fears you haven't outgrown, even if you think you should have? Or: if you're parents, what are the hardest things you've had to do to help your kids?

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When I was first starting to send short stories out to magazines, I got a really nice rejection from one of my very favorite magazines. The editor said all sorts of great things about my writing style, and said how close the story had come to being published, but she still turned it down. Well, I was feeling sick with a cold and very sorry for myself that day, and...(oh, I still cringe when I remember this)...

Read the whole story, and pick up the pie recipe, on Heather's blog!

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This is surprisingly frazzling. The first few chapters are always so easy! They're just for fun, I just see what happens...and then we hit this bit, where I need to actually make important decisions. Oops.

So it's good timing to be reading Russell T. Davies's The Writer's Tale: The Final Chapter (recommended by Sara Ryan), which is turning out to be the funniest and smartest book on writing that I've read in a long, long time. I keep wishing that I had post-it notes on hand to stick on every page where a moment or observation flies out at me and wants to be saved...sadly, this is a library book, so I'll have to wait until I buy a copy of my own (soon!) before I get to mark it up.

Here's one bit, though, that was most appropriate for the stage I'm in right now with my dragon novel. He's talking about the struggle to come up with the main ideas for a Doctor Who Christmas episode, and all the inevitable "buts" that come flying up in an internal cloud of skepticism whenever a possible new idea first occurs to him:

But why not...? Why would...? Why do...?...But that sort of thing shouldn't stop me. Let it ride. I mustn't bore myself with reasons with reasons why not. There are always a million dull reasons why not. Go for the images, the feel of it, the potential, the dynamic. Details come later.

I read that paragraph and thought, YES. It was exactly what I needed to read. The important thing is to focus first on the FUN of the idea, focus on how it could be the MOST fun, and deal with all the rational logistics of it later.

Because I'm me, the main external work I'm doing right now (while I work out all the big questions inside my head) is collaging the novel and going on a big musical hunt for songs that might work as a playlist. So far, the "dragon playlist" on my computer has a Pink Martini song ("Tuca Tuca"), the movie soundtrack from Pride and Prejudice (I don't really like that adaptation, but the soundtrack is just perfect), and some lovely, haunting Maggie Stiefvater songs that I downloaded from her website. I keep the playlist playing in my ears at least half of every day, helping to focus my mind as I work out the different characters and their arcs.

And the whole time, of course, I feel desperately restless and itchy and irritable, because I want to get down to it and just WRITE! But if I skip this pre-writing stage, I will pay for it, because my subconscious needs the time to simmer. That's a lesson I've learned before, all too painfully. Sigh.

Anyway! That's what my writer-side has been up to this weekend, while the rest of me has been mommying. MrD and I had a lovely café trip yesterday, visited the owls, and stopped in at Waterstones. A perfect Saturday! Today has been much quieter, but Maya and I went to the park, and later I'll be skyping with my family back home in Michigan, so it's a good weekend overall.

What about you guys? How are your weekends going? And if you're a writer, what kind of pre-writing work do you usually need to do?

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Even once my wonderful publisher had done all the hard work of paying for and organizing the party, I was filled with panic that I wouldn't make it worth their while. (What if no one came? What if people did come and I made a fool of myself in front of them?) Plus, my editor was taking the train all the way to Abergavenny to celebrate with me, and what if I made a fool of myself in front of her?

I couldn't eat before the party, I was so nervous. The thought of reading out loud from my book at the party suddenly filled me with terror, even though I've done so many readings before at other events.

Then I saw my editor walking down the street toward me (we'd arranged a coffeeshop date before the party), and all that terror just drained away. I LOVE my editor. She's one of those people who exudes confidence and enthusiasm and genuine belief in her authors, and from the moment she arrived, the reality hit - my book had been published! And we were about to have a PARTY to celebrate it! How cool was that???

I drank hot chocolate and we talked about the cover for Book 2. We went to the bookstore. People had come! Girls had come, of just the right age group, and they were excited about Kat. They were excited to be there. One had actually been brought by her mother as a special birthday treat.

I was in awe, and I was humbled. People asked me to sign their books as if I was the one doing them the favor...but that was just SO not the case.

I was nervous when I started reading, but then I genuinely had fun reading it...and I had SO much fun all the rest of the night as I got to talk to so many smart, interesting teenage girls who loved books and fantasy, so many wonderful kids and adults who'd taken time out of their evenings to come and celebrate with me.

I am so, so grateful to every one of them for giving me such an amazing launch party. THANK YOU. I am just in awe that people are really out there reading my book. It means so much to me.

(And I want to say right now that Pete, the events manager at the Abergavenny Waterstones, is SO fabulous to work with. The buffet spread he'd arranged was incredible! And he was just so generous and supportive and on the ball in every way, as was Angela, the store manager. If any authors out there ever want to do a Welsh event, the Abergavenny Waterstones is a wonderful place to do it.)

Sadly, there didn't end up being any photos from the event. We were sad afterward when we realized we'd forgotten to figure out photography - but honestly, I will never forget last night. It truly was one of the best nights of my life.

Today we went out on a day trip with relatives who'd come to Abergavenny for the party, and we took a gorgeous little vintage steam train* into the Brecon Beacons National Park, traveling high up up into the mountains above spectacular views of pine woods and an enormous lake. (OK, officially it's a reservoir - but I'm from Michigan, and I really miss lakes, so I thought of it as a lake!)

It was such a treat just to sit back and watch the incredible views through the windows as the train chugged along, whistling and pumping steam and really thrilling the toddlers in our family group. I was surrounded by beauty, and I was surrounded by people whom I love and admire, who'd come out of their way to celebrate my book launch with me. It was just perfect.

__

*A quick warning - the Brecon Mountain Railway website is worth checking out, but not at work - it has a loud steam-train sound effect that starts automatically when you click on it!

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It was the first time I'd had two cuts so close together since before MrD was born...and my hairdresser was visibly relieved! After finding out last time that it had been the first cut in five months, I think she had dire concerns about whether or not I was really grown-up enough to maintain the nice haircut she'd given me...and I have to admit, if I didn't have tomorrow's launch party as a spur to make myself presentable, I probably wouldn't have.

I really loved this bit from one of Sarah Dessen's recent blog entries:

I know I've said this before, but for some reason, I keep waiting for things to Calm Down. You know, get manageable again. But it's been three years since I became a mom, almost, and the chaos is clearly here to stay. I also realized recently that I have this habit of just waiting for, you know, that finish line moment, when everything will fall into place and it's smooth sailing from there on it. Like the end of a movie, right?

I loved the whole entry but laughed in particularly rueful recognition at that paragraph. Ohhhh, yeah. After MrD was born, I was SURE things would calm down within a few months...and yeah, they did, but then he became a toddler...and then, and then, and then... Funny, it turns out life is just a lot more full and complicated (as well as rich and often joyful) after you become a parent, and it doesn't ever really go back to the streamlined non-parenting timeline. (Well, except maybe after they leave for school or university? Obviously, we're not there yet.)

I really liked LK Madigan's blog entry Do You Need a Door?, which collects thoughts from a whole bunch of writers about what kind of writing space they need (including some thoughts on how that can change after having children). I am soooooo jealous of Deva Fagan's lovely writing desk, shown in a photo there! Nowadays, I do most of my writing while lying on a couch or a bed, while MrD is at his childminder in the morning or (if I'm lucky and he sleeps deeply) during his afternoon nap. But I still think longingly about coffeeshop writing trips...maybe I will fit one in soon. After all, I spent several months thinking that I couldn't fit in haircuts, and it turns out those really are possible. So who knows?

What would you guys really like to do, if you only had the time?

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It was a really, really good weekend. On Saturday night, we ate takeaway curries and drank anniversary champagne, and then we had a laid-back family Sunday with MrD, just hanging out in the back yard and at the local park. It was lovely and fun and incredibly relaxing to spend the whole day as a family - it can be too easy to fall into the habit of switching off childcare duties so that one of us is always alone Being Productive and Getting Stuff Done.

Yesterday, for once, we remembered that it was a Sunday, and that sometimes being productive is a lot less important than having a really good time as a whole family, together.

And then today, for the first time in almost five months, I sat down and read through the 11,000 words I'd written this spring of my Austen-y dragon novel! I was really nervous after all the time off. I'd loved it so much, I'd been having so much fun...would I be disappointed when I actually read what I had written back in March?

I was in love all over again within the first three pages, buzzing with inspiration and joy. I love, love, love playing in this world, with these characters. It's funny, I first had the idea for the concept of this book about five years ago, but it never went anywhere beyond the first line. Then I remembered it two years ago, wrote the first page and a half...but it still didn't work. I was stuck on concept and style without any real characters, which SO doesn't work for me. Finally, finally, this March, the characters slipped into my head, I threw away those first couple of pages and started over again from scratch...and here we are, with a real book on the way.

It's been a long, long time from first concept to realization, but I'm really, really happy to be here now. And another awesome thing arrived today: my American jacket proofs for Kat, Incorrigible! Once again, I've co-opted Carrie Jones's Need from my bookshelf, because it has exactly the right page count and size to fit my cover. Sadly, I couldn't find our digital camera (MUST find it before Thursday's launch party!), but PhotoBooth came to the rescue:

Days like this are just...well, I'm really, really thankful and aware of my good luck today.

Can anyone point me toward some good dragon-themed desktop wallpaper? Or alternately: what's the longest you've ever taken between starting a project and figuring out what it really wanted to be all along?

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Friends of ours catered the reception with fabulous Indian curries as their (incredibly generous) wedding present. We ate ice cream (both dairy and vegan) and traditional British wedding fruitcake, vegan-ified, for dessert. Our dog Nika was meant to stay in our house across the street, but she couldn't resist the party - she darted straight through someone's legs, across the (luckily empty) street, and ended up staying and partying with all the rest of us, much to the delight of all the dog-crazy little kids who were in attendance. The music mix alternated between heavy metal (Patrick's pick) and opera/girl-pop (mine).

It was fun and silly and totally awesome. It was quite literally the best day of my life up to that point.

Over the last six years, there have been a lot of ups and some really horrible downs. Our lovely Nika died far too young, of a really cruel genetic disorder; people we loved died; I was diagnosed with CFS, changing both of our lives in ways that we'd never anticipated. There were times that we were absolutely terrified about how we would cope financially, and that was hard - really, grindingly hard.

Through it all, though, what made all the difference was that no matter what came up for either of us, we were each facing it by the side of our very best friend.

I'm always baffled by the people who think that romance is unrealistic, as a genre - that romantic happy endings are simply too good to be true. I don't believe that for an instant.

Yes, life can be very hard. Relationships can be hard work. Quite often, they turn out not to be work-able at all, and divorces are agonizingly painful for everybody concerned, even when they're the right decision.

Quite often, though, our relationships really are the best part of our lives. I grew up surrounded by happy long-term marriages, marriages that brightened and bettered people's lives, despite any hard points that came up along the way. Not everyone finds the partner who fits them, and of course no one needs a loving husband/wife/partner to be happy. But it is one of the biggest strokes of luck in the world when you do find the partner who suits you to the ground.

I am so happy to have married my best friend. Happy anniversary, sweetheart!

And to everybody else: what are your favorite romances, in books or movies? I'm in the mood to hunt some down right now. :)

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I've sworn to myself to STOP looking at the Amazon rankings (AND the Book Depository rankings, for that matter). I've been thrilled by the first few reviews on Amazon, which means that now would probably be a smart time for me to stop looking for any more. (We'll see if I manage to restrain myself...wisdom says one thing; experience says another...)

Here's the one thing that has reliably worked every time this week that Publication Crazy has started to overwhelm me: writing something new.

I'd planned to give myself this week off writing, since I'd worked so hard to finish Kat3 in time to send off last Friday. Well. That was a really, really bad plan. What I'd forgotten, when I decided that, was that NOT writing always makes me antsy and edgy - and when you add that to Publication Crazy...urk!

Wednesday, when I found myself in such a crazy mood that I kept checking Amazon every few hours just in case anything exciting happened (and yes, I am embarrassed to admit this!), I finally went back to a very, very silly short story that I'd begun several months ago (but left unfinished because I didn't have time to work out the plot tangles at that point). Reading through the story-so-far, I giggled out loud. I wrote the obvious next few lines...and I felt my muscles begin to relax. All that buzzing stress slowed down and melted away.

Writing is really, really good for me. Funny how easy it is to forget that...

Which makes this a good time to finally mention that the Clarion West Write-a-thon ended last week! Thank you SO much to everyone who sponsored me in it this year. I really, really appreciate it. My original plan was to finish the Kat3 rewrite and send it off by July 1st, and then to write 40 pages of new projects. Unfortunately, about a week after the 6-week write-a-thon began, MrD's childminder went on unexpectedly early maternity leave, and we were left with about a month of little to no childcare at all...and there went all my major writing sessions for a month. Oops.

In the end, I finished the Kat3 rewrite, sent it off last Friday (on the last day of the write-a-thon), and wrote about 15 pages of new projects as well, along the way. It wasn't all that I'd hoped at the beginning of the write-a-thon...but it was a LOT better than it could have been, considering the circumstances. And it's way more than I would have accomplished if I hadn't had sponsors who'd believed in me and contributed to Clarion West on my behalf. I remembered you guys every time I felt too tired to write, or felt tempted to just blow off a writing session and surf the internet instead. Knowing that I had sponsors kept me honest, and I am so grateful for it.

It's tempting to lash myself right now for not doing everything I wanted to do - surely there MUST have been a way somehow to get all my goals accomplished even without childcare - but for once, I'm not going to. I'm trying to learn how to not freak out when I don't accomplish everything I want, and to be happy with what does get done.

Right now, I'm about to make myself a really rich hot chocolate, in honor of everything I have managed to do this summer, often in difficult circumstances. What about you guys? What small treats have you been giving yourself lately?

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See, one of the only downsides of moving to Wales was that I had to leave behind a bunch of friends in Leeds, women I really loved to hang out with. I figured I'd make new friends here...and I'm sure I would have by now if I had a day-job or if I took MrD to more playgroups where I could meet other moms.

Unfortunately (in this case), I work at home by myself, and MrD tends to go to those playgroups with his childminder, because that's the only way our schedule will work. So, while I continue to have lots of great friends who make my life infinitely better and richer, I tend to connect with them by phone or email nowadays, rather than face-to-face.

Last week, as we were driving into town, I spotted a woman with a little kid of about MrD's age walking down our street. There was something about her that made me think I'd like her - you know how those snap judgments happen, something about her face or her clothes or the way she was talking to her child...who knows? Anyway, she looked like someone who would be interesting to meet, but I figured that would just have to be left up to chance.

Then Patrick came home a few days ago having briefly chatted to her as they passed each other - it turned out she was just moving into the neighborhood this week. Ooh. Awesome excuse to knock on the door and say hi and welcome to the neighborhood! part of me thought. The other part thought: Yeah, right. I'm sure she's busy and not interested in having random strangers knock on her door to say hi. Forget it.

That second part might have won forever, but today I found myself on my own, without even MrD to look after, without anything I needed to do...and I crossed the street. All the way up the steps to her house, a whole lecture sounded in my head: If you knock on that door, she'll look at you as if you're an alien. You'll be interrupting her in the middle of something important. Just turn around. Turn around now! I rang the doorbell. I half-hoped that she wouldn't be in, so I wouldn't be humiliated.

She was in. And guess what? She was genuinely pleased to see me. It turned out that she's been wanting to meet people here, and has also been trying to get up the nerve to say hi to strangers. She invited me in, and we had a really lovely chat over tea and chocolate cookies. We'll be hanging out again, and introducing our kids.

It would have been SO easy, so much easier, for me to turn around halfway up those steps and drop the whole idea. I could have spent the next six months wishing that I'd had the nerve. I often do, in similar circumstances.

Sometimes bravery is all about leaping on a horse and risking your life. Sometimes it's just risking a moment of social humiliation.

They were really good chocolate cookies.

What have you guys done lately that scared you?

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And the grand prize winner is: Shawna Lenore!

Please contact me with your postal addresses and I'll put your packs in the mail tomorrow!

***

Today was no longer Publication Day, but it was a good day nonetheless. Since I'd sent off Kat3 on Friday (which continues to feel weird, after working on it for nearly two years!), today I used my childfree time for...okay, guess the LEAST LIKELY thing you can imagine. Ready?

I cleaned the house (or at least the living room, because, well, that was how much energy I had). Yes. It was THAT rare and unlikely an occurrence! But it was actually a relief to have the time to do it...and it will be even MORE of a relief to go back to writing as soon as the whole house is in reasonably good shape. That's my goal, after the last three months of putting all my spare energy into revision and forcing myself to ignore all the clutter (because why worry about something you can't change?): to FINALLY unpack the leftover boxes from our April move and get the house into a reasonably tidy and well-organized condition.

Better late than never...and at least part of the house-fix-up has actually been fun, since I spent about an hour putting up room stickers of tigers and monkeys and lions in one of the rooms of our house. (Guess whose? No, not mine. If I chose room stickers for my and Patrick's room, they'd either be Regency images or dragons.)

And the very coolest part of the last 24 hours has been the fact that I got the chance to read an ARC of Ying Lee's The Body at the Tower. I loved her first book, A Spy in the House (in fact, I loved it SO much that I actually sent her fanmail, something I'd never done after reading a book before!), but ohhhhhhh....I love Body EVEN MORE. You can read my review on Goodreads for now, and in a month or so, I'll probably give away a copy of the published book, because I loved it THAT much - I feel evangelistic about it! (It stands alone perfectly, btw, so you don't need to read Spy to read Body - but heck, why not?)

Which books do you guys love enough to thrust at everyone you know?

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Today I'm blogging there about three of my favorite picture books. Here's an excerpt:

One of my favourite parts of parenting so far has been getting to discover great new books together with my son. Even before he was born, I’d started collecting some of my old favourites from my own childhood, but for this post I wanted to talk about three books we discovered together and both love. The linking theme is independence: all three of these books feature characters going out into the wide world without their parents, dealing with strange adults and facing the unknown, just like every little kid eventually has to do...

You can read the full entry here - and I love the songs and activities Zoe's come up with to accompany the books I wrote about!

And of course today is the last day to enter my prize pack giveaway. It was a really, really awesome Publication Day. Thank you guys so much for celebrating with me! :)

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But officially? Today, my book is OUT: out there in the world, officially Published. That's something I've been dreaming of, quite literally, for twenty-six years now, ever since I was seven years old. And that is definitely worth a party!

So this morning, our whole family went out to celebrate...and of course A Most Improper Magick came with us. Here it is with my decadent "meal" at our local (and wonderfully child-friendly) Caffè Nero: 

Yes, that is whipped cream beside the (hot, melty chocolate) brownie. It was DELICIOUS! And sitting next to the plate is the compact mirror that Patrick got from the Jane Austen Centre giftshop as my Valentine's Day gift this year, in honor of the magical compact in A Most Improper Magick. Of course that had to come too! (Can you tell I'm a little bit giddy today?)

And here is Patrick, an hour later and in a different café (our local Coffee No. 1, which is not terribly child-friendly but a great place to write) showing off what can now be done in cafés around the country: 

Although the physical launch party (complete with party prizes!) isn't for another week and a half, today I wanted to do something online to celebrate, for everybody who can't come to my physical launch party.

So first of all, I've put up the second and third chapters of A Most Improper Magick - you can now read all of the first three chapters on my website! I really, really hope you guys enjoy them.

And secondly, if you want, you can enter to win a book-birthday party prize, no matter where in the world you are.

One person will win a signed copy of the UK edition of the book, along with a Kat postcard, Kat bookmarks, and an "Everything's Better With Highwaymen!" button. Two runners-up will get everything in that pack except the book.

This giveaway is only open for the next 36 hours, through Monday at 7pm UK time.

Here's how to enter:

1. You can get one point by just commenting on this entry to tell me that you want to enter the drawing. (I won't enter you unless you ask for it specifically, so feel free to comment on the entry even if you don't want to be a part of the giveaway! ;) I promise it won't happen by accident.)

2. You can get one more point by tweeting this:

A Most Improper Magick by @stephanieburgis is out in the UK today! Read the first 3 chapters here: http://bit.ly/Rmy1z

and then telling me you've done it, just in case I miss it. I should be able to figure it out through Twitter on my own, but I don't want to miss anyone by accident!

(And PS: if you already RT'd my earlier tweet about the chapters, that totally counts toward the giveaway. Just remind me in a comment here, okay?)

3. You can get two more points by giving that same information in a blog entry (and then telling me that you did it).

At 7pm tomorrow, I'll choose a random winner, and I'll put all three sets of prizes in the post on Tuesday!

***

OK. I know I've probably sounded fairly business-like and sensible in the last few paragraphs - or at least I was trying to...but you guys? MY BOOK HAS OFFICIALLY BEEN PUBLISHED. I am in shock...and very, very, very happy.

So I just want to share the last two lines of the printed acknowledgments in A Most Improper Magick:

And thank you to my community of friends on www.livejournal.com, who have cheered me on when I was nervous, comforted me when I was lost and joined with me in all my celebrations. You guys are the best!

I still remember when I very, very nervously went back to writing the first draft of A Most Improper Magick after my year off from it. I was convinced that I was being commercially crazy to work on it, but I just loved the book way too much to give it up...and one of the things that helped the most was the wonderful outpouring of supportive comments on this journal from people who told me to keep going - who had faith in me, and in Kat and her sisters.

You guys really are the best, and I know it. THANK YOU!

ETA: This giveaway is now closed.

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Yeah, right. Who am I trying to kid?

Every time I woke up in the middle of the night, I thought: they're coming today! When I woke up this morning, I thought: TODAY! And every time I heard a car outside our house, I twitched as if someone had given me an electric shock.

Still, I had to be productive. Today is the last day of the Clarion West write-a-thon and the day I'd sworn to finally send off Kat Book 3 to my American editor and my agent. So I spent the morning alternating between last-minute small fixes and historical spot-checks...and manic leaps toward the window every time I heard anything that might be a delivery.

The doorbell rang. I was mired down in manuscript paper. Patrick got there first. It was a Tescos deliveryman.

"Um...we didn't order anything," Patrick said.

The deliveryman said, "Someone did!"

And someone had. Tricia Sullivan had sent me six bars of luscious dark chocolate and a bottle of white wine, perfect weapons for fighting the Publication Day Crazy! I laughed and unwrapped a chocolate bar, set the wine in the fridge to chill, and started to chill out a little bit myself.

By noon, I was finished with the final changes to Kat 3 and was staring at the cover page. "But what am I going to call it?"

Patrick and I were both brainstorming titles when there was a knock on the door.

I lunged.

The UPS man was holding two packages: one box from Templar Books - mybooksmybooksmybooks! - and one padded bag from Atheneum Books, which I hadn't been expecting.

Patrick insisted on photographing the entire un-boxing process, which you can see behind the cut. 

And, in a total surprise, guess what the Atheneum bag added to the pile? Shiny new ARCs of Kat, Incorrigible!

I honestly never completely believed, throughout this entire process, that it was quite real. That my book really was being published.

But it was. And it has been. And it's a real book!

Half an hour after the grand unboxing, I emailed off Kat Book 3. (Tentatively titled, A Reckless Magick in the UK and Kat, Incorrigible: A Reckless Magic in the US.)

Then Patrick uncracked a bottle of champagne.

A Most Improper Magick is a real, published book. And today was just the most awesome mail day EVER.

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Here are two snapshots from my childhood:

One: I'm nine years old, walking back to my cabin at summer camp. As usual, I’m reading as I walk…and this time, I end up completely tangled in a vollebyall net I hadn't even noticed, because I was so absorbed in The Count of Monte Cristo...

You can read the full entry here - and please do leave a comment if anything occurs to you. Have you ever walked into anything while you were reading? Or am I alone in my book-related accidents? Eek. Maybe you shouldn't answer that one after all...

(No, actually I think I'm safe, because I know someone else who biked right into a car door when he was reading while riding a bicycle. Of course, he was a member of my family, so maybe it's just us...)

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Sherlock: A Study in Pink

This week I watched the first episode of Sherlock, Steven Moffat's modern-day updating of the Sherlock Holmes stories. Steven Moffat is my favorite writer for TV, so I really hoped that it would be good, even though I am a total Sherlock Holmes geek and was seriously disappointed to hear that it would be set in the 21st century. Still, Steven Moffat is awesome, so I was willing to give it a try...

...and, WOW. I was completely blown away. I haven't been this excited about a TV show in...well, let's just say a really, REALLY long time. It honestly was the best Sherlock Holmes adaptation I've ever seen. Despite the changes made for the contemporary setting, this was the first adaptation I've seen that perfectly got across the brilliant and intense weirdness of Sherlock Holmes as a person, managed the fast, fun pace of the original stories (this show was just SO MUCH FUN to watch!), and most of all conveyed the really great dynamic between Holmes and Watson (who is really not supposed to be stupid, as in so many of the film and TV adaptations - he's only stupid compared to Holmes because everybody is, when compared to Holmes). In their friendship, each of them is supplying something that the other really, really needs.

People in the show comment nervously on how much darkness must be in Holmes, to make him so obsessed with murder and crime - but there's something in nice, friendly Watson that draws him to be a part of that, too. Lots of yummy ambiguity done really well, along with sparky, funny dialogue and a great story...just perfect.

Oh, and I LOVED the scene at the end between Holmes and his arch-nemesis. No spoilers, but it made me very happy. :)

The single thing I didn't like about the episode was something that pops up in so many shows nowadays (including Buffy, another show I absolutely loved) and which always upsets me: the use of torture as an easy and reliable way to get instant truth from a bad guy. I really, really hate this plot device on so many levels, I hate that it's used SO MUCH in TV, which helps to normalize it in the broader culture, and I wish Steven Moffat hadn't cheapened an important revelation at the end of the show by getting it out that way. (Just once, how about someone lies under torture? Or genuinely doesn't know the information that's being pursued, but makes something up just to get the hero to stop hurting them - y'know, the way it often happens in real life? Sigh.)

Still, that was a very small moment in the episode, and if I wasn't willing to cope with shows that use that plot device, I'd have to watch almost no action-adventure television at all. And overall, I just loved, loved, loved Sherlock and can't wait for the second episode to come out.

***

Today MrD and I spent the morning in town, and it was good. We dropped off invitations to the book launch (two weeks from today!), we hung out at our favorite café, and we both got new books. (Mine was Jandy Nelson's The Sky is Everywhere, which is really lovely so far.) When we got home, I found a package from my publisher waiting for me: beautiful Kat bookmarks and postcards! I can't wait to start giving them away.

And best of all, all day today I've been hearing from people who'd pre-ordered A Most Improper Magick from The Book Depository, letting me know that copies are being dispatched! It's now officially in stock there (although not yet at any of the other UK booksellers). Eeee! Luckily, today the crazy is at a low enough level that I managed to restrain myself from ordering myself a copy just because I could. But it was bizarrely tempting... ;)

What have you guys done lately just for fun? (And OK, I admit that dropping off invites was not just for fun - but hanging out with MrD in the café, drinking hot chocolate and playing with him while we people-watched together? That was awesome. It made me really happy.)

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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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At the end of the interview, there's another chance to win a British ARC - and again, this giveaway is open internationally. :)

You can read the interview - and enter to win the ARC - here.

Now I am going back to drinking more Earl Grey and scowling at the first page of Kat3, which I just. can't. get. quite. right. yet! But I will. It may just take an awful lot of chocolate to break through...

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I still remember the moment I opened Elizabeth Peters’s Crocodile on the Sandbank for the first time. I was at Camp Blue Lake, a two-week-long music camp which I was attending - unfortunately - as a piano major. I’d been there for a week so far, which was more than long enough to prove that, although I really did like the piano, playing it for more than two hours a day was enough to make my head spin with boredom…and attending a piano-related concert every single night was enough to make me want to shrivel up and die....

You can read the rest of the entry here, and please do leave a comment there if any occur to you! What were the books that rose up and grabbed you when you were supposed to be focusing on Something Much More Important at the time? ;)

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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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Ever since MrD was born, I've had to realize over and over again that my understanding of how fast I can write is no longer completely accurate. More than that - I just can't control my own schedule the way I used to. I started this revision on May 1st and planned to turn in the finished draft on June 1st - but it turned out that I just couldn't revise fast enough. Then I planned to turn it in by July 1st, and I really think that could have happened - but MrD's childminder unexpectedly went on maternity leave a month and a half early, and we lost almost all our childcare for about a month. Oops. There went all the time I'd planned to use on finishing the rewrite.

Add in viruses sweeping the family and all the other complications of having a little kid and having CFS...and, yeah. The feeling of relief that swept through me when I typed THE END was one of the sweetest feelings I've known for quite a while.

Thank goodness my editor is really, really generous and tolerant! The only pressure on me has been self-inflicted - she just told me to take the time I needed and not to freak out about it. After all, it won't be published for another 3 years - who cares if I'm a month or two later than planned? But for a perfectionist like me - the girl who HAD to get all A's in school or else (or else what? I don't even know anymore)...well, forgiving myself for missing a deadline is an almost impossible goal.

But I am learning - slowly and painfully - to be a little kinder to myself about my new, slower, post-baby pace. Sometimes I see childless authors producing multiple books a year, and I feel a twinge - that's what I should be doing! But then I look at MrD, and I think about all the joy he gives me, and the joy we give each other by spending so much time together right now while he's so small. That would be worthwhile no matter what. And when I look back later in life, I can't imagine myself thinking I should have spent less time with my son so that I could write faster!

So today I'm consciously working to celebrate my achievement without all the internal qualifications that want to pop up and take over. (Like: Yeah, but you'll still turn it in almost 2 months late! Loser!) Today, I'm not going to let that nasty internal perfectionist be the one who wins.

Yesterday I printed out the Kat3 manuscript for my final read-through. Tonight, some very much loved family members are coming into town, and I'm going to enjoy my time with them this weekend without freaking out about what other "productive" things I could be doing. Monday, I'll sit down with my manuscript and read it through. By Friday, it will finally be on my editor's desk. And right now, I'm just going to be happy about that.

What about you guys? What small or large achievements are you celebrating right now?

--

*It's become a little complicated to talk about my book now that it has two different titles! My solution for now is to refer to it as A Most Improper Magick when I'm talking about the UK edition, and to switch to Kat, Incorrigible when I'm talking about the US edition...but you may see me wavering awkwardly between the two from time to time in the next several months!

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and the full jacket:

of Kat, Incorrigible! (Click to see a larger version on Flickr.)

The stars will be foiled in silvery-green. Eeee!

Kat, Incorrigible is the full title of Book 1 in the US, and it'll become the series title, too, so that Book 2 will be Kat, Incorrigible: A Tangle of Magics in the US (whereas it'll be A Tangle of Magicks (Book Two of The Unladylike Adventures of Kat Stephenson) in the UK).

The two titles and covers are SO different, but I really do love them both, and I'm feeling very lucky right now.

And just for fun, here's the full jacket artwork without the text, because it makes me happy:

(Click to see the larger version.)

The new US publication date is April 5, 2011 - but if you want to read an advance copy of the book long, long before that, you can enter now to win a British ARC at the book blog I Was a Teenage Book Geek! Lauren posted a really lovely review of the book yesterday, and now she's giving away her ARC, with the giveaway open to international contestants.

What do you guys think of the new American title and look?

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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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Or at least, I will as soon as I can pick myself up again. I'm currently lying, limp with relief, on the couch, eating cheddar cheese and apple slices as a reward for great exertions. (Alas, I'm out of chocolate chip cookies. At least I'm not forced to resort to salad as my comfort food...not yet...)

In the category of REALLY COOL! events which are also REALLY SCARY!, this week I had my first-ever phone interview with a reporter, followed this morning by a visit from a photographer from the newspaper. I would normally be a little nervous about both of these anyway, since they're first-time-ever events for me, but to be honest, what absolutely freaked me out this time was the house. I've been reassured by someone I love and trust that ALL parents of young children have messy houses...well, I really want to believe that. Please don't tell me if it isn't true!

(Actually, I have to admit that I do remember visiting one or two clean houses that young children have lived in. Urk. Well, I'm just not going to let myself remember those...)

I spent yesterday cleaning frantically, but of course the problem with having a young child and a dog is that they don't actually want to live in a sterile environment where the toys stay in their boxes and never come out. (How unreasonable of them!) Sooooo, this morning when MrD left to visit his childminder, I was still in my pyjamas with bedhead and sleep-crusted eyes, I had about an hour to prepare the house, and not only was the living room just as messy as it had been yesterday, but it had the extra-cool addition of stuffed-goose innards spread all across the floor, because Maya had chosen this morning as the perfect moment to rip open her new toy.

Aaghh. Those of you on UK- or Australian-time who read my twitter account may remember the ever-so-slight tinge of mounting hysteria to my tweets...

Luckily, it all worked out in the end. The house didn't look like a model home, but the living room looked, well, reasonably tidy - by our standards, at least. The photographer was a really nice guy who told me some genuinely fascinating World War II stories that made my mind start buzzing with cool new story ideas. And he absolutely promised me that none of the electrical junk (back-up hard drives, etc.) that we'd piled in one corner would end up in the photos. Whew.

Now I'm luxuriating in the sensation of having a reasonably clean house, being nicely made-up for the first time in several months, AND knowing that I'm finished with scary things...well, at least until this Sunday, when I'm doing my first official author event at a local street party! But at least that's going to be small and low-key, and I'm telling myself not to worry about it. Not until Sunday morning, anyway, when I'm next due to start panicking and moaning about why am I not better at putting on make-up, why am I not [insert neurosis], why, why, why...

OK. I'm back to taking deep breaths and reminding myself that I used to do public recitals and concerts all the time. I learned how to deal with stage fright then, and I can absolutely do it again. This "author" aspect of the writing lifestyle is definitely a bit of a shock after the last couple years of being a stay-at-home mom and hermit-y writer...but it's also most definitely good for me.

But can I ask some advice? What do you guys do to get yourselves through nerve-wracking new challenges? Any suggestions would be HUGELY appreciated right now.

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And thanks to everybody who entered the competition, for increasing my TBR list! :) (That is actually a good thing, no matter what our groaning bookshelves might think...)

Today was a day of total decadence. This morning, I got my first haircut in (drumroll) FIVE MONTHS, and ohhhh, did I need it. When I admitted to the (new-to-me) hairdresser how long it had been since my last cut, she actually gasped in disbelief and horror. This is the thing about working at home - or rather, the combination of working at home AND having a small child. My focus is divided between childcare, writing, and desperately trying to keep the house from falling apart; somehow doing things for myself like getting haircuts (even when my bangs have grown almost to my chin and I wince every time I see myself in a mirror) never makes it onto the list, because I don't have the external pressure of running into other adults at work every day.

On the other hand, this haircut feels SO good. My head feels so light, and I keep on reaching up to touch my nice short hair, just for the sheer pleasure of it. And since I'm actually going to be doing a bunch of public events in the next few months, I might just remember to make time for another cut even before my bangs start trying to eat my face again.

This afternoon was even more of the same, since MrD and I went into town together and indulged in a shopping frenzy: lots of cool stuff for him and a new pair of jeans that actually fits (shock! horror!) for me, along with a stop in at the printing shop to order up invites to my launch party. (My publisher designed them for me, thank goodness.) We ended up at a great child-friendly café and just had a really nice time together.

I always remember that it's important to work hard and take care of other people. But I don't always remember how good it is to take care of myself, too. Today was a good reminder.

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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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Now I'm going to go make myself more camomile tea...

ETA: This giveaway is now closed.

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On the other hand, sometimes it's moral or intellectual strength that appeals most to me, like in the case of Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice, who tends to be the smartest & wittiest person in any room, and who utterly refuses to marry any man she doesn't respect, no matter how rich he might be. Jane Eyre is another example - she might be poor and plain and alone in the world, but she won't let anyone - not even the man she loves - pressure her into doing what she believes is morally wrong.

When I first heard about Erin Blakemore's book The Heroine's Bookshelf: Life Lessons from Jane Austen to Laura Ingalls Wilder, I was really intrigued. Then I read a draft of it, and fell head over heels in love.

Chapter by chapter, Erin talks about fabulous woman authors and the fictional heroines they created, from Jane Austen to Zora Neale Hurston, Laura Ingalls Wilder to Alice Walker. There are chapters on books I read and loved as a kid, like A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and Anne of Green Gables, and I loved being reminded so beautifully of those books, and learning so many interesting new things about their authors. There are also chapters on books I've never read but now MUST read after her enticing descriptions of them, like Their Eyes Were Watching God. Each chapter gives tribute to the fabulous heroines Erin loves, and to the authors, flawed and fabulous heroines themselves, many of whom were battling truly horrific circumstances.

This is a book to sink into and LOVE. It's warm and fun and inspiring and also full of fascinating information. At the end of each chapter, Erin suggests times when these particular heroines - fictional or authorial - might be just what you need to get through your own difficult circumstances.

By the time I finished reading the book, I'd already realized that I wanted to buy copies for almost every woman I know. The book isn't out until October...but luckily, I can already start giving it away. Erin's donated one ARC of the book to be given to a reader of this blog. The giveaway is open internationally, and all you have to do is leave a comment telling me your favorite literary heroine. (She can be a fictional character or an author - either works!) I'll use a random number generator to pick a winner one week from today, on Wednesday July 14th.

So: who are your literary heroines? :)

ETA: This giveaway is now closed. Thanks so much to everyone who participated!

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When I first started researching about the lifestyle of a professional author, I found out about all these important practical things authors have to do, like introducing themselves to their local bookstores! Arranging launch parties! Designing invitations! Designing bookmarks! Writing press releases! Arranging all the food & drink details for their launch parties!

It all makes sense, right? There's only one problem: I am AWFUL at stuff like that. I love meeting people - I love hanging out with people who love books - but when it comes to organizing practical functions, I am hopelessly incompetent. Worse yet, at the very idea of introducing myself to a bookstore manager as an author (and one who WANTS SOMETHING from them, like a launch party!), I immediately shrivel inside. It's less than a month till my book comes out, and I still haven't summoned up the guts to introduce myself as an author to my local branch of Waterstones, or even to my wonderful local library.

I'd been getting more and more worried about this issue as it got closer and closer to my book's publication date. But now?

I love, love, love my publicist at Templar Books SO much. All those things I was dreading? She did them for me, without even blinking. Yesterday, she set up my launch party. I am having a real, live launch party!!!!!! I am so excited. And honestly, as pathetic as this is, I have to admit that it would probably never have happened if it had been left to me to organize. I would have spent the entire time up until my book's release just trying to talk myself into asking my local Waterstones to do it...and truly, I would never have gotten the guts to follow through. Luckily, my awesome publicist has plenty of guts to spare! :)

My launch party is at 6pm on Thursday, August 12th, at the Waterstones bookshop in Abergavenny, Wales.

This morning, it was my turn to sleep in after MrD woke up (Patrick and I take turns), but for once, I couldn't do it. I was already panicking. I would need invitations! I would need to DESIGN invitations! I can't design anything! I am artistically inept! OMG I WOULD HAVE NO INVITATIONS TO SEND! AAAAGGHHH!

Well. I just got an email from my publicist telling me (by pure coincidence) that she's getting some invitations designed for me to send out, as well as a whole bunch of bookmarks and postcards to promote the book (two things I'd been thinking I really ought to get done, but which intimidated me like crazy). She's also arranging and paying for the drinks and nibbles.

If she had been here instead of in Dorking, I would have fallen on her neck with tears of joy and gratitude. (So if you're reading this, Phil - be very, very grateful that you're in Dorking instead of Wales right now! ;p )

I am a limp, happy, and most of all intensely relieved author right now. And I'm having a launch party!!!! Have I mentioned that yet????

Abergavenny is a great small town in a beautiful Welsh valley, with one ruined castle in the town center, another just out of town, and several really nice coffeeshops. (They sell the best vegan hazelnut brownies EVER!) Better yet, it's got a great train service and is a very easy, short train ride from Bristol, Cardiff, and pretty much anywhere in the southern half of the UK.

I know a lot of the people who read this blog are in the U.S. or Canada, and of course I will not be offended if you don't all immediately hop onto a plane to come party with me...but I do wish that all of you could! And for anyone who CAN come:

Free drinks! Free nibbles! Party prizes! And as much as I get intimidated by event-organization and practical design skills, I LOVE hanging out at parties with other people who love books.

I would really, really love to see you guys there!

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I hope you enjoy the entry, and please do leave a comment over there if one occurs to you, because Lindsey is giving away copies of her (really fun & funny) book Princess for Hire and Jessica Leader's book Nice and Mean (which sounds great, although I haven't read it yet) to random commenters!

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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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(And yes, I have seen it, so I do know it really isn't all that good...but I just can't help myself. It's a Jane Austen adaptation that isn't absolutely terrible - so I have to have it and watch it, over and over and over again! It's like a sickness...but a fun one, at least.)

Yesterday was a happy day, too, because MrD and I went into town for adventures and made an unexpected and wonderful discovery: there were real, live owls in town! It was an outreach program being run by The Welsh Owl and Wildlife Sanctuary. MrD loves owls but had never seen any in person before, and I hadn't seen any since I was a young kid. We spent a long time just hanging out watching the owls, donated some coins to their collection jar, and will probably be either buying a WOWLS membership or adopting an owl very soon.

We also went through a bunch of charity shops, which is always fun. Charity shops might be my favorite aspect of living in a British town - so many cheap, cheap books and clothes (charity shops are the UK equivalent of thrift shops), and all for such good causes! Yesterday I got to feel virtuous about donating a bit of money to Oxfam and the Marie Curie society, while at the same time picking up incredibly cheap clothes, books and toys for MrD and for me. Shopping glee + virtue = score! ;)

Today has been a quiet day apart from my online book-buying binge. I finally watched the second part of the Doctor Who season finale, and ohhhhhh, I loved it. But I can't believe I have to wait until Christmas for more! I really loved David Tennant as Doctor Who, but the switch to Steven Moffat (my very favorite writer in television) as the show's head writer has been such a good move, and Matt Smith is so good as his own version of the Doctor, that I've coped with the change in cast much better than I'd expected.

What about you guys? What have been the highlights of your weeks so far?

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I am really, really proud of my brother.

Second, this morning there was a knock on the door, much, much too early - but for a fabulous reason. The cover proofs for A Most Improper Magick had arrived! And ohhhh, they're beautiful. They're fun to touch, too! The gold-foiled bits are bumpy, and the shiny white bits feel really smooth against the matte cover...I spent way too long just stroking them, as you can probably guess. ;)

Here are the cover proofs hanging out on the lounger in our patio, enjoying the bright sunshine of our insanely hot summer. (Does the weather not realize that we are in Wales? What is it thinking????)

The best part is that my editor sent me three proofs of the cover. I'm going to keep one, probably to frame; I'm going to save another to give away at my launch party; but I want to give away the third one here, to one of you guys.

At first I was going to put all kinds of sensible conditions on the giveaway, like that you must retweet it or post about it or whatever. But then I thought: y'know, a lot of you guys have been reading my blog for a LONG TIME, some of you from all the way back in 2002 when the idea of me publishing a book - much less a trilogy - must have seemed like a crazy fantasy. (At least, it certainly felt like that to me, an awful lot of the time!) And that deserves something nice in return right now, without a lot of marketing-style fanfare. 

So here's the thing. If you'd like a signed cover proof, just leave a comment here, telling me that you would like it. Then I'll use a random number generator to pick a winner on Thursday, July 1st, because that's exactly one month before the book will be published in the UK.

I can't wait. And thank you guys so much for hanging out with me along the way!

Note: This giveaway is now closed.

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Johnny Lee Miller IS Byron!!!!

And it showed a photo of Johnny Lee Miller (aka, Mr Knightley in the most recent TV version of Emma) with really, really poofy hair and a mad grin on his face.

I looked at it. I turned it over to look on the back cover for any good reviews that could possibly imply that it really was a good miniseries. There were none. No quotes at all...about the movie, at least.

The one quote on the back cover, made to look as if it were about the movie, yelled in big letters: "Mad, Bad, AND Dangerous to Know!"

...which, y'know, is actually an old quote about Byron, not about this particular two-parter. But I read the back cover anyway.

WILL Society's darling find that he has gone too far if he has an affair with his half-sister? Will he?

I couldn't help myself. I checked it out.

Here's the thing: if Byron were set in modern-day London, I wouldn't have felt an ounce of temptation. But set a piece in Regency England, and I just can't help myself. I think, Wellllll, how bad can it be?

Of course, all too often, the answer is: VERY bad. We'll see how this one goes...knock on wood!

What about you guys? What are your favorite trashy movies/TV shows? The ones you might not respect in the morning, but you couldn't help watching anyway?

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You can read the story behind the cut...

Blue Joe
By Stephanie Burgis

Josef Anton Miklovic, Blue Joe, was twenty-one years old and playing the sax in a nightclub in Youngstown, Ohio, when he met his father for the first time.

Joe was on stage with his family band: Karl on keyboard, hunched and intense; Niko on drums, grinning his lopsided, dreamer's grin; and Ivan, as smooth and polished as a Croatian Clark Gable, playing his shining trumpet like a peal up to heaven.

Smoke swirled across the tables, obscuring the waitresses in their Betty Boop outfits and the customers in their sharp suits, with dyed blondes on their arms. Ivan had hooked up with the son of a local mob boss to pull this job, and the rest of the brothers knew how lucky they were to get it. Ivan had big plans, and Joe was happy to go along with them.

Joe soared into his lead break, and at the end of it, as he emerged sweating and victorious, he met the fierce gaze of a hawk-nosed man at the back of the room, through all the smoke and the darkness. Time froze around them, and the music stopped.

"You don't look much like your mother," the man said as he crossed the room. He wore a long black coat from a different era, and it flapped around him like the wings of a crow.

Joe squinted through the smoke, watching the man sidestep frozen Betty Boops and customers' arms flung out in mid-gesture. Joe's brothers were as still as statues on the stage around him, and he thought he probably ought to be scared.

"Everyone always said I took after her," he said mildly.

"All they meant was, you don’t look like that lump she married." The man reached the stage and jumped up onto it as easily as if it were only an inch high, instead of four feet from the ground. "You take after me."

Joe looked the man up and down and knew it to be true. They shared the same crazy golden eyes, the same jet-black hair, though Joe's was slicked back into fashionable lines, and the same great, hooked nose, about which Joe's brothers had always teased him.

He turned to look at his brothers now, and the man before him shook his head.

"No. They're not mine. Your mother and I had parted ways by then. But I told her I'd come for you to raise you right, when I was ready."

"And you waited till now?" Joe laughed, despite the shock. "You left it a bit late, don't you think?"

"It took time to make my way over. Do you remember the journey you took?"

Joe shook his head. "I was only a baby when we came over to the States."

"Well, I took a longer route. It's harder to leave the old country, for some."

Some. Joe didn't know exactly what the  man meant, but he didn't care to ask, not with the rest of the nightclub frozen around them like stills in a newsreel. Whatever power this man had, it was obviously more than the local mob, and that was enough to scare anyone with sense.

"I'm here now," the man said, "and it's more than time. Your mother hid you too well." He fixed Joe in his hawk-like gaze. "Time to go."

"Hey, I'm not going anywhere." Joe stepped backward, crashing into Karl's keyboard. "I've got family."

"I'm your family."

"Uh-uh." Joe drew strength from his brothers' presence around him, even though they couldn't move. "I'm in a band. We're going places together. Might even break into Hollywood, if we're lucky."

His father snorted. "You're as stupid as your stepfather, if you really think that."

"I'm with my brothers," Joe said. "We're a team." He squared his jaw. "We can have a beer sometime and talk, if you like. But it's too late for you to act like a real father now."

"You'll change your mind," his father said. Anger flared deep and raw in his gaze. "I promise you. You'll change your mind."

Black, choking smoke erupted around him, making Joe tear up. He bent over, coughing...

And the music started up around him again, as if it had never stopped.

A black feather lay on the stage next to Joe's polished shoes.

Three days later, his draft papers arrived in the mail. Six days later, Joe shipped out to training camp, carrying his saxophone by his side but leaving his brothers behind.

#

Joe was on patrol in Germany the next time he saw his father. It was the middle of the night and he was alone on his shift when a great black wolf slunk out of the shadows and shifted into the shape of a man in a long black coat.

"Evening, Joe," his father said.

"Evening," Joe said, keeping his voice even. He kept walking as his father fell into step beside him. "Pleased with yourself?" he asked.

"Not really. It meant another long trip, and I don't care for travel."

"Maybe you should have thought of that before you got me drafted."

"You had to learn a lesson."

"If you mean you've got a nasty temper, I've learned that for sure."

"No," Joe's father said. He stopped walking and stared Joe in the eye as he intoned the words with a street preacher's intensity. "In the end, you're alone. You're always alone."

"Not tonight," Joe said. "Unfortunately."

He started walking again, leaving his father behind.

"You don't know what you're giving up," his father called after him. "I can take you away from all this, boy."

"Too late," Joe called back, without turning around.

His brothers had marched down together to the recruiting office the day Joe's draft papers had come through. That was his family, all over. Sure, Ivan had had big plans, but when it came down to it, they were a team.

They couldn't argue the Army into putting them all in the same unit, but they made a bargain. All of them had joined the army bands, and they saw it as good practice. As soon as the war ended, they'd be back on the road to Hollywood.

When Joe came back on his next rotation to the spot where he'd left his father behind, all he saw was a tuft of long black fur. He shook his head and let it lie forgotten on the ground.

#

Joe didn't see his father for the next three years, and he didn't miss the old man, either. He marched through days and nights of war, playing his sax for the unit, until the endless German rain rusted his beautiful instrument beyond repair. He played a shoddy borrowed replacement, provided by the army, to cheer the troops as they marched into towns filled with thousands of corpses lying piled on the ground, the aftermath of successful air raids. By nighttime, the corpses had been cleared from the streets with grim efficiency, but their faces filled Joe's dreams, to a soundtrack of the jazzy two-steps he played in the army band.

The day the keys of his second saxophone rusted over for good, Joe thought he'd tasted true despair. But he was wrong. That came later, when he got the telegrams.

Karl, who played keyboard with the intensity of a man possessed by angels, who'd dreamed nothing but music notes since he was a four-year-old kid, had had his left hand shot off in an accident in the Pacific. Looked like he wouldn't be playing in any band, in Hollywood or anywhere else.

And Ivan, slick, movie star-handsome Ivan with his great big dreams for the family, was dead, killed by a German sniper as he'd marched with his band.

If Joe's father had appeared to him then, Joe might well have killed him.

But his father didn't come.

Joe played a third saxophone, so harsh and squeaky it would have pained him to hear himself play if he'd ever bothered to listen. He was with the army unit that liberated two concentration camps, and the horrors sank deep into his skin and stayed there, like the hollow-eyed stares of the survivors.

The night his unit found out that the war was over, Joe saw his father for the third time.

There was a party in the camp, everyone celebrating with hectic gaiety. Booze flowed hard and fast, as if it could wash away the memories. Joe left after the first round of toasts.

He sat alone in the darkness, smoking one of the free cigars that had been passed around the party. A small black cat crept through the shadows to sit next to him. Joe eyed it warily and didn't reach out a hand to pet it. A moment later, he knew he'd been right, as the cat shifted into his father's shape.

"Well, Joe," his father said.

"Well," Joe said.

It was hard to tell for sure in the dark, but he thought his father looked older and more haggard since the last time they'd met. The black coat billowed out over a skinnier frame, though the golden eyes were just as fierce in the hollow face.

A year ago, Joe would have killed the man on first sight. Now he just kept on smoking, too numb to move or say any more. Faint light and the sound of voices filtered out from the mess hall nearby.

"My condolences," Joe's father said.

Joe stopped smoking and looked up sharply. He couldn't read an expression on his father's shadowed face.

"They wouldn't have been here if it weren't for you," he said.

"Who?" his father said.

They blinked at each other in mutual surprise. Then his father said,

"I was talking about your mother. She passed away two nights ago, in her sleep. I thought that you should know."

Joe took a deep breath. Then he kneaded his fingers over his forehead, closing his eyes against the lance of pain.

He wasn't completely numb yet, after all.

"She was a good woman," his father said, tentatively. "She did her best for you. By her standards."

Joe nodded. He couldn't speak.

"I was thinking," his father said. "I could take you back to see her, if you want."

Joe looked up. "You could do that?"

"I could," his father said. "She would have liked it."

"Did you—?"

"I was with her at the end," his father said. "She'd forgiven me, by then."

Joe tasted a story he'd never know, and let it go. "Fine," he said to his father. "Take me."

That was the night Joe found out what it meant to be his father's son.

They flew some way as crows at the beginning of the journey, but crows weren't fast or strong enough for an ocean crossing. They turned into smoke for part of that, then caught a lift on the wings of a military airplane.

Flying in the cold, thin altitudes, half disintegrated into smoke, Joe felt the wind blow through the pain. Pure, freezing numbness overcame him, and finally, he thought he understood what his father always felt.

Freedom. He could have flown forever, and never had to touch his pain or memories again.

At the end, well past midnight on a dark, cold Ohio night, they shifted back into human shape to jimmy open the window of the funeral home and crawl inside to the room where Joe's mother was laid out for viewing.

Joe touched her cold fingers and tried not to cry in front of his father.

"She was the prettiest girl in Kravarsko," his father said. "She wasn't afraid of anything or anyone. Not even me."

"She turned us into a team," Joe said. He looked down into his mother's face, calm beneath the layers of paint, and for the first time in over a year, he felt a clear point of resolution form underneath the brittle shell of numbness and the swirling, scattered layers of pain that had been hidden underneath. "She's the reason we all take care of each other."

"Well. That." His father cleared his throat. "I heard about your brothers and what happened. So. I guess there isn't going to be a band, after all. No more plans of Hollywood."

"Hollywood?" Joe almost laughed as he looked up from his mother to his father's fierce golden eyes. "You still don't get it, do you?"

"I didn't cause your brother's death," Joe's father said. "But it's been some time since then. I thought you might be ready to move on." He took a breath. "I thought you might be ready to come with me, now. Now that you know what it's like."

At that moment, Joe glimpsed something he'd never expected to see on his father's face. It was fear, pure and simple...and there was something else mixed in.

Loneliness.

Flying high above the ground, you could always feel free. Now that Joe had tasted that freedom, he felt the difference himself, standing thick and heavy on the ground, weighted down by human concerns, all the cares and sorrows that his father would never know.

But that wasn't enough.

"I'm sorry," Joe said, speaking to his father gently for the first time since they'd met. "It's too late for me now. It's not your fault. But I need to get back to my unit. I've got responsibilities."

"But—"

"There might not be a band," Joe said. "But my brothers and I are still a team." He hesitated and drew a breath, releasing the anger he'd carried with him for so long. "You could come and stay with us sometime. Anytime, really. I—"

Before he'd even stopped speaking, his father shook his head. The golden gaze shuttered, but not before Joe glimpsed the raw pain hidden behind the fierceness.

"Too late," his father said, and it sounded like the harsh cawing of a bird that knows it's lost all hope. "Too late."

#

Three of them came back from the war: Joe, without a saxophone, Karl, without a hand, and Niko, whose goofy lopsided grin had turned into a mask of sorrow. They gathered in their mother's house and huddled together, waiting for inspiration.

Ivan had always been the one with the big ideas. Ivan was gone. But the brothers were still a team.

Joe was cleaning out the attic one hot and dusty afternoon when he found his father's final message to him. Buried underneath the rubble of twenty years, he glimpsed the corner of a shining black leather case.

At first, he didn't know what it was. Then he lifted away the piles of old clothing that had covered it and saw its sleek rectangular lines, and his breath caught in his throat.

He undid the clasps and swung the case open.

A perfect, golden saxophone lay inside, gleaming and new.

Joe stared at it a long moment, caught between sharp, prickling emotions.

Finally, he reached out and picked up the saxophone. It fit perfectly into his hands.

As he lifted it out of the case, a black feather slipped out of the bell of the instrument and fluttered onto Joe's knee.

Joe let out a huff of breath that could have been either a laugh or a sob. A box of fresh reeds sat tucked in the case. He took one out and moistened it, even as tears blurred his vision. He fitted the mouthpiece onto the body of the sax and closed his eyes as he lifted it to his lips. He could already hear the wailing tune that wanted to be born.

Within a year, that tune would make his name in the nightclubs of Youngstown and Cleveland.

Five years from then, every jazz fan in the country would know the names of Blue Joe and his backup band—Niko on drums, grinning the loopy, lopsided, visionary grin of a man who's touched despair and been reborn into hope; and Karl, playing the keyboard like a demon with only one hand, worshipped by jazz fans everywhere for the uniqueness of his vision.

But at that moment, as Joe accepted his father's gift, he only knew one thing:

Maybe it wasn't too late after all.

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I just read a blog entry where the writer asked people to tell her what they thought dads were ideally supposed to do, if they were doing fatherhood "right"...and my first thought was, Um...exactly what moms are supposed to do. What's the difference?

I feel very, very lucky to have grown up with a great dad who showed us by example that dads could and should do all the things that moms do, from reading books out loud to changing diapers to cleaning and cooking and everything else that's involved in child-rearing. Having two equally committed and loving parents, in every aspect of life, is amazing luck for any child. And as a mom, I LOVE the fact that Patrick is an equal co-parent to MrD in every way. He's not just doing the gendered job of a "dad" - he's doing the job of a parent, which is so much bigger and more important.

And having thought through all this, of course I was even more frustrated than usual as I searched for Father's Day cards this year. Why are so many of them so sexist and obnoxious, or just so narrowly stereotyped? Not all dads love to play golf and to fish! Not all dads watch football!

Sigh. It just brings back all those horrible, frustrating shopping trips as a kid at this time of year, as I searched in vain through the department store displays of "gifts for Father's Day"...which were universally hopeless and a zillion lightyears away from the taste of my own dad, who didn't golf OR fish OR watch football.

Honestly. Had he just not read the "dad" handbook? Or were the stores completely brainwashed by some alien pod-person's idea of what a "dad" is supposed to be?

Personally, I'm voting for the alien brainwashing.

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(Click here to see the larger image.)

The cover artist was Anne Yvonne Gilbert, and the cover was designed by Tom Sanderson.

All the gold bits will be foiled, and the white bits will be shiny!

I am so, so happy about this cover. Every time I look at it, I feel like crying in wonder all over again. So this is a great day to give something away. And according to the random number generator at random.org, the winner of the Marie Brennan ARC is: bookblather! Congratulations, and please email me your mailing address so I can send you your ARC!

It's been a really, really good day. :)

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I'm sorry to tease by saying this and then not actually showing you guys the cover, but I'm not allowed to share it publicly yet. I really hope I can SOON - but in the meantime, it just would have felt really wrong to write a journal entry today and not mention the new cover, because it made such a difference to my day (and week and month!). It's been many hours since I got that email, but I've still got the PDF of the cover open in another window on my computer, and I haven't gone more than half an hour between ogling sessions ever since I first opened it. ;)

There are some days when writing is easy, some when it's hard, some when it's angst-ridden, interfered with by panic about publishing issues or fear of what people will think of the book or, or, or [insert neurosis here!]...and then there are days like today, when I am just filled with awe that I have been so, so lucky.

(And I wish I could go back in time and show this cover to the self of 7 years ago, who was - at just about exactly this time of year - taking Nika on long walks in the woods and crying the terrible kind of wrenching tears as she walked, because she was so convinced that she would never, ever manage to sell a novel or even a short story, EVER. It really was worth all those years of crazy, stubborn persistence in the face of all the odds, to get here.)

In other news, the 2010 Clarion West write-a-thon is about to begin. I finished the first draft of A Most Improper Magick during the first write-a-thon, and the first draft of A Tangle of Magicks (Kat2) during the 2nd; then last year I set myself super-ambitious goals that turned out to be way too challenging for life with a young baby who would only nap on my lap. This year, I've tried to figure out goals that are both challenging AND honestly do-able. I'm hoping to finish the rewrite of Kat3 and write 40 pages of some other project/s, whether that means the dragon book or a new short story or something completely different.

My write-a-thon page is here. I'll be really grateful if any of you donate in support - going to the Clarion West workshop was the best decision I ever made for my writing career (not to mention my personal life, since I met Patrick there!), and I could never have afforded to attend if I hadn't been given scholarship money. The write-a-thon raises money to give scholarships - and thereby opportunity - to other new writers who couldn't afford the workshop otherwise.

But even if you don't donate, I'll just be really grateful for the moral support as I work toward my writing goals this summer.

And my very last link - today I interviewed Angie Frazier about her wonderful YA debut historical-adventure-fantasy novel, Everlasting (which Heidi Kling called "Part Titanic, Part Raiders of the Lost Ark with a spunky teenager heroine"). You can read the interview here!

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Well. Unfortunately, that's not what's happening right now, because Patrick's still not feeling well himself, so all of my energy is being funneled into childcare and housecare, leaving very little energy for writing...and as much as I love blogging and writing emails, they can't take priority over my contracted novels. So I'm guessing that blog entries will continue to be scattered for a while, and I really apologize to everyone I owe emails to.

Have I mentioned how much I really hate CFS? :(

I'm still popping up a bit more often on twitter, because 1-line updates are more do-able than full blog entries - if you're there, you can find me at http://www.twitter.com/stephanieburgis - and otherwise...please know that I miss you guys and can't wait to come back to regular blogging and emailing! In the meantime, though, here's a quick roundup of some of my favorite things from the past couple of weeks:

Nigella Lawson
I have finally become a Nigella convert. I'd seen a couple episodes of her various cooking shows on TV and never been won over, but then I checked out her cookbook Nigella Express last Friday and fell in love. Luscious photos of food that's fast and easy to prepare (and so far, that promise has been upheld in all the recipes I've tried from the cookbook, all of which have been delicious as well as easy to make) - and I love, love LOVE the way she writes about the food. Her long, chatty intros to each recipe are lushly written and make the cookbook fun to read on its own, even if you don't do any cooking. I was completely blissed-out by the end of an afternoon spent reading it on the couch, even before I tried a single recipe. My only sorrow was that there aren't nearly enough vegan-convertible recipes included for my liking...but if that isn't an issue for you, there's really no downside to this cookbook.

Lisa Mantchev's Perchance to Dream book trailer
So dreamy and beautiful! I loved it. And as you guys know, I'm a huge fan of Lisa's books. Check it out:

Marie Brennan's A Star Shall Fall
I was lucky enough to get an ARC for this, and loved it. Eighteenth-century fantasy based around the impending arrival of Halley's Comet, with scenes of faeries debating real eighteenth-century scientific theory...it made my geeky, eighteenth-century-loving heart extremely happy. :) And have I mentioned yet that Halley's Comet is connected to a very, very cool and frightening dragon???? Here's what I wrote about it on Goodreads:

A beautifully written fantasy novel. The magic is perfectly interwoven with 18th-century British history and scientific theory, and the characters and their emotions are wonderfully complex.

I loved Book One in Brennan's Onyx Court series (Midnight Never Come, which was really fun), and I admired Book Two (In Ashes Lie) for how ambitious it was, but A Star Shall Fall is my favorite of Marie Brennan's novels so far, and it stands alone perfectly - you definitely don't need to have read either of the earlier Onyx Court books to enjoy this one.

If you like smart adult historical fantasy (and note, this is adult rather than MG or YA, so while there aren't any explicit sex scenes, there are complex romantic relationships and it is written in a different tone than fantasy for kids), I'm guessing that you might like this a LOT...and although it isn't due to be published until the end of August, you can read a copy sooner than that just by commenting on this entry.

Tell me either (a) your personal favorite historical period, (b) your favorite historical fantasy novel, OR (c) why you want to read it even though you don't have favorite periods OR historical fantasy novels....and you'll be entered to win my ARC from me! (Shameful note: the cover of this ARC is a little beaten-up, because MrD got hold of it. HOWEVER, nothing has been damaged apart from the wrinkled cover.)

I'll pick a winner next Thursday. The giveaway is open internationally!

And now I'm going to rest for a little while before it's my turn to take over childcare again.

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GIRLS BEHAVING BADLY

Saundra Mitchell

In Spring 2011, A Most Improper Magick will be in my hot little hands, and I can't wait. It's exactly the kind of book I would have read ragged when I was a kid (and frankly, I'm gonna read it ragged now that I'm an adult.)

My favorite books growing up were always about girls behaving badly - which generally means, girls actually getting to go on adventures, seeing the world, and having every possibility. No one seems to think a boy is badly-behaved if he wants to sign onto a boat heading off to find fortunes in lands untold- but I digress.

I stuffed myself full of adventurous stories about adventurous girls - Tamora Pierce's Alanna was a favorite. So much so, that I nicknamed myself Alanna, after the princess of Tortall who wanted to be a knight instead of a sorceress. I got giddy on Marion Zimmer Bradley's Cassandra and Morgan le Fay. Stories about Deborah Sampson - who disguised herself as a boy to fight in the Revolutionary war - were favorites, too.

But no need for all firebrand girls to all pretend to be boys. Boudicca sacked London in her own gown: Harriet Tubman led the way on the Underground Railroad in her own dress. Rosa Parks was exactly herself when she refused to give up her seat on the bus, and while Hatshepsut wore the ornamented beard of a Pharaoh, there was no mistaking that she was a woman.

I've always been inspired by stories of girls behaving badly - and making a difference. They're the same kind of stories that my character Iris prefers, in Shadowed Summer. And while she may be stuck in a dying, rural town, Iris can look out at the world and become anything through books - I have no doubt that she'd see herself in Kat Stephenson.

And I'm glad, because as they say, a well-behaved woman never made history.

Shadowed Summer by Saundra Mitchell
In paperback June 8, 2010
www.shadowedsummer.com

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I finished Season 2 of The Gilmore Girls this weekend, and ohhhh, the ending of that season! Sad and wrenching but real, and with all sorts of intriguing new complications implied for the future. I can't wait to find out what happens next. Luckily, one of the best birthday presents I got was a gift certificate to Amazon.co.uk, so along with all the books I ordered, I also ordered the Season 3 boxset. Now I'm just waiting for Patrick to catch up on the last few episodes of Season 2 so we can watch Season 3 together!

One of the other birthday presents I really, really loved was Leah Cypess's Mistwood. It's YA high fantasy in the same vein as Kristin Cashore and Robin McKinley, and mmmm, it was so good - romantic, emotionally intense, and genuinely magical, with complex issues of independence and power interwoven through it. Definitely worth checking out if you love good high fantasy! You can read the first three chapters here.

I also particularly loved the way Mistwood threw into question the whole idea of "rightful", "true" kings. One thing that I don't personally like about a lot of American fantasy novels is how implicitly monarchy-loving so many of them are. I understand why it happens - we all grow up reading fairy tales with princes and princesses as heroes, and before I moved to the UK, I enjoyed that as a fantasy trope without ever thinking twice about it - but now that I'm living in a country with a continuing monarchy, it doesn't feel like such a harmless fantasy to play with anymore.

I don't mind authors using royal characters or setting their books in kingdoms - I hope I never become that cranky and unreasonable! - and a lot of great writers use the idea of rightful kings/queens to write wonderful books which I'd hate to miss out on just because of my own personal hang-ups. But, on a personal, subjective level, I just particularly enjoy reading books that do show some of the complexity and gray areas of real-life monarchies and class systems...because personally, I have a big problem with the idea that one person is better or more important than anyone else just because of the family they happened to be born into.

Rant over now! I promise. ;p But I really can't wait to read more Leah Cypess novels.

And I also wanted to wish a happy belated book birthday to two fabulous books that came out in America this past week: Lisa Mantchev's Perchance to Dream, the second book in her Theatre Illuminata YA fantasy trilogy (you can read the first chapter here); and Sarah Prineas's Magic Thief: Found, the third book in her Magic Thief trilogy. I was lucky enough to read multiple drafts of Perchance to Dream as Lisa was writing it, and it got better and better every time (and I'd loved even the very first draft!) - I can't wait to read the final version when my copy arrives. And I read Magic Thief: Found last week and enjoyed it so much - it gives an incredibly exciting conclusion to the trilogy, and the ending was just perfect, beautiful and right.

What about you guys? Which books or TV shows have you really enjoyed lately?

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It was a wonderful day.

I worry that it would be too immature to list all of my birthday presents online...but I will say (because I can't resist!) that that list would include Leah Cypess's Mistwood, Libba Bray's Going Bovine, Sarah Monette's Corambis and Nina Kiriki Hoffman's Fall of Light, among other awesome gifts...so in other words, I have been gloating very, VERY happily over my pile of presents ever since I got them yesterday morning. :)

One of the best birthday presents I got, though, actually came the night before, when my wonderful American editor wrote me an email saying that it would be perfectly fine for me to turn in Kat3 a full month later than planned. For the last few weeks, I'd been desperately wishing that I had at least 2 or 3 more days to get things right. To have a whole month is bliss beyond reckoning! I could actually feel all the sick tension evaporating out of my back and chest as I read the email.

I know I'm really perfectionist, and it sometimes causes problems. I know I could have turned in a draft this week and it wouldn't have been the end of the world, just a rougher-than-ideal draft. But I feel so, so much better now that I have faith that I can turn in a draft that honestly is as good as I want it to be, not just as good as I could make it by Monday.

I'm still working on my rewrite as hard as I can. But I'm doing it now with pleasure instead of with panic...and that makes a really nice difference.

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Sigh. It was totally worth it...but today, for the first time since British summer arrived, I haven't spent any time on the patio. My skin isn't quite ready yet for an encore.

Also, I'm on a tight deadline. Kat3 is due to my American editor one week from today. ACK! Yes, I will have a draft to send her no matter what - I'm doing a rewrite now, not a first draft - but ohhhh, I really want it to be a GOOD draft, as good as it deserves to be. And I'm panicking a little bit (...she said, understating wildly) about whether I'll manage that by next Monday.

So...journal entries and emails may be a bit sparse (and shorter than usual) this week.

Please wish me luck!

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This summer, I have discovered the definition of true bliss: lying outside on the lounger on the patio in our back yard, sipping a cold drink while baking in the warmth of the sun, feeling a breeze whisper across my skin, and closing my eyes to listen to the birds all around me.

Yes, I know it's only May. It's not officially summer. But here's something I learned in my very first summer in the U.K., seven years ago: anyone who wants to really enjoy a British summer has to learn to reach out and seize their opportunities. Right now it's hot and lush and sunny, so I'm enjoying my summer with all my heart...because many years of experience have taught me that June, July, and August may well be cold and rainy. (But then September may be gorgeous! Summer again!)

Anyway, when I'm lying out on the lounger, imagining an umbrella in my drink, I'm way too blissed-out to worry about dates on a calendar. ;)

And after a week of medical worries, followed by difficult financial decisions and a frantic rush to catch up on business-y paperwork - not to mention an oncoming book deadline...well, every so often, taking twenty minutes out to close my eyes and just soak in the peace in our back yard is priceless.

How about you guys? Do you want a break from the day? If anyone wants to join my virtual patio party, just leave a comment telling me what your particular cold drink of choice will be today!

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Of course, that means that I just took an unscheduled full week off of my Kat3 rewrite, which is due to my editor in just 12 days...eek. Let's hope that deadline panic inspires extreme efficiency...and that MrD is well enough to get at least a little bit of childcare from someone else very soon. *knocking on wood*

Oof. I feel like I'm just now starting to re-emerge, blinking, into the normal world after dropping into a black hole for the last week. (MrD got sick last Thursday - he's finally showing signs of real improvement now.) When MrD is sick - especially really, truly, scarily sick - it feels like the world compresses around me and becomes a completely different place, with muted colors and drastically different priorities than my normal life. Now I'm back, and trying to remember what I was doing and caring about a week ago.

Of course, that means that I just took an unscheduled full week off of my Kat3 rewrite, which is due to my editor in just 12 days...eek. Let's hope that deadline panic inspires extreme efficiency...and that MrD is well enough to get at least a little bit of childcare from someone else very soon. *knocking on wood*

(Normally Patrick and I share the parenting as equally as possible, and we also get 6 hours a week of childminding from someone we like very much. When MrD was most sick, though, Mama suddenly became the only one he wanted, and to be honest, I didn't even want anyone else looking after him - I wanted him right here in my arms, where I knew exactly how he was doing at every moment. But that's not exactly the perfect recipe for getting a big rewrite accomplished...and even since that full-on intensity has eased, when he's been napping or hanging out with Patrick - usually my prime writing time - I've been so exhausted and limp that I've had to rest, mentally as well as physically, to keep the CFS from rearing up and whopping me.)

Here are the three things that have carried me through the past week, though, during my time-out periods: <em>Glee</em> (I'm not exactly a fan, but I have gotten to the point where I watch whole episodes instead of fast-forwarding between the musical numbers - and I did love the whole Madonna episode); <em>Gilmore Girls</em>; and my newest and craziest addiction, for which I TOTALLY blame Karen Healey: <em>Hana Yori Dango</em>. It's a Japanese show, based on a manga (I think?) and featuring the most horrific romantic anti-hero ever...and yet it is insanely addictive.

If you want to know why - and why I hunted it down in the first place - just read Karen's entries about it, which start <a href="http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/874153.html">here</a>. She is not exaggerating AT ALL!

What about you guys? How are your weeks going? And what shows do you turn to when you need comfort/escape?

Here are the three things that have carried me through the past week, though, during my time-out periods: Glee (I'm not exactly a fan, but I have gotten to the point where I watch whole episodes instead of fast-forwarding between the musical numbers - and I did love the whole Madonna episode); Gilmore Girls; and my newest and craziest addiction, for which I TOTALLY blame Karen Healey: Hana Yori Dango. It's a Japanese show, based on a manga (I think?) and featuring the most horrific romantic anti-hero ever...and yet it is insanely addictive.

If you want to know why - and why I hunted it down in the first place - just read Karen's entries about it, which start here. She is not exaggerating AT ALL!

What about you guys? How are your weeks going? And what shows do you turn to when you need comfort/escape?

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Unfortunately...

MrD got sick with a horrible fever Wednesday night. In one piece of wonderful luck and grace, my UK editor emailed me Thursday morning (not even knowing that my son was sick) to offer me an out-of-the-blue extension on my line edits since she didn't need them until Monday, after all. I was soooooo grateful to get that offer, because it meant I could spend all of Thursday just looking after our poor sick little boy, who really needed full-on mama time.

Unfortunately, things got worse instead of better, and we ended up spending 8 hours checked into the pediatric unit of our local hospital yesterday, until the doctors could be certain that it was safe to take MrD back home.

We were really lucky - we were only dealing with a normal (albeit horrible and intense) childhood illness. We left after 8 hours with a box of medicine and the certainty that MrD will be just fine again within a day or two. Not all of the parents on the ward were that lucky.

I have a new set of heroes, now: every parent who had to stay on that ward. God, it takes strength to be a parent when your child is sick. There's nothing that hurts as badly as seeing your child in pain or fear; I don't know any parent who wouldn't automatically, without a moment's thought, volunteer and even beg to take the pain for themselves, if only it were possible - not out of kindness, but because it hurts so much worse when your child is the one who's suffering. And when they're in physical agony and there's nothing you can do to make it better, but you can't let them see your own fear...

There was one moment when the other mom in our room turned away from her daughter for less than a minute, while the nurses were adjusting her position in an attempt to ease the pain just a little bit. (It didn't work.) In that one moment that her daughter couldn't see her, the expression on the mom's face...oh, I hurt for her.

Then the nurse moved away, and the mom turned back, with a smile on her face. As she leaned over her daughter, soothing her through the pain, her voice was calm and bright and optimistic, as if everything was normal and she wasn't worried at all.

But I remembered that unguarded look, and I could guess what it was costing her to sound so calm and confident, for her daughter's sake.

I am so glad to be home today, with my little boy sleeping through his fever on my lap. But I'm thinking of the parents who are still on that ward.

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This morning: OMG. I got woken TWICE. I can't believe it. I feel like I'm going to die...

Yup. This is the unexpected side-effect of having a child who's just started sleeping through the night most of the time. (Four out of the last six nights!) Funny how quickly my body adjusts...in completely the wrong direction! I keep trying to remind myself that a couple of weeks ago, being woken only twice a night would have felt like an impossible dream. Oops. ;p

In the meantime, I am bursting with fascinating stuff that can't yet be shared, and it's driving me crazy.

I have seen my British cover! It is awesome! It even shimmers (no, really)!...but I can't show it to you guys yet. :(

I have found out that Kat will have a different series title and a different Book One title in the US, and as of last night, I even know what they will be...but I can't share them yet, either. :(

Aaaahhhh!

Imagine me hopping with impatience. Or maybe not. Like I said, I'm a bit tired today... ;)

However, if anyone wants a signed copy of the UK edition, in particular - or just wants the chance to read the book months before it's published in America! - you can do a good thing for Nashville at the same time by bidding on the signed UK paperback edition here. It's part of the Do the Write Thing for Nashville auction to support flood relief, which is also offering up a ton of other fabulous items from authors, editors and agents.

I'll sign the paperback copy of A Most Improper Magick and send it to the winner as soon as I receive my author copies, which will be at least five months before the US edition comes out, and quite possibly more (since the US edition may not come out until later in the spring - the exact date is still in flux).

And in the meantime, I wanted to recommend one of my new very favorite books, Jaclyn Moriarty's Feeling Sorry for Celia. I first discovered Jaclyn Moriarty as a writer by reading a guest blog she wrote on Justine Larbalestier's blog. That entry was beautiful and made me want to read more, so I went to check out her own blog, which is wonderful, and I got completely addicted. Finally, I decided to try her first book, hoping to enjoy it since I liked her blog writing so much...

...and oh. Oh. I loved it so, so much. Feeling Sorry for Celia is a story about a girl whose best friend (Celia) is out of control, and it's about friendship and family and change. It's told in letters and notes to and from the teenage heroine. Some of them are real (her mum's fabulous notes, left on the fridge, are among my favorite); some of them are imaginary, from groups like The Association of Teenagers (or, Young Detectives), berating the heroine for her inadequacies; they're all equally wonderful. I love the characters, I love the story, and I love that it was one of the funniest books I've read and yet also included some parts that made me want to cry.

It's the first in her Ashbury High series, and now I can't wait to read all the rest. I already know I'll be re-reading Feeling Sorry for Celia many, many times.

What about you guys? What books have you loved recently?

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On UK Mother's Day, I talked about me and my experience of being a mother. On US Mother's Day, I wanted to talk about my mother. I don't usually do this, because I try not to talk online about anyone who doesn't have an online presence. I don't think it's fair to invade their privacy.

But - without getting into any invasive personal specifics - I just really wanted to say, publicly, how lucky I have been, all through my life, to have such a strong woman role model to look up to. When I was a kid, my mom told me all the time that I was strong enough and smart enough to do anything I wanted to. That's priceless stuff to hear, over and over again. More than that, though, she showed me that that was true by modeling achievement herself, changing careers when I was a kid, starting from the bottom rung and rising to the top through dedication, incredibly hard work, and, oh yeah, the fact that she's really, really good at it.

I can't even begin to explain just how important that was for me to see...especially when so many of the girls I knew in high school - even in the 1990s! - were being told by their moms that it was pointless to try for any difficult career that they might not be smart enough to handle, or that it was pointless to go for a demanding career that they'd just have to quit once their husbands or babies came along.

Now, as an adult pursuing the career I always wanted - which is, yes, difficult and scary and rewarding - I think of my mom all the time as a role model of how to do it, even though we're in different fields. I think of her as a model for achievement and professionalism, and also as a model for how to mix a demanding career with strong, caring parenting. My brothers and I have never been allowed to doubt for a single moment how much we are loved...and that's even more priceless than all the rest, for a child (even a grown-up child).

So: thank you so much, Mom. I love you.

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Sorry for all the exclamation points, but...this is a Big Deal. I don't even know if I can express what a big deal it is without going into brain-numbing details, but...oh, wow. I just had my first night of sleep unbroken by any baby wakeups AT ALL for over 19 months. (And up until a few days ago, those wakeups had been coming every 1-2 hours a night ever since January 2009. So...)

Yup. I could hum all day long, today. :)

Then I checked my email and was reminded immediately of why WisCon is my favorite con in the whole world. One of the organizers had written to me to say he was worried that we had paid for our memberships and weren't going to be able to use them...so would we like a full refund?

Would we? I had just assumed that wouldn't be possible. It isn't possible with most cons. But WisCon is really special, for this among so many other reasons. I love you, WisCon!!!! And I really hope to be back very soon, even though it won't be this year.

After my email check, as I was finishing my breakfast, I read this horrifying essay by Hanif Kureishi's sister, which pretty much expresses exactly how toxic and terrible it can be for a brother and sister to both be writers...which made me feel so, so intensely grateful for my own two writing brothers. According to Yasmin Kureishi,

I remember a few years ago, after my father died, I'd won a competition for a play I wrote, and Hanif told me I should give up writing. I've always felt that he can't stand the thought that I might be any good, might be better than him.

I stared at that line in horror, but also in shock, because I cannot even imagine a world where either of my brothers reacted in such a way. The three of us formed a writing group when we were kids, and since then, we've kept on reading and cheering on each other's work, whether the pieces we're writing are novels, short stories, or screenplays.

And since I am still feeling shaken by that article, I would like to take this opportunity to say how incredibly proud I am of my brother Ben, whose dark, disturbing, and powerful story "Dark Coffee, Bright Light, and the Paradoxes of Omnipotence" was chosen as one of the best online stories of 2009 by the storySouth Million Writers Award. And I am also incredibly proud of my brother Dave, who has written two short stories as Christmas presents for me that were so, so good that Ben and I both tried to talk him into being the third of us to attend Clarion West. (So far, he hasn't wanted to, since he's been focusing on his very cool screenplays instead.)

Finally, today is the perfect day to share a short story that Patrick and I wrote together in 2002 and saw published in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine in 2006. "Fire Magic" is an adventure fantasy with swordfighting, banter, and romance, set in an imaginary Eastern European kingdom in an alternate history version of Europe. It was the first and last story we ever wrote together, it's pretty different from anything that either of us has written on our own, and I still like it a lot. Patrick has just put it onto his website, so now you can read it for free. I hope you guys enjoy it!

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So...I am tentatively feeling excited about the rewrite. Please wish me luck!

Sadly, I'm feeling very un-psyched about the fact that we absolutely, definitely will NOT be going to WisCon this year, after all. We just couldn't get all our travel documentation taken care of in time. My first UK passport, MrD's American and UK passports...the timing just didn't work out...which was completely my fault for not being better organized. Gaarh. I much prefer to be able to blame other people for things like this! Alas, that's not an option this time round...and I am going to really miss seeing so many of my friends this year, not to mention the awesome client dinner party my agent has organized for the WisCon weekend. Wahhh! :(

We WILL be at the Hay-on-Wye festival, which starts the same weekend at the end of May (and then goes on for about a week), and our tentative plan is to spend my birthday wandering around the festival toddler-free. It'll be really nice, I know, and I'm hoping to enjoy it a lot. But I will still be feeling deeply WisCon-wistful.

But! I have done more than enough whining for one journal entry. So I'm going to close with this:

A Most Improper Magick will be published in LESS THAN THREE MONTHS in the UK! My publisher will be getting proofs of the final cover sometime this week, and I'm really, really hoping to be able to share it with you guys soon afterwards. They're emailing me the pdf of the final, proofread version by the end of this week. It is all so cool that it feels completely surreal.

When I get most frustrated about the things I've screwed up, or the things I might not be able to do this year that I really wanted to do...well, that's what I hang on to. My Kat books are being published, and that is such a dream come true, it's hard not to feel that things are balancing out somehow.

What about you guys? What do you hang onto when you're frustrated with yourself or your situation?

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In that spirit, I am not going to focus on the fact that I started my Kat3 rewrite one day late. I am going to focus on the fact that today, despite feeling absolutely terrified, I took out the first draft and began to read, aided by three perfect pieces of encouragement and motivation:

1. This quote, which I came across on the internet yesterday, stared at in shock (because it felt SO relevant to my blocked state), and ended up saving onto my computer to keep open on my screen as often as possible over the next month:

"May I have the courage today to live the life that I would love, to postpone my dream no longer, but do at last what I came here for and waste my heart on fear no more." --John O'Donohue

2. This song, Jem's "It's Amazing", which is directly relevant to anyone trying to get up the nerve to do what they have to do to make their dreams come true:

(It's the kind of soft pop that I don't normally like, but the lyrics more than make up for it, for me.)

3. A vegan chocolate hazelnut brownie...because not everything that's good for me is healthy. ;)

I read through the first third of the novel, not stopping to make any large changes yet, but making notes where I felt things didn't work, so that I can come back to them later with a sense of how the book works as a whole.

The best part? I realized tonight that, without ever consciously thinking about it, my whole attitude had shifted since that moment when I forced myself, with so much difficulty, to start reading. This morning, when I thought about the book, I felt terrified: OMG, how will I fix the problems in the first draft?

This evening, as I settled MrD down to sleep, I spent the time thinking about the problems in the first draft - not fearing them, but thinking them through, puzzling at possible solutions with the same feeling I have when I'm working on a kakuro puzzle: calm curiosity and absorbing interest.

It's a really good shift.

What do you guys use to motivate yourself to do the things you're scared of doing? And: how has your weekend been?

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2. Since a draft of Kat3 is due to my editor on June 1st - and since I swore to myself to begin the rewrite by the end of this week - I decided to make an official date of it and start the rewrite on May 1st, tomorrow morning. (And I'm mentioning it here to gain some accountability!) My biggest preparation, to get myself in just the right mood, was to download a new desktop wallpaper that reminds me of exactly what my attitude should be.

The most important thing I've learned about revisions over the last several years is that they are all about making the book as fun as possible - which means having as much fun as possible with the rewrite itself. I love my new desktop, and I'm hoping that it'll help me keep my shoulders relaxed and my mind loose and flexible instead of worried and tense as I finally, finally get started on the rewrite. Please wish me luck!

(And if you like the desktop, check out the whole list available at Smashing Magazine this month - very cool.)

3. Today I got the official invitation in the mail for my first-ever scheduled author event in the UK: I'm going to be leading a creative writing workshop for kids 10 and up at the Big Read celebrations hosted by the Newport Library (in Wales) in October! I'm so excited about this. We're going to focus on worldbuilding, and I think it's going to be really fun. I used to live for workshops like this at that age - I ate them up like chocolate cake! It makes me really happy to be able to do this.

4. I'm listening to a CD I bought at my own local library, on sale for 50p, last week: Opera Babes's Renaissance. I'd never heard any of their performances before, so I wasn't sure what to expect. It turns out that they're a duo that sings mostly classical music - not just opera arias & duets but also other classical pieces rearranged for voice - but orchestrated with a lush pop feel. As a former classical musician and musicologist who used to hang out with people who had Strong Opinions about the pop-ization of classical music, I keep feeling twinges of guilt for how much I enjoy it. Surely I should be finding it hopelessly cheesy, right? If I don't, what does that say about me?

Sigh. I've decided to take it as a sign of growth and maturity that I only feel occasional twinges, and that they haven't stopped me from listening to it. The truth is, I've played this CD at least once a day since I got it, and sometimes a lot more. I love it! And I hate that those old insecurities still plague me, years later. I didn't even agree with that kind of musical snobbery at the time, so why does it still have such a hold on me? And when will I finally be able to just let it go?

I am having fun, though, despite those old nagging voices from the not-so-great parts of the past. My very favorite piece on Renaissance is "Bailero". I turn it up loud whenever I start feeling tired or low, and it always cheers me up. Perfect!

5. Two days ago, only about a month after realizing that our answering machine was broken, I finally ordered a new one, and today it arrived. Score! It should start working tomorrow. So if anyone's been wondering why we haven't been replying to any answering machine messages...well, the situation should improve rapidly! ;)

Happy Friday, everybody!

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Every so often, though, I realize that my childhood in East Lansing did not give me all the experience I was going to need in my adult life.

This afternoon I read MrD a picturebook that was (like so many kids' books) set on a farm. It's a look-behind-the-flap book, and it doesn't label any of the things we're looking at, because it assumes that parents will know all the names already. Er...

I was OK on the animals. Cows, sheep, ducks, I recognized them all, no problem! I even knew the exact noises they should make. I was feeling pretty smug.

Then MrD pointed at one of the farm implements in the picture. I swallowed hard.

"Um...look at the one next to it! It's a shovel!" I know shovels!

He pointed again, more insistently. He knows shovels, too. My job, as the grownup and the mother, was to tell him what the unknown object was.

"Um...um..." I stared at it. It was long...it had two prongs, like the outer prongs on a fork... "It's...a forky-thing!"

He looked up at me. He was frowning. Even at a year and a half old, he knew better than to be convinced.

"...A forky-thing for hay?" I added, weakly.

Sigh.

I checked with Patrick later, and it turned out that the real name was: pitchfork.

I feel that I probably shouldn't even be allowed into the countryside, from now on. Beautiful though it is, I would only embarrass myself.

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Last week I went into my local Waterstones (and no, I haven't yet gotten up the courage to introduce myself to the manager as a local author) and looked at the space on the shelf where my book will be. It's a good space. It'll be eye-catching. It's what I always dreamed of.

I felt sick to my stomach with panic.

I finished the first draft of Kat3 in early February. I planned to start revising it in March. I didn't, because sitting down to revise it made it feel much, much too real that I was turning in the final book in my trilogy.

I started writing another book, my dragon novel, which made me laugh and feel giddy with happiness every time I thought about it. I wrote the first 11,000 words. Then someone asked me a fair, well-meaning question about whether one particular aspect of the novel was going to be commercially sensible at this point in my career...

...and I stopped. I haven't written a word of it for about a month now. Because right now, as I wait for my first book to come out, to find out whether anyone will buy it, whether anyone will love it the way I love it, whether my publishers will be thrilled or horrified to have paid me for it?

I am TERRIFIED about the concept of what is commercial and what isn't. And every time over the past month that I even thought about going back to the dragon novel, which had been making me so happy before, all I could feel was sick panic about my career as an author...which is distinctly different from my work as a writer.

I feel weird and insecure about posting this entry, because I feel like I should be staying positive and upbeat on my blog, as a general rule. But I read a wonderful entry a few days ago by one of my favorite authors in the world, talking about her own insecurity issues, and it made me feel like a ray of light was shining down into the dark, panicky corners of my own brain...so I decided I should go ahead and post about the scary stuff, too.

I just got my first two crits for Kat3, and they were both incredibly useful AND incredibly positive and enthusiastic, which was a huge relief. Patrick's reading it for critique right now. As soon as his crit is ready, I'm going to sit down and force myself to dive into the revision, even though that means admitting that yes, for better AND worse, I really am almost finished with this series I have loved so much.

In the meantime, my goal this week is to brainstorm and make a collage for my dragon novel, diving back into everything I loved about it and focusing on those aspects and those alone to figure out how I can have the most fun possible with this novel. After it's finished, I can let myself (or better yet my agent! hi, Barry! :) ) worry about whether it's commercial or not. Right now, that kind of speculation is the kiss of death for my creativity, and I can't let it take charge.

Whew.

Hitting the "post" button now, before I can give in to insecurity one more time and press "delete".

What are your goals this week? Or: what are you scared about?

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Here are a couple of the phrases that people have used to find my website lately:

• young lady needed - oh, dear. I am too old to qualify, and Kat is not ladylike.
• the sinister family stephanie - I actually quite liked this one. I feel dangerous and intriguing! But I somehow don't feel that the searcher will have found what they were looking for on my site...

It's a good thing I don't look at Google Analytics more than once every couple of months. I always come away from the experience feeling frazzled.

***

There's a new meme going around online - people are giving advice to their high school selves. Mostly, people are doing this on twitter. I started to write a tweet of my own, to join the meme, but found myself so overwhelmed with the need to give REAMS of advice that I couldn't fit it all into a 140-character tweet.

Here's the main and most important point, though, that would have made such an enormous difference to my own high school self:

If none of the boys you meet are smart AND cute AND like the same kind of fiction and jokes that you do? Don't assume that you just have to lower your standards (and then feel bad when those compromise boys, with whom you have so little in common, don't really like you in return)! Just wait a few years, and it will all turn out fine.

I promise.

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Whenever I have to handle practical details, my whole body fills up with stress. Arrangements take much longer than they really should, and details often go haywire. I know part of this must be a mental block - for instance, I've become notorious within my family for the fact that I frequently get the dates wrong for trips that I, myself, have arranged. I tell people (and believe!) that my return airplane ticket is for one particular date when it's actually two or three days earlier or later; even after I figure out the right date, I get the time of that flight wrong, and run into trouble because of it. Those details just fly straight out of my head no matter how hard I try to hang onto them, the same way laws of geometry used to slip through my fingers whenever I sat down to try to learn them.

(So okay, I'm not good at all forms of academia; geometry was my Waterloo, the first time I ever flunked a test...multiple times. :( Aack! I was even good at math - I got "A"s in algebra, calculus, etc. - but it turned out that I have NO spatial visualization skills whatsoever, so geometry was a lost cause for me. That was particularly embarrassing for the daughter of two mathematicians...)

Usually, nowadays, my skewed skills set works out okay. I have a career where writing is the most important skill to have (score!); I have a husband who appreciates me for who I am and is willing to take responsibility for most of our household arrangements. (Thank God I wasn't born into an earlier generation! If I, as the woman, was actually expected to be in sole charge of our household, we would all be eating cornflakes for every meal while wearing clothing that hadn't been washed for weeks.)

Unfortunately, I can't expect Patrick to take charge of all the stressful details in our life (and it wouldn't be any good for our marriage if I did!), and one of the areas I'm responsible for is travel organization. (See above, re: travel disasters of the past.) Right now, I'm trying to organize MrD's US and UK passports as well as my first UK passport and our travel arrangements for this summer, and I've been tearing my hair out, close to tears many, many times as I realize how many parts of this process I should have already taken care of months and months ago...and surely, surely, anyone with a brain would have figured that out in time, unlike me?

Sometimes, I manage to take a deep breath and tell myself that everybody just has different skills in life, and my own skills are valuable enough to give me value as a person, even when I screw up left and right on practical issues. More often, I think I'm just a big, hopeless loser for not being even remotely competent at this most important stuff.

What about you guys? Do you feel like you're pretty well-rounded when it comes to your life skills? Or are you more like me with a strong specialization in one particular area...and a feeling of hopeless incompetence in the others?

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Well. That didn't work out quite as well as I'd hoped.

Unfortunately, it turns out that there's a fault on our new phone line, meaning that phone calls range between difficult and impossible, and the internet connection veers in and out. So I spent most of the morning arranging for that to get fixed "sometime in the next 72 working hours"...and then, when I tried to use my cellphone to make all the other important and urgent phone calls (to the gas company, to Her Majesty's Revenue Service, etc., etc), I ended up sitting on hold for so long that I ran out of all my calling time before I'd managed to sort out a single issue.

Wah. At least I tried...right?

In the end, here's the one thing I managed to Get Done today: I bought a new pair of jeans and a summer cardigan. Oh, and a vegan hazelnut brownie.

I am not proud. (But I am relieved. Until this afternoon, I only had one pair of jeans that fit...and the zipper on that pair didn't work!)

What about you guys? Are your days (or weeks) going to plan?

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So in other words, I am very tempted to spend this whole entry whining, because colds always make me feel very, very sorry for myself! But I will take pity on you guys and restrain myself. Instead, I’m going to focus on the good stuff that’s happened in the last few days.

First, our friend Tricia drove four hours roundtrip to help us clean out our old house after we moved out, AND she brought homemade soup for us to eat after she’d gone. That was way beyond the call of friendship, and it made such a huge difference to us. (The soup was delicious, too.) Thank you sooooo much, Trish!

Second, I’m reading a really fascinating book right now: Moon Dust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth, by Andrew Smith. It’s about the twelve men who walked on the moon between 1969 and 1972 - still the only twelve men in history to have done it - and how they spent the rest of their lives afterwards.

It’s got elements of a history book to it - I love the intensity and vividness of his descriptions of the actual moon-walking experiences - and elements of biography, too. It’s mostly written like a memoir, though, with the focus on Smith’s own personal experience of meeting with the moonwalkers and finding out their stories. I’ve never been particularly interested in the history of the space program, but I’m finding this book incredibly compelling, and it’s really inspiring me to find out more about the whole subject.

Lastly, I just got an invitation to a very cool-sounding anthology, so this morning I started a brand-new short story. It’s a bit different from any of the stories I’ve written in the last year or so, so it feels like it’s stretching me in really good, creative directions. Working on it reminds me of Ursula LeGuin’s theory that what everyone in life is really looking for, deep down, is work-play - the kind of satisfying, challenging work that feels like playing.

It’s the kind of work I love to do…even when I do have to sniffle and gulp down gallons of tea as I do it.

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For various reasons, I wasn't able to come along with Patrick when he viewed it originally, but at that point we were coming up hard against our deadline to either find a new place or commit to our current house for another 6 months...and I really, really hated our first house in Wales. (Mold everywhere! Aagh!) So I trusted Patrick's judgement, we applied for the new house (sight-unseen, on my part)...and I finally saw it for the first time Wednesday afternoon, about an hour after the movers had piled our boxes into it!

Patrick was more nervous than I was, actually. He warned me that the house itself was pretty ugly from the outside - typical 1970s grayness. He kept trying to second-guess what my reaction would be, and worrying that I would hate it. I was honestly pretty zen about the whole thing - as long as we were safely out of our last house, I didn't care where we were! - but because of that, I had low expectations. Then I actually stepped inside...

...and oh. Outside, yeah, it's nothing special. But inside? It is full of light.

We've been living in dark houses for years now - townhouses and duplexes with never enough windows. This house? Not only is it the biggest house we've ever rented - and the first one with a (big!) back yard we can actually use - but there are just so many windows! When you sit in the living room, you can look out one huge window to the pretty front garden and then turn in your chair to look at the big glass doors on the other side of the house, leading out to our back yard.

I don't know if I can express just how giddy all this light and space has been making me. Better yet, we've had bizarrely beautiful, sunny, warm weather. We moved in Wednesday night, and I've pretty much spent every daylight hour since then hanging out in our back yard. (It even has a cute stone pig in the garden! We've named him Pippin.)

So it was the right week to get some news that was necessary and unavoidable but still a little sad for me personally. The US publishing date for A Most Improper Magick has definitely been shifted to Spring 2011. (The date you see on Amazon may or may not be the right one - I'm going to hold off a little while on announcing the exact date here or on my website, until I'm 100% certain that I'm giving you guys the right info.) The main reason for that is that the publishing team is working on a brand-new cover for the book. I still have no idea what that cover will look like, but I can't wait to find out.

(And the UK publishing date, as far as I know, is still remaining the same - August 1, 2010. I did just see a draft of that cover yesterday, and it's fabulous! I can't wait until it's ready to share.)

My professional self knows that the date change was necessary and important, and it's always worth waiting to have the best, most commercial cover possible. My whiny, impatient inner self is sad to have to wait longer to hold the book in my hands. But luckily, when I'm lying on the grass in the rare, beautiful Welsh sunshine, it's hard to feel bad about anything.

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Eastercon, though, was FABULOUS. As we drove toward the Heathrow airport hotel where it was being held, I told MrD, "We're going to hang out with our people!" And that's exactly how it felt, how cons almost always feel to me: the chance to hang out with my tribe, smart, passionate people who love books and imagination and creativity just as much as I do. (I've only had the chance to do this so far at SF/fantasy conventions, but I'm betting that YA lit conventions and romance conventions probably have a very similar vibe in that regard.)

It's like getting to breathe out that little bit of tension that usually rests in my shoulders as I move around the world, interacting with people who don't think books are that important (especially fantasy novels), who have different priorities than I do, and with whom I generally hold back a lot of what I really feel, so that I can fit in. That was a lesson I learned as a kid - how to fake "normal" cultural interests in social situations - and it's an important lesson to absorb if you want to have a pleasant day-to-day life. But it is an incredible gift to be able to meet up with your tribe and be surrounded by people who have the same priorities and passions you do, and who don't think there's anything odd about them.

(And can I say for the millionth time how glad I am to be married to a guy just as geeky as I am? This was the first time Patrick and I haven't been able to really hang out as a couple at the con, because we had to take turns chasing after our very active toddler [MrD had a GREAT time at the con!]...but oh, was I glad to be coming home afterward with a guy who understands and shares my world.)

Since we got back, I've been reading testimonials from YA authors all across the internet to what it was like to be bullied as a kid, as part of Carrie Jones's wonderful YA Authors Against Bullying group. They're all intense and heartbreaking. (Here's just one example, from author Saundra Mitchell.) I only ever faced mild bullying as a teen, but I had friends and relatives who suffered horribly.

I wish I could say to every kid: it really will get better. K-12 schooling is, in so many ways, the worst part of many of our lives. It's like Lord of the Flies in a way I've never, ever witnessed since high school graduation. As author Judy Blume has pointed out, if you were ever in an adult work situation where things like that happened, where you were harassed and hurt and frightened on a daily basis, you would eventually quit and LEAVE - but kids aren't allowed that escape. More than that, if someone seriously harassed you or physically hurt you as an adult, you could report them to the police for stalking/physical assault. If you're a kid, though, that's just considered "normal" - a fact of everyday life that you're just expected to live with. No wonder so many kids lose hope.

I hated school. But then I graduated, and the world suddenly got so much bigger. College felt like a revelation - someplace I could meet other people who actually thought like me, people who really liked me for who I was, not just the façade I could put on for social blending. And when I started to meet other writers and to go to cons...oh, wow. I found my tribe in every way.

I want everybody to have the chance to find their tribe in life.

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Well. Two years later, MrD is 18 months old, and of course the first obvious difference is that our packing list is at least 3 times as long, this time! Of course, we have to bring all of his best toys and books, plus endless changes of clothing for him, plus, plus, plus...and we've been so focused on all the different toddler-at-a-convention issues that I only just now realized a really horrible truth: yet again I don't have enough clothes that fit. (But it's for the opposite reason, this time - one of the side-effects of breastfeeding is that you can lose a lot of weight that way). Sadly, there was no time to rush out for a clothes-shopping expedition this time round. So if I look like I'm wearing the same pair of jeans all weekend...well, please forgive me!

(I was scarred for life a few years ago when I read an article in one of the online magazines that sneered at the way writers, as a group, had dressed at WisCon that year. First, of course, I was baffled - how did anyone think it was remotely appropriate or cool to spend their time at a con - and a feminist con at that - rating other people on their clothes???? But afterward I was left with a lasting feeling of deep nervousness. So I really do wish I'd managed that clothes-shopping trip this week.)

I was sitting here panicking about my lack of good clothes/recent haircut/etc, etc., etc...and then to distract myself I started clicking around Waterstones.com. I started by checking how long I had to wait before I could get a copy of Sarah Prineas's third Magic Thief Book (only 28 more days, hooray!), then I clicked onto the Waterstones page for A Most Improper Magick...

...and every single worry flew straight out of my head, because the first thing it said on the page was: 122 days until publication. Eeeeeeee!!!!! Between the joy and total panic of that realization - somehow I just hadn't realized it was coming up quite so soon! - every fear about clothing, appearance, and everything else non-book-related just totally disappeared for a while.

We're off to Eastercon tomorrow morning, driving a car full of toddler entertainment options. We're parents this time round, we're two years older and a lot more tired, and I know I look it, especially after weeks like the last one...

...but my book is coming out in the UK just four months from today. And I am really, really excited.

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Times like these, there are very specific kinds of books I want to read. Across the sleepless weekend (which was completely consumed by sick baby + copyedits), I re-read Nick Hornby's The Complete Polysyllabic Spree, and it was perfect - a collection of bite-sized columns he wrote about the books he was reading. Each of the columns was funny (I laughed out loud many times and insisted on reading several bits out loud to Patrick), each was very smart, I made notes of several new-to-me books to pick up based on his discussions of them...and best of all, each column was only about 6 pages long. That's ideal for a period when I might only get 10-minute chunks of time to read anything in between trips upstairs to re-settle MrD back into sleep. (Sunday night, I was getting an average of 7 minutes off in between each re-settling, and if I hadn't had the Nick Hornby - if I'd actually been trying to focus on a long, connected storyline - I might have just gone crazy.)

Today, thank goodness, after 24 hours of antibiotics, MrD is finally starting to feel better, so life is gradually resettling itself into normal rhythms. I had a full-length writing session AND a shopping session in town, which would have been even better if it hadn't been in the middle of a rainstorm. Still, on top of all the boring necessities I bought, MrD also got a stuffed triceratops, Maya got a squeaky stuffed lemming, and I got a vegan brownie, so it was all worthwhile. ;)

Now our houseguest is reading Carrie Jones's Need (I love having houseguests and getting to force my book recommendations on them! ;) ), Patrick is working on revising, and MrD is (gasp!) actually napping...so I'm going to pick up a new book to read. And it will be a novel this time, not an essay collection, but it will be one with a happy ending, because I'm still too tired for tragedy.

What kinds of books are you guys in the mood for today?

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Also, every time I watch an episode, I end up with all the theme tunes echoing in my head, and not much else left in there...

(I know ALL the major characters' theme songs by heart, AND I can do the dances. Yes. This is how parenthood REALLY changes a person. And the weirdest thing about it is, MrD sees maybe one episode a week, if that! But there's just something so hypnotic about that show...)

Luckily, our timing with the house move worked out after all - we don't have to leave our current house until the second week of April, giving us plenty of time to move into the new one. Whew. Only 5 days ago, we'd worried that we would have to move out on Friday, and I can't imagine how we would have coped, what with MrD feeling as sick as he does.

And best of all, we don't have to move before Eastercon! I'm so relieved about this - it means we can arrive with full energy intact. And I can't wait. I've had so much fun at the last two Eastercons, and this year, I don't even have the stress of a panel to take away from the fun factor - I can just focus on hanging out with people and (of course) spending way too much money on books in the Dealer's Room.

How many of you guys will be there this year? Please come up and say hi if you see me - I will be the one following around an active blonde toddler while carrying far, far too many books...

Oh, and for all the Americans who won't be at Eastercon, check out the The Book Scout's YA Author/Pet contest (US-only, alas): you can win a bunch of YA fiction & swag by matching up YA authors with their pets! Maya and I participated in this one, so you may recognize at least one of the photos from my flickr account/old journal entries... ;)

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It also made me realize how much I've missed hanging out with other writers since we moved down south. Of course there must be lots of writers living in Wales and the south of England, but we don't actually know many of them personally, so this was the first time in about 6 months that Patrick and I have actually gotten to hang out and talk writing/publishing/etc. with another writer in person. It was so fabulous - especially since we got to talk parenting, too! (The perfect combination of topics for me right now. :) )

I was so thrilled that she was willing to drive the 2 hours to hang out - even though we failed on our organization and didn't have vegan brownies waiting for her after all! Oops. Next time, I promise!

Since we spent a lot of time talking about books, it reminded me that I haven't talked much on this blog about the books I've been reading recently. So here's a quick round-up of my favorites over the last month or so:

Orange, Mint, and Honey by Carleen Brice

Shay Dixon is forced to go home to her alcoholic mother for the first time in years when she has a breakdown in grad school and starts seeing the ghost of Nina Simone. Her mother has gone through AA and changed her life...but is it too late to change their relationship? This book (although adult rather than YA) reminded me of Sarah Dessen's novels in the best possible way. In other words, it was really lovely, full of real emotion, complicated relationships, and wonderful, strong female characters. I loved it! :)

Hearts at Stake, by Alyxandra Harvey (aka, My Love Lies Bleeding in the UK)

This one is packaged in the UK to look dark and angsty and very Twilight-y...which is so, so wrong for the book. I like the American title and cover much better, because they convey the real spirit of the novel, a wonderfully funny and action-filled double-romantic comedy starring two best friends...one of whom happens to be a vampire.

Both of the romances in this book are sweet and cute (I especially loved the Beatrice-and-Benedict-style sparring between snarky human Lucy and vampire Nicholas), but the real foundation of the book is the rock-solid friendship between Lucy and Solange, both of whom are strong and smart and funny. A sparkling romantic comedy-adventure that just happens to include vampires and sword-fighting...oh, yeah. I absolutely loved it, and can't wait to read the next book in the series, starring another of Solange's brothers.

The 10 P.M. Question, by Kate de Goldi

This was one of the ARCs in my goodie bag from Templar Books (my UK publishers), and wow, do I feel lucky for getting to read it early. (Well, relatively early, anyway - it was published in New Zealand and Australia a few years ago.) Frankie Parsons is a 12-year-old in a quirky, lovable, and deeply eccentric family with one big fault line running through it...something that no one ever, ever talks about until a new girl shows up at his school and starts asking questions. This one was really funny, sweet, and sad (it made me cry at one point), and I really, really loved it.

What about you guys? What books have you loved recently?

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(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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Thank goodness for chocolate chip cookies. I baked half a batch on Sunday and the other half on Tuesday, and that spread-out chocolatey goodness has been absolutely crucial for maintaining sanity across the week. (I used this recipe for vegan chocolate chip cookies, which was okay - I especially liked the cinnamon in it - but I'm still looking for a better recipe. Which of course requires serious scientific experimentation - but luckily, Patrick and I are both very happy to put our stomachs to work for the cause of Science... ;p )

In better news, the Templar Books website shows the British edition of A Most Improper Magick available online for preorder, hurray! - AND, no matter where in the world you are, you can download the free sample they've posted from the middle of Chapter Two. (Click on "download a sampler" in the top-left corner of the book's page.) Hope you guys enjoy the teaser!*

(And btw, the cover posted on that webpage won't be the final UK cover - it's just a holding cover while they work on the final version. But I do think it's cute!)

Now I'm going offline to close my eyes and listen to more of Carrie Jones's Captivate audiobook. Pixies and valkyries and Valhalla, oh my! So much fun. :)

___

*And of course you can read all of Chapter One on my website

.

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So, here's our biggest and most chaos-inducing news: we're moving! Not out of Wales, or even out of our own lovely small town, but out of our very moldy and unhealthy house to a much nicer, bigger one, with mold-free walls, an honest-to-God shower as well as bath (our current landlord took out our shower, without even warning us first, a week after we moved in here...surprise!), and close proximity to a playground for MrD. It's the least picturesque house we will have rented since I moved to the UK 8 years ago, but on the other hand, it's in the best condition, which is definitely worth the lack of prettiness factor.

Or anyway...we think we're moving. We've applied for the house, and the new estate agency thinks we'll get it, but we still have to wait for official confirmation after they've run credit checks, reference checks, etc. Meanwhile, they think it'll be available on April 1st but aren't quite sure, because it might not be available until a few days later after all...oh, and meanwhile, our current estate agents haven't got any answers yet for us about whether we can stay past March 27th, when our contract runs out. Oh, and Eastercon starts on April 2nd, up in London.

Or in other words: aack!

So...Patrick is cleaning and sorting out the house, in hopeful preparation, as I type. I'm about to phone our current estate agents again. Pink Martini is playing over my laptop speakers, which is at least taking the edge off my simmering panic.

And in other, happier news: the first official review (from "Booklist") came in for A Most Improper Magick, and it was good! Whew. (You can read the full review on the book's Amazon page, under the header "Editorial Reviews".)

And I've just finally started to read through the first draft of Kat3, and guess what? I still like it! Yay. :) Soon, I'll be sending it off to critiquers, but this is the interim draft where I fix all the embarrassingly blatant mistakes before anyone else can see them and force me to hide my head under a blanket in embarrassment for the next week. Because, of course, who knows where our blankets will even be living by that point?

*pantpantpant*

OK, taking a deep breath. Time to call the estate agents again. Wish me luck!

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Right now I'm listening to this year's Mother's Day gift, which is Pink Martini's newest CD, "Splendor in the Grass". It's wonderful - Pink Martini is probably my favorite band at the moment, and this is by far my favorite of their CDs so far. And two bouquets of beautiful tulips are sitting on the table, picked out jointly by Patrick and MrD.

It's funny what a transformation it really is to become a parent. I always wanted kids - I grew up with younger brothers, one of them 10 years younger than me, as well as a pair of much younger cousins, so I did a lot of babysitting both within the family and around my neighborhood as a teenager. Then, when I went to college at 17, I was horrified to find myself feeling baby-hungry. Eek!

Believe me, I did NOT want to have a child at age 17...but I was so used to having cuddly small people around that it was a genuine emotional shock not to have that kind of affection and fun at closehand. So in a way, I guess it's almost surprising that I ended up waiting so long to have a baby - I was 31 when MrD was born.

But my expectations of parenthood, by the time I was 31, were pretty clear. I had friends who were stay-at-home moms (SAHMs, according to online mom-jargon) and friends who voluntarily went back to full-time work as soon as possible. Both sets loved their kids equally, but I identified with the second set SO much more. I had worked at a very good daycare in my hometown for several months before I moved to England, so I felt quite positive about the daycare option, and I had a hard time understanding why so many moms resisted it.

When I looked at my SAHM friends, I couldn't imagine how - or why! - they did it. Their kids were sweet, but still...I was certain that when I had my own children, I would want to have lots and lots of childcare set up by the time they were six months old. I would certainly keep work as my top interest, because that was just who I was, and that was never going to change.

Well. Hahahahahahaha. Yes. Funny how wrong we can be about ourselves, huh? Or maybe that's just me.

Of course I'm still a writer. Of course I'm still passionate about my writing, I still try for 500-1000 words of fiction every day (thank goodness for toddler naps!), and I meet all of my publishing deadlines.

But. I have SO become one of those moms who used to baffle me. Because of the CFS, I physically cannot be a full SAHM - Patrick's doing at least half the parenting now, supplemented by a childminder two mornings a week - but that is, shockingly to my old self, the only reason why I'm not doing it. (And I'm definitely not saying that anyone else should - just that I've been shocked to find out that that's what I would personally prefer, despite having always expected the opposite.) The joy that MrD has brought to my life is just astonishing. It has certainly astonished me. It turns out that, despite all my expectations, becoming a mom actually did transform who I am and what I care about most in the world.

I would never deny the stress and exhaustion that come with motherhood. I haven't had 4 solid hours of sleep in nearly 15 months, so I am constantly exhausted. There are plenty of days when I get frustrated or cranky. Being a mom, no matter what your parenting style, is an incredibly hard, demanding job, and I would never, ever recommend that anyone do it unless they really, really wanted to.

But it also turns out to be the best thing that ever happened to me. And that has been such a wonderful surprise.

So happy Mother's Day, British moms! And I hope everyone else is having a really good Pi Day. :)

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So I haven't been doing as much writing as I wanted to do, and I'm way, way behind on emails (even more so than usual). Sorry!!!

On the other hand, here are some things that have cheered me up this week, and I'm really hoping you guys can suggest some more things for me to check out while I wait out this crash.

1. I am incredibly proud of my brother Ben, who is now officially known as Dr. Burgis! (Ten years ago, I didn't know a single Dr. Burgis. Now there are two of them in my immediate family, and within a few years, there will be three. It's pretty incredible. But I rely on my youngest brother to keep me from being the only non-PhD in the family...okay, Dave??? ;p )

Seriously: congratulations!!! I am so proud of my little brother. (Who is now, of course, about a foot taller than me. But whatever!) And here is the great webcomic one of Ben's friends drew to express the terror of an oral PhD defense, which made me laugh a lot.

2. My glittery dragon stickers arrived! I had so much fun arranging them on my moleskine for the new novel. Inspiration + laughter = perfect. :)

3. Before the big crash hit, I managed to get halfway through Chapter 2 of the dragon novel, and it's making me really, really happy. I can't wait to get back to it!

4. Ying Lee's first book, The Agency: A Spy in the House just had its North American debut! I love this book, and burbled about it last year when it debuted in the UK. Ying is the first novelist I ever wrote a fan letter to, because I was so excited when I finished reading her book. Girl spies in Victorian England! Disguises, mystery and intrigue! A perfectly-toned romance! A genuinely unexpected family secret, a whole host of strong, interesting women, and a completely non-stereotypical view of the Chinese community in Victorian England!

So, so cool. You can read an excerpt on Ying's website.

What about you guys? What's been cheering you up this week?

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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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At the same time, this is making me realize just how lucky we've been to afford all these months of paternity leave. Patrick and I have been genuinely doing equal parenting since last August (apart from the times when my CFS has been bad, when he's done the HUGE majority of the parenting work. That is an amazing rarity and a real gift (for MrD, definitely, but also for Patrick and for me). And even apart from the co-parenting, it's been such a gift for me to be able to hang out with my husband-and-best friend every single day, to share all aspects of life with him. That's so different from the years when we were both working day jobs, and I've really, really loved it.

So...today feels odd, without him here. We're all looking forward to him coming back late tonight. But it's also making me realize just how lucky we've all been, in a way that is too easy to take for granted.

***

So...with me left to do sole parenting on my own, what did I decide to do this morning? Oh, take a wild guess, I bet it won't be hard. MrD and I went to the library!

I've always loved libraries (as long-time readers of this blog already know from all my burbling about them over the years), but I've never felt so grateful to them as I have since MrD was born. Even apart from the great events that libraries arrange for babies and toddlers and their parents, I just love that our tiny local library is a safe, happy place for me to take MrD and spend an hour or more. There are plenty of books and blocks for him to play with, and the libarians are warm and welcoming and take it for granted that toddlers WILL make some noise and do some running around, no matter how hard their parents work to control them - that's just what toddlers do.

Not only do the librarians smile indulgently at MrD even in his most rambunctious moods, they go out of their way to search out fabulous CDs of nursery rhymes and baby music for him and recommend books he'll like. When we arrive at the library, he lights up with happiness and excitement, and so do I.

Today I only had enough room on my card for 9 new items, and there were way too many good books and CDs and DVDs to choose from. (I was cursing myself for not returning more!) Luckily, MrD has his own library card, so he still managed to get plenty of new books, and we came home with a big pile. I've got a CD of Welsh Celtic music to listen to, I've got the DVD of Driving Aphrodite to watch, and I've got Jay Asher's Thirteen Reasons Why to read, along with six other exciting books.

MrD's asleep upstairs right now, and Maya's asleep in her dog bed. I'm listening to my new music and about to dive into one of my new books.

What about you guys? What do you have checked out from the library right now?

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Actually, I'd been planning to take off some time between novels, because there's a lot more research I have to do before I can get started on the 30s screwball comedy I've been planning. I figured I'd just play around with short stories for a month or two...but then I realized that I honestly just can't cope with the angst of waiting for my first book to come out unless I'm involved and obsessed with a brand-new book.

But which book? It's really scary to start a new, unrelated book after working on one trilogy for the last four years - especially while I'm waiting to find out how that trilogy will actually do in the marketplace. I've spent the last few weeks feeling really unmoored, and every time I started trying to have fun with novel-planning, I ended up feeling panicky and scattered - the least creative mood possible.

What finally did the trick for me, no matter how weird this may sound, was a computer desktop wallpaper that I found in Smashing Magazine's March collection. I saw this wallpaper - a girl walking down a road into adventure - and something clicked inside me: Yes.

Symbolically, it works on such a great level for me, because that girl is exactly who I'm writing for - the twelve-year-old girl I used to be. And that's who and what I need to focus on right now.

I downloaded the wallpaper onto my computer. I spent some time just looking at it and letting myself daydream. Things began to click into place in my subconscious.

And then yesterday, I sat down and wrote the first 1000 words of...

...a very Jane Austen-y YA dragon book! It's silly and romantic and just for fun, and I am having such a good time with it. This is the one that has been bubbling in my subconscious for a while now, in one form or another. For a long time I thought it was a no-go because all I had originally was the concept without the characters - but then yesterday while settling MrD into a nap, the characters slid into place, my whole body started tingling with excitement...and voila! I was scribbling madly about ten minutes later.

I'm over halfway through the first chapter now, and that girl is on my desktop, reminding me every step of the way why I'm writing and who I'm writing this book for.

What about you guys? What works to inspire you when you're feeling scattered or stressed?

___

PS: I am still researching the 30s screwball comedy while writing this, so please do keep on keeping me in mind if you run across any fun 30s novels in the meantime...

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The Unladylike Adventures of Kat Stephenson have sold in the UK!!!!!!

Better yet, even though the sale only happened a month ago, A Most Improper Magick will be published in the UK in August 2010 - only 5 months from now!

I am just incredibly happy about this. My UK publisher is Templar Books, a fabulous independent publisher that has focused on creating award-winning illustrated books for the last 30 years (UK readers have probably seen their fun "Ology" books - Dragonology, Piratology, etc.), but is now starting a brand-new fiction line, with AMIM as one of their very first novels.

!!!!!!

OK, just give me a moment to breathe deeply and stop hyperventilating with excitement. It has been SO HARD not to share this news until now!

The London Literary Party (TM) that we attended last week was Templar's grand unveiling of their new fiction list at the Covent Garden Hotel, with champagne and canapés - and shiny new British ARCs of A Most Improper Magick as one of the items in all their guests' goodie-bags! I got to meet my wonderful British editor, Emma Goldhawk, as well as a whole bunch of other Templar editors, all of whom were smart and fun to hang out with and - best of all - really excited about Kat's adventures. And I came away absolutely floating with excitement and happiness to be working with a second group of fabulous people, all of whom really get Kat and her family and are making such a perfect British home for them.

(And btw, Templar is planning an author tour, so I'm hoping to meet a lot of British readers in this coming year, too!)

In celebration, it's the perfect day to share another ARC giveaway! This one is being held on the blog of Kim Harrington, a member of The Elevensies whose own first book, Clarity, is going to be published next year.

You can win an ARC of A Most Improper Magick no matter what country you live in - just go to Kim's blog to find out how!

Now I'm going to go fan myself for a while. :)

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This time, we decided to splurge and have an amazing overnight stay there, so we stayed at the Club Quarters hotel just off Trafalgar Square, which was absolutely wonderful. As we walked on Wednesday night from Trafalgar Square to Covent Garden (where the publishing party was being held), we passed fountains and world-famous museums, cafés and theaters and cinemas and opera houses, lights and crowds...oh, it felt fabulous.

Since MrD was waiting at the hotel with his aunt, we didn’t stay out too late, but on our way back from the party, we kept poking each other in amazement like the country yokels we are: "Look! The coffeeshops are STILL OPEN, even though it’s after eight o'clock!"

So in other words, it’s obviously been too long since we’ve lived in a big city... ;)

I loved, loved, loved the party - it was really and truly one of the best nights of my life - but I’m going to wait to talk about that until I can finally share a piece of publishing news that’s been bursting inside me for about a month now. Very soon, I hope! But even apart from the party, it was just so great to be able to get dressed up and go out with Patrick in an exciting city, and then to spend the next morning being happy tourists with MrD, ogling the lions in Trafalgar Square (his favorite attraction) and spending an hour in the National Gallery before we had to leave to catch our train.

Of course, since the National Gallery is Britain’s national art museum, an hour was only enough to see the tiniest fraction of the paintings there - but it was still absolutely wonderful. It had been way too long since I’d been to an art museum, and although I felt embarrassingly uncultured pointing out stuff to MrD to grab his interest ("Look, sweetheart, there’s a big cow!") at the same time that art students Seriously Studied the paintings beside us...well, uncultured or not, it was still incredibly fun.

Besides that constant click of recognition as we passed Very Famous Paintings, there was the awesome writing inspiration of seeing history come to life in street scenes of eighteenth-century Rome and Venice, portraits of Regency families...and then my absolute favorite painting that I saw yesterday, Joseph Wright’s An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump (1768), which was extremely disturbing but also incredibly powerful and dramatic in person.

What’s really cool is that the National Gallery has images of ALL of its paintings online, so you can browse the collection on their site - something I will definitely be doing a lot from now on.

Now we’re back in Wales, in our quiet little town surrounded by our beautiful mountains on every side, and I’m happy to be back...but I’m still glowing with the excitement of the last couple of days. And we definitely have to go back to London again soon!

(You can see the rest of our London photos - and a couple from our day out in Hay-on-Wye - on my flickr account.)

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It was, of course, Patrick’s birthday treat...but I was in total bliss. I found four books at different bookstores (there are over 30 bookstores in that one small town!), including one great 1930s research book at the Castle bookstore, which is - just like the name says - actually inside the crumbling old town castle.

Let’s just pause to appreciate that for a moment. A castle that’s also a bookshop? Why can’t we just live there????

(Well, it was kind of cold and drafty. But still...)

Today, alas, was far less blissful. We spent it in our own lovely small town, getting ready to go to London later this week. The good news is that - hooray! - I finally found some high-heeled party shoes that fit our budget. (Thank goodness Clarks was having a sale!) The bad news...well...

I hadn’t had a haircut since we moved to Wales four months ago, mostly because I didn’t know which salon to try, and it was just way too easy to let the whole thing slide, even as my hair got longer and shaggier every month. Today, though, I was determined to get a really good cut so I could look my best on Wednesday. So, I went to the salon that had been recommended to me at our bank (yes, really!), happily prepared to pay a high price to get a great cut...and came out having paid quite a high price indeed - but with a cut that looked not great at all.

Wahhhhh! I hate bad haircuts. I especially hate them when I’ve gotten them done for a specific event, and it’s too late to change...

Sigh. I’ve figured out that if I pull my hair back in a headband, it doesn’t look quite as bad. So I’ll be wearing a headband at the party Wednesday night to cover up my haircut (which is at least an improvement over my original idea of just wearing a bag over my head as a cover-up - it’s awfully hard to sip champagne through a bag)...but I definitely won’t be going back to that salon again.

If anyone has any haircut horror stories to share with me right now, I would feel much better!

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It's one of the few short stories I've written in direct emotional response to a loss, so I can't say that it was exactly fun to write, but it was really emotionally satisfying - and what was genuinely fun was getting to start a project and finish it within less than a week. Short stories: the yummy snack-foods of a writer's life!

2. The current Olympics are drawing out the REAL cultural differences between a woman brought up in snowy Michigan and a man brought up partly in sunny Zambia and partly in cool, rainy Bristol.

Patrick: "The Winter Olympics are boring. What's the point of the winter sports?"

Me: staring at him blankly "But...they're the only sports that are actually interesting!"

So in other words, we're not watching the Olympic events together. ;)

3. We're attending the London Literary Party next week, and I can't wait! We've decided to splurge and make it a really great (albeit short) overnight trip, so we went ahead and booked a really plush-looking hotel near Covent Garden. (By London standards, it's not even that expensive. But by ours? Yes, this is a HUGE splurge for us.) I can't wait to wear my new Little Black Dress, sip champagne, meet my agent's British co-agent, AND have a great dinner beforehand with my London sister-in-law, who's going to be spending the evening with MrD. But...

4. I have a LOT of stuff to get done first. I.e., my desperately overgrown hair (my bangs hang in my eyes in a very un-stylish way), my lack of any black shoes to wear with the Little Black Dress...eek.

I love living in our beautiful, small Welsh town. I do. But Tuesday, when I spent the morning shoe-shopping with increasing desperation, I found myself equally desperately missing Leeds - or rather, missing the Leeds high street shops. After nearly two hours, I gave up - I genuinely could not find a single pair of black mid-heel dress shoes in my size and in my price range.

Wah! This just shouldn't be so hard...should it?

On the other hand, in Leeds I couldn't walk to a coffeeshop and buy a vegan hazelnut brownie. I don't go to that many London Literary Parties (in fact, this is my first one ever)...so I guess I'll go for good brownies over good shoe-shopping almost any day. ;)

5. And without having to leave the house at all, I got the coolest package the other day. It was a beautiful 13" x 19" print of the front cover of my book! Barnaby Ward, my wonderful cover artist, sent it to me as a gift. When I opened the package and saw Kat grinning out at me, I actually cried. It was just so amazing to see her drawn so beautifully, by such a fabulous artist - the vision in my head all these years turned so perfectly into art. And it was such amazing timing to get it just after finishing Kat3! Right now I'm looking for a perfect frame to hang it on the wall. This was such an amazing gift to get. Thank you so much, Barnaby!

What about you guys? What have been the highlights of your weeks?

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The only downside is that it does mean our American travel plans are going to have to change. I'd planned to arrive in April and stay through May, and had made some commitments which I'm now going to have to cancel or rearrange. I am so sorry to have made anyone's schedule difficult. And of course I'm sorriest of all that it now looks like we may not be coming to WisCon after all. Wahhh! We haven't finalized the decision yet, so there's still some hope...but it's not looking very practical at the moment.

Of course, if you want to read A Most Improper Magick before June 15th, you still have three more days to enter the ARC giveaway at The Story Siren. If you're in the UK, you can find me at both Eastercon and Bristolcon this year, and if you're in the US, I will be there sometime this year - I just don't know yet exactly when that will be. Hoping to post more announcements soon!

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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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Today I finished writing Kat Book 3!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am so, so, so, so happy about this. I'd had to take a few days off earlier this week because of the Viral Bug of Doom, but ever since I started feeling better, I've been writing like a madwoman, because The Story Just Would Not Stop Coming. That kind of insane narrative momentum is such a gift from the writing gods. Right now I feel as mentally winded as if I'd just finished running a marathon...and it feels amazing.

And wow, can I just say what a HUGE moment this is for me? First, it's the last of the books in the Kat trilogy which I began four years ago...and second, it's not only the first book I've written to proposal but the first book I've written since I became a mom. That last bit may not sound particularly epoch-making to anyone else, but when I had MrD, as I shifted from a lifestyle with lots of solid sleep every night to a lifestyle with very little, broken sleep most nights, and as hormones took over my whole life in a lot of ways, I genuinely wondered whether I would ever be able to write a whole novel again...and that fear became stronger and stronger as I spent 7 months (!!!!) trying and failing to come up with the right opening for Kat3.

It was only after seven months and five separate 40-page openings that I finally came up with the right opening for the book...and now, almost eight months later, it is such a relief to know that I really can still write novels after all. More than that, this wasn't just the hardest novel I've ever written; it really was the most satisfying and genuinely fun one, too. It challenged and stretched me as a writer, and I really didn't know if I could do it...but I did.

And now I am going to stop burbling. I really am.

But I am just so, so happy right now.

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(Sadly, this one is only open to US readers, but I promise there will be more opportunities for international readers in other months.)

In less excellent news, by 7pm last night I was feverish and miserable with the same bug MrD has been suffering through. Thank goodness, he finally started to perk up at about the same time (the worst part of the virus hopping smoothly from one person to the next!), but since he was still having a hard time breathing in his sleep because of his leftover cold symptoms, I only ended up getting about 4-1/2 hours of sleep spread across the night...so, well. As you can imagine, I'm still feeling pretty miserable.

Luckily, Patrick leapt into the breach and, last night, when I couldn't imagine eating ANYTHING because I was so clogged up and sick, he made up a recipe for French onion soup. A few weeks ago my friend Jenn talked on Twitter about her Sick Soup. French onion soup is definitely my Sick Soup! It was absolutely perfect - comfort and heat and nutrition all in one, and it even cleared my head out for a while.

The only issue is that Patrick can't figure out what extra herbs to add. He made a very basic recipe, and to my cold-clogged senses, it was BLISS (I ate it again for lunch today, and again, it made me feel MUCH better for about an hour afterward), but to his healthy tastebuds, it was definitely missing something. Hmm...

Here's the recipe:

-4 large onions, chopped

-6 cloves garlic, chopped

Fry the onions and garlic in a ton of olive oil. Add water, vegetable stock, and a little bit of salt and simmer until done.

What do you guys think? What herbs would be a good addition?

Or, alternately: what's your personal Sick Soup?

(And now my brain is finished working for the day, so I'm going to lie down again.)

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It's a weird feeling, coming to the end of a trilogy. On the one hand, part of me feels furiously impatient: I want to FINISH this book, I'm SO CLOSE to the end now! But on the other hand, I genuinely have to fight down tears when I think about how soon I'm going to be done writing this series. I love Kat SO much. I love her sisters and her brother so much. I love writing about them all so, so much - I can't bear the idea of saying goodbye!

So far, the only thing that's worked to cheer me up is thinking about my next book. I don't want to go into too much public detail yet in case it doesn't work out, but I had an idea several months ago that's gotten more and more compelling to me. It's a really scary idea to contemplate, though, because it's set in a time period I don't know much about - 1930s America. (If ONLY it could be set in 1930s Britain - I know so much about that setting! That would be easy! But no, this one insists on being America.) So: major research time!

I don't know how other historical writers work, but for me, the three things that help the most are letters/diaries, biographies, and novels from the time period. Of course, general history books are useful and important, too, but they don't work as well for personal inspiration. So, for the Kat novels, I read a ton of biographies of women from the right time period (especially Jane Austen, since I was basing Kat's own general family situation - her father a clergyman who used to be a Fellow at Oxford and now takes in male students for tutoring; lots of siblings; not much money - on Jane Austen's own upbringing), read Jane Austen's and Fanny Burney's letters voraciously, and of course re-read Austen's novels, especially Northanger Abbey.

As far as the 1930s goes, I grew up obsessed with 30s screwball comedy movies, which are a great start, since I want this to be a screwball comedy of a novel. I've started reading nonfiction books about Hollywood in the 30s and biographies of different film stars from the period. But what about novels from the period? There, I'm drawing a huge blank. All the American 30s novels I can think of - Grapes of Wrath, etc. - are excellent books but massively depressing, which is exactly the wrong mood for my novel.

If I were setting this in England in the 30s, I'd be re-reading Dorothy Sayers, Agatha Christie, Stella Gibbons, Nancy Mitford, Evelyn Waugh...so many great options! But I really don't know where to get started with the American 1930s. Can you guys think of any genuinely *fun* American novels from the 30s? Ideally, they'd be funny, but at the very least, they shouldn't be depressing.

I'd be so grateful for any recommendations. Help!

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(When MrD first started waking up every 1-2 hours through the night, I stopped even trying to write fiction, because really...how could anyone possibly be creative on such an insane, tortuous sleep schedule? I figured I'd just wait until it got better before I even bothered to try again. Then I finally realized that, oops, it wasn't actually going to get any better, at least not any time in the short-term future...so I had to learn how to be creative and productive anyway, no matter how little sleep I'd gotten. A year later, it's become pretty much second nature, but it sure didn't feel that way at first.)

Luckily, the book has been speeding along again after the temporary block last week. Today I finished the chapter that was the scariest and most emotionally wrenching chapter to write in the whole trilogy. I embarrassed myself by actually starting to cry yesterday as I read part of it out loud to Patrick. I am sooo not the distant, sophisticated type of writer...oh well. Not a surprise, really, to anyone who knows me. But I am making a note NOT to ever read that particular chapter out loud in a reading, if I want to keep my own makeup smear-free...

And speaking of dangerous things, for my own financial sake, I have GOT to unsubscribe - and soon! - from the Jane Austen Centre gift shop's mailing list! Today they emailed me about their Valentine's Day collection...and ohhhhhh, I want so many things! But what made me jaw LITERALLY drop open was this compact mirror. Anyone who's already read A Most Improper Magick will know exactly why I got so excited - and even if you haven't read AMIM yet, you can just check out the front cover illustration to see just how important a certain compact mirror is to the magical (and emotional) plot...

I am not going to buy it for myself. I am NOT. I am strong, and I will resist. But I might just peek at it a few more times...

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I've been reading it pretty slowly, because it's my book for reading while I settle or re-settle MrD into his naps. Yesterday, when I went upstairs to settle him down into a nap (my main writing time, btw, comes while he sleeps), I was at a point of total writer's block and absolute panic about the whole thing. Kat3 had been progressing so, so well lately...but then, just as I hit the beginning of the final, climactic showdown between Kat and the Big Bad, I froze up completely. Mostly, I think this is just because it really hit me that, OMG, this is the climax to the final book in the trilogy - it has to be REALLY GOOD!

And that has to be the least helpful message to hear screaming in the back of your head as you sit down to write a difficult scene...

So in other words, I was totally stuck, to the point where on Friday I hadn't managed to write at all, and Saturday I was convinced I wouldn't get anything done either (and maybe I just COULDN'T FINISH this novel at all, OMGOMGOMG!!!!!). But then, as I got MrD to sleep, I hit the point in Finding Your Own North Star where Martha Beck talks about how to get yourself to do something you REALLY don't want to do, something that's been looming over you so intimidatingly that you've completely panicked and turned to avoidance instead of even trying. (She used writing her PhD thesis as her example.)

She gave lots of different strategies for getting going, but the two that stood out to me were turtle steps - picking very, very tiny daily goals, SO tiny that they feel manageable even at your most panicked - and Do it badly! - which means, let go of the need to do it perfectly (or even well). Just DO IT, and if you're doing it badly, at least that's better than not doing it at all.

I had been reading fairly casually up until that point. But those points really, really resonated with me. I stopped reading. I started thinking. MrD went to sleep...and I went downstairs, chose a daily writing goal of 300 words (rather than the 1000 I'd been trying for before), and sat down just to write a rough draft, no matter HOW rough that turned out to be, and not to let myself worry about quality, just to get the words down...and I ended up writing 1200 words that actually made me really happy AND set the whole showdown in motion, making the whole rest of the novel so much easier to write.

WHEW.

So. My original goal was to finish Kat3, which I'd expected to be 70,000 words long, by the end of today. I'm pretty sure - well, no, I'm positive - that that is just not going to happen. On the other hand, in today's writing session, I passed the 70,000 word mark, and I liked what I had written. I've got less than 10,000 words to go, and I'm having fun.

So...for once, I don't feel too bad about not hitting one of my own goals. And even if I have to turtle my way through the rest of the book, I think that'll be okay after all.

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Anyway, it was great being social. And yesterday I had one of the coolest things ever happen to me. I got a beautiful invitation on thick, cream-colored paper, inviting me to a London Literary Event (TM) at a super-glamorous hotel. Eeee! Obviously, I said yes...and equally obviously, my first thought was: I need a new dress! Honestly, I really do. That's the thing about having a baby - I don't have any dresses that actually fit anymore, because my size first went WAY up and then WAY down. And all the comfy jeans and toddler-food-stained T-shirts that I normally wear just don't quite gel with my idea of appropriate attire for an evening party serving champagne and canapés, to say the least...

So thank you to everybody on Twitter who leaped in last night to help me pick out a Little Black Dress! It was incredibly fun to shop with help from friends all across the world. Now all I still need are some shoes...hmm... ;)

(And of course part of me right now is asking, "Who do you think you are????" Because once you become a mom - or no, I should be honest and say, once I became a mom, the concept of wearing a little black dress and going off to an evening party suddenly started to sound like a total pipe dream. But I am going to be strong and have faith that I can still carry it off after all, even after 16 months of living in stained T-shirts and jeans and a total lack of glamor!)

Now back to the writing cave...but with really excellent music to cheer me on. Patrick recently bought the full boxset of Sharpe TV episodes and got me totally addicted to them. Sean Bean plays a rough Northerner promoted to the rank of an officer (to the horror of all his upperclass-twit colleagues) who swashbuckles his way through the Napoleonic wars with awesome female guerilla commanders fighting by his side in Spain, obnoxious aristocrats blocking him at every turn, and - of course - evil French captains twirling their mustaches menacingly. It's just enormously fun...and now that we also have the Sharpe soundtrack on CD, that's become the perfect writing music.

So off I go. Wish me luck in the cave!

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(And FWIW, I personally believe that traditional cream teas are the most blissful culinary experience EVER. I grew up reading Elizabeth Peters/Barbara Michaels novels where American heroines go to England and get teased by the hero for going SO INSANE over the cream teas...and guess what? They were totally right.) (In both respects, actually. Unlike me, Patrick is not a cream tea fan, possibly because cream is not vegan.)

In other news, remember the urban werewolf anthology I talked about, the one that's going to publish my story "Locked Doors"? The editor, Ekaterina Sedia, has just posted the Table of Contents, and it looks awesome. Now I'm even more excited about it!

And this week we are being astonishingly social, since some wonderful friends have come into town. No, this doesn't mingle well with my plan to finish Kat Book 3 by this Sunday...but it has been really wonderful and fun, especially after our last month of being hermits in our writing cave. I did have one moment where I wondered whether I should stay home and write instead of hanging out...and then I thought, Are you CRAZY, woman?! Because our friends are only here for four days, and this is, after all, a self-imposed deadline. All the same, I'm sneaking in 500 words here and there every day, so the end is getting closer...and closer...

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Join the teaparty and enter to win an ARC of A Most Improper Magick!

I love that Lisa let me write fanfic for her characters and world. And can I say how bizarre it is that it felt SO much easier to write fanfic for her characters than my own? Kat's voice is SO strong and clear in my head that it's been sheer pleasure to write her first-person narration in her own novels - but I found it almost impossible to write her in third-person in someone else's world. Funny, that...I guess I'll have to leave Kat fanfic to other authors! ;)

(And can I just say how much I LONG for people to write Kat fanfic and draw fanart for her world? That's one of the biggest things I hope for when the book is published. My understanding is that legally I'm not allowed to read any Kat fanfic...but oh, I really want it to exist somewhere out there in the world! And any fanart will be devoured by me with great delight.)

Today has been a day of irritating but mundane trials - our car battery is dead without warning, so far too much of today has been devoted to trying to get it replaced - but today has also been a great day, because I wrote 1,410 words, finished the first stage of Kat3's climax, and had such a fabulous time with it. I really think I might finish this draft by the end of January after all. Knock on wood for me, please...

And then go join Kat's ARC teaparty! Winners will be chosen on Sunday, January 31st...by which point I HOPE to be the tired but triumphant writer of a complete draft of Kat3.

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(Just in case my editor reads this: but not too much longer, honest! I promise not to turn in anything that makes the desk shake beneath its weight. ;))

On the upside, though, I am really, really enjoying it, and I hope - knock on wood for me, please! - I really, really hope that other people will enjoy it too.

Kristin Cashore wrote a great blog post about first readers, which is great for any writer to read. I'm very lucky in that I've found a circle of really fabulous first readers and critiquers for my books. This becomes a little easier when you're writing a series - if someone has liked and given great suggestions for Book One (and really, for a good first reader, both of those points are equally essential - someone can be an absolutely brilliant critiquer, but if they don't like your kind of book, if your tastes don't mesh in that particular way, then the book you're trying to write won't be the one they can help you to refine), it's a good guess that they'll be great first readers for Books 2 and 3. On the other hand, this definitely ups the personal nervousness factor - if someone loved Book 1 and Book 2 but didn't like Book 3, that would be terrifying.

Right now, since I'm still in the middle of writing the first draft, I don't ask for any critiques, because that would completely stifle me. (I've made that mistake in the past and ended up blocked for MONTHS.) Instead, every time I finish a new chapter, I read it out loud to Patrick and then email it out to a couple of trusted friends (this time round, Jenn Reese and Karen Healey), who send me back encouraging emails like: "Ha! I love that bit", "Ooh, Charles is being HOT!" or simply: "Aaack!" (Trust me, that one really is encouraging, in the right circumstances. ;) ) I can't even express how helpful this is in terms of pure motivation. Sometimes, when I'm feeling tired and blocked and completely unmotivated, I open up their old chapter-response emails and re-read them to remind myself that people are WAITING for the next chapter - so hurry up, writer lady!

Then I finish the book. And at that point, all the critiquing floodgates are opened, and all my encouraging friends suddenly show their teeth. For instance, with Kat2 (A Tangle of Magicks), Jenn sent me a critique that involved one suggestion so massive and terrifying that I was HORRIFIED. No way! I could NEVER do that! It would change EVERYTHING! It would be SO HARD! It would make Book 3 completely different! It would...be a really good idea. Sigh. Needless to say, I did it...and I am so, so glad I did. I'm really lucky to have smart friends.

Anyway. Soon I will have other things to talk about besides writing! (I hope.) Right now, though, between childcare and intense novel-drafting, my life is very uneventful. (I loved the line I read recently in a book about eighteenth-century women, in which one 18th-century mother described her parenting day as a succession of "a thousand little nothings". Parenting is wonderful, rewarding, difficult work, but unlike most other jobs, it's hard to point at any concrete productive accomplishments on a day-to-day basis.)

Oh, but wait, here's one exciting event: I bought new earrings! Yes, this really was exciting. ;) (My brothers are both rolling their eyes at me right now.) I just discovered a new-to-me Etsy store that I LOVE. I bought myself these earrings, and Patrick bought me these. When they came out of the package, I let out the loudest and most embarrassing squee-ing sound of delight! They are absolutely adorable. So if you feel like doing any jewelry shopping, I heartily recommending checking that store out!

Now back to writing. I have a chapter to finish!

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And I have a special, added fondness for Poe because he was responsible for my first short story sale. When I was 15, my English teacher assigned us to all write short stories in the style of Poe. Well. I LEAPED on that assignment! I had so much fun writing my big, Gothic, Poe-styled story, "La Maison Cherbignac"...and then, incredibly and mind-blowingly, I actually sold it to Merlyn's Pen (a magazine edited by adults but written by teens)! (I also got my first taste of what professional writing really feels like, since the first phone call I got was to ask me for revisions. If I revised well enough, they would buy the story...so that was my first experience of frantic and passionate revision for a sale!)

By the time I was 15, I had dreamed for years of being a professional writer. Making that first sale, when I found out that my revision had actually been accepted...oh, it felt like pure bliss. It was the best thing that had ever happened to me.

Unfortunately, adults running kid-written magazines aren't always ethical, and I've ended up feeling pretty unhappy about the way Merlyn's Pen used the story in later years, especially after they bought the copyright from me (something I should never have sold - if any 15-year-olds read this, please remember that lesson!). But the sheer joy of that sale - that first moment when I thought Maybe my dream will come true, after all - will stay with me forever. And for that, I will always be grateful.

Happy birthday, Edgar Allan Poe!

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So it was a safe bet that I was going to enjoy it...but the one thing that really puzzled me about this version was: why on earth would someone adapt an Austen novel and leave out all the humor? Mansfield Park is a really funny book. It has my least favorite Austen heroine of all time (and I'm not the only one who feels that way - pretty much every movie adaptation RADICALLY changes Fanny Price's character to give her a spine, because it's hard for modern audiences to sympathize with her otherwise)...but I've still re-read it many times because it's so nastily funny in all the character interactions. Jane Austen was hilarious when she was writing about really horrible, self-centered and shallow people, and Mansfield Park is absolutely filled with them, in the movie as well as the book...but in this adaptation, all the humor was left out. Yes, we hated the horrible people who were oppressing the heroine, but we couldn't laugh at them...and that felt very un-Austen to me.

Having said all that? It's on my Amazon wishlist now, because I have this uncontrollable weakness for Austen films. And if I end up getting it, I bet I'll watch it many more times, even if I'm sighing over the missed comic opportunities every time. I really love humor...but I'll take Austen even without it.

And these have been a very decadent few days, because this morning, as I thought about "Mansfield Park" (and, yes, as I seriously considered re-watching the 1999 version for comparison - see, this is serious study, not fun, people! - er, yeah, right...), I sent Patrick and MrD out to pillage the local village for me. It was a pirate raid full of swordplay, drama, witty banter, and high adventure, and when they came back? They came bearing hazelnut-praline vegan brownies, handed over by a terrorized café-worker.

It's a good brownie, too. Mmm. Maybe I'll see how Austen films work for me with added chocolate goodness on the side!

This could be a good Saturday...

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I've written (rarely) to short story authors before to say how much I loved a short story I'd just read; once, I even wrote to another novelist to say how much I enjoyed her wonderful first novel, which had just come out. (It turned out that she's also really fun and nice, as well as a great writer, and we'll probably be doing an event together in Toronto this spring. Wow, am I glad I wrote that letter!)

But I've never written to a big-name author before, someone I've been reading since I was a kid. Somehow I always subconsciously assumed that it would be a presumption to write to someone like that; that it would be pushy or irritating for me to tell them how much their books have meant to me.

Well. This is crazy, as a couple of things recently have made me realize.

First, I got my first piece of fanmail a few months ago, from a smart, sweet twelve-year-old girl, and it made me happier than I can express. Seriously, I don't know how long it took her to write that email, but I have re-read it SO many times, and just thinking back to it makes me feel like dancing. This book I wrote isn't just going out into the aether - it spoke to exactly the kind of reader I'd imagined when I wrote it, and then she wrote to tell me how much she loved it. What magic! And what a huge reassurance!

Then, in an episode of synchronicity, I started seeing reminders everywhere across the internet that - duh - it's not just me: most authors love to hear that their books have made a difference. Yes, it really would be pushy and presumptuous to write to a busy author and ask them to do something for you; but it's a genuinely nice thing to write and thank them for what their books have done for you already.

What about you guys? Have you ever written to your favorite authors to say how much you love your work? Or, if you don't dare do it yet - or if the authors you feel most grateful to aren't alive anymore to hear it - who would you really like to thank?

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But! Today the whole world is shiny and happy because he's feeling better. Yayyyyy! Everything feels happier and lighter now, and all my goals suddenly sound so much more do-able. So I thought I'd list some of the things that are making me particularly happy today:

1. For the first time since I moved to the UK 8-1/2 years ago, we have what I would call a real winter snowfall. We've got 4 inches in our little Welsh town, and Maya goes mad with joy every time we let her out. She does high bunny-hops through the drifts, bites off snowballs and even throws them for herself! Watching her makes me laugh and laugh and feel pure happiness. (Plus, snow just inherently makes me happy, even here in the UK where it also makes things deeply inconvenient, since there's no real set-up for dealing with it, and therefore the trains stop running, many of the roads don't get salted, etc., etc. I don't care! It's snow, and it feels like magic every single time I step outside.)

2. My friend Aliette's first book is being published in the UK and Australia TODAY, and I can't wait to read it. (I pre-ordered my copy from Amazon, and it still hasn't been dispatched. GRR. But still: book birthday!)

Aliette is a fabulous writer (she was nominated for the Campbell award for best new SF/F writer last year!), and this book sounds absolutely awesome - a smart, dark, historical fantasy/mystery for adults set in the Aztec empire. It won't be published in the US until September, but you can order it from Amazon.co.uk - it's a paperback, so not too expensive to buy internationally. (You can also order it from The Book Depository for free, world-wide shipping as soon as it's back in stock - it seems to have sold out there at the moment.)

You can go congratulate Aliette here, and you can also read the first three chapters of Servant of the Underworld on the blog My Favourite Books. (I probably would have bought the book even without this, because I have faith in Aliette's writing in any genre - but then I read Chapter One and pre-ordered immediately afterwards! :) Yay Aliette! Congratulations!

3. I just made a new short story sale! The story is called "Speaking English", and it's a YA ghost story about Croatian immigrants to America. It sold to an Australian anthology, Belong (an anthology of spec-fic stories about immigration), which is due to come out in April. So now I have even more reasons to look forward to that month!

4. And finally, reading the comments on the interview Ivana Mariç posted with me yesterday made me really, really happy. I can't even begin to express how amazing it feels to hear people I don't even know saying that they're looking forward to my book. That really is magic - there's no other word for it.

What about you guys? What's making you happy this week?

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I am so, so sad that David Tennant (my favorite Doctor ever) has left the show...which makes it all the more impressive that, after watching the very end of the finale, and after seeing the preview for next season (which we raced to watch directly afterward), I am actually incredibly excited about next season. I'd already been pleased that Steven Moffat (my favorite TV writer) was going to be head writer in this next season, but now I'm even tentatively excited, after all, about Matt Smith. Of course, he isn't David Tennant...but then, nobody (except Tennant) is, and I'm starting to hope that he'll also be wonderful in a different way.

So, yes. My TV disappointment was completely turned around.

I also watched a really lovely, inspirational writing video made by Jackson Pearce and a bunch of other YA writers. Most of you have probably seen it already, but just in case you haven't, here's the link to watch it on YouTube: Everybody's Free (to Buy a Laser Printer). It's a great video not just for aspiring writers but for published writers, too. I plan to watch it several more times, whenever I need it.

In other news, I've reached the beginning of the climax for Kat3, and I'm in a mad writing daze. This is the point where a lot of full-time writers stop showering, answering phone calls, or cooking meals until the novel is DONE. I feel some wistfulness about that - that approach sounds really tempting right now - but as a mom, and as someone with CFS, I just don't have the time or mental energy to go that route.

Even without 24/7 writing, though, I've doubled my daily target wordcount, which feels like speeding to me, and I'm at that crazy stage where the novel is constantly running through my head, even as I read Where the Wild Things Are to MrD for the thousandth time (and even when I'm howling along with him during Max and the Wild Things' wild rumpus). It's a dizzying, almost schizophrenic feeling - here I am with my family, and there I am with my characters, both at the same time - but it's also the most magical feeling I know.

I've been hoping for a long time to finish this draft by the end of January. Knock on wood, I really think I will. But I hadn't been anticipating just how sad I'd feel as it drew close to an end...

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Apart from the sleet, though, everything has been going really well. Or, at least... Ahem. Everything has been going well apart from The Horrible And Humiliating Pie Incident, but I don't think I'm quite ready to write about that in any detail yet. Let's just say it'll be a long time before I feel confident enough to bake pecan pie again - or, especially, to offer to bake it for a whole, big family gathering.

Oh, the horror, the horror... shudder!

In other news, I'm trying to come up with a set of reasonable, challenging-but-do-able New Year's writing resolutions. That's harder than it might sound, because I still feel like I haven't totally gotten a grip on what reasonable resolutions actually are when you have a toddler in the house. (Partly, of course, because the answer keeps changing as he grows and learns. What I could do when he was 8 months old and had only just started to crawl has NOTHING in common with what I can do now that he's 15 months old, walking, and curious about everything!)

At various points this past year, I got really frustrated by not meeting some personal goals that - as it turned out - were actually pretty unrealistic. Now, I finally feel like I've gotten into a pretty good writing schedule again, but I'm really torn between aiming high, to push myself as far as I can possibly go, or aiming low, to avoid sickening frustration. Hmm. Putting it that way, I guess there's an obvious answer: aim high but don't hate myself if I fail. Hmm...

How do you guys balance your New Year's resolutions? Or do you not do them at all?

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I'm tempted to babble at length about my own presents, because I love them all (I'm just in the middle of reading one of them, M.T. Anderson's Whales on Stilts, which is hilarious, and as I type, I'm listening to another of them, Yo-Yo Ma Plays Ennio Morricone, which is gorgeous)...but after that brief hiccup (oops), I'm going to stop myself, because it just feels like gloating. (Of course, I spent all of Christmas and Boxing Day gloating shamelessly over my stack of presents, stroking them like a dragon would stroke new additions to her hoard of gold, but Boxing Day is over now and it's time to get mature about things.) So instead, I'm going to move on to Christmas presents that other people can share.

So first off: Maureen Johnson is giving away e-books of her awesomely stylish and funny YA novel Suite Scarlett. I own a paper copy of this book and enjoyed it an awful lot, and now I'm planning to download an e-copy so I can carry it around with me on my iTouch. Enjoy (and make sure you download it before January 15th, when the offer ends)!

And secondly, Karen Healey wrote a wonderful, funny, magical Christmas story this year, which you can read on her website: Queen of the Kitchen. I loved it, and I hope you guys do, too! (And if you like it, make sure to look out for her YA fantasy novel, also set in New Zealand, which is coming out this spring: Guardian of the Dead. It's darker than the short story, but equally wonderful, and Karen and I are going to share a launch party at WisCon.)

What about you guys? What were your favorite gifts this Christmas? Or, if you didn't celebrate Christmas, what books or CDs have you been enjoying recently?

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We've still got snow on the ground, and I'm crossing all my fingers and toes that it'll stay at least another 30 hours. We went out this morning and bought ingredients for pancakes for Christmas breakfast. It's almost time.

Merry Christmas to everybody who celebrates it, and I hope everybody has a warm, relaxing day tomorrow whether you celebrate it as a holiday or just a winter day off work. :)

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The two runners up are: @elledisney and Lisa Voisin

and the ARC winner is: Kaylynn of Kay Darling Reviews

Yay Kaylynn, Elle, and Lisa! If you send me your mailing address (using the contact form on my website), I'll put your packages in the mail.

And for everybody else who entered: I've got four more ARCs still waiting in my desk, and I'm planning to give away one a month here on the blog for the next four months. So you will definitely have more chances to win!

***

In other news, I just finished reading Kristin Cashore's Fire, and WOW. It completely blew me away. I'd really, really liked and admired her first book, Graceling, but for me, Fire resonated much more strongly, and I absolutely loved it. It really was one of the best coming-of-age novels I've ever read in any genre, and it immediately became one of my favorite fantasy novels ever (which is saying an awful lot).

I really wish I'd been able to read it as a teen, when I honestly needed a book like that in many ways...but I'm very glad that at least I can read it now. The copy I read belonged to my local library, but I'll definitely be buying my own copy very soon for lots and lots of re-readings. It's one of those books that manages to tackle really difficult, painful subjects, like grief and terrible injustice, and yet still feel like a pure pleasure to read - and that is really impressive.

It's been a good day in lots of ways, actually. In a true Christmas miracle, it actually snowed yesterday (snow! before Christmas! in the UK! is that even allowed?), and even more incredibly, it hasn't melted yet. I'm hoping with all my heart that it will stay for Christmas. Today my computer is being shipped back to me from Apple - knock on wood that it will work this time! And this afternoon I'm off to pick up my new pair of glasses, so I'll actually have a pair that doesn't hang at weird angles off my face. Total decadent luxury! ;)

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1. My short story "Locked Doors" is going to be reprinted in the upcoming anthology Running With the Pack, edited by Ekaterina Sedia.

It's an anthology of urban werewolf short stories with lots of great contributors (check out the ones on the cover!) and I'm really excited to be included. Better yet, it's due to be published on May 29, 2010, so I'm guessing it'll be on sale at WisCon 2010 (making the con even more fun for me)!

2. My wonderful editor wrote to let me know that she's sending Kat Book 2, A Tangle of Magicks, over to copyediting. That means that all the major editing is finished, and we're down to mostly line edits for the rest of the process. Yay! And: that's one step closer to making it a real, published book! I feel sooooo tingly excited about this. It's also an enormous relief to know that I'll be able to keep writing straight through Kat Book 3 until that draft is finished, rather than having to take a month off to do more Kat2 editing.

(Also: how cool is my editor? She is so cool that she is also the lead singer of a really great band, Ninth Street Mission. You can download their songs for free on their website. That is pretty cool. :) )

And in other news, I guest-posted last night on Margie Gelbwasser's blog as part of her "Eight Nights of Writing Tips". My post is all about the very best writing tip I know. I hope you enjoy it!

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And now it's definitely Christmas season, because yesterday, a Mysterious Package arrived. It's wonderfully big. It comes from my parents. I was sooooooooooo tempted to open it immediately!

But I guess maybe I am a real grown-up now, after all...because I didn't. Instead, it's sitting under our beautifully fat Christmas tree, waiting until Christmas Day (or at least until Christmas Eve, if I get too impatient). MrD wants to open it. (He loves opening boxes!) I want to open it. Patrick wants to open it! But we're all hanging on.

Eight more days until Christmas, and this year, as I start to introduce the holiday to my own little boy, I'm loving it even more than ever before. :)

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Not only could they not retrieve ANY of the data from the hard drive, but after 3 hours of driving (roundtrip) to get there and 3 hours hanging out in town waiting for the new hard drive to be inserted (thank goodness for Apple care - at least it was free), we finally got home, I turned on my computer...

...and got that same old gray screen and bouncing question mark. AAAAGH. The computer is still broken.

Worse yet, we can't even get back to the Apple store for the next attempt until Wednesday...so I'll be stealing time off Patrick's computer for a while longer. Sigh.

But! To cheer myself up, I have decided that it's time...drumroll...to do my first Advance Reader's Copy (ARC) giveaway for A Most Improper Magick!

This giveaway is open to anyone in any country. All you have to do is let other people know about the giveaway, either by tweeting the following tweet, if you have a twitter account:

RT @stephanieburgis : Win an ARC of my novel A MOST IMPROPER MAGICK: http://tinyurl.com/yckky2q

...Or by mentioning it on your blog, using any phrasing you like, but making sure to link to this entry.

Then come tell me that you've done it, so I'll know to enter you in the drawing! You can either leave a message for me here on this journal entry or else email me through my website.

The giveaway will be open for a week, until midnight UK time next Monday, December 21st. One winner will get an ARC, plus an "Everything's Better with Highwaymen!" button and a postcard with the book cover; two runners-up will get "Everything's Better with Highwaymen!" buttons and postcards.

(And if you're debating about whether or not you want an ARC, remember you can read the first chapter on my website to get a taste of the novel!)

Yay! And I can't tell you how happy and worried and excited and scared I feel, all at once, at the idea of more people reading my book! ;)

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...and a gray screen popped up with the picture of a folder with a bouncing question mark inside. In other words: it couldn't find my hard drive. And it hasn't been able to ever since. There was no warning beforehand, no clues that it might be dying. When I called the Apple support line, after going through ten zillion tests to try to fix it, and then preparing to tell me how to erase the hard drive as the next obvious step in the process, the support guy said casually, "So, do you have everything backed up?"

Ahahahahha. Ahahahahah. Waaaah. NO! Of course I don't. Because that would require, I dunno, intelligence!

Sigh.

I've got an appointment tomorrow at the closest Apple Store, where the service guys will try to save any data they can before (augh) erasing the hard drive after all. In the meantime, I'm grateful that at least all my versions of Kat3 (and the first two Kat books, too) are backed up online...and I only wish that I could say the same for all my unfinished short story drafts, not to mention music, movies, TV shows...

BUT.

Even this catastrophe could not stop me from something I've been looking forward to for the past week, ever since fellow Tenner Kody Keplinger first suggested it: celebrating Agent Day! This is where writers around the internet join together to say what they appreciate about their agent...and with the help of Patrick's laptop, I, too, can join in, because honestly, in my case, there is SO MUCH to appreciate.

I'm represented by Barry Goldblatt, and even before I ever queried him, I knew of him as the agent for SO many of my favorite YA fantasy authors. He was my dream agent from the moment I first imagined marketing Kat, and I felt incredibly lucky when he offered to represent me. But I had no idea how great it really was going to be.

The bottom line is: Barry always, always supports me and my work. His enthusiasm and belief in my books has never wavered with any publishing rejections and never increased with publishing acceptances - he always told me they were great, whether or not any publishers recognized them. That kind of rock-solid faith from someone whose taste I trust so much has meant the world to me. And he always got my books, from the very beginning - his edits for the first book so perfectly matched my vision of what I'd always wanted my book to be.

On top of that, he phones me every time there's news, good or bad, he supports me when I'm panicking about any of the zillion things that authors can panic about in the publishing process (and talks me down from unreasonable panics, too, which I REALLY do appreciate), he replies quickly to my emails, he sends along payments with lightning speed, and this coming year, he's even coming to WisCon to help me and Karen Healey celebrate our publishing debuts. I really, really love my agent, and I'm so happy he represents me.

Thanks, Barry!!!

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• Sarah Dessen's Just Listen: beautiful, intense and deeply romantic. Something terrible happened to Annabel Greene this summer, and now she has to learn how to heal...with the help of my very favorite romantic hero of the year, Owen Armstrong. I loved this book so, so much. I only discovered Sarah Dessen as an author this past January, but after I read Just Listen, she became one of my favorite YA authors in the world. I love pretty much all of her books (and if you're looking for a lighter YA read, I'd recommend This Lullaby instead, which is a funny, snarky romantic comedy with an edge)...but Just Listen remains my very favorite of all her books, and one of my favorite novels ever. (YA)
• Maureen Johnson's Thirteen Little Blue Envelopes: funny, quirky, emotionally true, and full of the sheer joy of world travel and exploration. Maureen Johnson was another author I only discovered this year, but I'm so glad I did. She's my very favorite comic YA author now, partly because there's always such a deep layer of emotion underneath the zany comedy. This book brought back to me all the joy and fear and excitement of going abroad on your own for the first time, and I loved every bit of it. (YA)
• Lisa Mantchev's Eyes Like Stars: SO much fun! This novel is just bursting with joy and passion and imagination. Seventeen-year-old Bertie Shakespeare Smith lives in a magical theater where her sidekicks are the trouble-making fairies from A Midsummer Night's Dream, her maybe-could-be-boyfriend is a sweet, sexy pirate, and her nemesis - or is he actually her true love? - is Ariel, the trapped elemental from The Tempest. It's wildly inventive, funny, and romantic, and I loved it. (YA)
• Linda Urban's A Crooked Kind of Perfect: sweet, wacky, laugh-out-loud funny and full of heart. Eleven-year-old Zoe dreams of playing the piano at Carnegie Hall - but her father gets painfully nervous outside their own house, and when he comes back from his musical shopping expedition, he isn't exactly bringing her a piano... ;) If you liked the movie "Little Miss Sunshine" (I did), then you will LOVE this book. (MG)
• Jo Knowles's Jumping Off Swings: beautiful, heartbreaking, and true. When one teenage girl becomes pregnant, her whole circle of friends find their lives changed forever. The characters were so real, their choices so heartbreakingly difficult... I cried and cried, but it was SO worth it - and there's real light and hope in here as well as sadness. I usually don't like "issues novels", but I really loved this book and plan to re-read it many times. (YA)
• Ysabeau Wilce's Flora's Dare: funny, wild, magical, and heartwrenching. This book won the Andre Norton Award this year, and oh, did it deserve it! I loved Book 1 in this series (Flora Segunda), but Flora's Dare just completely blew me away! It was even tighter, even more magical, and it was full of truly astonishing family revelations. It mingled fun, rich fantasy world-building with deep emotions. This is Book 2 in the series, but it stands alone beautifully - you don't need to have read Book 1 to enjoy it. (MG)
• Sarah Prineas's Magic Thief: Lost: magical, exciting, and pure fun! Again, this is Book 2 in a series, but you don't need to read Book 1 to enjoy Book 2. Conn is one of my favorite heroes in kids' fantasy: smart, sharp, and funny in a perfectly understated way. Book 1 showed Conn discovering his own magic powers and his ties to the city he was born in; Book 2 takes him far out of his comfort zone, separated from his magic and his city, and forces him to fly. It's full of magic and adventure, and I can't imagine any fantasy-loving kids not loving it. (MG)

What about you guys? What were your favorite books this year?

__

PS: I bought myself copies of all these books except Ysabeau Wilce's Flora's Dare, which I was lucky eough to get as a free ARC. I'm friends with Ysa, Sarah, and Lisa, and I feel very lucky to be friends with some of my favorite authors. Even if I didn't know them, I would still love their books!

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Well, maybe you're starting to see the problem.

Pretty much any parent of a toddler will tell you that time is the thing they have least of in the world. Personally, I'd add "mental energy" right afterwards, and not just because of the CFS. Even if I didn't have CFS, I'd still be exhausted after months of teething (i.e., no sleep for any of us).

Which means...well, I also really, really love writing, but honestly: which sounds easier and more fun to you? Sitting down and working out a tangle in the plot, or browsing etsy.com for cool, unique Christmas presents? Forcing myself through the first 15 minutes of stuckness in every writing session (all the fun ideas and inspiration demand 15 minutes of perspiration to prime the pump before they start flowing, every single time) or...putting on more Christmas carols and checking all my online accounts to see whether Patrick's presents have shipped yet?

Yeah...me, too. Sigh.

So I'm being tough with myself. I just (gasp!) turned off my Christmas playlist. When I finish writing this journal entry, I'm going to turn off the internet for an hour. (If you see me replying to comments before the hour's up, you'll know something has gone wrong, and wow, will I be humiliated! I'm hoping the peer pressure will help me keep my resolution on this one.)

And even if the doorbell rings with a new Christmas package delivery, like it did half an hour ago when I first started trying to focus on my novel, I swear I won't open the package until my writing session is over.

Eek. I'm already feeling a little short of breath and panicky at the very thought of it.

No Christmas fun for me?!?!

Well...not for another hour, anyway.

What about you guys? Do you have anything you're struggling to accomplish right now? I'd love to hear about it to cheer you on (although I can't do any cheering for one more hour)!

ETA: And it worked! Yay!

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This is one thing that makes it soooo convenient to be married to another writer: your partner totally and completely gets that not being able to write can feel like The Worst Thing in the World sometimes - that getting to the end of the day and thinking, I haven't written...again! can feel like the equivalent of saying, What is the point of my life, anyway?!?!

...Which is exactly the kind of ridiculously melodramatic angst that starts flying through my head when I'm not writing. It's another reason why writers have to write: because otherwise all that dammed-up urge to create fictional drama comes surging out into your personal life instead of staying on the page, where it belongs.

Luckily, like I said, Patrick understands why I start flailing around with melodramatic Despair (with a capital D) when I'm blocked on the writing front, and he's wonderfully tolerant of it. But that can't make it fun for him either, I'm sure. And the whole house definitely feels happier when I'm writing again.

I'd had four very unhappy days off (blocked mostly by exhaustion) when I found out about a really disappointing rejection on Wednesday afternoon. Powered by the energy of sheer frustration, I wrote 250 words that night, breaking through my block and FINALLY finishing the chapter I'd been stuck on - because although there's nothing you can do to change an editor's rejection, fresh writing is the best cure for rejection that I know.

I spent yesterday re-reading through the book so far to get a sense of what the pace should be in the next few chapters...then today I wrote 1100 words and left off in the middle of a scene that made me giggle out loud as I wrote it. I'm having fun again, and the whole world feels better.

What about you guys? How are your Fridays going?

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Jenny N!

And the two runners up are: Rob C. and Chelsea H.

Congratulations, everybody! Just send me your mailing addresses, and I'll get your prizes in the mail.

Meanwhile, it's December 1st, which means...yes! I'm finally allowed to listen to Christmas music every day. Bwaaaahahahaha...poor Patrick. Poor, poor Patrick.

I understand it's an addiction. But it's a jingly happy Christmas addiction! So that's all right, right? Right?

Oh well. Every so often it's Patrick's turn to have his music on, and his heavy metal balances out my Christmas music nicely.

Although his turn is the length of one CD, whereas my turn is the length of my Christmas playlist. And my playlist has many, MANY Christmas CDs on it.

*cacklecacklecacklecackle*

It's lucky I have a very good husband. :)

And in the true Christmas spirit, here is a comic that made me laugh out loud today with sheer embarrassing recognition and pleasure: In Which Beth Keeps Her Books. Enjoy!

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YES. I always knew it had to exist somewhere, and now I've finally found it: The Town of Books!

And seriously. I have NEVER been anywhere with so many bookstores! As we were walking down the streets, there were at least two bookshops per block. Per block! Even the town's castle (hey, this is Wales, of COURSE there's a castle) has now been converted into a bookstore!

Amazingly, I didn't swoon. But ohhhh, was I in bliss! We'd officially come for the sake of the town's Christmas fair, which was indeed very nice - but we didn't actually spend much time there. How could we when there were so many bookstores calling our names?

We will be going back again very soon, oh yes, we will. But it's probably just as well that it's not a sensible location for us to move to permanently. I'm not sure our bank balance could cope with so much wonderfulness... ;)

***

And one final reminder: this is the very last day to enter my Thanksgiving giveaway! I pulled out Joan Bauer's Squashed from the bookshelf again this weekend, reminded by the giveaway, and started giggling all over again as I re-read my favorite parts. I'll draw the winners tomorrow morning!

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Yesterday morning, Patrick took out MrD to give me a chance to rest after an awful night of interrupted sleep. I looked on the BBC iPlayer and saw that there was an episode of Natural World available called "Bringing Up Baby". It was all about mothers and babies in the wild.

Oh good, I thought. I should find that interesting.

When Patrick got home an hour later, I was sobbing uncontrollably. "...and the mother lion was roaring and fighting to protect them, but then he killed her babies in front of her and she was in so much agony as she had to watch...and then the penguin mother couldn't get back with food fast enough, and her baby was dead!...and then...and then..."

Patrick finally managed to interrupt. "Why in God's name would you watch that documentary?"

I blew my nose. "Well, David Attenborough was narrating, so I knew it would be good...and I thought that episode would be the most topical one for me, since I'm bringing up a baby right now..."

It was a bit too topical for either me or my hormones to cope with, it turns out. On the plus side, I feel very grateful to have been born human, after watching that film. But I'm going to feel emotionally shattered for a long time whenever anyone mentions lions...or penguins...or fur seals...or lemurs...or far too many other kinds of animals!

Those wildlife documentaries are NOT a good idea for mothers of babies to watch. They really ought to come with warning labels.

***

In completely more uplifting news, though, there are still two days left to enter my Thanksgiving giveaway! And Joan Bauer's Squashed has only ever made me laugh, even after watching traumatizing documentaries. ;)

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Today I'm talking about the writers who make me want to write. If you have time, I hope you'll stop by (and comment with a few of your own favorites)!

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29 years ago, when I was 3-1/2 years old, my little brother got his MMR vaccination shots...and I went into flailing hysterics on the floor of the doctor's office, so horrified and upset on my little brother's behalf (because I KNEW how much those needles hurt!) that I just couldn't cope.

So you can imagine how I felt this morning when MrD had his shots. At least I managed to control myself, this time. I didn't cry, and I didn't kick the floor or pound my fists on it as I sobbed. But I really, really wanted to.

***

It's been a glum few days, here in Wales. The endless rain is starting to feel nigh-on apocalyptic, and when you combine that with pure exhaustion (the return of the dreading Teething monster, eating all our nights)...well, glum and grim are both good words to use.

Luckily, last night I found exactly the right book to brighten my mood: Sherwood Smith's Once a Princess (Book I in her Sasharia en Garde! duology). Swordfights! Pirates! Witty banter! Romance! And a truly awesome mother-daughter team. Now I'm midway through the novel and feeling so much better about everything.

I bought this one as an e-book to read on my iTouch for the sake of speed (I needed a comfort read STAT! no time to waste ordering a copy from Amazon!), but I think I might have to buy myself a print copy, too, for easier re-reading in the future. And Book 2 will definitely be a print purchase for me. For some reason, e-books feel like disposable reads to me, maybe because they're so easy to delete, or maybe because they're dependent on computers, and I've lost sooooooo many files to dead computers in the past.

What about you guys? When you love a book, would you rather have it in print for comfort or on an e-reader for the sake of easy portability and having it with you ALL the time?

__

And a quick PS: don't forget, 5 more days to enter my Thanksgiving giveaway! Joan Bauer's Squashed is one of my favorite comfort books ever. Good luck!

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And ohhh...can I just say how blissful it was to have an excuse to make pecan pie again, for the first time in years? Last year I was too exhausted, post-baby-birth, to cook anything at all, and in the two years beforehand, none of our Thanksgiving guests had liked nuts in any form, so I stopped making it. But pecan pie is my very favorite kind of pie in the world, and I was soooo happy to return to it this year!

And in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I thought I'd share some joy around. :)

I've got a whole page of favorite books on my website, and one of my favorites is also the best Thanksgiving-related book I know: Joan Bauer's Squashed. It's probably the funniest YA book I've ever read...and since I first discovered it when I was 13, and have re-read it at least once every couple years since then, I've read it a lot! But I still laugh out loud every single time.

Here's how I described it on my website:

Teenaged Ellie is determined to win the prize for growing giant pumpkins in her local fair AND win the heart of her true love, but she's got a whole array of dangers and enemies stacked against her. Luckily, she has her hilarious family (and one of the funniest dog characters I've ever read) on her side, and she has loads of pluck and determination. This is a comfort read for me - every time I re-read it, it makes me happy.

So this month I'll be giving away a Thanksgiving package that includes:

• One copy of Joan Bauer's Squashed;
• One notepad from the Jane Austen Centre in Bath, England, with a quote from Pride and Prejudice;
• Two A Most Improper Magick postcards; and
• One "Everything's Better with Highwaymen!" button.

Two runners-up will also get postcards and "Everything's Better with Highwaymen!" buttons. :) Here's how to win, in two steps:

1. First, let other people know about the competition. If you're on Twitter, you can tweet it like this:

RT @stephanieburgis : Win a Thanksgiving prize pack that includes Joan Bauer's SQUASHED! Find out how: http://tinyurl.com/y9pszde

If you're not on Twitter, just mention the competition on your blog, and make sure to include a link to the rules page on my website.

2. Send me a message through my website letting me know whether you've tweeted or blogged about the competition, AND giving me the names of all three of Kat's siblings (which you can find out on my Meet the Characters page).

This giveaway is open to anybody in the world, and it'll run through Monday, November 30th, at midnight UK time.

Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!

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But there was one American-only holiday that I just couldn't give up.

I first came to England as a PhD student at the University of Leeds, studying opera history.* I was one of four Americans in the department (a mix of students and faculty). We were all on friendly terms but rarely did more than nod to each other as we pased...but when we saw each other on that final Thursday in November, every single interaction started with someone brightening at the sight of me and saying, "Happy Thanksgiving!"

Once, it was even whispered to me covertly, so that the British students and faculty members around us wouldn't hear the woman saying it. It was as if - after living in the UK herself for so many years - she was too embarrassed to say it out loud and reveal her foreign-ness to all her colleagues...but she couldn't resist sharing that moment with another American.

There are a lot of things I didn't mind changing when I moved to the UK, like the words I use in conversation to make myself understood (like saying "purse" instead of "wallet" - honestly, why not?). But I love, love, love Thanksgiving. For all its troubled political history, the holiday it is now, as I grew up celebrating it, is about being thankful for your family, your friends, and the blessings you have, and taking the time to show it. There's no commercial aspect to it, people don't expect gifts - they just want to share a wonderful time with you. And I just wasn't willing to give that up.

Being a long way away from my own family, I haven't been able to share many Thanksgivings with them in the last several years (except for last year, which was wonderful). So ever since 2002, my first November in England, I've been inviting my new friends here - all of them huge blessings I've been truly thankful for - to share Thanksgiving with me. We usually don't do it on the last Thursday of November, because that's a work day in the UK - but that's a part of the tradition I can happily amend, just like we replace Thanksgiving turkey with vegetarian and vegan options.

This year, we're going to celebrate Thanksgiving tomorrow with five guests I love. It'll be Saturday instead of Thursday, and in Wales instead of America; instead of traditional turkey, we'll be eating vegan shepherd's pie and pasta salad; but we'll be finishing off with pecan pie and apple turnovers, which is pretty darn traditional by my standards, and I'll be thinking, like I do every year, about the things I'm thankful for in my life. And one of those things is the incredibly supportive community I discovered online when I moved to England.

I was incredibly lonely when we first moved to Leeds. I didn't know many people in town yet, I was acclimating to life in a foreign country, and I was alone all day doing my research while Patrick went to work. It was really hard, for a while. But one of the things that got me through was discovering this incredible online community of writers and readers who loved the same kinds of books and stories that I did. I'd never planned to write a blog, until then - I always thought that sounded too weird, too personal to share with the world - but now I wouldn't give up blogging for the world, because of the community I've found here.

Thank you so much, guys. And happy early Thanksgiving!

***

Now it's time to go back to the other traditional part of Thanksgiving that I haven't been able to dispense with: desperately rushing to get the house in a fit state for company! ;) But in the meanwhile...Hazra at Advance Booking just posted an interview with me that was really fun to do. Readers of this blog will already know the answers to the first two questions, but I hope that some of you will read past them, because I really want to hear your answers to the final question!

Hazra asked which five characters from literature I would invite to a dinner party. You would not belive how long I angsted over this question! Even after I sent my answer (which you can read in the interview, of course), I literally spent twenty minutes that night lying awake wondering if I'd made a mistake. What if the characters I'd picked wouldn't all have fun together?

Yes. I am a TOTAL dork. But you guys knew that already. So: who would you invite?

__

*...which probably deserves a blog entry of its own, one day, all about changing your life & career choices and how difficult that can be (at least for me).

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But I owe Carrie Jones a big apology. I needed to find a hardcover book to test the cover, and it had to be 304 pages, the same page count as mine, so that the cover would fit. Need was the first one that fit the bill! So Carrie, I'm really, really sorry to have stolen the inside of your book for that one photo session...

...oh, who am I trying to fool? Of course my copy of Need is still sitting in my bookcase wearing Kat's jacket, because that way, I can pretend my book is shelved there. I hope Zara doesn't mind too much! She can have her own jacket back this spring, I promise. But look! It looks SO REAL!

Okay. No more photo madness until the real book arrives. Really! Well, probably...unless I totally lose control...

But anyway! In other good news, Patrick, Mr Darcy, and I all just registered for WisCon 2010. YAYYY!!! WisCon is my Favorite Con in the World, and it's been way too long since we've been back there. Now I'm going to go back to stroking the spine of (almost) my book...don't mind me, really... ;)

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However, I've made a recent resolution to start acting genuinely proud of the work I do, rather than talking it down out of some weird version of Midwestern politeness, so... ...Deep breath: here is the list, 16 months of my published short stories, posted partially for the attention of any Nebula voters but mostly just as a statement: this has been my published life for the last sixteen months. Regardless of awards season, I'd love more people to read these stories, because I truly loved writing them. If any of you do have time to follow a few links, I hope you really enjoy the stories. :)

• “True Names”, published in Strange Horizons, November 2009.
• “Offerings”, published in Fantasy Magazine, August 2009.
• “Wolf’s Kin”, published in Space and Time Magazine, Issue 108, July 2009.
• “Red Ribbons”, published in Black Static, Issue 11, July 2009.
• “After the Change”, published in the anthology Future Bristol, ed. Colin Harvey, April 2009.
• “The Five Days of Justice Merriwell”, published in Beneath Ceaseless Skies, March 2009.
• “Blue Joe”, published in Shimmer Magazine, Issue No. 10, March 2009 (which is available as a free PDF download).
• “The Andrassii Agreement”, published in Lone Star Stories, December 2008.
• “How to Recognize a Dragon”, published in Full Unit Hookup, Issue No. 9, August 2008.

(And please note: if anyone wants to read one of the stories that isn't available online, just email me and I'll send you a PDF or Word doc. You don't need to be a SFWA member for this - I really do just want to share these stories right now.)

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We drove across the English border, then through England for a while. We drove past rivers and down rumbly dirt roads under low-hanging trees. And we finally ended up in the Forest of Dean, a beautiful old forest I'd never visited before with tons of dramatic viewing points over valleys and gorges. I LOVE forests - my second full-length novel (written when I was 16, which is why you'll never see it published!) was even set completely in a forest because I'm so obsessed with them. Just walking under old trees fills me with a sense of peace and happiness.

(You should have seen me when we visited Sherwood Forest a few years ago - it's an old, old forest AND the site of so many childhood fantasies! I could barely talk, I was so blissed out.)

I'm not going to post any photos from the Forest of Dean today, because I know Patrick's planning to post his own entry about it soon. But I will just say again how happy I am that he knows me so well. :) I had a really, really wonderful time.

***

I've been meaning for a long time to talk about two different YA novels I've read recently. They're each VERY different from each other, actually, but both so good that I wanted to point them both out.

Ice, by Sarah Beth Durst: I bought this one based on the excerpt I read on Sarah's website, and oh, I am so glad I did. I devoured the whole book in one evening!

Of course, I've always loved the fairy tale "East of the Sun, West of the Moon" (I even did my own retelling of it a few years ago in my story "By the Light of the Dark"), but that actually made me a little wary of this book before I read it. When I love a fairy tale so much, sometimes it's hard to read other people's versions of it! But this one was just wonderful.

Ice starts out on an Arctic research station, where 18-year-old Cassie has grown up preparing to be a scientist. The shift from gritty Arctic realism to the dazzling magic of the Polar Bear king's palace is just perfectly handled, and oh, I loved Cassie's very modern reactions to the king's fairy tale expectations. Their relationship was perfectly drawn, the developing romance was just right...and the final adventure, as Cassie combines her scientific know-how and intelligence with her growing understanding of how magic really works, was so much fun. I loved how fierce and strong she was, and this book was just a joy to read. Really, really fun and recommended!

The Snowball Effect, by Holly Nicole Hoxter: I was lucky enough to win an ARC of this from Holly (one of my fellow Tenners). Wow, is it different from Ice - but also so, so good. This one reminded me of a darker version of a Sarah Dessen novel, and some parts of it were so painful to read that I had to take time away and read the novel in slow bites...but again, I am so glad I did.

Lainey Pike's family is truly broken. Her dad's out of the picture, her stepdad died recently, and her mother, who always suffered from depression, has just committed suicide in the family's basement, just after Lainey's high school graduation. Now Lainey and her estranged older half-sister are suddenly left to look after their five-year-old adopted brother, who has major emotional and behavioral issues. Lainey's never had a protected childhood, and now she's expected to take on a parent's responsibility for a brother who has never felt truly part of her family anyway...and all while grieving (and raging) over her mother's voluntary death. Lainey has a supportive boyfriend, but she feels suffocated even by him and by the way the rest of her life has been forced onto her.

Lainey and the other characters feel utterly real, and her anger and fear and frustration are palpable and completely understandable. She makes a lot of really questionable decisions as she flails around, trying to find her way, but every single one of them felt true to her character, even when they led her into even worse situations. This was often a hard book for me to read, but it was absolutely emotionally truthful, and it had a hard-won hope to it in the end.

***

What about you guys? What books have really stood out to you lately? I'm always looking for reading suggestions!

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I love both of my brothers so much. It always hurts to say goodbye, even though this time, it's only for six months. So because I'm feeling nostalgic, this is going to be a photo entry, with pictures from our trip to Raglan Castle this past Saturday:

Raglan is the only castle I've been to that actually still has a moat:

I love the face that's been caught in this tower ever since the Middle Ages:

A shot from inside the castle grounds:

And (almost) the whole family:

You can see more photos on my flickr account.

I'm feeling very lucky right now to have such a great family.

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...and that's been causing serious havoc in my critiquing schedule. I am SOOOO humiliatingly late on a couple of crits for some really wonderful writers, and I hate it...but I just haven't been able to physically do it.

My iTouch works fine for reading published ebooks, using the "Stanza" program, but it can't handle PDFs or MS Word docs in any really usable way.

Do Kindles work well for those? Or Sony e-readers? Any suggestions would be hugely appreciated (by my crit partners at least as much as by me)!

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You can read the story here.

I have lots of photos to post in the next day or two from our trip to Raglan Castle (LOVE that castle!), but right now we're on our way out for a day trip into Bristol, one of my favorite cities. I'll be wandering around bookstores, eating good food, and glowing the whole time with the happiness of getting this story published in my favorite magazine. :)

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...hmm. It's actually been a really long time since we last watched a TV show together. The last time I can remember even trying to do that was way back in the middle of January, and at that point, we finally decided it just wasn't practical to watch TV together with a baby in the house (especially a baby we're trying NOT to allow to watch television*).

Well. We finally, finally have (I'm almost scared to say this out loud, in case I jinx it!) a routine where MrD goes to sleep at least 2-3 hours before the rest of us do. That means that Patrick and I have actual TIME, which - especially since my brother's here to help - we can often spend together. Better yet, in our new house, we can play music or watch a TV show in the living room without headphones, because it's far enough away from the bedroom not to wake up MrD.

So tonight we sat down and finally went back to Season 2, Episode 6 of Gilmore Girls, which is where we'd left off this past January, almost 11 months ago. We sat cuddled up together, with Patrick's arm around my shoulder, we laughed at the jokes...and it felt amazingly good.

(Although I am worried about the coming arc for this season, because the new love interest they've introduced for Rory? Ewww. NO appeal whatsoever, at least for me, so I'm going to be really depressed if Rory falls for him. It's not that I don't think a sixteen-year-old girl is capable for falling for him - I just really, really hope it doesn't happen. Sigh. I'm pretty sure that's a lost cause...but hey. It's nice to be able to think about TV shows again and argue about show decisions!)

____

*...except in cases of emergency, when In the Night Garden leaps to the rescue!

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Being me, of course, my natural solution to any dilemma, no matter how large or small, is: read a book! ;) Luckily, this time my favorite strategy has actually been working. Right now I'm reading Martha Beck's The Joy Diet: 10 Daily Practices for a Happier Life, and even though I'm a little wary of most self-help books, this one is turning out to be incredibly smart about an awful lot of things. (Her earlier book Finding Your Own North Star is the best career book I've ever read, which is why I gave this book a try.) One of the points that really resonated for me was this:

Our deepest pleasure doesn't come from total lethargy and ease. It comes from experiences that both interest and challenge us. [...] Menu Item #7 shifts your focus from dreading and avoiding difficulty to finding the sort of difficulty you can love, and making sure you don't take it too seriously.

This is so true, at least for me. When I came down with CFS several years ago, I had several well-meaning but clueless people say to me, "Oh, you're so lucky - you can just spend all day doing nothing."

Well...no. Before I had CFS, when I was working a demanding fulltime job and trying to write novels, work on a PhD thesis, and still have some semblance of a family life, I used to think yearningly about doing nothing...but the joy of doing nothing only lasts for so long. After a certain point, it becomes excruciatingly boring. Life begins to feel horribly empty unless you can find a way to fill it with interesting challenges even when you're lying on a couch...which is, of course, one of the many reasons I'm grateful to be a writer, someone who can do their work even while lying down in their own living room.

But she's so right, too, about not letting yourself take your challenges too seriously, because that is absolutely the kiss of death for productive creativity, and something I've been really struggling with ever since I signed the three-book contract. It can be astonishingly hard to remember how much fun something is when you're getting paid to do it! All the neuroses suddenly leap in - Oh, no, I have to take this seriously now... BAD idea.

Anyway, one of the other points in The Joy Diet is that everyone should give themselves several treats a day. Not the kind of generic treats everyone in the world is expected to enjoy (luxurious massages, etc.) but individual treats designed specifically around the kinds of ordinary things that make you smile spontaneously when you're doing or having them.

It's an interesting way of thinking about treats, and when I thought about them that way - what makes me smile? - I came up with a completely different list than I would have otherwise. Here's the list of some of my personal favorite treats, all of which I gave myself yesterday:

• Playing music: not listening to a CD, but actually making music myself, which is one of the biggest joys I know, and one I haven't indulged in for over a year. I pulled out my beautiful alto recorder yesterday afternoon and enjoyed it so, so much. I only played it for about ten minutes, but they were ten minutes that left me feeling loose and happy and wondering why on earth I had ever let that habit disappear from my life.
• Playing with MrD: not just looking after him, but really whole-heartedly throwing myself into a real and protracted play session with him. I can't remember the last time I laughed so much and felt so perfectly happy.
• Writing more of Kat 3. This is one of those things I usually call "work"; in fact, when the CFS arrived in my life and I had to give up my dayjob, it was incredibly important to me to call my fiction writing work, because it meant that I was still doing something productive and important. But after reading Martha Beck's book and thinking about it, I remembered that really, writing fiction is supposed to be play - and last night after MrD went to bed, although I'd seriously planned to take the day off and didn't expect myself to write anything, I surprised myself by having the most joyful and productive writing session in ages, doing it just for fun and enjoying it wholeheartedly. Even after I went to bed, I lay awake beaming into the dark as I thought about the scene I'd written and how much fun I'd had with it.

What about you guys? What would you define as your personal treats?

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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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So...in other words, it's time to get back down to writing again!

I actually had a really wonderful experience related to my writing in the last couple of days. I got a pair of emails from a very cool twelve-year-old girl and her mother, both of whom had read and enjoyed an ARC of A Most Improper Magick. Their emails made me so, so happy - it feels like a bubble of happiness expanding inside me to know that there are copies out there which people are not only reading but really enjoying in just the way I hoped for. It truly is a dream come true.

One of the things that came up in the emails was a request for writing tips for an aspiring teen writer. I spent all of last night thinking about that, trying to think of the best tips to pass on. When I was twelve years old, I knew with all my heart that I wanted to be a professional writer when I grew up. What would have been the best things for me to hear, if I'd had the chance to ask a pro writer for advice? Here's what I wrote back in the end:

As far as writing tips, of course every writer will probably give you different ones, but here are the things that have been most helpful for me:

-Write as often as you can (every day if possible)

-Write what you want most to read - for instance, I LOVE Regency romantic comedies like the ones Jane Austen and then Georgette Heyer wrote, but I always wished they had magic in them, because I love fantasy so much, too. So with The Unladylike Adventures of Kat Stephenson, I'm actually writing the books I always most wanted to read and wished that I could find on the shelf in the library.

I wish I had let myself do this a lot sooner - I wasted a lot of time trying to write what I thought would make other people respect my writing, which is really a waste of time. You'll always write best when you're writing something you genuinely LOVE, instead of writing to please somebody else.

-Work to improve your writing. Personally, I can't think critically about a first draft, whether it's a novel or a short story. I have to write that draft straight through and just for fun, without getting any critiques or even letting myself think about what could be done better. AFTER I've finished that draft, though, it's time to think about what could be done better, and to ask other people for suggestions. It's a bad idea to take all of everybody else's suggestions - only take the ones that make sense to you and feel right for the story - but it's important to take the time to improve every story, even your best ones. That's how your writing skills will grow.

-And here's my last, totally subjective point...personally, and speaking only from my own experience and that of my friends, I think that majoring in creative writing in college is usually a bad idea. Creative writing classes can be very, very useful - I've taken some wonderful classes & workshops that really helped my writing - but most of the productive, happy writers I know actually majored in something else, and now they have something to write *about* because they know about more than just writing.

I majored in music performance and history, and not only did that give me really rich, interesting experiences that I can draw on for all my stories and characters, I also learned a lot of history that has been particularly useful for my historical novels. I also know writers who majored in physics, film studies, theater, math, biology...the main point of college, *I think*, is to stretch your brain and learn about the world. A lot of people who major in creative writing only know about the skills of writing, and don't have much else to actually write about, which is a real lack.

Again, though, that's just my subjective, personal opinion, so feel free to ignore it! :)

(And a quick note about that last point: I think MFAs in writing are quite different from undergraduate degrees, so I'm certainly not trying to discourage anyone from pursuing an MFA. I think an MFA can be a great and very valuable experience - I just think, personally, that undergrad is the time to explore and find out more about the world, rather than the time to focus on learning writing skills. For my money, the best thing you can do for your writing career, at the age of 18, is learn about the world, and how people work. Writing craft can always be picked up later on.)

What about you guys? If you're writers, what advice would you give a twelve-year-old who wants to be a professional writer one day? If you're readers, what's one question you would love to ask?

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The two runners-up, each of whom gets an "Everything's better with highwaymen" button and Kat postcard, are:

Angie Frazier and Camille Peters.

Yay Angie and Camille! Just send me your addresses, and I'll send you your loot!

And the grand prize winner is: Chloe from The Book Bug: Books for Tweens and Teens.

Yay Chloe! Just send me an email or write to me through the website's contact form to let me know which Georgette Heyer novel you'd prefer (The Talisman Ring or The Reluctant Widow), and where I should send the whole package. :)

The Kat postcards and Jane Austen notepads (more to be used in future competitions!) just arrived in the mail today, and oh, they're so cute.

In other news, we are ALMOST settled into our new house in Wales. Right now I'm sitting with a (napping) Mr Darcy in a relative's house three blocks away, while Patrick and my brother Dave work on unpacking the zillions of boxes currently filling up our new house (to head-height, in some cases! It's kind of scary). We've had some of the usual traumas of moving - a bookshelf was broken, and, far more tragically, so was my Jane Austen action figure. :( But a friend from Michigan leaped into the breach to immediately offer me a new JA figure, so my blood pressure went down to a safe level again. ;)

Also, yesterday I got a library card at the really nice little public library (which has a surprisingly fabulous number of books crammed into a very tiny building), last night I got a heavenly vegan chocolate brownie from one of the coffeeshops in town, and today MrD and I both made new friends at a toddlers playgroup. So all in all...well, I haven't taken off my good-luck bracelet yet. But, without wanting to jinx anything...well, I think it might be working.

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In the last few days, I've been saying goodbye to all my friends in Leeds. Ouch, ouch, ouch. One of my best friends in the whole world lives in my neighborhood, and I can't even begin to describe what a wrench it's going to be to go from weekly meet-ups at the local pub to (realistically speaking, since we both have little kids and busy schedules) only hanging out by phone calls and once-a-year Eastercon meet-ups.

Sometimes being a grown-up hurts, y'know?

I think this shifted for me when I was in my late twenties. I went to two different colleges in undergrad, transferring from Michigan State University to the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, and I never thought twice about the issue of friendships. I knew my earlier friends would always be my friends, and I would make lots of new ones. And I was right, mostly...although those earlier intense friendships have mostly trickled down into Facebook friendships over the years, because that's the way life tends to go.

Then I flew off to Vienna for a year, made friends there, went to Pittsburgh for my MA degree, made some really wonderful friends there (Camille, I MISS YOU!), flew off to Leeds...

...and somehow, it started hitting me that every time I moved, I was leaving friends behind. Maybe it's all about getting older and starting to recognize your own mortality?

Oh, well. I don't want to get too morbid. And I did choose this move, after all. I am looking forward to it for all sorts of practical reasons. But yesterday, I had to say goodbye to the wonderful group of smart, funny moms who've been an incredible support network for me ever since MrD was born. Today, I'm saying goodbye to one of my very best friends. And it all makes me feel a little shaky.

So, yesterday? I'm almost embarrassed - no, to be honest, I am actually REALLY embarrassed to admit this, but...yesterday, on my way home from my goodbye to the other moms, I was feeling SO shaky that I decided it was time for some low-level magic.

So I went to Next, my favorite British clothing shop, and I looked through all the jewelry until I found the one - a perfect charm bracelet full of butterflies and leaves and color, a bracelet that signified magic to me. It's my good-luck bracelet, the one that promises that our move will turn out to be a good idea, and I'll meet great new people in my new town, even though I'm having to leave behind such wonderful people here.

I know it's silly. I don't even believe in magic. But I'm wearing the bracelet on my wrist now, and apart from sleep and showers, it's not leaving my wrist until we're safely settled in Wales, no matter what! The movers will arrive tomorrow morning. Wish us all luck, please....

__

PS: And don't forget, my Regency Prize Pack competition ends on Tuesday at midnight, UK time. Winners will be announced on Wednesday!

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Writing, as the parent of a baby, has turned out to be an exercise in ruthless prioritizing. I have a toddler who's bright, active and curious and needs non-stop supervision while he's awake (which is almost always); I have a novel that needs to be written. Because I want to do my best by both of these (very, very wonderful) creatures who need me, I barely ever watch DVDs anymore, or do almost any of the other things I used to do to relax. That's fine; it's completely my choice, and it's more than worth it. Getting ready to move, though, has taken self-discipline to a whole new level.

I haven't just had to give up DVDs and the BBC iPlayer; to get my novel written as well as parenting, getting the crammed-full-of-junk house sorted out, AND getting all the associated errands taken care of (changing our address with various different authorities, etc., etc)...well, in the end, I just feel like there are a thousand things I SHOULD be getting done every day, and no matter how many I actually do, I always, always feel overwhelmed and behind. Which leads to stress and anxiety and bursting into tears when I finally manage to write a long-overdue email to a friend and silly Yahoo eats it. Sigh.

Whine, whine, whine. ;) Aren't you guys looking forward to next Tuesday, when we'll be settled in Wales? I know I sure am. And I'm very grateful to have this sounding-board for my whining. After next Tuesday - knock on wood! - I should have time to start writing real emails again, and my anxiety levels should go way down. In the meantime, though, it's important for me to keep up with this blog, so that at least I can send up smoke signals to my friends: Hey! I'm still here, even though I'm not answering my emails! I still love you guys, really!

In better news, though, I am still reading, albeit slower than usual, and what I'm reading is awfully fun: Dark Victory: The Life of Bette Davis, by Ed Sikov. It's a really entertaining biography that's making me want to watch Bette Davis's films (as well as making me realize, with some embarrassment, that I've never seen ANY of them); and it's giving me just the right spice of classic Hollywood glamor/cattiness to offset my moving gloom. Take, as an example, the Bette quote on the back of the book:

The laaaaaast movie I made with Joan Crawford was Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? I played Baby Jane, and Joan Crawford played...whatever.

SO much fun.

Kat 3 Wordmeter

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...and of course, that's actually a really good thing. When I spent an hour the other day sorting through all the old clothes crammed into our bedroom closet, chest of drawers, and various cupboards, I ended up with three huge black garbage bags full of clothes that genuinely needed throwing out, along with another two bags of clothes to be donated to thrift shops. It was pretty staggering. And when it came time today to sort through all the books that we'd stuffed into a closed cupboard when we first moved here, 6-1/2 years ago, and ran out of shelf space...

Well, let's just say that, after never once missing them in the last 6-1/2 years, it wasn't hard to put an awful lot of them into the thrift shop pile, too. And it's amazing how liberating it feels to get rid of so much stuff that way...which is an odd and slightly unnerving thing for a natural packrat like me to realize.

I'm sure there must be some great metaphors for me to draw here. I certainly do wish I could dispose of some of my old bad memories or hang-ups as easily as I can get rid of all the old clothes that don't fit or look good on me anymore. In the meantime, though, I'm just enjoying watching those bags pile up by the front door, and feeling more and more free with every bag we get rid of.

We have one more week left in Leeds before we move to Wales, and there's an awful lot of stuff I'll miss about our life here, and the beautiful Yorkshire landscape. But it's nice to have a slightly lighter load to take with us.

Kat 3 Wordmeter

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• This morning several wonderful people emailed me different articles about the most positive and important medical discovery about CFS/ME that's ever been made, to my knowledge. The physical virus that causes the syndrome may have been isolated; if this theory turns out to be correct, even though the syndrome will still be lifelong and incurable, there will actually be *possible treatments* - something that's been completely impossible until now. This is so incredible, it's...well, there really aren't words for how wonderful it would be. But as I read the end of this article, I found myself chanting under my breath, "Oh, please, please, please..."...and really, that sums it all up. Here's the NY Times article about it.
• My awesome friend Jenn Reese (the one who came up with Kat's series title!) has truly awesome news: she's now agented by Joe Monti at the Barry Goldblatt Literary Agency! I am enormously happy to be agency-mates with Jenn, and I can't WAIT for her to sell her wonderful trilogy of girl-powered science fiction adventures! You can congratulate her here.
• I was lucky enough to win a copy of Megan Crewe's YA novel Give Up the Ghost last week. I was expecting it to be fast-paced and fun, but to be honest, based purely on the description, I also expected it not to necessarily have much depth. I was right on 2 out of 3 points. It was fast-paced and fun...but what made it honestly wonderful was the raw emotionalism of the novel. I cared passionately about the heroine, and that was what made the story matter so much, way beyond the snappy pacing and banter.
• We're in the process of getting quotes from moving companies, sorting through masses of old clothes and books, and generally being overwhelmed by moving madness...but all the same, in the best news for a long time (on a completely subjective personal level, that is), I'm actually powering with some speed through Kat3! The big motivator for me (apart from JoNoWriMo, which definitely helped to kick-start me after far too much time off) was my realization last week that it had been a whole year since MrD's birth...and yet, I still wasn't back in a regular writing habit. Ouch. So I made a vow that from now on I absolutely have to average at least 500 words/day until the novel is done - and if I manage to stick with it, I should actually have a draft done by the middle of January at the very latest. WHEW. Just to keep myself honest & accountable, I'd really like to set up a wordmeter at the bottom of my posts from now on, but the old one I used to use at zokotou.co.uk doesn't seem to work any more. Does anyone have any wordmeter recommendations?
• And in not-very-surprising related news, I'm having SO MUCH fun with Kat3 now that I'm actually playing in that world every single day instead of only popping in and out at long intervals (and thinking, What? Who? Was I planning something here...?). Now that I'm absorbed in it all again, it's just a totally different experience. I was actually giggling out loud yesterday with pleasure as I wrote one scene, and one of the moments I wrote today...well, all in all, I just feel really, really lucky to be getting to do something I love so much. Getting paid to write this trilogy, in particular, is just one of the best things that's ever happened to me in my life. And I'm so glad to be finally giving Book 3 the energy and focus it deserves again.

That's it for me! What about you guys? What are your highlights from this week? And can any of you link me to a good wordmeter?

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The trailer was made for me by one of my first readers for the book, my brother David (I feel VERY lucky to have a filmmaker in the family!), and I really hope you enjoy it! :)

And in celebration of the trailer's completion...for the first time EVER, I'm going to hold an online competition!

It's still too early to start giving away Kat ARCs, so instead, I'm going to give away a Regency prize pack. The winner will receive:

• One Georgette Heyer Regency romantic comedy (either The Talisman Ring or The Reluctant Widow, based on the winner's preference)
• One notepad from the Jane Austen Centre in Bath with a quote that reads "... till catching her eye, he withdrew his own and coldly said, 'She is tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me.'''
• One button created by me (via Café Press) that reads: "Everything's better with highwaymen!" - because that's the tag line my awesome agent used when he was marketing A Most Improper Magick in the first place...and really, it's just so true! :) (In novels, at least.)
• And one blank postcard with the cover of A Most Improper Magick (left blank for you to use unless you want it signed, which I'm happy to do instead!)

The competition is open to anyone in the world who has a blog. To enter the competition, you have to do two things:

• Embed the trailer for A Most Improper Magick on your blog (you can find it on either Vimeo or Youtube), and insert the following line underneath: "My entry for the A Most Improper Magick book tralier competition. Read the rules and enter at http://www.stephanieburgis.com/competition.php." (You can also find the embed code on that competition page, if you don't want to go looking on YouTube or Vimeo.)
• Either send me an email or write to me via the contact page on my website, giving me the link to the blog page where you've embedded the trailer and ALSO answering the following question: "What is Rule No. 4?" (Don't worry, this question is less obscure than it sounds...you'll understand once you watch the trailer. ;p )

And that's it!

The competition will be open for two weeks, from now through midnight (UK time) October 20th. At the end of the two weeks, I'll draw the names of one winner of the full prize pack and two winners of "Everything's better with highwaymen" buttons and A Most Improper Magick postcards.

I can't wait to see who wins!

_

*There's going to be at least one more book trailer closer to the publication date. SO useful to have a filmmaker in the family! ;)

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Join me over at BLOGFEST!

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We've got two weeks left in Leeds before we finally do our move, and I'm experiencing really mixed feelings. On the one hand, we're going to Wales! I LOVE Wales! It's a beautiful country full of castles - what's not to love? ;)

And we're moving to a really nice town full of the kind of amenities I've been doing without for far too long, like a bookstore, several coffeeshops, and a library all within walking distance (not to mention a CASTLE!). Plus, we'll be living near Patrick's family, which will be soooo helpful for MrD and for us.

On the other hand...

Well, it's been seven years now since I moved to England, and for 6-1/2 of those, we've lived in Leeds. For 6 of those years, we've been in the same house. I got engaged while we lived here; married while we lived here (and had our wedding reception in the 18th-century stone schoolroom just across the street); had our baby and spent the first year of his life living here...

Yeah. That's a lot of memories, all wrapped up in this one little neighborhood. And when you add in the deep, wonderful friendships I've made here...

Moving felt a lot easier when I was in my early twenties and ready to spontaneously pack up & move ANYWHERE for 6 months or two years - Vienna, Pittsburgh, England, it all felt like one big glorious adventure. Now that I'm in my early thirties, somehow I seem to have developed a set of roots that feel suddenly fragile when they get transplanted.

It's definitely still worth taking risks, of course, to make life better for us and for MrD. I just feel a little unsteady as we do it, nowadays.

So this morning I took Maya and MrD on a walk down to the village in the sunshine, stopping to say hello to all the horses on the way. We got takeaway from our favorite Indian restaurant this afternoon - oh, am I going to miss the wonderful Bradford curries! And in the next couple of weeks, along with packing up our house, we're going to make a real effort to go to some of the nearby tourist spots we've always meant to go to but never got around to, like Chatsworth (aka, Pemberley! - in the Keira Knightley version of Pride and Prejudice, at least) and Bolsover Castle.

Change is still a good thing. It really is. But sometimes it feels a little scary.

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This week it was my turn to lead a Tenner Tell-All session based on a discussion question, and this week's question was: "Where were you when you got The Call? And what was it like?"

You can read my answer over here (which involves hot chocolate and hysterical giggling, naturally! ;p ), and check back on the comments throughout the day to read answers from all the other awesome Tenners!

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And here's the full jacket, including flaps:

(You can click on the images to get to the larger versions.)

I am soooooo happy about this! :)

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Here's how I answered. What about you guys? Those of you who are writers - have you had similar experiences with your characters? What about from a reader's POV? The first time I read Izzy Willy-Nilly by Cynthia Voight, which is about a girl who's lost one leg in a car accident, I actually forgot that I still had two legs! It was a real shock when my dad called me down to dinner and I saw that both legs were whole, because I'd gotten so absorbed into Izzy's mindset.

So what about you guys? As readers, have you felt that you ever became certain characters as you read about them?

You can leave a comment on the Blogfest entry. Hope to see you over there! :)

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Tomorrow we'll start getting our new house ready...I hope. In the meantime, I'm just sucking down hot tea with honey and hoping that tonight I actually manage to get some sleep in-between nose-blowing.

In less disgusting news, today's Blogfest question asked us whether we've stuck with certain themes in all our books. My entry talks about how, one way or another, almost everything I write comes down to families in the end (and why that's true). I hope you like it!

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But hey! We just got good news yesterday: our rent application has been approved. We're definitely moving south to Wales! Unfortunately, I have to say that the weather is not noticeably better down south (I always love the mock-tourist ad in Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next novels that promises Wales: not ALWAYS raining!), but still, I've been indulging in fantasies of balmy southern weather...maybe a warm sea breeze...

Oops. I think my fallback fantasies are actually about my brother Ben's neighborhood in Miami, not Wales. Time for a quick mental shift...chilly autumns, but also castles! Two coffee shops AND a library in walking distance of our house! Yup, that does it for me. :)

Yesterday, errands ate most of the day in the way they often do - as usual, we figured, well, we'll just get these few things done...and then the day was over. Oops. But the weirdest errand by far (which was also the most fun) was buying birthday gifts for MrD. I still can't believe it's been almost a year since he was born.

Actually, my huge mental block on that - it can't have been a whole year, surely! - led me to make the most embarrassing mistake ever. I found out last week that a good friend is coming to the UK in early October, I said oh yay, come visit us in Wales! (thinking, oh, October is a long way off, I'm sure we'll have moved by then)...and then this morning as I was lying in bed, it hit me: October is NEXT WEEK!

Oops.

Luckily, she is a very good friend, and only laughed at me a little bit rather than throwing things across the internet at my head. And she's even changed her travel plans so that she can see us in Leeds instead of Wales, so I am feeling very relieved (while also still horribly embarrassed). (I would love to blame that kind of mistake on baby-brain and lack of sleep, but really...as my family can attest, I've ALWAYS been awful with stuff like that!)

But to alleviate some of my embarrassment, I got a piece of really good news: my editor said it would be fine to put up the first Chapter of A Most Improper Magick on my website! So I did.

Here's Chapter One, free to read online. I hope you enjoy meeting Kat and her sisters!

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And, um, me. Eek.

We were all sent fourteen questions posed by teen readers - one for each day of the two-week blogfest - and each of us chose five questions to answer. Today, the question is "What made you start writing?" If you keep going back during the day you'll gradually see all the different authors' replies - mine is up already.

I really hope you'll read it and, if any responses occur to you, please do leave a comment. I'm feeling like a VERY small fish in a very big sea over there, and it would be lovely to have some company! :)

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I liked my old website, but I LOVE this one, which is much bigger and also more Kat-centered, with tons of behind-the-scenes info, Regency trivia, and more. There's going to be even more stuff on it soon - my plan is to update it regularly and gradually add videos, excerpts from the book (once my publisher OKs them! :) ), quizzes, competitions, etc.

Will you guys please do me a favor? Could you take a look around and let me know (a) what you think, and (b) if you spot any typos or broken links?

In other news, it's been a quiet, mostly website-obsessed weekend for me and Patrick (and therefore pretty boring for Maya and MrD). When I wasn't been working on the website (which took up 99% of my mental energy for the past several days!), I was generally reading baby books to MrD or hunting online for birthday gifts for his first birthday. (I still can't believe that that's coming up SO SOON! It doesn't feel real at all...how could it have been a full year since he was born???)

What about you guys? How has your weekend been?

Oh, and a quick note: for those of you who aren't regular livejournal users, you can now read my livejournal entries mirrored here on this new blog - I've copied the last several entries over here already. You can leave comments either here or on my livejournal.

You can read all of my older blog entries on my livejournal, which goes back to 2006. Hope you enjoy!

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We had a great time with Tiffany Trent, who came on Saturday and stayed until this morning. We talked writing, books, pirate girls and perfect SF convention T-shirts...we went out to Bolton Abbey to show Tiffany what my imagined "Grantham Abbey" in A Most Improper Magick was based on (and ohhhh, that was a poignant trip, since it may well have been my Very Last Trip to Bolton Abbey, if we really do move to Wales in a few weeks)...and in a brilliant move, Patrick and I used the excuse of a houseguest to justify getting lots and lots of wonderful Indian curries from our favorite restaurants. Yum!!!

It was a really smart move to invite a writer to stay, too, even beyond the sheer pleasure of Tiffany's company. There is nothing more stimulating and motivating for my own writing than to hang out with another working writer, especially one who's working on so many cool projects! After my week off from Kat3 to work on Kat1's ARCs, I had really fallen out of the groove of my current book. I kept opening up the MS Word document, looking blankly at the half-completed scene I had been working on beforehand, and thinking: what in the world was I planning to do next? I can't remember!

Then Tiffany arrived, we talked for hours about writing and fantasy and books, and the very next morning, I sat down, opened up my document, and wrote 600 new words, finishing the scene and chapter with a totally unexpected plot point that makes me really happy. I LOVE hanging out with other writers! Thanks, Tiffany!!!

While we were at Bolton Abbey, Tiffany and I did a totally silly, punchdrunk-on-history-and-afternoon-tea video blog, which I hope to post here soon. (First I have to figure out how to get it off our super-fancy digital videocamera! We'll see how long that takes...) In the meantime, though, I've posted a bunch of photos from that day on my flickr account, and you can see some of my very favorites behind the cut.

Bolton Abbey looking particularly Gothic:

Tiffany sitting on medieval stones in front of the big manor house:

Me and Patrick on more ruins:

All four of us:

And one more reason why I'm going to miss Yorkshire so much:

Now Tiffany's gone and I'm missing her, but I'm determined to keep up that writing energy. I've signed up for JoNoWriMo, and my goal is to finish four more chapters of Kat3 in the next six weeks. Wish me luck!

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I can't remember the last time a book made me sob this hard.

Jumping Off Swings is so beautifully written, so fiercely honest and so compelling. I read it in one intense session, because I Could Not Stop reading it. There are four different POV characters, some of whom hate or avoid each other now for really good, sympathetic reasons, and yet all four were equally compelling and real, and by the end, I cared desperately about all four of them. This is a book that never compromises the emotional truth of the very difficult situation, but it's not a grim read at all - it's just right.

I loved it, and I want to push it on everyone I know. It really is that good.

Jumping Off Swings is a novel about an unplanned teenage pregnancy, and how it changes the lives of four friends. That description makes it sound like an Issues Novel, but it's really not. It's about four very believable kids caught in an awful situation, and it feels real and true and beautiful. If you're a fan of Carrie Jones's books (I am!), I bet you'll be a fan of this book, too. If you love good YA fiction, you'll love this book. If you have a baby of your own, then I have to warn you, it's going to push all sorts of hormonal buttons - like I said, I really SOBBED over this book (while nursing my own baby!). But: it's worth it. Really.

Check it out.

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Sigh. Those must be some of the most dangerous words in human history, repeated in SO MANY dubious situations! ;p

For the past several hours, voices in the back of my head have been singing the refrain of "Omigod, omigod you guys!" over and over AND OVER again....! BE WARNED.

Of course, after watching that first video I had to watch a couple other videos from the musical...then I started wishing there was a full performance online of the entire show...and now I'm wondering whether or not to put the movie on my rental list, after all these years of resisting it. Darn you, Karen!!!!

In other news, on Sunday I finally summoned up the nerve to actually start reading through an ARC of A Most Improper Magick, which I'd spent two days feeling way too scared to attempt. How come some of the most exciting parts of publishing are also so terrifying? I think part of the issue with ARCs is that these advance copies are the ones that are going to be sent to reviewers...so I am PETRIFIED by the fear of finding something TERRIBLY WRONG and knowing that it's too late to keep any reviewers from seeing it. Eek. Luckily, I'm about halfway through the book now, and while I've come across a couple small inconsistencies and several line edits, there's been nothing that makes me swoon with horror. At least, NOT YET...

Here's the thing that makes it all so scary. The embarrassing truth is: I really, really love this book. It feels terrifying just to admit that, even to myself. The thing is, if it were a book I didn't care so much about - if I'd just tossed it off, or if I'd written it like an assignment without any passion, I could pretty much shrug off any bad reviews. But that isn't how it happened. I wrote this book with so much joy and care, and I am so in love with Kat and all her siblings, and all of that makes me feel more and more horribly vulnerable as publication day approaches. Because as much as I've longed for it to be published, I also know that not everybody will like this book. Even the books I love most in the world are hated by many people. That's the way the world works.

But I'm petting my ARCs a lot right now, even as I hunt through them for typos and still-fixable flaws. And the occasional bout of distraction therapy - like the one I got sucked into this afternoon, thanks to Karen's blog entry - is priceless.

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This morning I was woken up in the very best way possible: my ARCs arrived!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here they are (7 out of the 8, anyway - the 8th had gone on an exciting trip with Patrick and MrD :) ) with my writing tiara and the Jane Austen action figure who stood on my desk the whole time I was drafting the novel:

Here's the title page:

And then I got a little excited with my camera... ;)

MrD wants his own copy:

This is as close as he's allowed to come right now:

And Maya expresses her appreciation as the literary dog of the house:

Right now I'm listening to the happiest music I know, which is Franz Lehar's Die Lüstige Witwe (The Merry Widow), silly and exuberant and joyful. I've danced all over the house with my ARCs. I am feeling just so incredibly happy. :)

One copy is for me to keep; one copy goes to my mom and dad; one copy goes to the Tenners; and the other five are being set aside to use in online giveaway competitions over the next several months. I'm trying to be really, really strong and not start giving them away until January, since the book won't be published until the end of April...but I am feeling a huge urge to give something away, so keep an eye on this space over the next month! I might time it to coincide with Simon & Schuster's Blogfest. Hmm....

Now I have to go back to ogling and cuddling my ARCs like a madwoman! :)

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Hahahahahahaha.

Ohhhh, was I wrong. The other day, as Patrick and I were FINALLY setting out on our errand-run, 45 minutes after we'd originally planned to leave, we looked at each other and just laughed. Because you can either laugh or weep, and only one of them is a good idea in front of the baby...

So, looking back on the last few days, I can't see a lot of things I've done, apart from looking after the baby. (Which is a pleasure as well as a job, of course.) Probably the biggest thing we did was - gasp! - we finally stiffened our upper lips and actually donated 6 bursting bags of books to the Oxfam charity shop. Book purge! The little old lady taking donations looked mildly pleased and impressed when Patrick carried in the first two overflowing bags. Then I brought in the third and fourth bags, and she began to look afraid. By the fifth and sixth bags, she was backing away from me and looking downright horrified. "We're moving house," I explained, with an apologetic smile.

Truth? These are the books we'd already set aside to purge a month ago, well before we found a new house. And now, as we start to think about packing up our house, it's time to think about yet another purge. (We still have piles and piles of books sitting on the floor as well as in our 7 bookcases.) But maybe we'll find a different charity shop for that second round - I think if the Oxfam ladies saw us coming, they might lock the door against us!

Sigh. I hate giving up my books, but sometimes, it truly Has To Be Done. And it's not like we won't still have thousands left...especially once this month's Amazon order arrives. ;) I admit that, from some perspectives, I might be seen as having A Book Problem. On the other hand, I am a writer, so it's a professional requirement...right????

Someday we're going to live in a house with walls that are actually lined with bookshelves, floor to ceiling. Then people who don't have This Book Problem will think I am a maniac...but I will feel wonderfully, deliciously At Home. :)

What about you guys? Do you keep your books after you've read them, for comfort and future re-reads, or do you read once and then dispose for the sake of a lovely, uncluttered house?

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We were planning to rent in southwest England; now we're probably going to rent in Wales, just over the border, for at least 6 months, while we keep on househunting in England. (Houses in the city that we want come up for rent only VERY rarely, and they tend to be snapped up within 24-48 hours. That makes househunting difficult in general but absolutely *impossible* while living up north.) We'll be living in a little Welsh town loomed over by huge hills, and our house will be in walking distance of two coffeeshops for me and Patrick, a playground for MrD, a park for Maya, and best of all, a castle for me. Woooooot!!!! I love castles so much. Ever since I moved to England, I've been hoping to live in a town with a castle one day, and this one, while tiny, is very cute. Plus, it's in easy driving distance of one of my favorite castles anywhere, Raglan Castle, which is GORGEOUS. So all in all, although this wasn't the housing solution we were expecting, it's one that looks really promising. :)

Now MrD and I have just gotten back from a day out, having had lunch with Shana and her partner at a nice Italian restaurant in Leeds and then a wonderful hour-and-a-half-long play session in the baby section of Borders. One of those things I would never have known if I hadn't become a parent - the baby section at Borders is a major social hub! MrD had a great time playing with other babies his age there, and I had a great time with their parents, none of whom I'd ever met before, but all of whom were commiserating/trading tips on all the same issues we've been going through. Then, when we left, the Borders employee at the till generously gave me a 20% discount on all the books I bought even though I'd accidentally left my discount voucher at home. International chain or no, I'm feeling an awful lot of customer loyalty to Borders right at this minute!

But the one book I'm most excited about right now is only being stocked in American shops: Freda Warrington's Elfland. Seriously, if you're a fan of adult fantasy novels, you should run out to buy this book! It's a contemporary fantasy set in England, full of love and magic and betrayal and redemption. It's lushly written, deeply intelligent and full of complex, difficult and true human relationships, as well as beautifully atmospheric magic. I was lucky enough to read an early version of this novel, and I loved it SO much even in that early draft. I can't wait for my copy to arrive from Amazon.co.uk! Freda wrote one of my very favorite historical fantasy novels, The Court of the Midnight King (about Richard III), and I'm so glad her books are finally being published in the US. Yay, Freda!

And now, since for the first time all day, I'm alone with no babycare or dogwalking to do, I'm going to actually do some (gasp!) fiction writing. Wish me luck...

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It was a lovely surprise to see that today, after a frustrating afternoon of phoning yet more estate agents without much success. Our first day of house-hunting, on Saturday, was...well, it wasn't really unproductive. After all, it's a useful thing to find out what houses (and neighborhoods) won't work for us...it's just very frustrating. At least we also went to my favorite used bookstore in the world and bought 9 awesome books for £8, which was definitely some consolation. I found a couple of books I'm looking forward to re-reading now and reading out loud to MrD when he's older (The Phantom Tollbooth and Mrs Frisby and the Rats of Nimh); a couple of books I've been meaning to read for a long time now (Looking for Alaska and The Luxe), and some other books that were lovely random finds, like Harriette Wilson's Memoirs, which I found for 60 pence.

(After reading the first 60 pages of Harriette Wilson's memoirs, I am now totally convinced: if Mr Darcy hadn't bribed Wickham to marry Lydia, she would have turned into Harriette Wilson. Wilson was one of the most famous courtesans in Regency England, a career she first launched into when she ran away from her parents' house with a man at age 15, the same age that Lydia was when she ran away with Mr Wickham. In her memoirs, she has exactly Lydia's shallowness, exactly Lydia's cattiness - especially toward other women - and exactly the same purringly self-satisfied perspective on the world...and yet, despite all that, her memoirs are hugely entertaining and readable. They give a fascinating perspective on a world that isn't shown in most Regency novels, a world whose existence respectable women weren't supposed to even acknowledge - but which respectable men like the Duke of Wellington and Beau Brummell could freely visit, right after dancing at proper Society balls.)

So I have lots of new books to console me as I keep making phone calls, and we have more house viewings set up in the next few days. Wish us luck!

And in the meantime, I really hope you like the story. :)

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Yeah. There's one of my more embarrassing secrets... I don't think I could live without a dog anymore. Once you've experienced that infinite sweetness aimed directly at you, that total sense of companionship, loyalty and playfulness at your side, it's almost impossible to give it up. Getting Maya is one of the best things I've ever done, and I've never regretted it.

But there is just one part of living with a dog that I hate. And it's called househunting.

We've been living in Leeds for 6-1/2 years now, and 6 of those have been spent very happily in the same house. We love our landlady (she's also one of my best friends - how convenient is that?), we love the wooded valley two blocks away and the horses that live on our street...but it's finally time to move, and we're moving all the way down to the southwest of England, where Patrick used to live, and where we've always planned to move "someday". Now someday is here...and I'm remembering just how much I used to hate househunting, for the sake of that one moment repeated thousands and thousands of times along the way...

"I'd love to view the property, but I ought to tell you first - I have a dog, is that going to be a problem? Oh...well...I understand. Thanks anyway."

Sigh.

Maya is a super dog. She's been perfectly housetrained ever since we first met her, she rarely barks, and she's a joy to know. But househunting with a dog? Totally sucks.

Tomorrow we're driving down to spend the week in the southwest, househunting in person. So far this afternoon I've called five different estate agencies about five different properties. Only one of them said that the owner of the house would allow pets.

Again: Sigh. Back to searching through the online listings for the next set of phone calls. But at least I get to do it with a sweet, happy dog snuggled into my side, as consolation...

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*Note: volunteering as a dogwalker was such a great experience. If anyone out there doesn't have a dog but still wants to get some regular cuddling & playing time, please go sign up as a shelter volunteer! They desperately need you, and oh, you'll get so much out of the experience. It's not just about doing a good deed for dogs who desperately need some kindness. It's also about making yourself happy and getting lots of love. I walked the shelter dogs twice a week, spending an hour at the shelter each time, and every single time I did, I spent the rest of the day afterward just floating on the fun and sweetness of it.

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It was my first time in Vienna and my first time living abroad. I was in bliss. I ate apple strudel every single day, along with big fatty Austrian meals like baked cheese, but I still lost weight while I was there because I walked miles every day, too, awed by the architecture, the language, the music (we went to concerts at least twice a week)...

When I came back home, someone told me that going abroad teaches you how American/[insert your own nationality] you really are. It's in the contrast of a different culture that you really notice your own and all your embedded assumptions. I guess that's true - it certainly called things into question for me that I'd never even considered before. But guess what really shows up all your most deeply embedded assumptions? Having a baby in another country.

Of course, there are lots of external cultural differences that are obvious from the start. I got pregnant at the same time as my friend Ysa, who lives in Chicago, so we went through pregnancy together and got conflicting "standard" medical advice on all sorts of things. That's continued since our babies were born, since American and British doctors recommend different vaccination schedules, different vitamins, etc., etc. The list goes on and on, and really, it's been pretty eye-opening. Sometimes I've instinctively agreed with the British medical doctrine, sometimes with the American. Either way, it certainly makes me less likely to blindly believe whatever medical advice I happen to be offered by a doctor in any one part of the world.

But the differences go way deeper than that. Patrick and I grew up with all the same lullabies - but half of them were set to different tunes. American babies are taught to call their babies "Mommy" or "Mama". British babies are taught to call them "Mummy". American "wallets" are British "purses", while American "purses" are British "handbags". Which do I call it when MrD points at something? Half the time, I pause in mid-sentence, frozen as I try to work that out.

When I'm reading him a picture book set in the jungle, do I call the animal we're looking at a "jag-wahr" or a "jag-you-are"? Do I use my own natural pronunciation (thus being true to myself AND my culture!) or do I use the pronunciation he'll need to use later in life if he wants the other kids to understand him? That's just one small example of a big issue I grapple with every day. Of course I want MrD to identify with his American identity and heritage. (He's a dual citizen.) And of course I want him to fit in here...because for both little and big kids, not fitting in is fatal. So which issue is really more important? And when?

Right now I'm making that decision on a case-by-case basis for every small dilemma. For instance, I'm teaching him mostly British words, so that he'll be understood by the British kids he grows up with...but the name he's already learned to say is "Mama", and when he gets older, if he lets me pick the name that shifts to, it'll be "Mom", not "Mum". Because that's about my identity, as much as his, and when I first tried to teach him "Mummy", when he was younger, I was shocked by the irrational but powerful sense of repulsion and unhappiness that went through me. Of course there's nothing wrong with calling your mother "Mummy"...but I grew up planning to be either a "mommy" or a "mama", instead, and that somehow matters even when it shouldn't.

I knew that becoming a parent was going to teach me an awful lot. But I wasn't expecting that one of the things it would teach me - just like moving to any foreign country - was who I really am already, whether I like it or not.

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• Blowing bubbles with MrD: I hadn't blown bubbles for at least twenty years. But one of the other moms I know recommended getting a bottle to entertain the baby...and guess what? MrD likes the bubbles just fine, but the person who really loves them is me! They're beautiful and magical, with all the rainbow of colors swirling around them as they float away from me through the air. There's something incredibly relaxing about sitting outside on the grass in the cool English summer air, blowing iridescent bubbles through the air. We do it every afternoon now...and I have to admit, it's not really for Mr Darcy's sake.
• Y.S. Lee's The Agency: A Spy in the House: I finished reading this book yesterday and absolutely loved it. Girl spies in Victorian England! Disguises, mystery and intrigue! A perfectly-toned romance! A genuinely unexpected family secret, a whole host of strong, interesting women, and a completely non-stereotypical view of the Chinese community in Victorian England! It was just so cool, and I can't wait to read the second book in her trilogy. This is the first time in ages I've actually written a fan letter to an author. You can check out an excerpt here.
• Upcoming ARCs: the ARCs for A Most Improper Magick are due to arrive on my editor's desk next Wednesday, and I'll be getting copies soon after that (making adjustments for the speed of international mail, of course...why yes, I am obsessing! ;) ). I have been literally counting down the days until I might be able to hold one in my hands! I don't know yet how many I'll get, but I'm hoping to use them in a series of giveaways over the next eight months.
• Lara St John's Bach Works for Violin Solo: the awesome sent me this CD, and oh, wow. Listening to it feels kind of like getting my heart ripped out...but in the best possible way! I can't even count how many times I've listened to it over the last week.
• Primeval: this show is so silly. So, so silly. And yet...dinosaurs rampaging through London tube stations! How could I possibly resist? I absolutely love it. I'm nearly finished with Season 1 and planning to start watching Season 2 very soon. On zombie exhaustion days, it's just exactly what the doctor ordered. :)

What about you guys? What's been making you happy lately?

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For me, Strange Horizons has meant different things over the last 8 years. It's been my favorite fantasy magazine, hands down, ever since I first started reading it in 2001. It's consistently published stories I'm interested in and stories I love, and it's the magazine I always go to first, every time I'm in the mood to read a new short story. Because of that, it was also the pro magazine I wanted most desperately to sell to ever since I first started regularly writing & submitting short stories, also in 2001. I submitted to them for three years straight without any luck - and then when I finally sold them a story in 2004 ("Some Girlfriends Can"), it felt like the biggest victory EVER. I found out about the sale in the middle of our honeymoon, and oh, it really was the best wedding gift I could have possibly been given! Better yet, I sold them a second story pretty soon after, and I thought, wow, now I really am a pro...

...and then guess what? I didn't manage to sell them anything else for years. And trust me, that wasn't for lack of trying. On average, I've probably submitted at least 6 stories a year to them since 2001, but I've still sold them only 4 stories in total. So here's another way I think of Strange Horizons: as my personal gold standard, the one I aspire to every time but don't always hit. Every time I do, the news still fills me with the same, disbelieving joy.

When I'm in the mood for good fiction, I often just browse their fiction archives. There's such a huge variety of stuff there, from romantic contemporary fantasy (Deb Coates's Magic in a Certain Slant of Light) to wonderful fables (Jenn Reese's Tales of the Chinese Zodiac, starting with Monkey) to quietly powerful horror (Charles Coleman Finlay's The Moon is Always Full). Those are just a few of my personal favorites - I bet if you read through the archives, you'll come up with your own personal list, because there's such a rich variety to choose from.

If you have a few dollars to spare for the fund drive, that would be absolutely awesome. Strange Horizons pays its authors pro rates, which is part of why the fiction is so consistently good, and yet they give the stories away for free. That means they desperately NEED reader donations - and hey, if you do it now, you can enter the drawing for cool prizes! But even if you can't donate right now, I'd definitely urge you to check out their fiction archives next time you're in the mood for a really good science fiction or fantasy story. They really are worth your time.

Check them out!

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*Karen's creativity spills in different ways into rich, wonderful fiction-writing, friendship, mix tapes, crafts, and parenting, a combination I really admire.

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But not as much as there usually would have been, because WOW, was our anniversary night out wonderful. We ate really delicious Thai food at a restaurant loaded with beautiful, romantic atmosphere; we made a deal that we weren't even allowed to discuss any baby issues while we were out; we actually (gasp!) held hands for the first time in ages, since for once, neither of us was pushing a stroller or holding a wriggling baby...wow. What a weird, weird way to have a date! ;) Best of all, Mr Darcy had a fabulous time playing with his best friend "Captain Wentworth", so it was a completely guilt-free night out: parenting gold. :)

And it was a nice, low-key weekend, too. The downside was that I've been really tired because of an unnamed baby's nighttime wakefulness (ahem); the upside was that because of that, in the last three days I've actually allowed myself some total downtime for the first time in a long time. Instead of grabbing all my free time to write (please look away now, Barry! :) ), I actually watched DVDs. Whoa. I hadn't seen a movie or a TV show for...umm...well, I can't even remember the last time before that. It had definitely been at least a month. I managed to convince myself, though, that using my baby-free time on Sunday to watch the 1990s BBC version of "Emma" (starring Kate Beckinsale) wasn't being lazy - it was doing research! Yeah! This is where it really helps to be writing Regency novels. I LOVE having justification to watch Austen films! And this was a fun adaptation - worlds better than the Gwyneth Paltrow movie! - and in fact was so good that, amazingly, I only barely cringed at the "romantic" line, as the hero is finally drawing the heroine into his arms: "I held you in my arms when you were three weeks old..."

EWWW. But really? In context, it was only a little bit gross. Honestly.

Of course, it was a little less convincing when I told myself later that watching the first episode of "Primeval" also counted as research (it's, um...spec fic! And I write spec fic! So...???), and when it came to mainlining the first four episodes of the BBC documentary "Underage and Pregnant" yesterday (great for learning about human character! really! er....)...well, I was pretty much grasping at straws by that point.

But today, for the first time in four days, I actually sat down for a solid writing session, and I wrote 750 words that made me pretty happy. So who knows? Maybe the TV did help after all.

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I have to admit it was touch-and-go for a while. Two days ago, when I received my own Mysterious Package, Patrick gazed at it with great longing and open speculation. We looked at each other. We said, "Well, we could open our anniversary presents just a little bit early..."

But we didn't. We were strong, like pioneers! Or, well, like people who enjoy getting nice presents on important days, and who learned hard lessons when they were seven years old and went crawling through every closet in the house, hunting down every hidden Christmas present weeks early...and then had a really, really sad and disappointing Christmas Day when there wasn't a single surprise left.

Okay, I'm really just talking about myself now. Patrick and I do have a lot in common, but I can't swear he actually had that last experience. I did, though, and boy did it stick with me. It was a Learning Experience.

So! We waited until this morning, then, like all the classiest couples do, wrapped the gifts in towels or baby blankets, whichever was handiest for each of us, and did the exchange. Mr Darcy whooped in glee at the boxes, by far the most exciting part of the experience for him! But I screamed out loud when I saw my gift, because it was Just Exactly Right and What I Wanted.

It's a Cross fountain pen called "Starlight", in Midnight Blue, with silver stars on a deep blue background, and, well, for everybody who remembers the original name of Kat Book 2*, you'll get how absolutely ideal this pen feels to me for writing Kat books (and maybe even for signing some next year). And for anyone who knows how absolutely gaga I am for fountain pens, especially really nice ones, you won't be at all surprised to know that I was so blissed out at the sight of this one, I turned into limp jelly. Right now, I'm typing on my laptop, but the pen is still lying next to me on the couch so that I can reach over and touch it any time I want.

Yeah, I know I'm a geek. But I'm a happy one. :)

Tonight, Patrick and I are going to be wild and radical and, for the first time since Mr Darcy's birth, go out to dinner on our own. Whoa. We are actually using a babysitter, and one who isn't even a member of the family (although she is a good friend whom we trust, and who will be getting babysitting of her own in return very soon). Bets are on for which of us freaks out first and insists on racing back to the babysitter's house because we can't bear to be away from our baby any longer...

...but in the meantime, it's been a great anniversary, and the surprise was worth the wait. Thank you, sweetheart!!!

___

*the-book-formerly-known-as-Kat by Starlight

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