Scarlet Letters

We just changed formats here, and I didn't realize I had to actually click to approve comments. The comments for the last few days have been approved. I never claimed to be all that bright. Once again: abusive and wildly off-topic comments will not be approved. Feel free to vent in your own space; this is my living room, and I expect people to behave as if they were actually sitting in my home. If you have criticisms, I'll approve them - as long as they're polite. Anonymous comments will be allowed again if everyone plays nice. I love to hear from my readers. But there's only so much nonsense I'm going to take in my own space. Say what you will elsewhere, but here, let's remember the kindergarten rules: speak to others as you would wish to be spoken to.

God-damn. I could use more days like this. It's a cautious joy, writing something I love and knowing it's what I really wanted to do. Joyful because I love this story, love these characters and I think I'm making it better. Cautious because as much as I love this book, it's never right, and there's no one to buy it. I wish I had the security of established contracts. I hate writing on spec. And yet most of my work is on spec. Is that because I'm small press? Is it because I have yet to land with one solid publisher - poly-published? Is it because I suck like a Hoover and nobody loves me? Ah, the reasons writers drink. :) Still, I'm having so much fun I don't want to stop even though my fingers are numb, my wrist is sore and it's midnight with work in nine hours. It's been a long time since I felt this way. And I didn't even kill anyone today.

My preliminary schedule for DragonCon is as follows: FRIDAY 4 p.m. - autograph session (books will be available for sale) 10 p.m. - Little Deaths: The strange relationship between eroticism and horror (a.k.a. the Ubiquitous Late-Night Sex Panel) SATURDAY 2:30 p.m. - reading (I'll be doing THE COLD ONES - be there!) 5:30 p.m. - Vampires vs. Zombies (hey, I can be a double agent!) 8:30 p.m. - Undead in Dixie (southern vampires, y'all) SUNDAY 11:30 a.m. - The Sacred & The Profane (religion in dark fantasy; I bet I'm the token Christian) MONDAY 10 a.m. - Challenges for Today's Writers (the oh-shit-we're-all-gonna-die panel) I'll be in the exhibitor's hall hawking books any time I'm not doing this stuff, or perhaps wandering about mugging people in the hallways. Buy books!

ME: Woof, when you get a moment, can I bother you? WOOF: Yes dear? ME: Magazine or clip? WOOF: What do you want to do with it? ME: Shoot people. WOOF: Who are you? ME: Military. WOOF: Magazine. ME: When is it appropriate to use "clip"? WOOF: When you're a civilian. ME: Noted. This is why a writer must always have friends. :)

Ye gods, it's my life. Quasi-seriously, folks? If you want to see something other than the latest TWILIGHT clone in books, if you want to see artists and artisans thrive, if you value those snarky buttons and funny T-shirts that make up such a part of convention culture... bring the cash to the dealer's room. Every show for the last eighteen months has been thinner and the eyes of the dealers become more desperate. Keep them in business, or you'll be stuck with Hot Topic. Oh, and buy my books. :)

For those who knew her, today is a bittersweet day. It would have been Jennie's 26th birthday. Jennie died in March. I intended to link to the column I wrote about her for the paper, but it seems those links only last for a few weeks and then they expire. For those who don't know or who weren't with us, Jennie was our friend. She had cystic fibrosis. She received a lung transplant, but it didn't hold. She was on the transplant list when she died. For her mother Selena, today was especially difficult in a manner I can't even begin to contemplate. My own son is so very dear to me, and I feel his absence even when he's just away visiting his father or my mother. I cannot comprehend the depth and breadth of Selena's loss. But it seems an appropriate day to remind all who don't know about STEAMPOSIUM. There's a connection. Bear with me. As Jennie was entering her final battle, Conflation had a particularly successful year with a steampunk theme. In fact,...

Artist Janet Chui talks about the process for developing this lovely Dreadmire image: Shiny, isn't it? I really think it captures Alesia particularly well. Anyway, read all about it on Janet's blog .

A friendly reminder that you only have until July 15 to preorder THE DREADMIRE CHRONICLES! It's first-come, first-served for those who want the limited first edition - I have absolutely no idea how many of those will be available after Babelcon, guys. Depending on how popular it is at the show, there may not be any. So you must preorder AND PAY before July 15 to be guaranteed a book! While I'm hopeful I'll be able to get future shipments, "hopeful" isn't the same thing as "positive." The books are $18 plus $5 shipping, and if you order more than one book shipping is free. I have all my titles in stock at the moment, though a snag with the printer is making SETTING SUNS a little scarce. Order now! Don't let the swamp boat sail without you! :) P.S. Since there was confusion on this... order by emailing booksales@elizabethdonald.com, not by posting here. Yes, we're working on a smoother method. Possibly by the fall, more likely next year. Paypal...

Okay, folks, here's the way it's gonna go: There will be a special first edition of THE DREADMIRE CHRONICLES available only at BabelCon in Baton Rouge, July 17-19. This will be an extremely small print run, and I don't have the price yet. However many are left at the end of the show - and I have no guarantee any will be left - I will snag for you guys. The trade release will be out August 1. The cost is $18 plus $5 shipping. You can preorder now, and I strongly urge you to do so, because I don't know how many copies of either edition I'll be able to acquire. That's if you want a copy signed by me. If you don't care, you can wait and order from the publisher. We'll take preorders starting now through July 15. If you prefer the special first edition, say so in your order, but keep in mind you're reserving a copy without knowing the price. However many I can snag at the show, that's how many I'll have, first come first served. As before, if you ...

Okay, normal people do not have these dreams. I dreamed that I met with an agent who had brokered a deal for another collection of short stories. She had everything in place, including a cover, and I had a week to get the stories together. "But I don't have enough short stories for a collection!" I protested, but she didn't care. "Write them," she insisted. Then I talked Steven Shrewsbury into writing the introduction on the horror short story as an art form, probably because my subconscious is still intimidated by Shrews' 350 published stories. Dream-Shrews was very agreeable. Less agreeable were nameless editors I was contacting to get rights back to some of my short stories so they could be reprinted in this collection. Which is funny, because I actually have the rights to much of my stuff by now. I think. I spent the whole dream in a panic attack about getting this thing together by my fictional agent's unrealistic deadline. When I awoke, I was r...

SUNDAY My wonderful minions (I even bought them MINION buttons) were so understanding about letting me free from booth duty. The first panel of the day was on constructing a space combat game that actually follows Newtonian physics. Now, I'm not constructing a game, but I am constructing space combat. So I attended the panel with Professor Rob Knop, designated physics nerd, and took notes on how Newtonian physics would apply to space travel and combat. It's always humbling to be the dumbest one in the room. Everyone knew more about physics than me, including the teenager in the back. I took Physics for Dummkompfs in tenth grade and passed, fleeing it for molecular biology as fast as I could manage. I got about 80 percent of what Rob was saying, mostly because he was patient with my stupid questions. I still don't quite get why we can't go faster than light, because I don't get how space and time are tied together, because I'm not fuckin' Einstein. But I thin...

SATURDAY I love Hypericon for many reasons, but one of the top reasons is that His Fredness never schedules anyone before 10 a.m. This is one of the many reasons we love Fred. But I was hunting Fred, because there was a zombie panel at 1 p.m. and I wasn't on it. Now, it wasn't Fred's fault, per se - he couldn't know that I had a zombie novella coming out because nobody knew it - I was announcing it at the con. But I wanted on that panel. Keep in mind, Fred likes to give me shit. I'm noticing this trend among my closest friends and certainly my family. Those who like me the best give me the most shit. I'm all sweet and gentle to them, and this is what I get? I swear, I don't know what the world is coming to. *ducks* Because I know the best way to find Fred is to find his wife Stephania, I went to the con suite. Stephania dashed my hopes, said she can't keep track of Fred at con without a bell around his neck. So I grabbed a diet soda instead and who shoul...

FRIDAY All right, enough silliness. Time to work. Flunkies lined up, we proceeded to the con for booth setup. The work Katie and I did clearing out all the detritus really paid off. The boothstuff was reduced to one rolling box of doom, and Katie organized all the books by title into fewer boxes, eliminating the endless trips to the car and the annoying jumble behind the booth. Brava Katie. Therefore booth setup was much less painful than previous shows. I really like our design this year: Louisiana gothic, with moss-green crinkled not-silk draperies, cobweb black lace toppers, creepy-fabric accents on the racks and strings of little human skulls. What's that you say? I've got a dark-fantasy swamp romp coming out next month? Well, I suppose it's a coincidence! The new display for the buttons worked amazingly well, especially when propped against the box of stained glass, which looks very nice on the black lace (too bad I can't auto-generate a window behind every booth, ...

How does one write up a blast like Hypericon? It's like a crazy, inebriated and decidedly geeky family reunion, except you like these people. WEDNESDAY The boy and I got a spectacularly late start - thanks, all you sources that waited until 4:30 p.m. to call me back. I spit my last breath at thee. With a little extra spit-up for UPS, which was delivering a box of SETTING SUNS and thought 5 p.m. was a good delivery time. I almost left without it, except SS is perennially my best seller. I was on four hours' bad sleep, as I always have - ahem - performance anxiety before cons. I'm shy. And to be honest, I've had more than a little insecurity about my career of late, given the massive writer's block, the book that hates hates hates me and last year's publication setbacks. Whinge whinge complain bitch. This one was a big mess to organize, what with two cons the same weekend. The lovely and talented Miss Katie handled DieCon in St. Louis while I was gallivanting abou...

This book hates me. It wants me to die in a fire. Of course, I have 3912843 other things going on right now and I suspect if I locked myself away somewhere for a long period of time, I might actually get real work done on it. I might even start to enjoy it. But lacking a long period of free time or any creative energy at the moment, I expect I will not enjoy this motherfucker until I'm doing the second draft. Just once, I want to be able to write a book well the first time. In other news, COVER OF DARKNESS is in and preorders will ship after the weekend. Other things are brewing, but I can't tell you yet. Looking forward to Hypericon next week. For now, sleeeeepy. Goodnight, moon.

I finished up my night shift a little early tonight, and thought I'd do my friend Jeff Strand a solid by picking up a paperback of PRESSURE. It's a terrific book, and Jeff was rightfully nominated for a Stoker for it. I already have the fancy-schmancy hardback, but if I had a paperback, I could read that to smithereens and save my fancy-schmancy for when Jeff has a zillion dollars and nubile slave-girls feeding him peeled grapes and his first Big Break Book is worth a zillion dollars. I went to the horror section, and to my chagrin, there were no PRESSUREs there. Now, I know the terrible stories as well as Jeff. The first week is the most important for a NY-published book, the first month is crucial, and authors whose books don't make it quickly onto the shelves can wind up screwed. There have been authors whose whole careers tanked because bookstores were lazy about stocking the books they ordered. So I proceeded immediately to the information desk and asked if they had PR...

Welcome to the post I'm going to repeat so often you'll all hate me by the end of the month! Most of you know I'm a team captain for Relay for Life, the primary fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. We're in the homestretch, and my team is small but mighty. But last year Relays were down by something in the area of 50 percent, and my team didn't make its goal for the first time since our inception. So help me out! I'm scrounging for donations. Even $5 makes a difference, $20 makes even more. And you'll get something out of it. In previous years, I've offered a short story. This year, you get a different short story for every $5 you donate, up to four! Two of them have never been published, even. Please consider donating to my efforts. I guarantee when you stop and think about it, you know someone affected by cancer. Someone who fought it. Someone who died of it. Cancer is the truly universal disease. It knows no boundaries, respects no race, religi...

As I have gotten multiple requests public and private... Sorry, I cannot take preorders yet for DREADMIRE, as we don't have pricing information. I'm gratified at all the interest when we haven't even got a cover yet! I may take reservations, but we're not doing that until at least June. COVER OF DARKNESS is taking all our efforts right now, and if I add another preorder Katie may quit, and then where would I be? :) But rest assured - once we have our undead ducks in a row, you'll hear all about how you can buy DREADMIRE...

Almost forgot, didn't ya? Got word today that THE DREADMIRE CHRONICLES will come out in mid-July. It looks like we're going to release the book at Babelcon in Baton Rouge, July 17-19. I'm really excited about this book. It was a real departure for me, doing the sword-and-sorcery thing, and playing in Randy Richards' sandbox was a blast and a half. I think you guys will really enjoy the romp through the swamp. Unknown yet whether I'm going to do a premiere event in St. Louis. I'm considering it, if we can find a way to fit it into the schedule (and budget!) without killing me or driving Katie into the asylum. She's already giving me The Look over our summer: "Baton Rouge in JULY??" Hey, we're Illinoisans. We don't do hot. Welcome to the muck...

I attended my first two years of high school at the Bryn Mawr School for girls in Baltimore. I was a scholarship student, and it was my only experience with private school. We moved the summer after my sophomore year to Martin, Tenn. where I finished high school in public school. But I always loved Bryn Mawr, as the wonderful, progressive and ground-breaking school it was, for its history and inclusiveness and intellectual challenge. I keep my class ring in a special place, and I was glad they allowed me to join the alumnae association even though I graduated elsewhere. Recently they asked me to answer a few questions for an upcoming newsletter on alumnae authors. I rattled something off at about 1 a.m. the night it was due. Just like old times! Ah, the midnight oil burned as I crammed for those history exams... Anyway. I was floored to find the Communique in my mail and see that they gave me an entire page, plus a picture of me and cover art from ABADDON and SETTING SUNS. Whee! If you...