Scarlet Letters

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...

I am taking preorders for COVER OF DARKNESS only through Sunday! This horror anthology from Sam's Dot Publishing includes my short story "Weathergirl" and comes out on May 10. Cover price is $10 plus $5 shipping, but if you order any other title from me at the same time, shipping's on me. What's that? You want the entire collected works of Elizabeth Donald? Here's what we have in stock: SETTING SUNS $13 NOCTURNE $12 ABADDON $8 Or you can get all three for $30. Toss in COVER OF DARKNESS and it's $40. Bonus: You get them all signed. Also available for $1 each: Buttons! Too many images to upload, but here at the slogans: Aim For the Head I Got Bitten at Nocturnal Urges and All I Got Was This Lousy Button Fire Good, Zombies Bad I Baked You a Halfling, But I Eated It Halfling: The Other White Meat I Don't Drink.... Wine O-Positive: Shaken Not Stirred Paddle Faster, I Hear Banjos Rock Paper Crossbow Show Me Yours and I'll Show You Mine (with sword) You k...

We haven't done this in a while, and since the anthology's about to come out, I guess it's time for a chat! WHAT: Fan chat WHEN: 7 p.m. Monday, May 4 WHERE: The Wilderness Chat Room (directions below) WHY: For fun! Prizes and silliness will abound. Wilderness Chat Room Directions: a) Go to http://wilderness.homeip.net/wilderness/connect/bean/index.html. b) Wait while it loads. This can take a minute. You may see a little coffee cup thinking. c) If it asks you if you trust the applet, you say YES. d) You'll see a little black screen. Click File and go down to Connect. e) It will ask you for a login name and password. You only have to do this step once. Remember your password for the next chat! Join us!

By the way.... I wish I knew why this book was like pulling teeth, but at least it's moving again. More tomorrow if it kills me. I know it'll be a great book if I can just get the words.

Today was Assistants Day, or the Artist Formerly Known as Secretary's Day Before We Decided That Was Rude. Katie called it National Flunky Day, but I don't listen to her. Much. I took Katie out to lunch today, however, because it was a tiny itty bitty way to thank her for everything she does for me. Folks, this woman doesn't do what she does because I pay her scads of money. *pauses for the hysterical bitter laughter coming from East Alton* Believe me. The money ain't good. If I were Laurell K. Hamilton, Katie would be on salary with health care and all the trimmings. But at the moment, my cash flow barely covers our expenses, much less the kind of money that makes it a real attractive job. In the lean weeks between shows, payment is frequently in the form of baked goods. And yet Katie Yates hauls her ass halfway across the Midwest and back for me, spends weekend after weekend strapped into a corset and shilling my stuff to men (and not a few women) trying look down her...

I spent part of tonight's session writing up an outline. I didn't use an outline for my first few books, but since my publishers started requiring them, I've become rather dependent on figuring these things out in advance. I'm rather pleased with the plot I've outlined - I think it'll be a lot of fun, and the characters are starting to take shape. I'm less confident in my worldbuilding - I keep trying to fall into my other space universe, and this needs to be standalone. I'm not sure if I have enough plot to make a full-length novel. My fiction usually grows about one-third longer in second draft, but I think I definitely need another complication to make this a novel-length piece. One day I'm going to learn to write fiction in one draft with edits, rather than writing everything twice. No wonder I can only do a book a year. Still, I'm enjoying this one pretty well. I think it'll be a lot of fun, and I hope the readers will like it too. It...

Happy to declare that the anthology COVER OF DARKNESS will be a trade paperback released the first week of May from Sam's Dot Publishing. They accepted my short story "Weathergirl" for the anthology, and I'm enjoying working with Tyree Campbell again. Here's the shiny shiny cover art:

Hey buster, wanna buy a book? This is the chorus most often found in convention dealer's halls, as we're all getting so desperate we're nearly mugging the passers-by. While sitting behind the rack of books at Midsouthcon this past weekend, I tried the Jedi Mind Trick: "These ARE the books you're looking for." I got a lot of amused giggles. Not so much with the sales. We're all in trouble. Nobody's buying books. Heck, Borders itself may go under any day. So I beg you to participate in the 2009 Horror Bail Out! The banks got one, so did Detroit (but not newspapers!). Here in the horror world, we're dying on the vine. Books aren't selling, magazines are folding and publishers are clinging by fingernails. So take a whole $20 and go buy a horror novel or subscribe to a magazine. Any magazine, any book. (Though you can try mine if you really want to - I make a great birthday present!) Go buy from one of Choate's participants and you'll get ...

Midsouthcon was held this past weekend in a strange Escher-like hotel with ramps and staircases leading to nowhere in particular. I have to say, it was a neat environment, even if the hotel policies annoyed me to no end. But this is not the place to gripe. Also, bourbon is evil. Instead, I'll tell you something interesting that happened in Memphis. I had just finished a panel on pulp fiction in which I was completely and utterly faking it - no idea what the hell I was talking about, but I've never yet missed an assigned panel, so I wasn't about to start. As I left the panel, I nearly bumped into a woman arriving for the WATCHMEN panel. She stopped and said, "Oh, I LOVE YOU!" This threw me off my step just a tad, and grinning, I stopped. She pointed at me and said, "SETTING SUNS!" Squee. You know, sometimes I still think SETTING SUNS is my favorite book. About half the stories seem horribly amateurish to me now and it's been out for years so just abou...

For reasons passing understanding these colors are all screwed up. Pretend the colors are normal. I cannot make up my mind.

It's fun what you find when you wander around looking for yourself. I was checking on Amazon's ABADDON page and saw that someone was selling a "collectible" version of the book. Since I'm not familiar with a collectible edition, I clicked it. Seems a Lisa Marie (Presley?) ordered a personalized copy of the book and never picked it up from this seller. This is quite a trick, since personalizations would only be available at conventions or by direct sales. Either this bookstore special-ordered it from us for her (and didn't get the money in advance) or they actually stood in a (very short) line at a show last year to get it done. Or, y'know, it's used. :) They're asking $11.99. Until the price kicked up on Jan. 1, the book retailed $5.99. Now I know what my signature is worth: six bucks. HEE. I will not be satisfied until it's at least twenty! Hey, Stephen King's early hardbacks go from $55-70 to $500-plus when he signs them, depending on ho...

In my sophomore year of college, I took a class on playwriting. I kept meaning to take a fiction writing class, but it was always cross-scheduled with something required by my theater major. I figured playwriting was the closest I would get and still satisfy my adviser. The playwriting professor was Dr. Stephen Malin, one of the finest teachers from whom I ever had the privilege to learn. I had already taken theater history from him. Dr. Malin was not satisfied with my writing, regularly giving me C's. It was quite the conflict for me at the time - my writing had always skated me by in other classes. I might not have understood very much about World War I, but my charming prose usually got me higher marks. My writing was my strong point. But Dr. Malin didn't grade us on what we accomplished. He graded us according to what we were capable of doing. He knew I could write circles around much of the stuff I turned in, and he would not accept the bare minimum. Naturally, I was nervo...

Last night I dreamed I was flipping through an electronic Writers' Market, which is funny because a) I haven't used WM for years, and b) I don't own a Kindle. Maybe it was actually Ralan.com, best market listing on the web - sort of Ralan if it was on a booklike reader. I was flipping through guidelines searching for new novella markets, because I have this really great novella and I can't find a good home for it. That part is true. And clearly it's taking over my subconscious. So I'm reading the guidelines for market after market, and for some reason I'm also sitting beside the lovely pool at my ex-husband's house, which is funny since I've never been there. And I find a great market, but oops! It pops up a preemptive rejection note, very polite but very firm. Addressed to me. Yes, in my dream I am rejected before I even submit. Methinks the whole slush fight might be getting me down a bit. But we all fight the slush wars, don't we? Okay, maybe ...

Reposting from damn near everywhere: Online "Lottery" to Benefit the Shirley Jackson Awards Takes place from February 9 through February 23, 2009 Boston, MA (January 2009) – The Shirley Jackson Awards will hold a "lottery" to raise funds for the award. This on-line event takes place from February 9, 2009 through February 23, 2009. Persons buy as many "lottery tickets" as they want in hopes of being selected the winner for any of an array of donated prizes from well-known authors, editors, artists, and agents. "Lottery" tickets are $1 each and can be purchased from http://www.shirleyjacksonawards.org/store/ Persons may purchase as many tickets as desired. Tickets will be available from February 9th, 2009 through February 23rd, 2009. At midnight on February 23rd, "lottery" winners will be selected randomly for each item and announced on the website. Prizes will be mailed to the lucky winners. In recognition of the legacy of Shirley Jacks...

When I saw that Clint Eastwood had the best opening of his career, I mentally kicked someone, because I'm so sick of box office records being made every day because of ticket price inflation instead of "number of butts in seats." In the latter category, GONE WITH THE WIND is still champ, thanks. But this little chart from BoxOfficeMojo.com could be useful for you writers. It lists the average ticket price for movies each year since 1910. Now, take with a grain of salt - the current average price is listed at $7.20. The average resident of New York City or Los Angeles would love to pay that price. So if you're writing about either city, you might want to adjust accordingly. But the chart should give you a little perspective for a historical piece, and is interesting to see as well - those GWTW viewers paid an average 23 cents to get in. Of course, a quarter went a lot further back then. Now if only there was a comparable chart for the price of popcorn...

A beautiful, fulfilled life requires nothing more than what you already have. Fulfillment depends solely on your decision to accept and experience it, in the moment where you are. There are some achievements that may take a lifetime to reach. Yet at any point along the way, from the very moment you begin, you can know fulfillment. Reaching any goal is a matter of commitment, discipline, intention and effort. Fulfillment itself is immediate, for it is a matter of knowing that you are living true to your highest purpose. Do not become trapped by measuring success based on what you’ve already done or failed to do. Learn to see that success is entirely a function of how you are feeling and thinking and acting right now. Your past cannot hold you back and your future cannot intimidate you, unless you allow it. This moment has every possibility of being the most fulfilling time you’ve ever known. Your life is infinitely more wonderful than any possession or event or circumstance that you ca...

As many of you know, I was diagnosed with thrombophilia last year. I've been informed this means I will never be able to give blood again. This is a great disappointment to me, as I've always believed it is very important for us all to give blood. Giving blood saves lives. It's as simple as that. In case you needed one, gives you more reasons and more ways to help. Everyone who needs blood will get it, but when someone gets it, that supply needs replaced. When someone requires massive amounts of blood to keep them alive after an accident or through surgery, or a burn victim needs 30 units of platelets to help rebuild and heal tissue, those platelets need to be replaced. By healthy people like us. So if you want to give a gift to the world, keep in mind that there are places where these vital fluids are being rationed. Yes...rationed. That means the low-priority patients (and if it's you or a loved one, it's NEVER a low-priority) go without or with a reduced allocat...

For anyone confused by the YahooGroup messages today: • My sister uses autofill in her email handling program. She tried to send me an email describing the Christmas ornament she made with her daughter. But autofill sent to the elizabethdonald YahooGroup instead of my personal email. • She then sent an email to the group apologizing. I snickered and remarked that only she and my mother ever do this. • My mother then sent an email snickering as well. • Only Mom's autofill... you guessed it. So she sent another email to the group apologizing as well. • I have declared that they all need to turn off autofill. Hee. Merry Christmas, mi familia!