Would you like fries with that?

After the day I've had, I lack the focus to do anything more involved than a review roundup. And so, with no further ado, I present...the review roundup. Again, it's cut-tagged because it's huge; I'm trying to winnow the list enough to get back to my customary sets of five.

( We cut because we love. Also because we have knives.Collapse )

This is a week full of things! For example, it's full of Home Improvement: Undead Edition, edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni Kelner. And Home Improvement: Undead Edition is, in turn, full of things. Specifically, it's full of awesome urban fantasy and paranormal romance stories...

...including a brand new October Daye adventure.

That got your attention, didn't it?

"Through This House" is set chronologically between Late Eclipses and One Salt Sea. It is specifically NOT required reading (something I didn't think would be fair in a side story), but it provides a bridge between the two books, and lets you have a sneak peek at Goldengreen as it was when Toby and the gang first came to claim it. See Toby be cranky, May be damp, Quentin be awesome, and Danny be large! Enjoy happy Barghest fun times! And best of all, get a little more Toby for your troubles.

Home Improvement: Undead Edition is available now. I could not be prouder to be a part of this book, you guys. Seriously, being asked was just...was like...it was just absolutely a dream come true, and I remain stunned and happy and just totally amazed that I got to be a part of it.

Things!

Hey hooray, it's ANTHOLOGY TIME! I love anthology time. And I have stories in two upcoming anthologies, both available for pre-order now!

First up is Home Improvement: Undead Edition, edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni Kelner. This is my first-ever hardcover publication, and I am so excited I'm flailing. What's more, this is the first time a Toby short story has actually been printed. Yes; my story in this is a Toby piece.

"Through This Houses" chronologically bridges Late Eclipses and One Salt Sea. It isn't required reading; you can skip it, read the books, and be totally happy. But if you do, you'll miss Toby shoving May off a cliff, Quentin being awesome, killer pixies, and the house telling everyone to get out. Home Improvement: Undead Edition will be published August 2nd, and can help take the edge off your need for more Toby Daye.

Second is Human For A Day, edited by Jennifer Brozek and Martin Greenberg. This is Jennifer's first DAW anthology, and I couldn't be prouder to be a part of it. What's more...

Who read Tales From the Ur-Bar? Good. And who remembers Mina Norton, my cranky little gaslamp alchemist bartender with the seasonal monarch issues? Better! Well, Human For A Day contains my second Mina Norton story, "Cinderella City," in which she and the King of Summer ("James" to his friends) team up with the incarnate city of San Francisco to stop all of California from tumbling into the sea. Human For A Day will be published December 6th, and needs to grace your shelves.

And that's my publication news for today. I will now resume preparing frantically to leave for San Diego. Shower time!

Remember how back in March of this year, I had a short story in an anthology called Tales from the Ur-Bar? It was pretty awesome. I had a great time, and the editors were fabulous to work with, and so when Josh and Patricia (see re: the editors) asked me if I thought I might want to do it again, I was delighted. I love anthologies, I love an excuse to write short fiction, and I love working with people who have already proven themselves to be rockin' cool. And so I wrote them a story, and now...

"We Will Not Be Undersold" has been, well, sold to the anthology The Modern Fae's Guide to Surviving Humanity, edited by Josh Palmatier and and Patricia Bray. The anthology will be coming out in March of 2012, which seems at once very far in the future, and far, far too soon for my taste. It involves a big box super-store, true love, picnic tables, M&Ms, and plastic.

This is most definitely not a Toby universe short story; it contains fae creatures, but they're not playing by the rules of Toby's world, and I bet none of them could take her in a fair fight. At the same time, they're strange and quirky and were a huge amount of fun for me to write, and I really, really enjoyed the process of writing their story. (Story, singular. Unlike Mina Norton or the Fighting Pumpkins, these folks are not turning into a series. Dammit. I absolutely refuse.)

I'll post again as we approach the time when the book will become a sweet reality, rather than a future milestone, but for right now, remember, shop smart. Shop Undermart. We will not be undersold!

Berkeley, California. July 4th, 2014.

The Berkeley Marina was packed with parents, children, college students on summer break, dog walkers, senior citizens, and members of every other social group in the Bay Area. A Great Dane ran by, towing his bikini-clad owner on a pair of roller skates. A group of teens walked in the opposite direction, wearing clothes so brightly-colored that they resembled a flock of exotic birds. They were chattering in the rapid-fire patois specific to their generation, that transitory form of language developed by every group of teens since language began. Stacy Mason paused in watching her husband chase her son around the dock to watch the group go past, their laughter bright as bells in the summer afternoon.

She'd been one of those girls, once, all sunshine and serenity, absolutely confident that the world would give her whatever she asked it for. Wouldn't they be surprised when they realized that sometimes, what you asked for wasn't really what you wanted?

"Where are you right now?" Michael stepped up behind her, slipping his arms around her waist and planting a kiss against the side of her neck. "It's a beautiful day here in sunny Berkeley, California, and the laser show will be starting soon. You might want to come back."

"Just watching the crowd." Stacy twisted around to face her husband, smiling brightly up at him. "Aren't you supposed to be watching something? Namely, our son?"

"I have been discarded in favor of a more desirable babysitter," said Michael gravely. His tone was solemn, but his eyes were amused.

"Oh? And who would that be?"

Behind her, Phillip shouted jubilantly, "Oggie!"

"Ahhhh. I see." Stacy turned to see Phillip chasing Maize in an unsteady circle while Marigold sat nearby, calmly watching the action. Mr. Connors was holding Marigold's leash; Maize's leash was being allowed to drag on the ground behind him while the Golden Retriever pursued his toddler target. "Hello, Mr. Connors! Where's Marla?"

"Hello, Stacy!" Mr. Connors turned to wave, one eye still on the fast-moving pair. "She went down the dock to get us some lemonades. Hope you don't mind my absconding with your boy."

"Not at all. It'll do both of us some good if our respective charges can run off a little of their excess energy." Stacy leaned up against Michael, watching as Maize and Phillip chased each other, one laughing, the other with tail wagging madly. "Maybe they can wear each other out."

Michael snorted. "That'll be the day. I think that boy is powered by plutonium."

"And whose fault would that be, hmm? I just had to go and marry a scientist. I could have held out for a rock star, but no, I wanted the glamor of being a professor's wife."

This time, Michael laughed out loud. "Believe me, I count my blessings every day when I remember that you could have held out for a rock star."

Stacy smiled at him warmly before looking around at the crowd, the sky, the water. Phillip was laughing, his sound blending with the cries of seagulls and the barking of over-excited dogs to form just one more part of the great noise that was the voice of humanity. She had never heard anything so beautiful in her life.

"I think we should all be counting our blessings every day," she said firmly. "Life doesn't get any better than this."

"Life can always get better." Michael kissed her one more time, his lips lingering light against her cheek. "Just you wait and see. This time next year, we won't be able to imagine looking back on this summer without thinking 'oh, you had no idea; just you wait and see.'"

"I hope you're right," said Stacy, and smiled.

***

The annual Fourth of July laser show at the Berkeley Marina was a huge success this year, drawing record crowds. Replacing the firework displays as of 2012, the laser show has become a showpiece of the year's calendar, and this year was no different. With designs programmed by the UC Berkeley Computer Science Department...

When will you Rise?

[NOTE: I am a few days behind, due to the convention I attended this past weekend. So I'll be posting several of these today. We're almost there, I promise.]

Reston, Virginia. June 15th, 2014.

"Alex?"

All the lights in the main lab were off. Most of the staff had long since gone home for the night. That made sense; it had been past eleven when John Kellis pulled into the parking lot, and the only car parked in front of the building was his husband's familiar bottle-green Ford. He hadn't bothered to call before coming over. Maybe some men strayed to bars or strip clubs. Not Alex. When Alex went running to his other lover, he was always running to the lab.

John paused to put on a lab coat before pushing open the door leading into the inner office. The last thing he wanted to do was upset Alex further by providing another source of contamination. "Sweetheart? Are you in here?"

There was still no answer. John's heart started beating a little faster, spurred on by fear. The pressure had been immense since the break-in. Years of research gone; millions of dollars in private funding lost; and perhaps worst of all, Alex's sense of certainty that the world would somehow start playing fair, shattered. John wasn't sure that he could recover from that, and if Alex couldn't recover, then John couldn't, either.

This lab had been their life for so long. Vacations had been planned around ongoing research; even the question of whether or not to have a baby had been put off, again and again, by the demands of Alex's work. They had both believed it was worth it for so long. Was one act of eco-terrorism going to change all that?

John was suddenly very afraid that it was.

"I'm back here, John," said Alex's voice. It was soft, dull...dead. Heart still hammering, John turned his walk into a half-jog, rounding the corner to find himself looking at the glass window onto the former hot room. Alex was standing in front of it, just like he had so many times before, but his shoulders were stooped. He looked defeated.

"Alex, you have to stop doing this to yourself." John's heartbeat slowed as he saw that his husband was alive. He walked the rest of the distance between them, stopping behind Alex and sliding his arms around the other man's shoulders. "Come on. Come home."

"I can't." Alex indicated the window. "Look."

The hot room had been re-sealed after the break-in; maybe they couldn't stop their home-brewed pathogens from getting out, but they could stop anything new from getting in. The rhesus monkeys and guinea pigs were back in their cages. Some were eating, some were sleeping; others were just going about their business, oblivious to the humans watching over them.

"I don't understand." John squinted, frowning at the glass. "What am I supposed to be seeing? They all look perfectly normal."

"I've bathed them in every cold sample I could find, along with half a dozen flus, and an airborne form of syphilis. One of the guinea pigs died, but the necropsy didn't show any sign that it was the cure that killed it. Sometimes guinea pigs just die."

"I'm sorry. I don't understand the problem."

Alexander Kellis pulled away from his husband, expression anguished as he turned to face him. "I can't tell which ones have caught the cure and which haven't. It's undetectable in a living subject. After the break-in, we're probably infected, too. And I don't know what it will do in a human host. We weren't ready." He started to cry, looking very young and very old at the same time. "I may have just killed us all."

"Oh, honey, no." John gathered him close, making soothing noises...but his eyes were on the animals behind the glass. The perfectly healthy, perfectly normal animals.

***

Dr. Alexander Kellis has thus far refused to comment on the potential risks posed by his untested "cure for the common cold," released by a group calling itself "the Mayday Army" almost three days ago...

When will you Rise?

1. It is now twenty-one days to Deadline. I am scrambling to catch up on "Countdown" (the series of little in-universe snapshots has a name!), and writing ahead so as not to get caught flat-footed by my next convention adventure. I'm not certain I'll have internet while at Wiscon, so the last few pieces may be posted a little late, but they will be posted.

2. The cats responded to my going to Leprecon by magically acquiring giant felted mats which should have taken them well over a week to create. Last night's brushing adventure was a lot of fun for everyone involved, let me tell you what. Also, ow. Also, I am so saying "screw this noise" when I get home from BEA/Wiscon, and just taking the pair of them straight to the professional groomer for trimming and mat removal. I am not going through that again if I don't have to.

3. My whole house is clean! Why is my whole house clean? Because my mother is awesome! Why is my mother awesome? Because she cleaned my house! The first rule of tautology club is the first rule of tautology club.

4. I get a Cat this weekend! Cat Valente is using my house as her base of operations during the San Francisco Bay Area branch of her tour for The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making. She'll be at our best-beloved Borderlands Books this Saturday; there will be cupcakes, and carousing, and all the usual wonderful things. You should totally come.

5. There will be another, probably photo-heavy post about this later, but...I got an Evangeline Ghastly doll! More precisely, I got two; the one I bought, and one that mysteriously appeared on my doorstep in a big-ass box from Wilde Imagination. My squealing, it was vast. Of course, now I have entered the dark realm of the ball-jointed doll, from which there is no returning. Which leads us to...

6. I am allowed to do one fiscally silly thing every time I do certain things, career-wise. As I have done a certain thing (more on this later), I get to be silly, and I've decided that this time, for silly, I want a resin Evangeline doll. They fit more of the clothes, and can wear all the shoes. Specifically, I want the Cemetery Wedding Evangeline, since she has the best face. If you know anyone who might be selling part of a doll collection, please let me know?

7. The new season of Doctor Who continues to delight me.

8. I have finished the Tybalt short! "Rat-Catcher" is 10,000 words long, and has been officially submitted to the market it was written for. If they buy it, I'll announce when and where it will be appearing. If they don't, I'll start looking for something else to do with a story full of Cait Sidhe. Whatever I do, it will probably need to involve gooshy food.

9. Zombies are love.

10. I am hammered enough right now that my response time is slow, and the amnesty on replying to comments on the "Countdown" posts endures. I'll still answer comments on all other posts; it may just take me a little while. Thank you for being understanding.

[NOTE: I am a few days behind, due to the convention I attended this past weekend. So I'll be posting several of these today. Please don't tell me how it's not spam.]

Denver, Colorado. June 13th, 2014.

Suzanne Amberlee had been waiting to box up her daughter's room almost since the day Amanda was diagnosed with leukemia. It was a coping mechanism for her. Maybe some would call it morbid, the way she spent hours thinking about boxes and storage and what to do with the things too precious to be given to Goodwill, but as the parent of a sick child, she'd been willing to take any comfort that her frightened mind could give her. These were the things she would keep; these were the things she would send to family members; these were the things she would give to Amanda's friends. Simple lines, long-since drawn in the ledgers of her heart.

The reality of standing in her little girl's bedroom and imagining it empty, stripped of all the things that made it Amanda's, was almost more than she could bear. After weeks of struggling with herself, she had finally been able to close her hand on the doorknob and open the bedroom door. She still wasn't able to force herself across the threshold.

There were all Amanda's things. Her stuffed toys that she had steadfastly refused to admit to outgrowing, saying they had been her only friends when she was sick, and she wouldn't abandon them now. Her bookshelves, cluttered with knick-knacks and soccer trophies as much as books. Her framed poster showing the structure of Marburg EX19, given to her by Dr. Wells after the first clinical trials began showing positive results. When she closed her eyes, Suzanne could picture that day. Amanda, looking so weak and pale, and Dr. Wells, their savior, smiling like the sun.

"This little fellow is your best friend now, Amanda," that was what he'd said, on that beautiful afternoon where having a future suddenly seemed possible again. "Take good care of it, and it will take good care of you."

Rage swept over Suzanne as she opened her eyes and glared across the room at the photographic disease. Where was it when her little girl was dying? Marburg EX19 was supposed to save her baby's life, and in the end, it had let her down; it had let Amanda die. What was the good of all this—the pain, the endless hours spent in hospital beds, the promises they never got to keep—if the damn disease couldn't save Amanda's life?

"I hate you," she whispered, and turned away. She couldn't deal with the bedroom; not today, maybe not ever. Maybe she would just sell the house, leave Amanda's things where they were, and let them be dealt with by the new owners. They could filter through the spindrift of Amanda's life without seeing her face, without hearing her voice talking about college plans and careers. They could put things in boxes without breaking their hearts.

If there was anything more terrible for a parent than burying a child, Suzanne Amberlee couldn't imagine what it would be. Her internal battle over for another day—over, and lost—she turned away, heading down the stairs. Maybe tomorrow she could empty out that room. Maybe tomorrow, she could start boxing things away. Maybe tomorrow, she could start the process of letting Amanda go.

Maybe tomorrow. But probably not.

Suzanne Amberlee walked away, unaware of the small viral colony living in her own body, nested deep in the tissue of her lungs. Content in its accidental home, Marburg EX19 slept, waiting for the trigger that would startle it into wakefulness. It was patient; it had all the time in the world.

***

Amanda Amberlee is survived by her mother, Suzanne Amberlee. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be sent to the Colorado Cancer Research Center...

When will you Rise?

Denver, Colorado. May 15th, 2014.

"How are you feeling, Amanda?" Dr. Wells checked the readout on the blood pressure monitor, attention only half on his bored-looking teenage patient. "Any pain, weakness, unexplained bleeding, blurriness of vision...?"

"Nope." Amanda Amberlee let her head loll back, staring up at the colorful mural of clouds and balloons that covered most of the ceiling. They'd painted that for her, she remembered, when she was thirteen; they'd wanted her to feel at ease as they pumped her veins full of a deadly disease designed to kill the disease that was already inside her. "Are we almost done? I have a fitting to get to?"

"Ah." Dr. Wells smiled. "Prom?"

"Prom."

"I'll see what I can do." From most patients, Dr. Wells took impatience and surliness as insults. Amanda was a special case. When they'd first met, her leiukemia had been so advanced that she had no energy for complaints or talking back; she'd submitted to every test and examination willingly, although she had a tendency to fall asleep in the middle of them. From her, every snippy comment and teenage eye-roll was a miracle, one that could be attributed entirely to science.

Marburg EX19—what the published studies were starting to refer to as "Marburg Amberlee," after the index case, rather than "Marburg Denver," which implied an outbreak and would be bad for tourism—was that miracle. The first effective cancer cure in the world, tailored from one of the most destructive viruses known to man. At thirteen, Amanda Amberlee had been given six months to live, at best. Now, at eighteen, she was going to live to see her grandchildren...and none of them would ever need to be afraid of cancer. Like smallpox before it, cancer was on the verge of extinction.

Amanda lifted her head to watch as he drew blood from the crook of her elbow. "How's my virus?" she asked.

"I haven't tested this sample yet, but if it's anything like the last one, your virus should be fat and sleepy. It'll be entirely dormant within another year." Dr. Wells gave her an encouraging look. "After that, I'll only need to see you every six months."

"Not to seem ungrateful or anything, but that'll be awesome." The kids at her high school had mostly stopped calling her "bubble girl" once she was healthy enough to join the soccer team, but the twice-monthly appointments were a real drain on her social calendar.

"I understand." Dr. Wells withdrew the needle, taping a piece of gauze down over the puncture wound. "All done. And have a wonderful time at prom."

Amanda slid out of the chair, stretching the kinks out of her back and legs. "Thanks, Dr. Wells. I'll see you in two weeks."

***

Denver, Colorado. May 29th, 2014.

"Dr. Wells? Are you all right?"

Daniel Wells turned to his administrative assistant, smiling wanly. "This was supposed to be Amanda's appointment block," he said. "She was going to tell me about her prom."

"I know." Janice Barton held out his coat. "It's time to go."

"I know." He took the coat, shaking his head. "She was so young."

"At least she died quickly, and she died knowing she had five more years because of you." Between them, unsaid: and at least the Marburg didn't kill her. Marburg Amberlee was a helper of man, not an enemy.

"Yes." He sighed. "All right. Let's go. The funeral begins in half an hour."

***

Amanda Amberlee, age eighteen, was killed in an automobile accident following the Lost Pines Senior Prom. It is believed the driver of the car had been drinking...

When will you Rise?

Today marks the launch of the Orbit Short Fiction Program, through which they will be bringing you delicious nuggets of juicy fiction goodness from Orbit authors. Including, naturally, one miss Mira Grant.

In fact, they have a new Mira Grant story available right now.

"Apocalypse Scenario #683: The Box" is a heartwarming story about high school friends who still see each other every week to play a game that they love very much. Namely, the Apocalypse Game, wherein they end the world with gleeful abandon. But sadly, someone may be taking the game a little more seriously than was originally intended...

"Apocalypse Scenario," and all other stories in the Orbit Short Fiction Program, are available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Diesel Ebooks, and Booksonboard.com. Follow the link to either the landing page for the program or the story itself to get the links.

Enjoy the end of the world.

Pardon me for profanity, but how the fucking fuck are we already at the April list of current projects? This implies that we have somehow already consumed 1/3rd of 2011, and I, for one, am NOT OKAY with this idea. Seriously, I have Shit To Do in 2011, and not enough of it has been finished, which means that it can't be April yet. Okay? Okay. Come on, universe. Fix yourself.

...or not. Since I don't control time, welcome to the April 2011 list of current projects, because I am the gift that keeps on giving. To quote myself, being too harried to say something new: "These posts are labeled with the month and year, in case somebody eventually gets the crazy urge to timeline my work cycles (it'll probably be me). Behold the proof that I don't actually sleep; I just whimper and keep writing."

Please note that all books currently in print are off the list, as are those that have been turned in but not yet printed (Deadline and One Salt Sea). The cut-tag is here to stay, because no matter what I do, it seems like this list just keeps on getting longer. But that's okay, because at least it means I'm never actively bored. I have horror movies and terrible things from the swamp to keep me company.

( What's Seanan working on now? Click to find out!Collapse )

Title: Velveteen vs. The Blind Date.
Summary: What is there for a formerly retired superheroine who's managed to find herself in the state she was aiming for—good—and somehow thrust back into the public eye (bad) at the very same time? Is it time for her to start moving past the things that have been holding her back?

( After the better part of a summer spent in Portland--a summer spent patrolling the rooftops, fighting crime with teddy bears, and being cruelly reminded of the way spandex likes to creep upward when worn for extended periods of time--Velveteen was starting to feel like maybe she had things back under some form of control...Collapse )

1. I have been blazingly ill since Sunday afternoon, and spent most of yesterday and Monday in a cold medication haze. I am thus behind on LJ comments, email, snail mail, passenger pigeon mail, Facebook mail (well, I'm always behind on Facebook mail), sending out the mail, opening the mail, and anything else that required actual effort on my part. If you're waiting for a response from me, please, be patient. If your request is urgent, please, mail again. If I do not consider your request to be actually urgent, like you're asking for kitten pictures or something, I reserve the right to delete your email and scowl in your general direction.

2. Despite being blazingly ill, I managed to make my word counts on Blackout both days, and am on track to hit 100,000 words on April 23rd. This is good, since it means I may actually finish the book, you know, on time. I love finishing things on time. It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy and slightly less completely deranged.

3. Saturday night was GP's birthday party! I did not come home that night, as it was late and we were all exhausted and sort of drunk (and yes, this may have dealt my immune system the fatal blow). Thomas showed his disapproval by climbing onto my computer desk, gently nudging aside the dolls on the second shelf, pulling down the jar in which I store my earplugs, opening the jar, dumping out the earplugs, and eating half of them. I do not know why he is so obsessed with eating the damn things, but he's why I bought that jar in the first place. Now he shits little pink bullets, and looks smug.

4. My vet has confirmed that this won't hurt him, but is also sub-optimal. I have moved my earplugs.

5. The first draft of "Crystal Halloway, Girl Wonder, and the Terror of the Truth Fairy" is finished and being hacked at by the Machete Squad. This is seriously the most depressing, nihilistic story I think I've ever written. Which makes it appropriate that I wrote it while I was sick even unto death. This thing reads like the prologue to a Vertigo comic series.

6. I am not writing a Vertigo comic series. Unless, of course, DC asks me to.

7. I also got started on the first draft of "Rat-Catcher," a Tobyverse story set in London, in 1662 (yes, only a few years before the Great Fire, and the Great Plague). In it, a young Prince of Cats named Rand must stop playing theater cat at the Duke's Theater long enough to find a way to deal with his father, keep his sister from doing something monumentally stupid, and oh, right, maybe save the Cait Sidhe of London from a fate worse than death. Is this Tybalt's origin story? Why yes. Yes, it is.

8. Things already pulled from my research shelf in service of "Rat-Catcher": The Writer's Digest Guide to Character Naming (second edition), London: A Biography, Sex and Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, and The Wordsworth Dictionary of Shakespeare. Make of this what you will.

9. Being sick did allow me to catch up on some of my cache of SyFy Original Movies, including the second half of Meteor with Marla Sokoloff. This was a disturbingly good, surprisingly high-budget feature, especially for a SyFy Saturday. Also, not only were women competent and realistic characters, they didn't all die. Well done, SyFy. Keep up the good work.

10. Zombies are still love.

What's up with you?

LJ appears to be vaguely stable again, which is a nice change. I missed you, LJ! I know that blogging is dead, and it's the age of Farmville or the Tweet or whatever, and I'm on Facebook (technically) and Twitter (avidly), but my heart's true home is here, in Blogland, where I can write full sentences and punctuate them properly without worrying about the number of commas I use. I LOVE YOU, OXFORD COMMA.

Ahem. Anyway...

We're in a vague lull right now, which is nice, since it's letting me catch up on my word counts. I knocked out 2,000 words of Blackout last night, and then turned around and wrote almost as much on "Crystal Halloway, Girl Wonder, and the Truth Fairy's Curse," which sounds like a fluffy cross between Nancy Drew and every Harry Potter knock-off ever, but is, no shit, the most depressingly nihilistic thing I've written in years. Possibly ever. I made a giant spider cry. I have no regrets.

I do have a book event at the Borders in Roseville, California scheduled for next Saturday, and if you're local, it would be awesome if you could drop by. Borders events are much more low-key than the Traveling Circus, and sometimes it winds up just me, sitting at my little "in-store author" table, working on art cards and pretending that I'm not lonely. Help me not be lonely!

Speaking of being lonely, there's been, like, a hugenormous influx of people recently, and I honestly can't tell why. There was a little bump last week, when I posted about my decision to withdraw from Wicked Pretty Things, but since then, it's just been like, WHOA HOLY CRAP I DON'T HAVE THIS MANY PLATES. So if you're new here, hello! Welcome! Can you please tell me who you are and how you got here? I'm totally thrilled to have you, I just like to have some vague idea of what's going on. (Yeah, right. Like that's ever going to happen.)

In other news, water is wet, zombies are love, Jean Grey is still dead, and Thomas is rapidly approaching an improbable size.

What's new with you?

Title: Velveteen vs. Patrol.
Summary: What is there for a formerly retired superheroine who's managed to find herself in the state she was aiming for—good—and somehow thrust back into the public eye (bad) at the very same time? More importantly, now that she's in Oregon, what is she supposed to do?

( The list of things Velma had conveniently forgotten during her years of self-imposed isolation from the superhero community was large, and the longer she spent staring at the paperwork required to get a permanent license in the state of Oregon, the longer that list became....Collapse )

Just last week, I announced that I would have a story in the YA anthology Wicked Pretty Things. I was extremely excited; this was going to be my first young adult publication, and I really, really want to start publishing some of my YA (werewolves and movie stars and sociological experiments, oh my). It seemed like a great opportunity.

Then I heard that one of the authors, Jessica Verday, had pulled out of the anthology. Which seemed a little odd, given how late we were in the process.

And then I found out her reason. To quote her blog post on the subject (originally posted at http://jessicaverday.blogspot.com/):

"I've received a lot of questions and comments about why I'm no longer a part of the Wicked Pretty Things anthology (US: Running Press, UK: Constable & Robinson) and I've debated the best way to explain why I pulled out of this anthology. The simple reason? I was told that the story I'd wrote, which features Wesley (a boy) and Cameron (a boy), who were both in love with each other, would have to be published as a male/female story because a male/male story would not be acceptable to the publishers."

...uh, what? That's not okay. I mean, really, that's not okay. I began, in my slow, overly careful way, to get angry. Then I saw a statement from the editor, saying that the decision had been entirely hers, and had been in no way a reflection of the publisher's views. I sat back. I thought very, very hard. And I decided that, barring any additional developments, I would stay in the anthology, rather than hurting the other authors involved with the project by pulling out.

Naturally, there were additional developments. In light of the ongoing situation, my own discomfort with this whole thing, and the fact that discriminating on basis of sexual orientation is never okay, I have withdrawn my story from the collection.

And here's the thing. There is absolutely no reason to censor a story that was written to the guidelines (which dictated how much profanity, sexuality, etc. was acceptable, as good guidelines should). If Jessica had written hard-core erotica, then rejecting it would have made perfect sense. Not that kind of book. But she didn't. She wrote a romance, just like the rest of us, only her romance didn't include any girls. And she didn't get a rejection; she got her story accepted, just like the rest of us. Only while we got the usual editorial comments, she got "One of your characters needs to be turned into something he's not." And that's not okay.

Books do not determine a person's sexual orientation. I was not somehow destined to be straight, and led astray by Annie On My Mind and the Valdemar books. I was born with universal wiring. I have had boyfriends and I have had girlfriends and I have had both at the same time, and none of that—NONE OF THAT—is because I read a book where a girl was in love with a girl and I decided that being bisexual would be a fun way to kill a weekend.

But those books did tell me I didn't have to hate myself, and they did tell me that there was nothing wrong with me, and they did make it easier on everyone involved, because here was something I could hand to Mom and go "See? It's not just me, and it's not the end of the world, and it's not the only thing that defines me." Supposedly, ten percent of people are gay or bi with a tropism toward their own gender. It stands to reason that there should be positive non-hetero relationships in at least ten percent of YA literature. And they're not there. And things like this are why.

I am not withdrawing from this book because I'm not straight. I am withdrawing because of my little sister and her wife, and because of my girlfriend, and because of my best friend, and because of all the other people who deserve better than bullying through exclusion. Thanks to Jessica for bringing this to our attention, and thank you to everyone who has been supportive of my decision to withdraw.

I am sorry this had to be done. I am not sorry that I did it.

UPDATE: I will not be appearing in this anthology, and this is why.

I am pleased to announce the sale of "The Prince is Right" to the anthology Wicked Pretty Things [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy], a YA collection of "dark fairy romance" to be published on August 2nd, 2011.

Questions I have been asked already:

Is your story set in the Tobyverse?

No. "The Prince is Right" is set in an entirely new fae-centric world, one that plays around with my fondness for seasonal monarchies and John Hughes movies. Salem Lyons must find the Harvest King and be crowned the new Harvest Queen, or everything she loves will pay the price. But what if she doesn't want the job?

Is your story a dark fairy romance?

It's a fairy romance that takes place almost entirely at night, which makes it dark. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it. I, um, sort of missed the whole "dark = grim" memo, and wrote a classic 1980s teen romance, complete with Molly Ringwald jokes and buckets of John Hughes references. Also, one of my central characters spends about half her time as a hairless cat. So the grim is not so present in this particular tale.

I am super-excited about this book, where I get to appear alongside authors whose work I respect and admire, like Rachel Caine, Tera Lynn Childs, and Lisa Mantchev. This is the first time Rachel (who is awesome) and I have been in a book together, and that's pretty much cause for celebration right there! Also, the cover is gorgeous.

Yay! Wicked Pretty Things!

The random number generator has spoken! And it says the winners of Whedonistas are...

firebirdgrrl
jeffreycwells

Congratulations! Please send me your mailing information via my website contact form within the next twenty-four hours to receive your prize. If I don't hear from you by the time I rise from the depths of sleep tomorrow morning, I'll choose a new winner. For which I apologize, but well, that's the only way to maintain order around here.

For those of you who are waiting for me to mail you something: I will be packing posters for mailing out tonight, and doing the mass mailing on Monday. I currently have four paid posters pending (say that five times fast). If you wanted to order a "Wicked Girls" poster, now would be a good time to do it, as it would get you into a guaranteed mail batch (IE, Monday). I will be deleting all unpaid poster requests on Monday the 21st, which should free up several numbered posters. Again, I apologize, but I can't hold things forever. If you have not received a poster, and think you've paid, feel free to email me.

Interview and giveaway over at My Bookish Ways! I'm mailing the prizes, so they will be signed. Go ye forth, and participate. Or point people at the interview, and let them participate. I'm pretty easy, as such things go.

Descended From Darkness, Volume II is now available from the Apex Book Company, and contains my story, "Dying With Her Cheer Pants On," a Fighting Pumpkins adventure that first appeared in Apex Magazine. If you're trying to acquire the whole pumpkin patch, this book is a must. Also, you know. Rah rah supporting Apex, lots of other awesome stories (seriously, some of them blew my socks off), go team. But it's early in the morning where I am, so "GO PUMPKINS!" is about the extent of my brain.

What's news with you?

April: Short story, "Riddles," in the anthology Human Tales from Dark Quest Books. This is a fairly small press, so you may need to buy the book online or ask your local bookstore to special-order a copy if you want one.

Short story, "Apocalypse Scenario #683: The Box," through the Orbit electronic fiction program. This story is being released on April 18th, as a Kindle download. It's a Mira Grant story, but is not set in the Newsflesh universe.

May: Novel, Deadline, from Orbit/Orbit UK, under the name Mira Grant. This is the second book in the Newsflesh trilogy. I do not have ARCs. Please do not ask me for ARCs. Deadline is e-ARC only, and I do not have download codes or physical copies. All asking does is add stress to an already stressful time, and then I have to go hide under the bed for a little while.

September: Novel, One Salt Sea, from DAW. This is the fifth of the October Daye books, and was preceded by Late Eclipses. It will be followed by Ashes of Honor, probably in September 2012.

March 2012: Novel, Discount Armageddon, from DAW. This is the first of the InCryptid books, and will be followed by Midnight Blue-Light Special, probably in March 2013. Yes, InCryptid is taking the March slot in my year. Yes, I consider this a good thing. Doing two Toby books a year is fun, but I need to diversify sometimes.

That's the schedule!

It's Friday. There's barely a weekend between us and Late Eclipses [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy], which officially hits store shelves in four days. I can barely believe that it's so close. I'm still a little stunned when I look at my shelf at home, and there's book four, staring at me. But the show must go on, and in honor of that fact, here are four exciting things coming in the next year.

4. Well, naturally, Deadline. The second book in the Newsflesh trilogy is coming out at the end of May, and it's exciting and terrifying and Feed was so well-reviewed that I'm considering disabling my Google spiders and hiding under my bed for a week when this one comes out, just to escape the inevitable comparisons. I think it's a good book. I even think it's maybe a better book. But it's not a sequel in the "do the same, only bigger" sense, and that makes me twitchy.

3. "Through This House" is my first novella set in Toby's world. More, it's my first novella appearing in a Charlaine Harris/Toni Kelner anthology, which still has me a little WAIT WHAT NO WHO IS DRIVING? BEAR IS DRIVING!! HOW CAN THIS BE?!? about the whole thing. I love the story, which bridges the span between Late Eclipses and One Salt Sea, but isn't necessary to enjoy either. And I love that I was somehow lucky enough to be allowed to write it.

2. Book Expo America! This is one of the biggest literary trade shows in the world. It's like, the Emerald City of giant book expos. I've never been before. And this year, I get to go. Lemme hear a "woo" from the crowd! Hell, I'll do it myself. WOO!

1. One Salt Sea. It comes out in September; I'm in final editorial revisions now; it's the book where, well, once again, everything changes. It's also the book I sometimes thought I would never finish, because it required admitting to myself that the series would make it five books, and I never quite believed that. But I did, and it did, and soon, you'll get to read it, and I'm so excited.

And that's four exciting things in the year ahead.

Zombiesque [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy] has been out for a few weeks now (although my anthology-loving heart still leaps every time I see a copy, even if it's on my desk), and a few reviews have poked their happy little heads up.

Lexile reviewed Zombiesque for Night Owl Reviews, and says, "Zombiesque is a better than average anthology." Yay! But what does she think of the Pumpkins? "The funniest story was Seanan McGuire's 'Gimme a "Z"!' about a cheerleader who recently died and is resurrected. She doesn't see any reason why even though she's dead she can't, you know, wash her hair or go out to get a soda or like be a cheerleader. The story is really ridiculous and what ultimately keeps her from being one of the shambling, flesh eating dead is just short of absurd, but it's immensely entertaining."

Oh, yeah. Fighting Pumpkins rule.

Kelly at Daemon's Books gave Zombiesque five stars, and says, "Personally, the zombie cheerleader story called 'Gimme a "Z"!' was my favorite." What more need be said? Oh, how about, "The writing was fantastic, Seanan McGuire’s take on the way that teenagers (well, stereotypical cheerleader teenagers) talk was perfect." See? All that snark is good for something!

Finally, the Zombiesque review at Errant Dreams calls out each individual story on its merits and failings, and gives a fantastic general overview of the anthology.

Everyone seems to be in agreement: this is a fun book with good stories, and you should check it out. Plus, it marks the first in-print appearance of the Fighting Pumpkins cheer squad (their prior appearance, "Dying With Her Cheer Pants On," was virtual). Show school spirit! Support the team!

GO PUMPKINS!

They hold my trial in absentia; an empty gesture intended only to placate the screaming public. The growing silence outside the courthouse walls only serves to illustrate the pointlessness of the proceedings. It takes three days to present the evidence: the charts, the lab results, the videos. It would take longer, but after the fourth prosecutor fails to return from recess, the court decides to pass judgment on the case as it stands. There is enough—more than enough—to convict.

—from "The Tolling of Pavlov's Bells," available to read now at Apex Magazine.

The January issue of Apex is now available for all to read! (Prior to this, you had to actually buy the issue. A worthy investment. Seriously.) And in the spirit of this availability, have a few reviews of my story:

Carl at The Portal says "Alternating between moments before and after the key event in her story, McGuire tells a tale of biological terrorism and cold, calculating vengeance that is frightening in its reality." Also: "'The Tolling of Pavlov's Bells' brought to mind films like 28 Days Later and the various incarnations of Resident Evil, stripped of all their implausibilities so that all that remains is the sheer horror of a very real threat to mankind." Dude. I win at creepy.

Terry at Fantasy Literature says, "Those who have read Seanan McGuire’s tasty urban fantasies starring October Daye will be surprised at the dark science fiction she serves up in 'The Tolling of Pavlov’s Bells.'" That was the goal! She goes on to say that she didn't realize I was Mira Grant, and will now be reading Feed.

If you haven't heard the bells, this is your chance.

You've been warned.

Some of my earliest memories of bookstores involve combing through the shelves while my grandmother looked tolerantly on, searching endlessly for more anthologies. Anthologies were the best thing ever, at least if you asked my reasonably limited book-buying power, because they gave you so many stories. If you guessed wrong on whether you'd like a book, you were stuck with a whole book you didn't like, but with an anthology, there would always, always be at least a few stories you'd enjoy.

A lot of those anthologies were published by a company called DAW, which must, I believed, have the smartest owners in the world. (At the time, I truly believed that anthologies made more money than any other kind of book, because they were so hard to find. I was a very innocent child.) And a lot of those anthologies were edited by a man named Martin Greenberg. Someday, I swore, I was going to be in one of those anthologies. When that happened, I would know, absolutely and for certain, that I was going to be a writer.

Yesterday, I went to the bookstore, and I bought the new Martin Greenberg anthology, co-edited with Stephen Antczak and James Bassett. It's called Zombiesque; it's all stories from the perspective of the zombie.

And I'm the sixth name on the table of contents.

There are viral zombies, pharmaceutical zombies, totally unexplained zombies, nanobot zombies, even black magic zombies. Zombie businessmen, fathers, policemen, doctors, authors, and cheerleaders. I'm reading the anthology cover-to-cover, that being what you do, and so far, the stories have been excellent. I'm the only one who's gone for black humor, really, but when you're writing a story about zombie cheerleaders (GO PUMPKINS!), a little black humor is sort of legally required.

I'm in a real DAW anthology, edited by Martin Greenberg, writing about zombie cheerleaders. Who belong to the Fighting Pumpkins cheerleading squad.

So you're aware, there's every chance that I currently control the universe.

Things that are awesome, part one: writing for anthologies.

Things that are awesome, part two: being asked to write for anthologies.

Things that are awesome, part three: being asked to write for anthologies being edited by John Joseph Adams, who is one of those anthologists I just have crazytrain respect for.

Things that are awesome, part four: ...did I mention the mad science?

When John announced The Mad Scientist's Guide to World Domination, I knew that failure to submit a story would result in hand-wringing, retribution-seeking, day-ruing agony on my part. This knowledge did not present me with an instantaneous understanding of what I should write. And then my iTunes decided to do a mad science medley, concluding with the me-and-Paul version of "What A Woman's For."

And then my cackling scared the cats.

I am crazy-pleased (or maybe just plain crazy) to announce that "Laughter at the Academy: A Field Study in the Genesis of Schizotypal Creative Genius Personality Disorder (SCGPD)" has been sold to John Joseph Adams for inclusion in the book The Mad Scientist's Guide to World Domination, coming in 2012 from Tor Books. It's a charming little tale about lab assistants and alternate paths to mad genius, and it has rapidly become a favorite of mine for live readings, because it's so. Much. FUN.

Plus, just look at this lineup: Carrie Vaughn, Alan Dean Foster, Daniel H. Wilson, L. E. Modesitt, Jr., L. A. Banks, Austin Grossman, Marjorie M. Liu, Ben Winters, David Farland, Mary Robinette Kowal, Harry Turtledove, Seanan McGuire, David D. Levine, Genevieve Valentine, Naomi Novik, Jeffrey Ford, Grady Hendrix, Theodora Goss, Jeremiah Tolbert, and David Brin, plus an introduction by Chris Claremont. See that? That's me, in a book with Chris Claremont. THOSE FOOLS SAID MAD SCIENCE DIDN'T PAY, BUT I'VE SHOWN THEM! I'VE SHOWN THEM ALL! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...er. Sorry.

I consider "Laughter at the Academy" to be part of my mad science triptych, along with "The Tolling of Pavlov's Bells" and "Apocalypse Scenario #693: The Box." This piece is the sheer, unfettered id, my delight in things that mutate, melt, and devour your brain while you're not looking. It makes me happy.

From my heart and from my hands, why don't people understand my intentions?

So there's this anthology coming out in March, called Tales from the Ur-Bar. Every story takes place in a different location and time period, and by the time I was invited to the anthology, my usual time periods had all been taken, leaving me with the early 1900s. Everyone assumed I would write steampunk. I wrote gaslamp instead, which is a subtle distinction. I did it out of annoyance, I'll admit, and then, I...I liked it. I had a good time. I enjoyed the setting, I enjoyed the characters, and I enjoyed writing about a cranky alchemist using cocktails as her magical weapon of choice.

Jennifer Brozek asked me whether I'd consider submitting a short story for her first DAW anthology, Human for a Day. I said "sure," and pitched a story involving the Fighting Pumpkins and the harvest queen and the Homecoming Game. And I tried to write it, I really did, but my heart kept drifting back to San Francisco in the early 1900s, when the fog was silver and the bridges were gold. And this is why Jenn got the sheepish "I appear to have written the wrong story," message. A story which she was gracious enough to let me submit anyway. And so...

"Cinderella City," being the second adventure of Mina Norton, James Holly, and Margaret Holly (although she's asleep for the entire story, so it's mostly just Mina and James) has been sold to Jennifer Brozek for her anthology Human for a Day. It involves the city of San Francisco, an evil plot, a potential earthquake, absinthe, and lots of pigeons.

Some of the pigeons are on fire. I'm pretty pleased.

It looks like I'm going to be writing a whole series of stories about Mina and company; I'm starting to see the overall shape of their story, and with me, that usually means I'm pretty much doomed. But I don't mind that much. I like it in the gaslight. It's all very pretty there. And besides, I get a discount at the bar.

I appear to have accidentally set myself a "get a piece of short fiction published every month of the year" goal in 2011, with short stories confirmed for January, February, March, and now April. That pretty much takes us through my current backlog, although I have a few possibilities for May and June, but, being me, I still find it hysterical. As for what brought this on...

"Riddles," my story of what really happened when mankind met the Sphinx, has been purchased by Jennifer Brozek for inclusion in the anthology Human Tales, coming out in April from Dark Quest Books. This actually happened a little while ago, but I kept waiting to find out the publication date, and then I got distracted, and look, you should have figured out by now that sometimes, I have the attention span of a mayfly. A mayfly which is ALREADY DEAD.

"Riddles" is a rare piece for me, in that it's just fantasy, not urban in the slightest. Even my historical fantasy, like "Alchemy of Alcohol" (coming out in March, in Tales From the Ur-Bar), tends to take place in an urban environment. So getting to play with a world where there were no sidewalks, really kind of awesome!

I'm super-pleased with the story, and I'm super-pleased to have sold it, and I can't wait to see what else will be contained in the book. I'll let you all know when you can get a copy of your very own.

And now I want to go to Borderlands, so I can hug the Sphynx kitties. Hee.

Title: Velveteen vs. The Ordinary Day.
Summary: What is there for a formerly retired superheroine who's managed to find herself in the state she was aiming for—good—and somehow thrust back into the public eye (bad) at the very same time? More importantly, now that she's in Oregon, what is there to do?

(You can get caught up on the story so far at the Velveteen landing page on my website. Enjoy!)

( Velma woke up slowly, resisting the process every inch of the way...Collapse )

If 2010 was the Year of the Ghost in my weird personal cosmology, 2011 is going to be the Year of the Rabbit. One rabbit in specific: Velveteen, former member of the Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division, reluctant superhero, and too long a stranger around these parts.

I can't commit to a story a month for the whole year, but I can commit to a story every other month. So here you go: I will be writing and posting a minimum of six Velveteen stories during 2011. Not sure who she is? Check out the series landing page for background and archived stories. I'll be bringing the website up to speed on her adventures, and then a new adventure can finally begin.

Coming in January, "Velveteen vs. the Secret Identity."

Heroes unite!

So Kate swears that I'm the creepiest thing going at any length less than thirty pages (I suppose because when I'm working under thirty pages, I don't have time for the why-porn to really saturate whatever it is I'm writing). Now's your opportunity to find out if she's right, because "The Tolling of Pavlov's Bells" will be appearing in the January issue of Apex Magazine.

YOU GUYS YOU GUYS I SOLD "PAVLOV'S"!!!! THE STORY WITH LIKE ONLY THE MOST TIPTREE TITLE EVER!!!!

...in case you can't tell, I'm pleased.

"Pavlov's" is the middle piece in what I view as my mad science triptych. The other two pieces are "Laughter at the Academy: A Field Study in the Development of Schizotypal Creative Genius Personality Disorder," and "Apocalypse Scenario #683: The Box." (No, you can't read the other two yet; I'm hoping you'll be able to eventually, I just need to get there.) They're sort of my id/ego/super-ego of mad science, and now that they're all written, maybe I can get it out of my head for a little while.

Ha. Ha. Ha. No, really.

But anyway: I finally found a home for "The Tolling of Pavlov's Bells," and it's a totally cool home, and I couldn't be more pleased. And if I ever do a short story collection, the odds are good that it'll be called The Tolling of Pavlov's Bells, so publishing the title story is always a good maneuver.

Mad science, killer viruses, and all that other good stuff can be yours in just one short month! You're welcome.

It's December 15th, and at long last, after detours and pit-stops, unexpected meetings and unexpected losses, our journey is finally coming to an end. I want to thank you all for taking this trip with me. It's been hard and it's been easy, and it's been wonderful, at least for me. I hope that it's been good for you, too. I hope that you're glad you came along.

Issue 60 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the last of the stories in the current Sparrow Hill Road sequence is available. With "Thunder Road," we have finally reached the Last Chance Diner.

When Bobby Cross finally finds a way to strike at Rose without her getting out of his grasp, is there a chance in hell—or in the midnight—that she'll get away intact? All the adventures and all the allies in the world can't change what's coming, and all we know for sure is that Rose never gets away alive.

Now roll down the window, and let the wind blow back your hair. The night's busting open, and these four wheels can take us anywhere. We've got one more chance to make it real.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

November is halfway gone, and that means it's time for our last stop along the road that runs from Sparrow Hill to the Last Chance Diner. Next month, we reach our destination; next month, old friends come calling, old bills come due, and everything comes to an end (hopefully with a minimum of steaming wreckage). Our year-long journey is finally almost over. But for now...

Issue 59 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the eleventh of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "Faithfully" takes us back to Rose Marshall's past, and into the arms of Gary Daniels, the only man she ever loved among the living. But everything that loves dies. Can she help the man who once brought her home find his own way there?

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

So first off, because I couldn't say this earlier, and also, HOLY CATS, here go: I was asked, by Charlaine Harris and Toni Kelner, to submit a story for one of their totally insanely awesome urban fantasy theme collections. You know, the ones like Wolfsbane and Mistletoe and Death's Excellent Vacation. The ones I have sometimes DREAMED about being asked to write for.

THEY ASKED ME TO WRITE THEM A STORY AND I SAID YES AND OH MY GOD YOU GUYS, LOOK:



The story, titled "Through This House," takes place between Late Eclipses and One Salt Sea. It involves Toby, Quentin, May, Danny, and some giant spiders, and while it was intentionally written to be non-essential—you don't have to get the book to understand what's going on in book five—I really like it.

But mostly, right now, I'm just REALLY EXCITED. Like, super-duper grasshopper pie and a magic unicorn pogo stick excited. My first appearance in an actual hardcover! Ohmygawd!

Happy Saturday!

I'll have better things later today (and things which include slightly more in the way of "actual coherence"), but I was out late last night, and a nice big pot of link soup is currently about my speed. Yum, yum, link soup. Anyway...

SFX Magazine conducted this fun interview with me in my guise as Mira Grant with me at this year's San Diego International Comic Con, which means they transcribed my actual speech, thus leading to a lot of exclamation points. They had some fun new questions. I heartily approve.

And while we're in the Mira part of the library, Fantasy Magazine posted this excellent review of Feed. It's a fun read, even if it doesn't provide any good pull quotes for me to share with the rest of the class.

Pseudo Emo Teen posted a lovely review of Feed, and says, "Let me start out by saying: Feed is one of the best, if not the best, book I have read in long time." Okay, you know, that works for me. Let's just go with that.

Sometimes it's nice to get interviewed in my guise as, you know, me. So here's a fun interview that was conducted before my trip to Australia, during which I talk about the Campbell and the destruction of mankind. You know, the usual jibber-jabber around these parts. (The lovely lady who interviewed me posted her review of Feed after I won the Campbell, and you should read that, too.)

And now for something completely different...a review of Grants Pass, the first anthology I ever actually sold a story to. They call out my story, which makes this relevant. Also, it's a bad-ass anthology, and if you like horror, you should totally read it.

Here we are at the middle of October, which means it's time for one more rest stop; one more pause along the road that runs from Sparrow Hill to the Last Chance Diner. Unbelievable as it is to say this, there are only two more stops after this one, only two more pauses before Rose Marshall finishes this leg of her journey. Strange, isn't it? It feels like we could have kept on driving for the better part of forever. But we can't. The trip is almost over.

Issue 58 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the tenth of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "Bad Moon Rising" lets us see how Rose Marshall spends her Halloween nights—and here's a hint: she doesn't get many treats to balance out her tricks. It's a chase in a cornfield, and a game that not everyone survives playing. Come along for the ride?

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

Welcome to September. Half the month is already gone, and that means it's time for another mile along the route that runs from Sparrow Hill to the Last Chance Diner; it's time to take another trip in the company of Rose Marshall, crankiest hitchhiking ghost this side of the Atlantic Ocean. We only have four more stops before we reach the end of this particular road trip, and things are getting a little darker all the time.

Issue 57 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the ninth of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "Last Train" marks the return of someone Rose was really hoping she wouldn't have to see again, and more, the payment of a debt she knew would come due sooner or later. It's going to be a bad night all around.

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

Bit by bit, I am beginning to catch up on everything that went undone while I was in Australia! First up...

The Living Dead [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy] is one of my favorite anthologies of the past few years. It's smart, it's savvy, it's awesome, and it's chock-full of zombie goodness, in every shape and size and degree of decomposition. So when it was announced that there was going to be a sequel, you can probably guess that I damn near dislocated something running to beg for a slot on the table of contents.

Well, I got it—or Mira did, anyway. "Everglades" is a story of the Rising, set in the Newsflesh universe more than twenty years before the events of Feed. You can acquire it, along with many other pieces of awesome zombie awesomeness, in The Living Dead 2 [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy]. We're talking forty-three stories, many of them appearing for the first time ever, all edited by the fabulous John Joseph Adams. It's swanky.

Come on. Let us tell you a deadtime story.

maryrobinette is in town for this month's SF in SF—which I will regrettably be missing, due to having a prior engagement—and I managed to catch her on chat this morning and arrange for an afternoon meeting to hang out. This delighted me utterly, because I adore Mary, and don't get to see her often. (For those of you who need a footnote: Mary Robinette is the "voice" of the October Daye series, as she reads them in audio book form. She's also a puppeteer, an author, and the 2008 recipient of the Campbell Award. Girl's got game.)

Since the first thing I do with any out-of-town guest is take 'em for cupcakes, I arranged to have Mary meet me at Cups and Cakes Bakery. Yes, I am the devil. She was properly delighted by the palace of sugary delights, and consumed a peanut butter cup (chocolate cake, peanut butter frosting, dipped in chocolate ganache) and a red velvet, while I, being a pretty pink princess, ate a Pretty Pretty Princess (strawberry cake with strawberry frosting). Yum, all the way around.

You can't hang out in a bakery forever, so I asked Mary if she'd like to walk over to Borderlands. She was game for this adventure, and I've walked that route so many times now that I don't really need to pay attention anymore. Gleeful chattering and wandering ensued, culminating in our arrival at the bookstore, where we found Jude, Alan, and—eventually—Jeremy.

Jeremy had a box.

Inside the box was the new Night Shade Press anthology, The Living Dead 2. This is a big, handsome book, with a gorgeous cover, and a great table of contents. Said table of contents includes Kelley Armstrong, Max Brooks, David Wellington...and Mira Grant.

Oh, wait. That's me.

Oxygen is hard.

The story, "Everglades," is set on the U.C. Berkeley campus during the Rising. It's sad and wistful and tragic, and you should totally read it. I mean, you should totally buy this anthology if you like zombies, even a little, because it's gorgeous, but really? My story. In a book. With all these amazing people.

I managed a) not to break Jeremy's fingers snatching the book away, and b) to stay and keep talking for a while, because running cackling into the night would have been rude. We eventually shifted to the cafe, where I hugged Cole, hugged Mary goodbye, and departed for home, taking my book with me.

My book. You cannot have it. Get your own. MINE.

Damn, this was a surprisingly good day.

It's the middle of August, and that means it's time for another mile along the route that runs from Sparrow Hill to the Last Chance Diner; it's time to take another trip in the company of Rose Marshall, crankiest hitchhiking ghost this side of the Atlantic Ocean. We only have four more stops before we reach the end of this particular road trip, and things are getting a little darker all the time.

Issue 56 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the eighth of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "Dead Man's Curve" follows Rose as she tries to take a night off in the company of some college kids...only it turns out they're on a mission, and it's one that just might get them killed. When Rose Marshall tangles with amateur ghost-hunters, it can only end in tears.

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

Well, I'm home from San Diego; more (much more) on that to come later, once I finish waking up and catching up on my email. First up, here's some link-spam to clean up what's come into my inbox in the interim. Forgive me that it's not as sorted as normal. I'm still not technically awake.

First up, check out this awesome Publishers Weekly review of The Living Dead 2, that upcoming anthology of zombie awesomeness from Night Shade Press. Does it mention my/Mira's new short story, "Everglades," set during the Rising? Why, yes. Yes, it does.

Second up, here's a shiny new review of A Local Habitation, posted by Tracy, who says "I said it in my review of Rosemary and Rue, the first book in the October Daye series; I tend to not be fond of fae mythos in general because it makes my brain hurt. I also said that I really liked Rosemary and Rue despite it...and despite myself. Well, with A Local Habitation, I may have to stop saying it altogether. I don't know what it is about Seanan McGuire, but she makes me like (if not totally understand) fae mythos. That's pretty darn impressive." Yay!

Our one Feed review for the day comes courtesy of Miss Geeky in the UK. It's well-written and thoughtful, but doesn't really have any good pull quotes for this sort of entry. So go check it out, shall you?

Now for the reviews I'm really getting excited about: two more reviews of An Artificial Night have hit the wide, wide world. Pardon me while I hyperventilate, 'kay?

The first is from Rebecca at Dirty Sexy Books, who says, "For me, An Artificial Night brought this series back up to the five-star rating that I gave to book one, Rosemary and Rue. Seanan McGuire's writing feels so dense and weighty to me, like a flour-less chocolate cake, but what astounds me is that her stories are such easy-to-read page-turners as well." Also, "I assumed this would be a rather simple three part play: Toby finds the kids; Toby fights the bad guy; Toby brings them home; The End. I was wrong. It was an emotional ride of ups and downs, and Toby is such a gritty, stubborn little fighter. I love her resolve. Toby's personal story progressed, and I have to say, I like where it's going." Glee!

Also up today is TJ's review at Dreams and Speculation. TJ says "Another strong installment in the Toby Daye series. The story isn't as gleaming with manic energy as the first or second, but still a fast and compelling read." Rock on!

And that's our administrative stuff for the right now. More later.

It's the fifteenth of July, and that means it's time for another stop along the road that runs from Sparrow Hill to the Last Chance Diner; it's time to take another trip in the company of Rose Marshall, crankiest hitchhiking ghost this side of the Atlantic Ocean. With only five stories to go, the stakes are getting higher, the challenges are getting stranger, and the shadow of Bobby Cross is never far away.

Issue 55 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the seventh of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "Do You Want to Dance?" takes us out of the ghostroads and back into the land of the living, where a girl named Bethany is preparing for the prom night of her life...and her plans include a ghost by the name of Rose. So get your prom dress, get your corsage, and get ready to stay until the music stops.

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

We're halfway down the road that runs from Sparrow Hill to the Last Chance Diner; we're halfway between the beginning and the end. And that means it's finally time for me to tell the one story Rose has that's been kept private up until now—the story of the way it all began, and the night that Rose Marshall, high school girl with her whole life ahead of her, became Rose Marshall, hitchhiking ghost.

It's June, and this is the story of the way Rose Marshall died.

Issue 54 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the sixth of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "Last Dance With Mary Jane" takes us back in time to 1945, where a teenage girl named Rose is about to lose her way forever. This is the ending that began everything. This is the real story behind the Phantom Prom Date, the Girl in the Diner...the Spirit of Sparrow Hill Road.

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

Rose Marshall has dared the Ocean Lady and come out the other side—but what does she have, and what has she paid? Her journey's barely starting, and she has a long, long way to go before she has a chance in hell of making it to harbor. And once you're dead, risking your life becomes a lot more terrifying...

Issue 53 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the fifth of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "El Viento del Diablo" takes us back into the daylight America, where Rose is running ragged...and a man named Bobby Cross is running too close for comfort. Deliver me from evil and deliver me from darkness, and deliver me, O Lord, from Bobby Cross.

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Give a girl a ride?

The Hugo voting packet is being assembled, and they want items from the Campbell nominees to allow voters to make a more informed choice. Since I want the tiara, I naturally want to put my best foot (and chainsaw) forward. We're submitting the first four chapters of Rosemary and Rue—what else should go in?

My bibliography is here, and up to date. It contains everything but the "Velveteen vs." series, which is archived elsewhere.

So...suggest. What should I send in? Justify your choices.

Help?

Rose Marshall has come a long, long way since she died in Buckley Township, Michigan, and now, with the stakes getting higher every time she turns around, she's finally doing what she's needed to do for a while. She's finally looking for help. Of course, on the ghostroads, even the help can harm you...

Issue 52 of The Edge of Propinquity is live, and with it, the fourth of the Sparrow Hill Road stories is available. "Building a Mystery" takes us deep into the ghostroads, and all the way along the back of the Old Atlantic Highway, where the routewitches may hold the key to Rose's past—and to her future. All she has to do is survive...and for the dead, that can prove to be surprisingly hard.

There are a lot of stories trapped and tangled in the twilight. This is only one of them. But it's the one I have to tell.

Give a girl a ride?

So let's review, shall we? I started this week a) exhausted from a comic book convention, b) with my back doing its best to murder me in my sleep, c) under deadline, and d) with the announcement that I am on the ballot for the 2010 Campbell Award. The first two have been sorting themselves out—I've had time to sleep, and my back is recovering, since I'm taking things relatively easy—but I'm still under deadline, and I'm still on the ballot.

(This whole thing feels a lot like when I first sold the Toby books. All I wanted to do was go up to strangers and be like "I just sold my first series!" All the strangers wanted me to do was leave them alone. So my friends wind up with a lot of really random-ass interjections. "What do you want for dinner?" "A tiara in Australia!" "Yes, but other than that, what do you want for dinner?" "I'm on the ballot!" "So we're having Baja Fresh again?" I try to keep this as non-offensive as possible, but really, it's like a constant GOTO loop at the back of my brain right now.)

Last night, I sat down with the goal of banging out 2,000 words on "Through This House," a Toby short set between Late Eclipses and The Brightest Fell. It's potentially for an anthology, and I wanted to make some definitive progress before I allowed myself to watch this week's episode of Castle. When I came up for air 4,000 words later, the first draft was done, and I felt vaguely as if I'd been hit with a brick. Tonight, I'm going to try to pull the same trick with "Build a Better...," an Alice/Thomas/colony of over-excitable pantheistic demon mice short (being written as the other option for the same anthology). Then, this weekend, I'll try to get three out of three by whipping through "Last Dance With Mary Jane," the Sparrow Hill Road story for June.

Sleep is for the weak and sickly.

In the cracks between the rushing, I've been dealing with taxes, trying to clean my room whilst entirely incapable of bending (it's a good thing I have flexible toes), and revamping both my websites, since the whole "on an internationally-published ballot" has been shoving a lot of traffic in my direction. It's fun like hysteria! And to be honest, I really am loving every minute of it. I am a sad, sad bunny-girl sometimes. So sad.

Next up, a webcomic endorsement, a Feed giveaway, some weird monkey noises, and a funky little dance. Whee!

Title: Velveteen vs. The Eternal Halloween, Part II.
Summary: There was a time before Velveteen had retired from The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division; a time when she thought that a hero's life was definitely the life for her. And a time, once upon a dark and stormy night, when Halloween seemed set to last forever...

( Velveteen's dizziness was getting worse. She secretly hoped this was a sign that she was getting ready to wake up from this crazy fun-house dream. Unfortunately, she'd passed the Alternate Reality Survival and Recognizing a Dreamscape in Ten Easy Steps units of Heroing 101 with flying colors, and the likelihood of this being 'just a dream' was going down by the minute. Too much of what was going on didn't fit with dreaming, even under the control of The Dream Postman or Daydream Believer. For one thing, she wasn't in her underwear, and no one was laughing at her. Not yet, anyway....Collapse )

Do you like cheerleaders? Do you like aliens? Do you like urban legends? Well, then you're just gonna love my latest published short story, "Dying With Her Cheer Pants On," in which the Fighting Pumpkins Cheer Squad goes up against an alien invasion in a battle to the death, with the very fate of mankind hanging in the balance.

"Dying With Her Cheer Pants On" is available now, in the April 2010 issue of Apex Magazine.

Some of you may have heard me perform this story live, since it's a favorite reading piece of mine (and how could it not be? I mean, really). For those of you who haven't, there's an audio version of the same story in this month's issue. Totally awesome.

Go, read, enjoy, and remember...

GO PUMPKINS!

Title: Velveteen vs. The Eternal Halloween.
Summary: There was a time before Velveteen had retired from The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division; a time when she thought that a hero's life was definitely the life for her. And a time, once upon a dark and stormy night, when Halloween seemed set to last forever...

( It was Halloween morning, and for some reason she couldn't quite identify or name -- 'couldn't put her finger on,' as David kept saying, looking mournfully at his own massive claws -- Velveteen was uneasy. She walked through the back halls of the compound that housed The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division with strange shivers dancing along the back of her neck, and waited for some unseen other shoe to drop...Collapse )

Bit #1: Toby has actually made it to the final four in the GIRL FIGHT TONIGHT, and she and Professor McGonagall are running literally neck-in-neck. Consider that a moment. Toby is a viable contender for defeating Professor McGonagall. The world has gone insane, and your vote could help her get to the finals, where she can have the pleasure of having her ass handed to her by Granny Weatherwax. Which is a victory unto itself, really.

Bit #2: Alcestis [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy] is a retelling of the classical Greek myth of Alcestis in the Underworld, and is just breathtakingly gorgeous. I am glad to own this in hardcover, because despite it taking up additional space, it is now sturdy enough to survive the many, many re-reads that it will be receiving as the years slip by. It's a beautiful book. Pair it with Malinda Lo's Ash and you have the perfect late Valentine (or early).

Bit #3: Castle has been picked up for a third season, guaranteeing me another night of brilliant television as time goes by. I really feel like I'm in something of a golden age, television-wise. I have my caper show (Leverage), my wacky science fiction (Eureka, Warehouse 13), my serious science fiction (Fringe), my comedy (Big Bang Theory), my mystery (Castle), and my good-n-gory (NCIS, Bones). Really, the networks don't need to do anything new with the upcoming season. I'm good.

Bit #4: Toby is still a contender in the Fourth Annual BSC Review Tournament, but her current round—in which she's going up against Juliet Marillier's Heart's Blood—remains very nearly too close to call. We're moving toward the end of the tournament, and it would be bad-ass to progress at least one more round, so please, if you have the chance, bop over and drop a vote.

Bit #5: I am apparently writing at least one short story (and maybe more than one, knowing me and my scary over-achieving ways) set before A Local Habitation, focusing on and narrated by January O'Leary. You can meet her girlfriend! Who is awesome, and puts up with an immense amount of crap from her scary technophile significant other.

Bit #6: Wondercon is this weekend! I am super-excited, and plan to spend the entire weekend wandering the floor, seeing awesome stuff, and learning new and exciting things about the X-Men. Because there is always something new and exciting to learn about the X-Men. (Hopefully not "Jean Grey is coming back," but things can't be wonderful forever.) I have also purchased my tickets for San Diego, which becomes a little more real every day. GEEK PROM IS GO!

Bit #7: Starfish loves you.

So currently, I am...

...working on The Agent's revisions to Deadline, all of which have been totally awesome, erudite, and coherent (at least so far; for all I know, I'm going to hit page 200 and suddenly she'll be demanding I insert evil clowns and flying monkeys). I'm addressing the manuscript 10% (IE, fifty pages) at a time, so that I can imagine a little progress bar guiding me sweetly toward the conclusion of draft two. Currently, the status bar stands at 20%. Since I started work yesterday, I am not yet freaking out over this.

...hammering away on The Brightest Fell (Toby Daye, book five), which, like, woke up one morning and just decided that it wasn't going to suck anymore. Seriously. This book has been a petulant brat for ages, and then bam, all of a sudden, it was all "La la la, I am ready to play nicely with the other children." So now I'm burning pages, the stakes are getting higher, the action's getting tighter, and Toby's having one of her Worst Weeks Ever. I'm always happy when Toby is having one of her Worst Weeks Ever. This is why Toby will eventually find a way to kill me in my sleep.

...getting content up on MiraGrant.com. If you go there right now, you'll still get the splash page, but I promise you, Behind The Scenes, Things Are Brewing. We'll be ready to launch super-soon, and when we do, look out world! Tara has done an incredible job with the site design, and Chris has done an equally incredible job with the coding. And of course, there's things afoot over on the Orbit side of things, and soon the whole world will be asking the question that's been gnawing at me for a while now: When will you rise?

...writing two short stories for the same anthology, since that's the only way to have a proper cage match between the two (thus letting me determine which one works better). In this corner, Toby, Danny, and Quentin do stuff involving poking things with sticks and following the basic rules of horror movie survival (IE, "When the house tells you to get out, you leave"). In this corner, Alice, Thomas, and the mice go wandering around the woods looking for fricken nests, and face the usual dangers inherent in doing what a tribe of talking pantheistic mice tells you to do. Fun!

...finishing the sixth Sparrow Hill Road story, "Last Dance With Mary Jane," in which we finally find out what actually happened on the night Rose Marshall died. This is sort of where the series turns, and where everything else that happens becomes inevitable. I'm really excited.

...really in need of a nap.

I will have a silly, silly contest starting later today, and remember, the various cage matches are still going on. Help Toby deliver the ULTIMATE SMACKDOWN, thus earning her a pretty tiara that she won't wear and a Starbucks gift card that she will use up in an afternoon.