...a signed copy of Indexing! Win this awesome tome for yourself, for a friend, or for a local library!

Welcome to the sixth of the Thirteen Days of Hogswatch. I will be starting a new giveaway every day between now and December 13th. Each giveaway will have different rules and a different deadline, although all prizes will be mailed on December 30th, because I am bad at going to the post office (and also, I am avoiding the post office as much as possible until that other winter holiday is over).

The sixth giveaway is for a signed copy of Indexing. This is going to be a random number drawing, because as you may have noticed, I am running a bit behind. So...

1. To enter, comment on this post.
2. If you are international, indicate both this and your willingness to pay postage.
3. Name your favorite fairy tale.
4. That's it.

I will choose the winner at 1PM PST on Tuesday, December 13th.

Game on!

ETA: This drawing is now CLOSED.

...every word a prayer.

Every Heart a Doorway is in the wild and in the world today. It's a beautiful book. Saying nothing about its contents, only about the book as a physical object, it's a beautiful book. The cover, the heft, the whole design, it's just gorgeous. And I made this. Me. This book exists because Lee Harris said "write me a thing," and my response when someone says "write me a thing" is to write a thing. This book exists because Irene Gallo designed it with love and care and attention to detail that takes my breath away.

It's so beautiful. It's something that will exist in libraries and on bookshelves forever. A hundred years from now, someone will still own this book. They will have this beautiful thing. That is just...it's amazing.

I feel like this is some of my best work. It's short and it's elegant and it's important in a way that's hard for me to fully articulate. It's about teenagers and trauma and magical doors and the things we are and the things our parents want us to be, and the things that we become.

If you already have your copy, thank you so very, very much. Thank you for helping me to get this book out into the world, thank you for helping me to convince Tor.com that I'm a good bet, and thank you for letting this story live. Stories need to be read to be real.

If you don't have your copy yet, that's absolutely okay. The world is big and has many things in it. If you were thinking of buying one, signed copies can be purchased now from Borderlands Books and The Booksmith, both in San Francisco (both do mail orders). I will also be signing copies for the University Bookstore in Seattle this coming weekend at Emerald City Comic Con.

Thank you all again, so, so much.

This will also serve as your discussion post.

The tenth episode of Indexing: Reflections is available today! This is your talkpost and discussion zone. There will be spoilers in the comments here. As always on talkposts, I have partial comment amnesty, and will not be responding to everything.

"Untold Truths" is hard to talk about in an unspoilery way, but wow, is it bringing us closer to the end. Only two episodes remain in this season. Shit's about to get vicious.

Once upon a time...

...a copy of Indexing: Reflections.

Welcome to the twelfth of the Thirteen Days of Hogswatch. I will be starting a new giveaway every day between now and December 13th (tomorrow). Each giveaway will have different rules, and a different deadline, although all prizes will be mailed on December 30th, because I am bad at going to the post office (and also, avoiding the post office until that other winter holiday is over).

The twelfth giveaway is for a copy of Indexing: Reflections, the second outing for the ATI Management Bureau. This is going to be a random number drawing, because why mess with something that's working? So...

1. To enter, comment on this post.
2. If you are international, indicate both this and your willingness to pay postage.
3. Tell me who your favorite member of the team is.
4. That's it.

I will choose the winner at 1PM PST on Saturday, December 19th.

Game on!

The random number generator has spoken, and the winner of a copy of Indexing is...

runiechica!

Instructions for the winner: Please comment on this post letting me know that you're claiming your prize and send me an email via my website (www.seananmcguire.com) with your mailing information. Both comment and email must be received by Sunday, December 13th to be considered valid.

Nine more days to go!

...a copy of Indexing!

Welcome to the fourth of the Thirteen Days of Hogswatch. I will be starting a new giveaway every day between now and December 13th. Each giveaway will have different rules, and a different deadline, although all prizes will be mailed on December 30th, because I am bad at going to the post office (and also, avoiding the post office until that other winter holiday is over).

The third giveaway is for a copy of Indexing (the first one). This is going to be a random number drawing, because I just got home from the East Coast two days ago, and I'm still tired. So...

1. To enter, comment on this post.
2. If you are international, indicate both this and your willingness to pay postage.
3. Name your fairy tale.
4. That's it.

I will choose the winner at 1PM PST on Friday, December 11th.

Game on!

ETA: This drawing is now CLOSED.

The third episode of Indexing: Reflections is available now! This is your talkpost and discussion zone. There will be spoilers in the comments here. As always on talkposts, I have partial comment amnesty, and will not be responding to everything.

"Brotherly Love" marks the return of a fan favorite from season one who is, alas, not easy to integrate with the rest of the cast on a regular basis. Hopefully this is enough of a glimpse to satisfy.

Game on!

The second episode of Indexing: Reflections is available now! This is your talkpost and discussion zone. There will be spoilers in the comments here. As always on talkposts, I have partial comment amnesty, and will not be responding to everything.

"Broken Glass" was originally blocked as the first episode of the season, before I realized that things would flow better if it came after the episode with internal affairs. It also sets up one of the big themes for this season: the idea that when the stories can't get you in their "pure" forms, there's always a chance that they'll take a step back and try another, equally deadly, way.

Fairy tales are flexible.

Game on!

Tomorrow.

Indexing was almost a whim. 47 North, Amazon's publishing arm, contacted me and asked if I had anything that I felt would work well as part of the new Amazon Serials Program. I had a short story called "Indexing," set in a world I very much wanted to explore further. I sent them that, along with a pitch for a full season. They took it, and for twelve episodes--six glorious months--I lived in a vision of twisted fairy tales and dangerous ever afters. We met Henry, and Sloane, and Jeff, and Andy. We faced down a power-hungry Mother Goose, and more princesses than you can shake a stick at. And when it was done, it was done, and I walked away content.

Until people said they wanted to know more. Until 47 North said they wanted to know more. (I write plenty for free, but the Velveteen and InCryptid short fiction universes pretty much fill the "unpaid work" slot, so I did need a publisher to show interest.)

Until I started really thinking about the princesses.

Indexing: Reflections begins tomorrow. Like the original Indexing, it is twelve episodes long, releasing every other week until it is complete. Because Amazon serials are available only in the US, Indexing: Reflections is only available in the US until it is complete; the finished ebook and collected print edition will both be available globally.

If you enjoyed the first volume, I think this one is going to make you really happy. Pre-order now to get episode one at midnight, and join the party already in process. (If you haven't read Indexing yet, I strongly recommend it.)

Whee!

When last we left our intrepid heroine (me), I was on a plane to Scotland, to visit Amal and Stuart for a week. Basically exactly a week, which was simultaneously a long, long time to go stay with someone I had never stayed with before, and nowhere near long enough to stay with a dear friend in a city I had never visited.

My flight was smooth and uneventful, and landed in Glasgow a little early, which was good, since it had been marred by navigation issues which caused the cabin crew to say "all electronics must be off, yes, even your Pokemon machine, yes, even your iPod." It was a sad, sad situation for a Seanan. When I landed, it became even sadder, as my phone had run out of minutes while I was in Ireland, and I thus could not call Amal to let her know I was there. I mooched back and forth in the airport for a while, sadly, until she materialized, all smiles and hugs and help with my luggage, and got me out of there.

When we arrived at the apartment, everything smelled like home. There was a chicken roasting in the oven and a pot of stock simmering on the stove, and I promptly decided that this was the best of all possible worlds. I was set up in the guest room, added to the wireless, and introduced to the two fabulous resident magpie cats. Amal quickly discovered that she could thrust things at me, and that I would then read them. This became a popular party game over the next few days.

Oh, the places we went! Oh, the things that we did! We visited the two biggest cheese shops in Glasgow, and assembled two glorious cheeseboards, including Bonnet (goat), Isle of Mull Cheddar (yellow), VJ Cabrales (DEATH BLUE), Old Lochnagar (cheddar-ish), and Dunsyre Blue, all from I. J. Mellis, and Isle of Mull Cheddar (white), Killeen (goat-gouda), Basajo (white-wine blue with grapes!), and Coulommiers (Brie), all from George Mewes. There was not a bad bit of cheese in the bunch.

I must, however, take a moment to focus on the Cabrales. This cheese was given in response to my request for an aggressive blue. "Aggressive" does not begin to cover it. This cheese was the Ghost Rider of cheeses, judging your sins and refusing to forgive them. It was so strong it was physically painful to eat more than a sliver at a time. I am in love. I want twenty pounds of it.

Amal and I walked Glasgow, enjoyed cake at Once Upon A Tart, and bought heather gems. She saw me have my first Victoria tart and my first rose lemonade, both of which engendered bliss face. We watched Doctor Who and made plans for the future and chatted about anything and everything, and it was lovely. I cooked her and Stuart goat. I snuggled their cats.

On Friday, we drove two and a half hours to Amal and I could hike off into the fields of Carterha and touch Tam Lin's well. This will be a post all of its own, and soon.

On Saturday, we went to the Scottish Owl Centre, which was perfect and sublime and like nothing I had ever done before. I want to go back.

Sunday we shopped, rested, ate, and made our farewells, and Monday morning, I got on a train bound for Swindon. It was nowhere near long enough. It was the perfect length of time. Scotland was beautiful, and its people even more so.

I want to go back.

...do not let it grieve you. No one leaves for good. You are not alone. No one is alone.

Well, here we are: the first season of Indexing is over and done, and the book has been closed on Henrietta Marchen and her friends, at least for a time. I can't tell you yet whether there will be a second season: that decision is in the hands of greater minds than mine. I can tell you that the best way to help that second season happen is to either buy the now-complete Kindle serial (available internationally), or to pick up the print book when it comes out in December (I know that I'm looking forward to having a copy on my shelf, where I can brag about it).

A lot of people have asked me about my experience with 47North and the Amazon Kindle Serials Program, and why I chose to do it. Now that the season has ended, I thought this would be a good time to talk about those questions.

First, and easiest, is "why did you do it?" I mean, in some ways, doing a Kindle Serial goes against a lot of what I've said about the digital divide, and my unending desire to have print editions available for everything, always. I never want anyone to be left in the position of "cannot possibly get a book." At the same time, the print edition was always a part of the plan, built into my contract; it was just going to come after the ebook editions. While that certainly isn't ideal, it was about the only way something like this could happen, since a week-by-week physical serial would have been way too cost-prohibitive for any book publisher to commit to. As for why I went with the Kindle program, well...they asked me. They also offered to pay me. I am very, very fond of getting paid, as it allows me to feed my cats and keep my lights on and all those other silly things. So when someone contacts my agent and says "we want to pay you to do something cool," my attention is assured.

But the main reason I agreed was because I hadn't done anything like this before. I was a universe author for The Edge of Propinquity in 2010 (when the original Rose Marshall stories were written), but that was very different than having a tight "once every two weeks" schedule, and this was a much bigger challenge. I like challenges. I like finding out whether I can meet them. In this case, I definitely did.

In terms of "what was good about this project," well, there was a lot. I got to write a serial novel in a setting I never thought I would get to expand upon (the ATI Management Bureau began in a short story I wrote years ago); I got to see a lot of people try my work because of the low price point and the easy entry point; I got to have fun with fairy tales. Fun with fairy tales is a huge draw for me.

In terms of "what was bad," there were a few things. The nature of the project meant that I didn't have time to write all twelve segments before things started going live, and that meant that if I wanted to change something after the fact, I really couldn't. I don't think any major contradictions or errors got past us and into the published chapters, but it made the whole experience a little more nerve-wracking than it otherwise might have been. The short, fixed schedule also meant that if there were any unexpected delays on either my part or the publisher's part, I could wind up with a much shorter turn-around period for copy edits and changes. Also not so easy on my nerves, given how tightly I tend to schedule myself. And of course, there was the fact that the Kindle Serial program is currently US-only, and my audience is international, which I know was frustrating for a lot of people. (Now that the serial part is over, the finished ebook is available wherever there is Amazon.)

On the whole, this was an overwhelmingly positive experience, and I would be open to doing a second season if the stars were right (and the holes in my schedule lined up, since again, I am very tightly booked). To any authors considering the program, I can definitely recommend it, as long as you work well under pressure and don't mind sometimes needing to turn things around with little to no notice. I hope to see you all again at the next once upon a time.

Now rest, my dear, and be at ease; there’s a fire in the hearth and a wind in the eaves, and the night is so dark, and the dark is so deep, and it’s time that all good little stars go to sleep.

Once upon a time, I began a story. Today, with the twelfth episode of Indexing, I complete it. Episode twelve, "Bad Apple," is ready for you to enjoy.

This post serves as both your reminder and discussion thread. Reminder that this is your last chance to get the whole serial at the special Kindle Serials price; the cost will be going up by $1.00 in the very near future.

Now rest, my dear, and be at ease; there’s a fire in the hearth and a wind in the eaves, and the night is so dark, and the dark is so deep, and it’s time that all good little stars go to sleep.

It's here! It's here! The eleventh episode of Indexing is now live!

With only one episode left to go, things are moving faster than ever. Episode eleven, "Scarlet Flowers," is ready for you to enjoy.

This post serves as both your reminder and discussion thread. In addition, there is one episode remaining (in two weeks), so now's the time to hop on board: remember that a purchase now saves you a dollar. Not too shabby! (Please do not comment to complain about Indexing not being available in your region. I am so very sorry that it isn't everywhere, but I have no power over that. You'll only make me sad.)

Once upon a time...

It's here! It's here! The tenth episode of Indexing is now live!

Everything is different now. Episode ten, "Not Sincere," is ready for you to enjoy.

This post serves as both your reminder and discussion thread.

Once upon a time...

It's here! It's here! The ninth episode of Indexing is now live!

Things ended badly with our last episode. Now, the single greatest choice of Henrietta Marchen's life stands before her. Can she risk it all to save the people she loves? Episode nine, "Whiteout," is ready for you to enjoy.

This post serves as both your reminder and discussion thread.

Once upon a time...

I am very pleased to announce that "Hook Agonistes" has been printed in the latest issue of Subterranean Magazine, and is available to read here:

http://subterraneanpress.com/magazine/fall_2013/hook_agonistes_by_jay_lake_and_seanan_mcguire

This novella is a collaboration between myself and Jay Lake. It is about loss, and identity, and longing to go home. It is about an animatronic Captain Hook, doing his best to shepherd the last remains of the human race. It is about dreams.

"The difficulty with steering by stars is that stars are by their very nature ghosts; they died long before we ever saw their light. When you choose a star to steer by, you are casting yourself as the lead character in a ghost story. It's far better to create stars of your own, set them in the heavens, and steer by the light of something living."

—Michael Lowry III, founder of Lowryland

"All stories are ghost stories."

—Jas of Lowryland

Welcome to Lowryland. This post also serves as your discussion thread, should you want to comment on the story itself; there will be spoilers.

It's here! It's here! The fifth episode of Indexing is now live!

Sometimes stories deviate from their predictable paths, turning darker than anyone ever expected them to be. Sloane Winters is still struggling to keep her own narrative difficulties hidden, and Henry Marchen is dealing with a team that doesn't seem to work together the way it used to. All this comes to a head in "Cruel Sister" as a Cinderella story gone awry threatens to reveal the narrative to the world...with deadly consequences.

This post serves as both your reminder and discussion thread.

Once upon a time...

It's here! It's here! The third episode of Indexing is now live!

Eventually the excitement of getting a new team member must die down and let things get back to normal, which means dealing with memetic incursions into the real world. In "Honey Do," Henry and the field team have a serious problem to deal with, and not much time to do it...unless they feel like being eaten by bears.

This post serves as both your reminder and discussion thread.

Once upon a time...

It's here! It's here! The second episode of Indexing is now live!

Demi Santos had a pretty good life before the ATI Management Bureau came along and shattered everything she thought she knew about reality. Now, in "Musical Patchwork," our newest team member must adjust to a world in which fairy tales are real...and she's one of them.

This post serves as both your reminder and discussion thread.

Once upon a time...

Let's talk about fairy tales.

Yesterday, Mattel—the company that makes my beloved Monster High Dolls, literally dozens of which occupy multiple rooms in my house—announced the launch of a new toy line: Ever After High, where the children of famous fairy tale figures go to school as they prepare to take the Legacy Pledge and relive the stories of their parents. Hundreds of generations of Wicked Queens and whiteout girls passing poison apples back and forth between them like Valentines.

One of my favorite TV miniseries of all time, The 10th Kingdom, is about a world where fairy tales are true, and where the descendants of the stories we know here, today, in our world still live, trying to eke out a chance at happily ever after. The main character, Virginia, is both Snow White and Little Red Riding Hood, just one more girl in danger (and falling in love with) a wolf. The novelization of the miniseries is one of my first choices for comfort reading.

Once Upon A Time, currently airing on ABC, is basically someone filming the playtime of a group of very inventive children (I'd say about age twelve) who have between them a complete set of the Disney Princess Collection dolls, a Peter Pan playset, and whatever other toys they've been able to scrounge from the rooms of their siblings. I keep expecting a T-Rex to show up, just before all the other kids start shouting at Crystal about how they let her make Red a werewolf, why does she keep ruining everything.

Fables and its spin-offs—especially Cinderella, which is deconstruction of both her story and of the modern myth of the super-spy assassin who never dies—are some of the best things happening in comics today. The worst issue of Fables is better than the best issue of a great many other things (none of which I will name here, because that's rude). It's a glorious fairy tale stew, and it tastes so very sweet when we put it in our mouths.

I could go on for quite some time (and eventually I may, because these are all things that are very much worth experiencing, for their similarities, for their differences). There have been Marvel Fairy Tales, recasting X-Men and Avengers into classic roles. There have been movies like Sydney White, recasting Snow White into a college-age modern woman and the seven dwarves into her socially outcast friends. Fairy tales are everywhere. Fairy tales are older than you think. They were the first form of urban fantasy, and I fully expect them to be the last. They are urban legend mellowed and fermented from vinegar into fine wine (and yes, sometimes, turned sour by the passage of time and changing cultural standards).

And here's the exciting thing. Each and every work I've cited above is, at its core, transformative fan fiction. Snow White is a really common figure in modern retellings: something about that whiteout girl with the bloody lips and the murderous mother figure appeals to us. Don't know why, although I know why she appeals to me. Don't much care. I'm having too much fun writing and reading and watching and loving fanfic about her, and I'll leave the deep contemplation to other people. We're all bringing our own touches to the reimagining, and that's the most fun part of all: is Snow White a politician? A gunslinger? A witch? A government agent? Does she have a wicked stepmother, or just a rival? Is she going to eat the apple? Can she escape her story? Does she want to?

It's the little things that make all these stories individual, distinct, and worth enjoying. (And before someone says "but if it's fanfic how can any of these things be under copyright, that makes no sense," remember that original characters and plot elements can be copyrighted even when the public domain source material is not. So my ATI Management Bureau, and Bill's Fabletown, are both protected by their recent creation, even as we stuff them full of characters that belong to everyone, forever. Again, this is how we don't all wind up getting sued by Disney.) We're in a period of remaking the fairy tales we grew up with, trying to turn them into something that we feel is still relevant, and will be relevant for generations to come.

Fairy tales are powerful things.

There's always room for one more happy ever after.

The first episode of Indexing (check this link for more details) has now been out for a little over a week. Response has been generally positive, which makes me very happy, but there have been a few recurring questions, so I figured I'd take a moment to answer them.

1. Can I get Indexing for my Nook/in the iBookstore/for any format other than Kindle?

No.

I'm not trying to be harsh: it's just that this particular question has a very simple answer. Indexing was commissioned by 47North for the Kindle Serials Program; "Kindle" is right there in the name. While I am historically opposed to "format exclusives," I am okay with this one for two major reasons. One, the project would not have been possible if not for 47North saying "we want this for the Kindle, we will pay you to write it." Two, there will be a World English print edition in December, meaning that even those of us who don't us Kindles will get the opportunity to read it. It's just going to take a little longer.

2. Isn't this just going to increase piracy?

Probably. But I really do hope that anyone who chooses to pirate the serial because they don't use the Kindle will then buy the finished print edition, because I really, really enjoy feeding my cats.

3. Didn't I read this like, four years ago?

The serial novel Indexing is based on a revised and expanded version of the short story "Indexing," which originally appeared on the Book View Cafe in September 2009. The original story is no longer available online, and has not been collected in any print volumes.

4. Why can't I buy this outside the US?

The Kindle Serial Program is currently US-only, which means that the biweekly installments are only available to United States residents/people who know how to fool their Kindles. The print edition, as noted above, is World English, and will be available wherever there is an Amazon partner site. If you have questions about why this is, please ask Amazon; I cannot help you.

5. Is the Aarne-Thompson Index a real thing?

Yes! I own one. It is my pride and joy and it is enormous and it cost a lot of money and one day Bill Willingham will pay someone to break into my house in the middle of the night so that he can claim it as his own. Sometimes I just sit and pet it for hours. It's a very helpful scholastic tool, for a folklorist, and a really great doorstop for people who don't read indexes for funsies.

6. You know Bill Willingham? Does that mean you know about how there's a Snow White in Fables?

I do, and I do, but our Snows are very different people. Snow White is what's called a "public domain character," which is how there can be so many versions of her without Disney deciding to sue us all for copyright infringement. I love her because she's a fantastic mirror to hold up to other stories. She brings the apples and the glass coffins, we bring everything else. For other awesome Snow Whites, read Catherynne Valente's Six-Gun Snow White, Neil Gaiman's Snow, Glass, Apples, and Jim C. Hines's The Stepsister Scheme. Archetypes are for everybody!

The next episode will be out this coming Tuesday, and I just finished the first draft of episode nine. I think you're going to like what's coming!

Got any more questions?

Well, folks, my convention season has started in earnest, and this time tomorrow, I will be on a big metal sky-bird, wending my way to sunny Florida to rejoin my Disney Magic Bitches, along with the Chicago Crew and my Alabama family, at our second home: Disney World. Yes, Disney World, which in the summer plays host to a plethora of lizards, snakes, and local amphibians. It is going to be HOT AND COLD RUNNING FROGS all up in there, let me assure you.

After we get our Disney on, I'll be decamping to OASIS, the annual Orlando Area Science Fiction Society convention, where I am the guest of honor! Woo-hoo! We're still crunching out exactly what my schedule at the con is going to be, so I can't post it for you here, but I can assure you that if you're in the Orlando area, you should swing on by and enjoy the many rapturous delights offered by a con featuring me in my post-Disney high. Seriously, it's like chilling with Delirium as redesigned for Disney's Brief Lives, and you know you want to see that.

While I'm in transit, I will not be entirely offline, but I will be mostly offline, due to the part where I am not going to be checking my email from the Haunted Mansion and I don't know what the internet situation will be at the OASIS hotel. Please expect delays in responses until I get back, and for a week or so after, while we get back up to normal service levels.

ONE SLEEP TO DISNEY.

I cannot wait. I need this so bad, you have no idea.

DISNEY.

And now, the final two Sailor Moon fairy tales, again because I like keeping things in one place. It's tidy.

( Click here for the Prince who loved roses, and the Rabbit who lost the moon...Collapse )

My friend Nikki asked what Disney Princesses the Sailor Scouts mapped to; I, naturally, responded that the Sailor Scouts were too awesome to be pre-existing Princesses, and would have fairy tales of their own. Nikki then dared me. This was the result.

( Together for the first time in one place, four Sailor Moon fairy tales. Enjoy.Collapse )

A long, long time ago—literally twenty years ago, when the world was a different place, and I was a different person—I met a man named Mike. Mike would go on to become very important in my life. He told me stories; he listened to me when I told him stories; he was one of the first people to read the adventures of a beat-up half-fae detective girl and say "There's potential here." Mike helped me a lot as a writer, because he listened to me when I wasn't good enough for many people to be listening to.

Also, he and his wife took me to Disney World for the very first time ever, and I'd love him forever for that alone. Dude gave me the Tower of Terror for my birthday. How could I not adore him? Anyway...

Mike is currently running a Kickstarter project to help fund an anthology project that's very dear to him, both as an editor and as a human being, titled Scheherazade's Facade. To quote the Kickstarter page:

"History, literature and mythology are replete with stories of those who, for one reason or another, disguise themselves as the opposite gender, or are transformed into that which they are not. Whether it's for love, ambition, or self-preservation, whether it's to challenge the status quo or simply to embrace their true nature, whether it's done willingly or thrust upon them, there will always be those who cross-dress and blur the lines between genders. Scheherazade's Facade takes its inspiration from those themes. From Bugs Bunny's dress-wearing shenanigans, to Mulan's impersonation of her father, from Tamora Pierce's Alanna of Trebond, to M*A*S*H's Klinger, this collection's antecedents are everywhere."

If you'd like a little more information, his full writeup is here.

I don't normally point people at Kickstarters, because there are just so damn many of them that I think are awesome that you'd be "uh, what?" at me over. I'm even planning one of my own, to reprint Stars Fall Home. But this is a good cause by a good friend, with clear goals and results. It's worth taking a look, and if you think this is a book that should be, maybe you could help a fella out a little.

Thanks for reading.

(This was sent to me by a friend who wishes to be anonymous, but she will see any comments left; I will now return to hammering my way through the end of this book, and see you tomorrow.)

***

This is a guest post by an anonymous friend of Seanan's; you see, she's been kidnapped by the fae, and while we could have rounded up the valerian and southernwood and archangel (dead nettles to you and me, did you know?) and gone in all puns blazing to bust her out of the hollow hills, we weren't sure she'd thank us if we succeeded before she'd finished teaching Puck one of those card games that has you fascinated at twelve, bored at twenty, and amused again at thirty-five. The cards have a golden egg on them—well, one does—but you can play the game a number of different ways. I'll bet Seanan knows them all. Sometimes it's the egg that wins.

Actually, while Seanan's not here to see I keep my shoes off the furniture and don't tease the cats with invisible white mice (what? You don't do that? Oh, OK. Just me, then) maybe I can tell you a few tall tales about her. I know, the truth's pretty tall already. Goes up and up, and keeps getting taller. But hey, spinning yarns is fun too.

Seanan knows stuff, doesn't she? She knows how magic smells and what color blood is when it isn't human...or any other earthly creature. She knows how to give—oh, goodness, she knows that—and she spills out stories like a fountain of inspiration with the hiccups. OK, maybe that's not a terribly useful metaphor. Never mind. Seanan's a conduit, a bell-tower, a gardener whose every rose wants to wrap her around and love her to death, she's made of patchwork like Columbine's other dress, and every bit of her pours out tales that it would probably kill her to try to keep in.

Well alright, so maybe she's not underhill with Puck—um, she's stowed away on a ship made of glass, for research, you understand, and the mermaids are insisting she stay and tell them her stories and theirs too, and they've tangled her hair up with little seashells that jingle when she moves her head and goodness but it's going to take a while to untangle them, and she has to be telling stories all the while, or they take away the samphire sandwiches and they sulk—they're known for it—until the biker mermaids come and liven things up again and then they want Seanan to paint designs on their leather jackets. You don't want to know what beast the leather comes from. No, you don't.

Anyway, so Seanan isn't here today, and I think she'd agree that the cupcakes weren't going to keep, so you have one and I'll have one and we'll bake her some more when she's back, yes? And in the meantime...she's left us some books to read...

Once upon a time there was a girl who...no. Wait.

That isn't how this goes.

Once upon a time there were a great many girls, and they did and were and knew and learned and loved and lost a great many things. Some of them were good girls and some of them were bad girls, some of them were nice girls and some of them were naughty girls, but most of them were a little bit of each kind of girl, beautiful patchwork people. Some of them were princesses and some of them were pirates. They were charmaids and scullery maids, ladies maids and goosegirls. They were ladies of good standing. They had dangerous reputations. They were fox girls and phoenix girls, autumn girls and summer girls, coyote girls and mermaid girls and every combination and everything in-between, and they were wonderful.

Some of those girls loved each other and some of those girls lost each other and some of those girls gave up on each other and some of those girls never found anyone at all. Some of them were loved and some of them were lonely. Some of them were happy on their own.

But sometimes, sometimes...sometimes, one of those girls would be walking in the wood, or on the beach, or in the pumpkin patch, or through the garden, and she would see someone up ahead, through the trees, through the seagrass, through the roses—someone who looked familiar, even though they'd never met before. And she would go running, that girl, our girl, with her bare feet in the sand or her high heeled slippers on the palace floor, running like her life depended on it. Sometimes the other girl would hear her coming, would stop, and turn, and wait. And when they met, they would look at each other, and ask a question. Always the same question, even if they didn't realize that they were asking it.

Now, do not think that they always loved each other. Some of them were too much alike, and hated each other on sight, or were even more alike than that, and cleaved together like two petals on a primrose. Some of them were indifferent to each other, too different to repel, too similar to attract. Many went their separate ways. But still, they asked their questions first, and had their answers.

"What took you so long?"

I am an autumn girl. I am a coyote girl. I am a pumpkin girl. I love crow girls and summer girls and fox girls and phoenix girls, mermaid girls and autumn girls and wild girls and lost girls, ocean girls and desert girls and fiddler girls and girls who sing like mockingbirds and laugh like falling leaves. I love my sailing ship girls who leave, and my lighthouse girls who stand to guide them home. And every time I have met one of them, one of my girls, I have asked her a question, even if I didn't know that I was asking it, and I have given her an answer, even if I didn't know that it was given.

"What took you so long?"
"I'm here now."

Love the ones you love. Count your crows and your comets and your lucky coins.

Live your fairy tale today.

Today is Thursday, and things are awesome! Like, seriously, seriously awesome. Why are they awesome? Because they are. I will explain.

First awesome: Conjure Oils is doing a line of perfumes inspired by the Toby Daye books. They debuted at OryCon, and they are amazing. Seriously, I squealed, more than a little. There are seven scents in the initial line, and more coming, some of which I am, like, crazy excited about (the idea of January O'Leary perfume makes me giggle way more than is strictly sane). If you're a BPAL fan, or know someone who is, you could do a lot worse than Toby Daye perfumes for the holidays.



Ahem: squee.

Second awesome: My darling Mia, over at Chimera Fancies, is getting ready for her incredibly massively huge holiday sale, and has put up a preview post of pendants. It seems like every batch is better than the batch before, which is probably part of why my pendant collection is beginning to rival my Pony collection for sheer number of pieces. I mean, damn.

The latest sale begins Friday, November 19th, at noon Pacific time, and if you check out her post, you can find out how to get yourself entered in a drawing for possible free awesomeness. I mean, how much better can it get than free awesomeness?

Third awesome: My mailing tubes arrived last night, and I estimated correctly, meaning that the mailing of the new "Wicked Girls" posters has officially begun. Specifically, I've mailed posters to Tara and to our cover model, but that means I now know exactly what I'm dealing with, rather than just making a highly educated guess. Hooray for math!

For details on the posters, and on how you can currently order them, please see yesterday's post on the subject. I'm planning to package and mail all paid orders from this week on Saturday morning, which means you'd have them by the end of the week in the United States, and by the end of the month in Canada. I also now know what it would cost to mail internationally, so please contact me via my website if you'd like to discuss other mailing options.

Tara bet me five dollars and a cupcake that we'd sell fifty in the first twenty-four hours. There's three hours left, and we're at thirty-eight. Free cupcake!

And those are the things which are awesome. What's awesome in the world of you?

While I was in New York, after the reading I did with the ever-lovely Cat Valente, I noticed that she had an ARC of The Habitation of the Blessed which looked, well, lonely. Deeply lonely. Unloved, even, an abandoned little slip of a book, begging for someone who would love it. I volunteered.

"If you take it, you have to talk about it," cautioned Cat. I said I understood, for that is the Rule and the Law of the ARC: if you take it, you have to talk about it. That's the bargain you make when you open the covers and release all that new book smell. I took the book.

Now I am talking about it.

The Habitation of the Blessed is the first book in the three-part Dirge for Prestor John, a historical figure who may or may not have been an early example of the Internet hoax. "Dude, let's tell the Church that we have all this neat shit, and watch them freak out!" Oh, they were wacky in the "here there be dragons" days. But The Habitation of the Blessed takes the approach that, in fact, Prestor John was a real man; his land contained all the things he claimed it contained; all those wonders once were true things. So where did they all go?

If you're familiar with Valente's Orphan's Tales books (In the Night Garden and In the Cities of Coin and Spice), the structure of Habitation will be familiar to you; told through three written memoirs and the reactions of two monks, it nests stories inside of stories, moving back and forth through time as the threads wind slowly together. This is not a book to be read in an afternoon; the density of its mythology is too great for that, and you'd miss a lot if you tried to rush. Valente has always been a fan of ornate and graceful language, a tendency which she honed with Palimpsest, and Habitation is no different; it's sort of like what you'd get if a medieval bestiary and a poet's dictionary decided to tryst in a seedy fairy tale bar, and then left the baby to be raised by the goosegirl who lives in the shed out back.

In case you can't tell, I liked the book.

Now, there are flaws. Depending on your familiarity with the source material, you may find yourself turning to your dictionary or even Wikipedia to check linguistic and historical facts. Parts of each storyline are omitted due to a fabulous, totally in-universe complication; this helps to reinforce the reality of the world, but is also a bit frustrating, because dude, missing story. But Valente never leaves out so much that you can't fill it in yourself, and as every horror movie, ever, has demonstrated, the monster you imagine is always more fantastic than the monster that you see.

Because this is the first book of three, it doesn't resolve so much as "find a convenient point and stop there for a little while, you know, to rest, maybe have some tea." You don't walk away with a complete story sleeping in your heart. And yet...

You walk away having seen something beautiful. Valente loves this story, and it shows in every word. She takes risks, and, for the most part, the risks pay off. I highly recommend The Habitation of the Blessed. It is beautiful, and strange, and a chronicle of something very dear that we know, inevitably, must be lost to us.

Read it, and rejoice, and learn, and grieve.

Last night was all about me and Cat Valente and the SoHo Gallery for Digital Art, home of the New York Science Fiction Review series of readings. Because, you know, when you import yourself a couple of fairy tale girls, the only thing to do is stick them in front of a large crowd and wait for the fun to begin.

But the fun has to begin at the beginning...

My flight got in right on time, which was a small blessing, since I wasn't really sleeping very well. Mind you, the fact that I was able to sleep at all made me a lucky girl. I had actually upgraded my ticket to Main Cabin Select, as that was the only way to get out of being crammed into a middle seat for five hours in the air. I turned out to be the only person in my row, and was able to pull the "belt yourself into the middle seat, curl up like a pillbug, and sleep" trick. Blessed empty seats, how I adore thee. But there were screaming babies on the plane, and there was turbulence, and it was not a restful night.

Jon and Merav collected me from the airport, and—after dropping Merav at work—Jon drove me home...where Kate was already waiting on the front stoop. Whoops. We went inside. I plugged in my laptop to make sure nothing was on fire, and the phone calls began, making it quite clear that a nap was not in my future. Well, fine, be that way, universe. After showering and changing my clothes, we were off, to meet The Agent in lovely downtown Manhattan, and eat lunch. Because without sleep and without food, I was going to murder someone.

(Incidentally, this was the first time The Agent got to meet Kate. They got along. So when they destroy your puny planet, don't worry. I'm sure they'll make you a nicer new one before long.)

Lunch was challah French toast and mussels, at least for me. Om nom. From there, we went to a lovely tea house The Agent knew about, where she and Kate drank lovely tea, and I passed out on a love seat. Eventually, The Agent went off to do something else, and Kate stole my headphones, while I...passed out on the love seat again. But then! A Cat Valente came and joined our party! Hooray! Kate and Cat sat and chatted while I achieved that nebulous state known as "wakefulness," and we set out for the venue. With one of those "only in New York" stops along the way, to buy hand-crafted artisan popsicles. No, seriously. I mean it.

We ate our popsicles, giggled a lot, and walked onward, to the SoHo Gallery of Digital Art...and into our very own fairy tale. The walls were covered in our books, our faces, our everything, and it was incredible. It was like a dream. I squeaked. We stared in awe. And then, because we needed our fairy tale faces in this fairy tale place, we ran off to change our clothes, Cat into a mad awesome tailored suit, me into a bright orange skirt and green top. And then the flood began.

We were both a little worried, in that abstract author way, that no one would show up. It turns out that what we should have been worried about was violating fire code, as the room wound up so packed that we ran out of chairs, then ran out of wall, and finally, ran out of places to stand. Wow. Everyone from DAW came—I got to meet Saladin!—and so did most of my New York friends, along with people like K. Tempest Bradford and Ellen Kushner and Teri Windling OH MY GOD I MET TERI WINDLING.

Ahem.

Cat read an absolutely gorgeous piece from The Habitation of the Blessed. I read "Laughter at the Academy: Field Studies in the Development of Schizotypal Creative Genius Personality Disorder." Everyone sighed and swooned at Cat's reading; everyone laughed in the appropriate places at mine. I got to shout "IGNITE THE BIOSPHERE!" in a room full of people who'd actually come to hear me do just that. It was magical.

In the Q&A afterward, someone asked us if we'd ever considered doing a photo shoot as Snow White and Rose Red.

And Cat and I laughed.

Congratulations! You woke up this morning in a beautiful full-color wonderland, with cartoon birds designed by Disney and backgrounds designed by Rackham. Which...may be a little worrisome, really, since the chances are good that you went to sleep in a house, not on the bonny green hillside, and that you usually live in a place where gingerbread is not considered a construction material. Don't worry. I'm here to help. Simply answer the following questions to determine whether you've fallen into a world where your only options are "happily ever after"...or death.

1. What is your name?

a) Jack, John, Margaret, or Janet.
b) Peter or Molly.
c) Anything else.

2. How many brothers do you have?

a) I have six older brothers.
b) I have seven brothers.
c) I have one brother/no brothers.

3. How many sisters do you have?

a) I have two stepsisters.
b) I have twelve sisters.
c) I have one sister/no sisters.

4. Where are your parents?

a) Parents?
b) Therein lies the tragic tale...
c) Home. Probably wondering where I am.

5. What time of year does it appear to be?

a) It's a fine morning in May.
b) The dead of winter.
c) I don't know. Summer-ish? Maybe?

6. Say something. What happens?

a) AHHHH WHY ARE SNAKES AND/OR DIAMONDS FALLING OUT OF MY MOUTH?!?
b) There's no sound. Maybe I need some hot tea or something.
c) "Something."

7. Your clothing is made of:

a) Thorns and brambles.
b) Cloth of gold and enchanted spider silk
c) A cotton-polyester blend.

8. The creatures of the forest are...

a) Offering me sage advic—HOLY CRAP I CAN TALK TO BIRDS.
b) Trying to lead me somewhere. Should I follow the squirrels?
c) Dinner.

9. An elderly woman warns you not to leave the path through the deep, dark woods. Do you...

a) Leave the path immediately. Can't fool me, old woman!
b) Stay on the path.
c) Deep, dark woods? Screw this, I'm going to the wolf-free, well-lit meadow.

Give yourself five points for every "a," three points for every "b," and one point for every "c."

Now for the yes/no questions:

10. Do you find yourself faced with the urge to rove out?
11. Look to the distance, beyond the misty mountains. Is there a castle?
12. Is it made of glass?
13. Yeah, don't go there. Are you going to go there?
14. When someone warns you not to wear gold in your hair and go to Cauterha, will you listen?
15. Are your shoes made of iron, glass, or something else that shoes shouldn't be made of?

Give yourself five points for every "yes," and one point for every "no."

THE RESULTS.

75-51 points: You are in a fairy tale. You are in a fairy tale RIGHT NOW. How the hell are you even getting to the Internet? Did Rapunzel forget to lock her wifi or something? Anyway, you'll never be seen again. Sorry about that. Watch out for glass coffins.
50-31 points: You are in danger of falling into a fairy tale. Be careful. Carry rope. Really, just wear a hiking pack everywhere you go. IT WILL BE WORTH IT. Trust me. Oh, and avoid spindles, towers, rampion, talking cats, candles, and anyone named "Jack."
30-15 points: You are not in a fairy tale. You probably work in a nice office. You will live a long and wolf-free life.

And they all lived* happily ever after.

(*Unless they were eaten by wolves. Or impaled on fast-growing thorn briars. Or poisoned. Or drowned and turned into a musical instrument. Or killed by a jealous spouse. Or turned into stew by robbers. Or...)

I've been writing structured poetry for most of my life. For the past several years, I've participated in a writing exercise I call "Iron Poet," wherein I request three words and a poetic form, and then write a poem to match the suggestion. (I don't have a round going right now, because I am out of hours in the day. I miss it. But I'm not quite that insane.)

I am honored and delighted to have a vilanelle in the latest issue of Goblin Fruit, an online magazine of speculative poetry. It's titled "Ever After Variations," and you can read it for free by following the link above.

Cabinet des Fees is an online journal of fairy tales. They publish fiction and poetry, essays and interviews, and I am totally over the moon to be interviewed in the latest issue. Another of my poems is reproduced alongside the article, titled "Baba Yaga Said." It's free verse, rather than a strict structure, and I'm quite fond of it. The interview was a joy, and the article is fantastic. Plus, check out this awesome description of me:

"A folklore maven and woman of the beautiful weird, Seanan burst onto the urban fantasy scene last year with Rosemary and Rue, the first book in her October Daye series. As her first series proliferates (Rosemary and Rue was recently joined by A Local Habitation, with An Artificial Night forthcoming in September), Seanan is also writing a year-long American folkpunk piece entitled Sparrow Hill Road at The Edge of Propinquity and has just published Feed, the first part of a zombie politico-thriller trilogy, under the pseudonym Mira Grant. Most of us are quite sure that Seanan never actually sleeps."

I'm folkpunk! Also a woman of the beautiful weird!

Halloweentown princess is go.

This one comes in two parts. Part the first: The Toby Daye FAQ is looking a little thin on the ground, with very few questions directly relating to the books themselves. Please give the FAQ a glance, if you get the chance, and propose new questions? I want to get things cleaned up and updated. In, y'know, my copious spare time.

Part the second: The Horror Movie Survival FAQ is going to be moving to MiraGrant.com with the launch of the new site. I know, I know, it's a sad day. But it'll fit in better there, and I'll have a lot of really awesome opportunities to update and expand.

This means I need a new "silly" FAQ for my main site...and that's where today comes in. I'm going to do a Fairy Tale and Ballad Survival FAQ. Please propose questions, offer survival tips, whatever comes to mind, and I'll get started from there! Help protect a new generation of children from evil stepmothers, wicked witches, inexplicable beanstalks, and the dangers of gingerbread houses.

Sometimes my life is awesome.

Last year, jimhines wrote a fantastic book called The Stepsister Scheme [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy]. My mother really really loved it, thus proving that a) she has taste, and b) Jim is trying to woo her away from me. Hmmmph. But since we're both DAW authors, it's not like I could stay cranky for long.

Well, in just two weeks, the sequel to The Stepsister Scheme can finally be yours. The Mermaid's Madness [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy] comes out October 6th, bringing you everything you loved about the first Princess adventure, and so much more!

Because it's almost Jim's book-day birthday, I thought he needed a pretty little dead ghoul to make the day even more exciting. Mel was surprisingly mellow about being turned into sushi, probably because the ocean is full of sharks, and she likes anything with more innate killing capacity than she possesses. I was a lot less mellow when I realized that I was going to need to hand-color all that fish netting. Oh, the things I do for love...

Happy book-day, Jim! Hooray for The Mermaid's Madness!

So, remember that discussion with Amy? The one where we spontaneously did all of Little Red Riding Hood as if done by I Can Has Cheezburger? It turns out that some things in this world really do cry out for illustration in more minds than just mine, and talkstowolves -- an enchanting and erudite woman in her own right; I highly recommend attending to her words, and not just because she likes my books -- has kindly filled this sucking void in our existence:

LOLRed: A Cautionary Tale In Three Panels.

Truly, I live in the best of all possible worlds.

(Remember the last time we did this...?)

Me: Rar!
Amy: Eeee! O halp, I is attacked by seananbeest!
Me: Dese dark woodz. U followz me into dem.
Amy: I dunno, dere'z dis bukkit I has fer gramma.
Me: Bukkit u sayz? Wut bukkit?
Amy: Sick grammal'rus needs her bukkit.
Me: OK. U takes her bukkit. I not sneakz ahead an eat her, k?
Amy: O gud! *traipses gaily*
Me: OM NOM GRAMMA NOM.
Amy: knokknok Gramma? U feelz ok? U wantz bukkit?
Me: U comez here now needz to see you bettah.
Amy: OK Gramma...
Amy: woah, dem's big eyez...
Me: Iz so's I can seez u bettah.
Amy: U must can see me waaaay gud.
Amy: Woah, dem's big eerz, Gramma.
Me: Iz so's I can hearz u bettah.
Amy: Ooh. Dem's...Dem's awful big teefs, Gramma.
Me: Iz so's I can nom you bettah.
Amy: Nom? O Noes! U not Gramma!
Me: Nope! Iz da Big Bad Woof! OM NOM NOM DUM KID IN CLOAK NOM NOM.
Amy: HALP HA---*squeeek*
Me: I can haz little girl. Iz like cheezburger. Only more dum.
Amy: *dies laughing*
Me: We are...very odd.

There are days when I worry about our sanity, since I'm reasonably sure that normal people don't break into spontaneous LOLcat retellings of Little Red Riding Hood. And then I realize that if we didn't do that sort of thing, I would have no idea who we were.

One hundred and seventy-nine days to Rosemary and Rue. Do you know where your granddaughter's basket of goodies is?

So y'all may have noticed me talking a goodly amount about the works of jimhines lately. This isn't because he bribed me, ironically enough; it's just that I find his books deeply entertaining, and I have a very low threshold for amusement sometimes. And it is in the spirit of my low threshold for amusement that I take this opportunity to remind you that The Stepsister Scheme comes out tomorrow. I haven't posted my full review of the book yet -- although I have posted my mother's -- but I found it to be a fun, fast, flippant take on the classical fairy tale heroines of old. Less 'Joss Whedon does Disney,' more 'Warren Ellis and Steven Moffat do the Brothers Grimm.' (Knowing Ellis and Moffat, they're either doing them in, or doing them some serious physical damage in an alleyway.)

I would happily hand this book to an eleven-year-old girl who likes to read, having been one, and thus having a decent recollection of what I would just skim over because hello, still boring. I would just as happily hand it to any adult friend, male or female, and be like, dude, check it out.

So anyway, The Stepsister Scheme, by Jim Hines, from DAW Books. January 6th, 2009. Help yourself through the post-holiday hangover with some ass-kicking princesses and a whole lot of wacky fun.

In honor of this most exciting event, I present another shot of my resident Pretty Little Dead Girl, this time in full-on Cinderella mode. (I promise you that the only similarity to the book is the archetype. Jim's Cinderella is a lot less likely to slit your throat, empty your pockets, and leave your body by the side of the road for the crows to peck at.) Now that I'm free from the confines of the calendar, I'm finding myself with an assortment of really odd, occasionally really amusing pin-ups. Because my brain does not believe in allowing me to have any of that mythical thing referred to only as 'down time.' Expect more randomness in the weeks to come, although I'm likely to save them until and unless I have something appropriate to post (like, say, this).

Whee!

I went holiday shopping with my mother yesterday. Always an entertaining experience, since she's essentially tireless, shameless, and the only person I know willing to go through the entire bottom-of-the-barrel clearance section at Rasputin's with me. As we were driving to the mall, the following exchange took place. (I started transcribing as we talked, and I take good shorthand, so this really is close to verbatim.)

Mom: "I finished that book you gave me. I really liked it."
Me: "You mean The Stepsister Scheme?"
Mom: "Yeah."
Me: "Good! Did you bring it back?"
Mom: "No, I forgot. I just can't believe a guy wrote it. Is he a little light in the loafers maybe?"

(We pause while I giggle hysterically. Then:)

Me: "No, Jim's married. He has kids."
Mom: "Oh. Well, it was really good. He describes things really well."
Me: "Well, I'll tell him."
Mom: "You tell him your mother gives it a thumbs up. Now he just has to write another one."
Me: "He has. It's called The Mermaid's Madness. It'll probably be out next year."
Mom: "Good! Because I want to know--"

(There is a longer pause while my mother gives opinions on the book that would count as spoilers if they were posted here. Also, because I spent half of her diatribe laughing too hard to write.)

Me: "I'll let him know."
Mom: "I couldn't put it down. It's one of those books you can't put down. I got home at three in the morning and I was reading the damn thing. I was like you in your bed with the flashlight when you were a kid."
Me: "That's awesome."
Mom: "I really liked how he handled--"

(Another long pause while Mom goes on about the book. Also, more laughter.)

Mom: "So I figure people will like it."
Me: "Good."
Mom: "On second thought, maybe you shouldn't tell him I read his book if it's not out yet."
Me: "That's what ARCs are for. They help build word of mouth, and that sells more copies."
Mom: "Oh. Well, I'll tell everybody they should buy it."

There you have it. The Stepsister Scheme: it kept my crazy mother up all night. (Also, she would pause for the rest of the day, say 'Cinderwench,' and just start giggling.)