reasons i suck

I have this one bad habit…

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Okay, stop laughing. I know I have more than one bad habit. Right now I want to talk about the one.

I have this habit of warning people they might not like my book.

Which is stupid, I know. I should talk UP the book, and if they happen on something they don’t like, they can decide that for themselves. Still, it’s an incredibly hard habit to break. I only did it once yesterday at the signing[1], but that was enough to catch myself and shut my mouth for the rest of the afternoon. Unfortunately, I also did with Jim Butcher at his signing.

I know where this comes from. I hate the idea of doing something that might make someone else uncomfortable or unhappy, and if I think my book might do that[2], my first instinct is to warn them off. It’s a habit I have to break, though.

[1] BTW, signing results: B&N set up 10 copies of Child of Fire and after three hours they were all sold. However, most of them sold to the other authors who were there or to people they knew. I only managed to sell two or three copies to random customers[3]. The bookstore staff, though, were wonderful. Some pix of the event: One. Two. I’m the bald guy.

[2] Attn potential Game of Cages readers! You might be put off by the plot if you are a [deleted] or [deleted] [deleted].

[3] It’s amazing how little time it takes to realize that J. Random Customer is never going to buy a book, no matter how much of your attention he demands.

See you at the bookstore

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Last reminder: I’ll be at the Tukwila B&N today at one o’clock with three other fine writers. I hope to see you there.

Don’t miss this one

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Andrew Wheeler went through Publishers Weekly’s list of best-selling books from 2009 and took out everything that wasn’t sf/f. The list of most popular sf/f books is here.

I don’t have a lot to say about the content of the books. You have to go pretty far down the list before you find science fiction. Fantasy and Horror dominate.

Another thing I notice at first glance is that there aren’t that many writers listed once on the list. Most of the slots are books from authors with at least one (usually more) other slot on the list. In Donald Maas’s The Career Novelist (there’s a free pdf of the book at the end of that link, btw) the agent took a look at which of his writers were earning six figures every year, and what they had in common.

He said the authors earning those big bucks weren’t getting it in advances. Most of it was coming from backlist sales, and they had to write about ten books before they reached that point. Interesting stuff.

And no, my book is not on the list. Yeah, I checked.

What happened to the day?

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Having gotten in way past bedtime last night (I didn’t get to sleep until almost 1 am) I naturally overslept this morning. By an hour and a half.

Now I keep finding myself looking down at the clock on my computer and thinking “break time already?” “How can it be lunch when I haven’t been uncomfortably hungry for the last 20 minutes?” In fact, I clock out in half an hour. Huh!

More Jim Butcher news. You know he cut off his long hair, right? It’s a big improvement, but I couldn’t find any pictures on flickr. Yet.

Now that his Codex Alera series is done, he’s planning to start a new project with a co-author–set in a world where the plucky band of heroes quested to overthrow a Dark Lord and failed.

Apparently, he pretty much planned out all 20 Dresden Files books when he wrote the first one. I can’t imagine doing that, or even wanting to do that.

Okay, back to me. I spent part of this morning going over the first chapter of Man Bites World for Betsy. Yeah, Game of Cages is going to have another teaser chapter in the back, and wow, I will never get over the fact that, no matter how vigorously I revise, I always miss the most bone-headed errors you can imagine. Jeez, but being edited is a humbling experience.

And now it’s snowing outside. WTH, day?

Bookstore appearance reminder

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This is just a reminder that I’ll be appearing at the Tukwila Barnes and Noble. 1:00 on Saturday, April 10th with authors Mark Henry (Battle of the Network Zombies), Gayle Ann Williams (Tsunami Blue), and Jessa Slade (Seducing the Shadows). We’ll be hanging out, chatting, and generally being an extrovert. If you’re in the area, drop by and say hello.

I shoulda shaved

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Jim Butcher’s event drew about 400 people. Yikes. I counted 32 black leather jackets, 21 fedoras/wide-brimmed hats, and only two guys who went for the trifecta: leather jacket, hat and “wizard’s staff”.

With my unshaved face and fat gut, I imagine I didn’t look out of place. I really felt out of place, though.

There was no reading; it was all Q&A, and what’s more, Butcher is a funny, engaging speaker. Even when a reader (the very first one!) came to the mike to ask him about his inaccurate research on gun laws, he was gracious and funny.

After an hour of that, it was time to queue up for signing. I waited an hour and a half to get his latest book signed and more importantly, to thank him for writing a blurb for Child of Fire. He was very kind about my work, and inscribed “One hell of a writer” in my copy of Changes.

But I should have shaved.

Bookstore appearance

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I’ll be appearing at the Tukwila Barnes and Noble. 1:00 on Saturday, April 10th with Mark Henry (Battle of the Network Zombies), Gayle Ann Williams (Tsunami Blue), and Jessa Slade (Seducing the Shadows). There isn’t going to be a reading, but I’ll be signing books and we’ll be giving a talk.

I think. I’m not sure exactly how it will all shape up, but I know I’ll be out talking to readers. If you’re in the area, drop by and say hello.

New word: compastion

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Compastion: n. The uncomfortable feeling you from reading a thank-you-everyone-for-all-the-kind-comments-and-emails-during-this-difficult-time post when you know you could have offered a comforting word but didn’t.

Right here

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Right here in the room with me is a woman in a sparkling satin dress, with a crumpled sash over her right shoulder and a tiara in her well-sprayed hair. Her face is streaked with tears, and she can’t stop saying Thank you! Thank you!. She has to steady herself by clutching the hand of the friend next to her.

That woman is me.

I just sent Man Bites World to my editor at Del Rey. And it’s only seven months and two days past deadline! Why, that’s practically early!

Okay. Not really. In fact, this book was really difficult to write. Add that the revisions for Game of Cages were extensive and time-consuming and you have me missing my target like a blindfolded man in a gun fight.

But it’s turned in and I’m ready for revisions. How do I feel?

So.
Frigging.
Relieved.

To finish the post, here’s a list of the words that MS Word for Mac did not recognize during that final spell check: hitman, baster, motherfuckers, meh, berm, lynchings.

Now I get to work on the next thing.

Fun with words

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How do you guys feel about “spasm” as a verb?