The only thing worse than having dozens of unread books on your shelf is when half of them are by people you’re friends with so you have the additional guilt of being TERRIBLY BEHIND on friends’ books. The only thing better than reading books that have been on the TBR shelf for years is reading one by a friend and it turns out to be WONDERFUL. DESDAEMONA is one such book, written by– –ah, see, now, this is where it gets meta. :) Ben Macallan is the main character of…
I’ve finished the first revision pass on IMMORTAL BELOVED, which has been a very interesting project to revisit. The final third is visibly stronger than the middle third; the middle third is visibly better than the first third. I knew I’d learned a lot writing it, but it’s interesting to see it so clearly. There are still a *lot* of things to fix. Worldbuilding, character relationship development, the poorly handled head-hopping (I don’t mind head-hopping, especially after writing MAGIC & MANNERS, but there are chapters where even *I* don’t know…
I’m trying to keep my nose to the grindstone while also being caught in this frustrating window of hurry up and wait. I put in an order for a proof for MAGIC & MANNERS on the 6th and it still hasn’t arrived, so I went and looked up why and the damned thing says it’s still ‘pending’. I don’t understand why, unless I’m supposed to tell the system that it’s print-approved, except as far as I can tell that will propagate it into the publication system and I don’t want…
Skraylings! I don’t think I’ve read a book with skraylings, or anything much like them, since Elizabeth Boyer’s books that I haven’t read in a Very Long Time Indeed but still have on my shelf because fond memory tells me they were pretty darn good. Anne Lyle’s THE ALCHEMIST OF SOULS is nothing like those books, though. I’d say it’s more grown-up, but that’s kind of a disservice to the Boyer books, which were of their time, just as Lyle’s novel is. I just really, really *enjoyed* ALCHEMIST being of…
Thanks to the efforts of the magnificent Thirzah Brown, I have a beautiful new website! Equally excitingly, I have, through the good graces of a reader, acquired a comments moderator, which means the comments have been turned back on for the site! COME ONE! COME ALL! SPEAK TO ME! :) This has all been in the works for quite a long time now, and I’m really delighted to see it go live. My needs for a website have changed over the years, with me gradually wanting a greater focus on…