Thursday, December 31, 2015

The New Year

Health, success and happiness to everyone. And for my wish list, more peace and lot more positive climate action during 2016.


Sunday, October 18, 2015

The Amberlight Covers - Next Change

Next episode in the Updating the Amberlight Covers story. Chris didn't like the revision from the last blog version, so that one didn't appear anywhere. We are now up to the following revision, just arrived yesterday.

For comparison, here's draft 2 (well, that's my numbering, Chris's are different)


And now, here's the new one:


Lost a bit of that gorgeous golden light, but in compensation, we have a lot more river, with perspectives, and distance, and really beautiful  mother-of-pearl effects near Tellurith.

I think, now I see them together, that I like the tones and glow in the second draft, but otoh, this IS a story about a River, and a river journey, and the new one has river, oh, yes, indeed it does.

So, comments definitely suggested on this one. What does everyone think?



Monday, September 28, 2015

The Amberlight Covers - changing times

As mentioned on the "Latest News" sidebar, I've recently signed a contract with Wildside Press to issue new editions, primarily e-books, of the first three Amberlight books, Amberlight itself, Riversend and Source.
The fourth book, Dragonfly, will be coming out after numerous dramas - though not with Wildside - for the very first time.

After the sturm und drang of negotiating a contract, and before the greater sturm und drang - in my case, after some bad experiences - of having the mss edited and prepared for actual release, comes the exciting if sometimes stressful part of Getting the Cover Organised.
For this edition, Tim Lantz, who did the illustration for the original print edition of Amberlight, has given me re-use rights. The first time I laid eyes on this cover, I was ecstatic.

Not just because it was a gorgeous image in its own right, but because for once, the cover artist's impression of the character matched or was even better than my own internal vision of her (or him.)

So, time passed, Juno Books brought out Riversend, the first sequel, then changed the shape of the line, and left my series "orphaned" as they call it, with the third book written but nowhere to send it.

Luckily, another publisher heard about the Juno orphans, and sent me a query, and I was very happy when they brought out the third book, Source, though the cover, that time, didn't have quite the charge of the Amberlight one.

Never mind, the book came out, and in due course passed on its way, and in the meantime, I had found myself, to my protesting disbelief, landed with the idea for a third sequel.  More alarming, it was going to be a next-gen sequel, a quirk I usually either regard with extreme caution, or detest.
Made no difference. Them Back There in the writing crew wanted the next instalment of the idea that began the whole series. Shut up, they ordered, dictating furiously, and write.

So I wrote. And finished the book, and it was quite unlike anything I had expected, and I now can barely wait to see it Out There, because I want more reactions to all the, ah, interesting bits I had so much fun getting down.

In the meantime, one of my writing mates, Chris Howard, has developed his art-work and started doing book covers. I no sooner laid eyes on samples than I wanted one. So, since Source was projected for a new edition sometime, I asked Chris to design me a cover, which he did. (Though pardon me, as Mark Antony said while brandishing Caesar's unopened will, I don't mean to show that one off just yet.)

BUT, also in the meantime, the Wildside edition means I need not just one but three new covers: one for Riversend, one for Source, and a first cover for Dragonfly.
Chris is now working on the Riversend cover. When I saw the first draft of that I nearly danced again.  Not only was it gorgeous, but as you can see, it was a perfect complement for the Amberlight original:















But then, as is the way of writers given their heads, I started looking and muttering, "But, oughtn't there to be a bit more River in there somewhere... after all, it's about the states of the Riverworld, and there's a huge River journey eventually..."
Being amazingly patient, Chris did an amended version:


There's the river, yes, but then, beautiful as the autumn colours were, it seemed a bit closed in ...
I'm now waiting for Chris's next amendment.
But in the meantime it has occurred to both of us that since he likes to work with his draft appearing online at his own site, we might as well share the process  here as well.
So, here's the current version of the Riversend cover art, sans title, author's name, etc, and awaiting, from my side, a little less trees just beyond Tellurith's profile.


And I'm inviting comments/suggestions from readers viewers, on the overall effect, any other interesting changes (though they may not actually happen), but particularly on,
Where do you think the title and author's name should go?

Hope to hear from you!

Sunday, August 30, 2015

The Air in Spring in Geneva



Audible have just released the audiobook of the Doings of Anton (aka my novella "Spring in Geneva," read by Jesse Einstein, who did the three first Everran books for Audible a couple of years ago.

He is a wonderful narrator - till I heard him read the first few pages of Everran's Bane I never thought I cd. write so well, heh. And he has done it again with "Geneva." Only heard the first scene, but he brings out the sly humour as well as the over-the-top early -19th Century sensibility that I was thinking of for Anton.

AND, nowadays Audible are doing a bit of promoting, too. I have or can get, nine, count 'em, nine free copies of the audio-book for friends, promotion etc.

Three have gone to friends/family - esp. people who had a part in writing "Geneva" - and two I am keeping in reserve, but the other four are up for grabs.
The link to the book on Audible is again, here.

So, if you read this blog, and want to check out the first few pages, there's where to click.
And if you want a free copy, add a comment on this post.


First come first served, as Anton would NOT have said.

Friday, August 14, 2015

After Long Silence....

And with apologies to Sheri S. Tepper, who used that as the alternate title for her brilliant SF novel The Enigma Score.

Finally have a moment to do a blog post with catch-ups for the, ahem, rest of 2015. (What, just from March to August? What's 5 months or so, after all? Well, a lot to the stat counting bots, apparently.)

Anyhow.

News 1: Next publication after Lilian and Jo in March, is/will be a letter to James Tiptree in the Letters to Tiptree antho from Twelfth Planet Press, due out this month, and now available for pre-order at the link just above.

The list of contributing writers is pretty cool, including

Kathryn Allan
Marleen Barr
Stephanie Burgis
Joyce Chng
Aliette de Bodard
L. Timmel Duchamp
A.J. Fitzwater
Lisa Goldstein
Theodora Goss
Nicola Griffith - read online at LA Review of Books
Valentin D Ivanov
Gwyneth Jones
Rose Lemberg
Sylvia Kelso
Alex Dally MacFarlane
Brit Mandelo - read online at Tor.com
Sandra McDonald
Seanan McGuire
Karen Miller
Judith Moffet
Cheryl Morgan
Pat Murphy
Sarah Pinsker
Cat Rambo
Tansy Rayner Roberts
Justina Robson
Nisi Shawl
Nike Sulway
Lucy Sussex
Rachel Swirsky
Bogi Takács
Lynne M. Thomas
Elisabeth Vonarburg
Jo Walton
Tess Williams

And there will be archived letters from Ursula K. Le Guin, Joanna Russ and Tiptree his/herself.

Never having met or contacted JT/AS in real life, my effort largely concerns one of Tiptree's Yucatan stories, a little off the usual Tiptree track but related in Tiptree's own supposed persona as a psychologist and long-term visitor to the Yucatan. It's from an award winning antho of the 1980s.

   TALES OF THE QUINTANA ROO: What Came Ashore at Lirios; The Boy Who Waterskied to Forever; Beyond the Dead Reef by Tiptree, James Jr. (pen name used by Alice B. Sheldon) - 1986 - from W. Fraser Sandercombe and Biblio.com


There were things that bugged me about the story, but it's also stuck in my head when many others, including some more famous ones of Tiptree's, have slithered out, so my epistle deals with some of the questions I was never able to ask the writer. More questions than answers, but that's the way it is, most times, when you try speaking to the dead. So to speak.

Shd. be a fun antho when it emerges, all the same.


Letters From:

Kathryn Allan
Marleen Barr
Stephanie Burgis
Joyce Chng
Aliette de Bodard
L. Timmel Duchamp
A.J. Fitzwater
Lisa Goldstein
Theodora Goss
Nicola Griffith - read online at LA Review of Books
Valentin D Ivanov
Gwyneth Jones
Rose Lemberg
Sylvia Kelso
Alex Dally MacFarlane
Brit Mandelo - read online at Tor.com
Sandra McDonald
Seanan McGuire
Karen Miller
Judith Moffet
Cheryl Morgan
Pat Murphy
Sarah Pinsker
Cat Rambo
Tansy Rayner Roberts
Justina Robson
Nisi Shawl
Nike Sulway
Lucy Sussex
Rachel Swirsky
Bogi Takács
Lynne M. Thomas
Elisabeth Vonarburg
Jo Walton
Tess Williams
- See more at: http://www.twelfthplanetpress.com/products/ebooks/letters-to-tiptree#sthash.jKrwPGSq.dpuf

Letters From:

Kathryn Allan
Marleen Barr
Stephanie Burgis
Joyce Chng
Aliette de Bodard
L. Timmel Duchamp
A.J. Fitzwater
Lisa Goldstein
Theodora Goss
Nicola Griffith - read online at LA Review of Books
Valentin D Ivanov
Gwyneth Jones
Rose Lemberg
Sylvia Kelso
Alex Dally MacFarlane
Brit Mandelo - read online at Tor.com
Sandra McDonald
Seanan McGuire
Karen Miller
Judith Moffet
Cheryl Morgan
Pat Murphy
Sarah Pinsker
Cat Rambo
Tansy Rayner Roberts
Justina Robson
Nisi Shawl
Nike Sulway
Lucy Sussex
Rachel Swirsky
Bogi Takács
Lynne M. Thomas
Elisabeth Vonarburg
Jo Walton
Tess Williams
- See more at: http://www.twelfthplanetpress.com/products/ebooks/letters-to-tiptree#sthash.jKrwPGSq.dpuf

Letters From:

Kathryn Allan
Marleen Barr
Stephanie Burgis
Joyce Chng
Aliette de Bodard
L. Timmel Duchamp
A.J. Fitzwater
Lisa Goldstein
Theodora Goss
Nicola Griffith - read online at LA Review of Books
Valentin D Ivanov
Gwyneth Jones
Rose Lemberg
Sylvia Kelso
Alex Dally MacFarlane
Brit Mandelo - read online at Tor.com
Sandra McDonald
Seanan McGuire
Karen Miller
Judith Moffet
Cheryl Morgan
Pat Murphy
Sarah Pinsker
Cat Rambo
Tansy Rayner Roberts
Justina Robson
Nisi Shawl
Nike Sulway
Lucy Sussex
Rachel Swirsky
Bogi Takács
Lynne M. Thomas
Elisabeth Vonarburg
Jo Walton
Tess Williams
- See more at: http://www.twelfthplanetpress.com/products/ebooks/letters-to-tiptree#sthash.jKrwPGSq.dpuf

Letters From:

Kathryn Allan
Marleen Barr
Stephanie Burgis
Joyce Chng
Aliette de Bodard
L. Timmel Duchamp
A.J. Fitzwater
Lisa Goldstein
Theodora Goss
Nicola Griffith - read online at LA Review of Books
Valentin D Ivanov
Gwyneth Jones
Rose Lemberg
Sylvia Kelso
Alex Dally MacFarlane
Brit Mandelo - read online at Tor.com
Sandra McDonald
Seanan McGuire
Karen Miller
Judith Moffet
Cheryl Morgan
Pat Murphy
Sarah Pinsker
Cat Rambo
Tansy Rayner Roberts
Justina Robson
Nisi Shawl
Nike Sulway
Lucy Sussex
Rachel Swirsky
Bogi Takács
Lynne M. Thomas
Elisabeth Vonarburg
Jo Walton
Tess Williams
- See more at: http://www.twelfthplanetpress.com/products/ebooks/letters-to-tiptree#sthash.jKrwPGSq.dpuf

Wednesday, March 4, 2015

Grammar Day 2015

The grammatically correct writer and reader's web-site is doing a quiz for Grammar Day. Have a look. Have a go!


Grammarly Grammar Nerd Quiz Feature Image