Day in the Life of an Idiot

 Today, (more like this evening at this point) I hope to get a new Tate bit posted on Wattpad, but I had to work today from 9 to 1 at Maplewood library.  It was really busy thanks to the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday.  Normally, Maplewood is my favorite library because the people are so awesome and they have the best ever graphic novel collection in Ramsey county, I swear.

In other writing related news, Rachel and I are also trying to see if we can build more of an audience for our School for Wayward Demons project by x-posting that at Wattpad too.  So, if you find it easier to read an comment on things over there, you should feel free to check it out: http://www.wattpad.com/96121914-song-of-secrets-book-1-of-the-school-for-wayward  (Also, if you want to, you can follow us on Tumblr, too: http://waywardschoolofdemons.tumblr.com).

If you're still following along at the entertheunseen.com website, the newest chapter is up "Bad Magic Puppies."

Meanwhile, Mason and I are recovering from our sledding excitement.  His face looks like he was attacked by Wolverine, and I keep finding new "old lady" bruises all over my body. You know what I mean by that, right? It's like those ones where you're, like, 'what? where'd this come from... oh, right.' accompanied by general stiffness, despite liberal application of aspirin.  Ah well.  'Twas fun.  

I have posted part 11 of UNJUST CAUSE, Tate's serialized, work-in-progress novel for your entertainment on WattPad: http://www.wattpad.com/53052964-unjust-cause-part-11-jazz-dance-of-justice

This one is titled, "Jazz Dance of Justice." In it, Alex attempts to get a message from the Dead (and rather wishes they could be clearer when making the effort to come back from Beyond.)

:-)

That took me longer than usual because I'm starting to get ready to head off for our honeymoon next week. I have many errands to do. Many, many. And I should warn you that since we're going to be up in the Boundary Waters internet access will be limited. You're going to hear from me even less than usual. (Sorry!) Though I should be able to get a few things out since the Lodge has wifi, and so I'm hoping to be able to continue to post this... though I think Mason and I will be skipping out Podcast next week, since that takes up a lot of bandwidth.

Anyway, I should go off to the post office and pet store now.

See you!

I see that I haven't updated since before Christmas. Yikes! Shame on me.

Let's see... perhaps I will try to work backwards to recount all the goings-on at chez Morehouse-Rounds. The New Year was quite lovely. We broke with a long-standing tradition of an early night and snoring before the ball dropped and actually decided to be down right social on New Year's Eve. Our friends, seanmmurphy and his wife, invited us out for a candle lit walk at Snelling State Park. Unfortunately, we were having a no-good-rotten day from almost the start. Shawn woke up with a killer migraine and Mason woke up... a teenager. (He was amazingly whiny, sullen, and angry about nothing and everything all at once.) Even though Shawn was feeling better by evening, I wasn't sure I wanted to inflict Mason's mood on the Murphy-Carlson's so, I volunteered to hike in the woods sans the rest of my family.

It was actually very lovely. If my family was more energetic and athletic, I would try to make it a family tradition of our own. There was no snow, of course (the storm blew in just as we were headed back to the car), but the park volunteers had lit the trail with lovely ice and plastic bucket candles. We walked and talked about mainstream fiction vs. science fiction and people we knew and our genetic/ethnic backgrounds and all sorts of things that one rambles on about with good friends. We had such a lovely time that Sean's wife offered to bring the wine and cheese over to Shawn and Mason, rather than having me have to fetch them over to the Murphys'.

When I called Shawn, the overall mood in the household had improved dramatically, so it was a go. We had munchies (added to by the things in our fridge, and I am please to report we could even offer a few fancy cheeses ourselves,) and sparkling juice for the majority of us, and bit of wine for those that wanted. We talked until nearly midnight, when the Murphys decided to head home and we rushed upstairs to watch Dick Clark and the ball.

The day had turned around quite nicely. I should say too, that in an effort to try to have a happier day, we had gone book shopping earlier. Uncle Hugos needed more copies of the AngeLINK books and so I brought what I had, and we made a nice trade. Mason got a ton of those punny MYTH books by Robert Lynn Asprin (I LOVED those when I was a tween,) and I even walked out with a book or two for myself. Then, since it was the one day when the shops were still open for a while, we zipped back to St. Paul with the plan of hitting Kowalski's for last minute food supplies before the holiday wasteland. We drove past our other favorite bookstore: Sixth Chamber, and we decided to drop Shawn and Mason off for a look-through and I went and fetched the milk and eggs and other sundries. When I came back to retreive them, they were just ready to walk out. I asked Shawn if she'd remembered to try out the secret password. On Facebook, Sixth Chamber had a deal that the first five people to walk in and say "hedgehog" would get a gift certificate. Shawn said she hadn't, so I marched up to the counter and said, "hedgehog!"

I won.

I was the very last person to offer the secret password. I got a t-shirt, a Japanese eraser (kitty!), and a 20% off coupon.

Then I came home and discovered a royalty check in the mail from Penguin for Tall, Dark & Dead (the book that continues to sell, sell, sell!)

So, I'd say that New Year's Eve was pretty auspicious. Money and fabulous prizes galore!

Speaking of TD&D, one of the things I did over the holiday was read the page proofs for the mass-market paperback edition. They sent it as a .pdf, and so I mailed it to Shawn's fancy new Kindle Fire, and spent a day reading my book on the Kindle. I found several typos, much to my surprise. But, the good news is that they'll be corrected in the paperback version. The other thing that was kind of awesome about that is that I discovered that one of my best selling books is also one of my quirkiest.

I don't know if you noticed, but Garnet is kind of a slut. There is a LOT of sex in that book, and sexiness. Sebastian is also surprisingly dark, and Parrish is... a total hustler, like literally, in that book. It's kind of amazing... and Garnet's friends are odd, a lot like my real friends, and the interactions in that books are very *me*.

Thus, one of the things that re-reading that has done for me is made me a bit more confident about my quirkiness as a writer. You see, in most cases, I have no idea if my personal brand of weirdness was a plus or a minus to sales. The AngeLINK books, which are very *me*, are all out of print.

This "failure" has caused me to believe that maybe I had no idea how to write to a popular market. But, TD&D is going to mass-market. It's the only book I've had that's changing format like that. As a trade-size book, it's well into its sixth or seventh printing. I've easily made as much money in royalties from that book as they paid me in an advance, probably twice as much... if not more.

My point is, I can now say, with confidence, that my quirkiness is _not_ a detriment to sales. IN FACT, a person could make a pretty strong case that... maybe, just MAYBE I know what I'm doing.

Well, we probably shouldn't go THAT far. But, at least, it seems to be true that a book that has a lot of my extra special weirdness smeared all over it isn't automatically headed for the remainder pile.

This was kind of an epiphany... during the Epiphany and everything.

Meanwhile, yesterday was our traditional day to take down all the Christmas decorations. You might not expect this of a couple of pagans, but we kind of go all out for Solstice/Yule/Christmas. There is tinsle! Bells! And all the other things that the Grinch absolutely detests. So, that was kind of the main event for the day. We hauled the tree out for recycling, put everything away into boxes... and, because it was the last REAL day of vacation, all this was interspersed with lightsaber battles.

Mason, I should warn you, is a dark sider. Which forces me, the Slytherin, to play the good Jedi. Mason, too, likes to make up the various Darths that he portrays. Yesterday, each Darth had the added power of the elements, a sort of Elemental Force power, so there was Darth Terrus (Earth) and Darth Inferno (Fire) among others. Probably the toughest guy was the one with water power because a touch of his lightsaber froze me with ice. In the Masonverse, too, the good guys do NOT automatically triumph, either. So, I died a lot.

Let's hope that old idea that how you spend New Year's Day is how you spend the rest of the year isn't true, or I'm going to be run through with a lot of lightsabers.

This morning I came in to an email from the fine folks that included me (or, rather, Tate,) in the anthology MANY BLOODY RETURNS. They were passin on the image of the cover art for the British edition of the book. It's not really much to look at, but it got me thinking. I haven't gone looking for my German editions of Tate's second, third, and fourth Garnet books. Well, I found them, and they're right cute. Check 'em out:



This one is what Dead Sexy became. I can't remember how it translates any more, but if you want a German edition of it, you can order it on Amazon's German site here. It came out in May of this year. Romancing the Dead, meanwhile, became Vampir Sein Ist Alles, which just came out (August):




...if you'd like to get that one, you can order it here: http://www.amazon.de/Vampir-sein-alles-Tate-Hallaway/dp/3802582861/

And, for the final German cover, here's Biss in Alle Ewigkeit aka Dead If I Do...



Again, if you're my folks (or anyone else who might like to obsessively collect my German editions), you can pre-order that one here: http://www.amazon.de/Biss-alle-Ewigkeit-Tate-Hallaway/dp/380258287X/. It comes out in November 2010.

In other news, I've been busy. I just answered a set of interview questions for a nonfiction book about vampire writers, and talked to a young student in Poland who is doing her masters (?) thesis on Archangel Protocol and, it seems, Marxism. Actually, I think the thesis has more to do with religion, but I did get asked a bit about how I felt about Marx's bit about religion as the "opiate of the masses." Also, I sent back a contract/agreement for the anthology MAKING WAVES which will include a reprint of my short story "Indigo Bunting." All proceeds for MAKING WAVES will go to a charity to aid victims (animal and human) of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill. Also, I got the cover art for NORTHERN LIGHTS another anthology a story of mine will appear in. NORTHERN LIGHTS is a collection of Minnesota authors, and my original short story "Bright, Bright City Lights" will appear in that. "Bright, Bright City Lights" was my attempt to deal with the death of senator Wellstone through fiction... and magic. It's a very weird story for me because the bad guy is actually Bobby Sands, hero of the struggle for Irish freedom.

Meanwhile, Mason and I are trucking along through DEATHLY HALLOWS. We're on chapter 30, "The Sacking of Severus Snape." I cried like a fool when Dobby died, and I actually found him kind of annoying in the story. I have to give Ms. Rowlings credit. That woman can write grief (and particularly funerals.) Even Shawn, who has really only been following along in snippets and through the movies, shed big tears.

I find whenever we're reading a lot of Harry Potter, I devote a large part of my subconscious to the stories. Last night, once again, I dreamed I was Harry. This time I was chasing Voledmort through the London underground. There was one particularly memorable scene where Hermione and I were on one platform and Voledmort on the other (in my dreams, he was trying to dress as a Muggle, which, of course, the Dark Lord would never do. The image was particularly funny, too, because he still had red eyes and a snake-slit nose, and he'd just put on a stocking cap, ala Spock trying to hide his ears in some Old Trek episode.) Anyway, we were casting spells at each other across the trains. It was very weird, but kind of cool. I had three wands, and I kept trying to find a good one that would work against the Elder Wand. I woke up dodging the Avada Kedavra curse.

In an hour or so, I'm off to pick up Eleanor for our weekly writing get-together. I'm hoping to work on the synopsis for the 3rd vampire princess book, which I'm sad to say, I'm behind on... as in missed a deadline, which I almost never do. But I was hoping to hear from my editor about what she thought of #2, in case the ending needed to change. But I think, at this point, I should just go ahead.....

FRIDAY 8pm
I Knew this Panel was Trouble when it Walked into my Office

It seems like “noir” is being tacked on to just about every sub-category of the genre these days: fantasy-noir, science fiction-noir, vampire-noir, and so on. And even if it isn’t attached to the genre label, the word appears on book jackets and in reviews in droves. But what do we mean when we say something is “noir”? What are the touch-stones that make something noir: must noir be gritty, violent, dangerous, or require a mystery be solved? How do our genre versions of noir compare to the classic examples of the style? Is what we call “noir” truly “Noir”, or is it just a shadowed reflection and a surly mood?

With: Doug Hulick, mod.; Rebecca Marjesdatter, Lyda Morehouse

--

SATURDAY 11 am
Villainry for Dummies

So one day you look around and realize that YOU are the bad guy and that twerp whose father you murdered a decade ago might turn out to be the hero. Now what? Tips on surviving beyond the last page of the book (or the credits of the movie)...at least through a couple of sequels

With Naomi Krizter, mod.; Kelly McCullough, Lyda Morehouse

--

SATURDAY 2pm
Unraveling the Mystery: Big Bang Theory

Come talk about what you like and/or don’t like about the physicist sitcom Big Bang Theory.

With: Tony Artym, mod.; Eric M. Heideman, Kelly McCullough, Lyda Morehouse, Brian K. Perry

---

SATURDAY 3pm
Broad Universe Rapid-Fire Reading

With Catherine Lundoff, Lyda Morehouse

---

If you come to MarsCON over the weekend, you will see me in the hallways or at least on these panels. I *thought* I had another one about hearting femme fatales, but that panel might have been moved/removed or I missed it in my recent search and I'll be there too.

In other news, I got some great shots of our snow fort before Mason collapsed it. Although I have to say that much of it had to be rebuilt. Seems that it's getting too warm for snow and our main wall collapsed in the heat over the weekend. Mason and I rebuilt a lot of it yesterday, and then he had a great time destroying it with a crochet mallet. Destructo-boy!

I will have the internet speed and technology to upload some of the pictures tomorrow. So, if you're interested, check back.

In Tate news, I don't know how official this is (so don't spread it around too much), but it seems that the Garnet Lacey books have been bought in-house to be reprinted by Berkley Sensation as mass-market paperbacks starting (tentatively) in December of 2011. Hooray! I have to say that I'm a huge fan of mass-market size, so I'm glad these books will get a chance to try out the smaller format. My editor isn't sure, but they *may* get a new cover make-over as well.

That could be very cool.

I've NEVER had a book go from one size to another before, BTW. I know a lot of authors have hardbacks that then become paper, but not me. Until now, I've always stayed whatever I was original printed in.

Speaking of that, hold on to your copies of APOCALYPSE ARRAY. I just went through my inventory for taxes and there are exactly 5 left in the universe. After those go to Uncles, there will be no new copies in existance anywhere on earth. (Presumably, you'll still find them used on Amazon and through other used bookstore venues, but... no more fresh, unbroken spines!!)

I also got edits for my short story "Jawbone of an Ass" which is going to be printed in an anthology of Biblical Horror stories called SHE NAILED A STAKE THROUGH HIS HEAD by Dybbuk Press at some point in the near furutre. I'll keep you posted when that's available. It's one of my better short stories, if I do say so myself. I'm not really very good at shorter works, but this one came out very atmosphere, IMHO. Plus, while it doesn't take place in the AngeLINK universe, it is about God and religion, so it's got a signature flavor to it, as it were.

I'm also working on some proposals for Tate... my editor is passing down the pike the humorous chick-litty ones I wrote (including the "solid cow mutilation mystery," as Shawn called it). I guess Berkley Trade isn't doing as well with the funny stuff. They're going darker in their urban fantasy, which makes sense. I see a lot of that out there these days. Elizabeth and I were talking about that, in fact, when last I was at Uncles (which, btw, is still a great place to pick up your new copies of all my books.)

Anyway, I'm trying my hand at some darker ideas (though those funny ones aren't dead yet.) Wish me luck.

When Mason goes back to school next week, I'll be working on the young adult sequel of Tate's which is due in July.

Oh! And I forgot to tell you a funny story. When Mason and I were walking home after dropping mama off at GoodWill (we joked we're trading her in for a newer one), we got to the far corner of our block. I saw a pigeon on the ground that looked injured. I tried to pick it up. It was so disoriented that it actually smacked into my thigh. But it was well enough to get back in the air again, so I shrugged, and was turning to Mason to explain the rule "if you can't catch them, you have to leave 'em in the wild" when ZIP! Out of the clear, blue sky swoops a Cooper's hawk who slams into the pigeon and takes her down!! Munch, munch, gooble, munch, that pigeon became lunch! Mason and I stood there a moment with our mouths open, and then I said, "Well, that's nature in action, I guess."

"Yep," said Mason and we went off to play in the slushy ice puddles.

According to Mason, he spent yesterday's skating practice mostly just getting around on his knees. (Poor guy, though he sounds like me.)

I feel I can kind of relate. This week is crazy-busy. naomikritzer read my book in about ten minutes, so I was over there yesterday to get critique. I just settled in to get that done by this weekend so Shawn will have a chance to proof it before it goes to the editor, when who should e-mail, but said-editor. Could she send along the revisions for HONEYMOON or would it break my stride with ALMOST?

Did I mention we're headed for Indiana on October 15 to spend a couple of days with Grandma?

Yet I always remind myself in times like these, that these are the problems I DREAMED of having for years. I really can't complain. I have work. Not only that, it's work I LOVE. It's work that I can do while at home, and, on days like today, take a two hour break to putter in the garden in the bright October sunshine.

In other news, the house is a complete mess. I can't seem to get out from under the dishes. AND I just found a well-over due library book of Mason's neatly shelved on his bookshelf, *and* another one that belongs to his school in the computer room on the floor. Ye gods. We have too many books in this house.

Oh, and the gerbils stink. They need a change of bedding. I should get up and do that, but, listen, there's a warm cat on my lap. Would you get up? No, I didn't think so.

I got the cover art for my last Garnet book. I'm waiting to see if it's okay to post it, but I'm going to warn you: they changed artists. And the font. The whole style really. You can tell me what you think when I get it up.

Yeah, and Gaylaxicon is this weekend, right?

It's been a busy week, which explains my absence from the Interwebs you kids hang out on. It's also been kind of strange, but I'll explain.

First of all, may I have a moment of silence while I speak the benediction? "Gucci, Gucci, Garnet. You were a good series."

Yes, Garnet Lacey is no more. The book I finished this year, HONEYMOON OF THE DEAD, will be coming out in May of '10 as scheduled. However, my editor turned down the proposals my agent and I sent for books 6, 7 and 8. As far as I know, all the previous books are still in print. I haven't heard that they're going to be remaindered right away or anything.

Yesterday was my day of mourning. I wailed and gnashed teeth. But it was a rather less dramatic affair than you might imagine because I *am* still contracted for three books in the new young adult series. And, as I told Shawn, we're not really _out_ anything, since, most years, I only write one book a year anyway. More to the point, Penguin was actually quite gracious. They told my agent that they're interested in possibly seeing a new series by my psuedonym. So it's not like they said, "And don't let the door hit you on the way out." In fact, quite the opposite. It's hard to be too depressed when this really does feel like an opportunity to propose something fun and fresh. My editor would like to see contemporary urban fantasy, but that's a mighty wide pool. I'm kind of excited to start pondering ideas. I think I've mentioned this before, but I actually really, really LOVE writing proposals. Most people dread the synopsis, but I rather embrace it. It's a funny thing.

And today Mason and I off to Hidden Falls with a friend from Crossroads. He and I have been neglecting our big explores, so I'm glad we have the excuse of company to get off our quickly expanding back sides. It's funny how easy it is to get wrapped up in doing stuff around the house even when the temperatures are so gorgeous. It doesn't help that a new Netflix "Loony Tunes" volume arrived, and Mason has been watching it on a steady loop since the little red envelope appeared yesterday afternoon.

Yesterday, I was also mourning the loss of Senator Ted Kennedy. Foolishly, I made an off-hand comment about Senator Kennedy and health care reform in my status bar on Facebook yesterday that exploded in a huge (for me) aguement among all my liberal friends and my one crazy Republican friend that I only friended because he was the game master of the AD&D game where I first met Shawn. Without him, there would be no Shawn and Lyda. Too bad he's on the wrong side about the public option in the health care reform debate.

I gave up on the book by Mike Resnick that I took out of the library. It was the third in the series and it didn't quite grab me, alas. I've learned that, with my mild dyslexia, if a book doesn't drag me into it instantly I usually can't sustain the energy it takes for me to finish a book. Unless I'm on vacation or other mitigating factors (like it's the last "new" book in the house, etc.) I like the idea of the series, though, and might see if the library has the first one. I remember enjoying other things that Resnick has written, and I'm still craving more, more, more in the reading department.

Tonight we pick up our next CSA box and it looks like another good one. There will be more corn and... (drum roll, please)... WATERMELON. I'm really excited. Plus, Shawn and I bought into a sunflower oil share and another bottle may be waiting for us! Yippee!

It's also Wyrdsmiths tonight and I can't wait! For various reasons (mostly trips up to the cabin), I've missed a couple of months worth of meetings. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone again and get back to the habit of critique and production.

Yesterday, Mason had his kindergarten graduation celebration. It was really quite precious, as you can probably imagine. My little guy got to do the introduction and he totally stole the show -- although they couldn't find the microphone, so I'm not sure the folks in the back rows heard his most awesome performance, which is entirely too bad. My favorite part was his class (and the other kindergarten science class) singing "First Grade, Frist Grade" to the tune of "New York, New York."

Yesterday, in fact, was a damn fine perfect day. I made French bread in the morning and had a spontaneous visit by seanmmurphy and a planned lunch date with Rachel Gold. They're both bright, interesting, and Scorpios --which just means we all share a similar, rather wicked outlook on life, IMHO. The sun was shining, the breeze was cool and refreshing. We sat in the backyard, while Deliah (our one outdoor cat, who is only allowed outside because she comes when I whistle, like a dog,) impressed us all with her unexpected, mad tree climbing skillz. (We got her down, no worries.)

Today started out much less awesome. It's still beautiful outside, but little things have gone awry including Mason telling me, rather rudely, this morning that my opinion about where Mama should start reading "The Hobbit" to both of us didn't count, a weird argument in the car with mama over my "attitude" (which was really a fight, IMHO, about perspective, because my attitude was FINE, thank you very much) and then an attempt to go to the gym that involved me walking in and immediately walking back out because my .mp3 player was at home. (I've tried working out sans music and I have to tell you, it's much, much more difficult.) And then there's new copy for the YA novel that's much less zippy, a lukewarm response to the first sixty pages from my editor, and just a general grumpy feeling that has since settled over me....

Whine.

Yes, I would like some cheese with that. You know why? I still still have some AWESOME French bread here that would go nicely with w(h)ine and cheese.

How about you? How you doin'?

My brain hurts from trying to come up with new "Dead..." book titles. All I can say is thank God(dess) I have creative friends and partners. I put up a request for ideas help on Facebook and got great responses. Susan Harris came up with "Dead If I Do," and now I can thank my friend Bill Stitlter for "Dead Over Heels." And, of course, Mr. Sean M. Murphy for "Dead on Arousal," but I still need one more... any ideas out there?

In other non-Tate news, my life continues apace. Mason is off school for three weeks for Spring intersession. Luckily, he's currently obsessing on video games, so I can still get a bit of work done. It looks like today might be rainy, but otherwise we might go out into the garden to putz around and get everything ready. I'm currently in the waiting-for-the-check-to-arrive phase, and one of the many things I'd like to spend part of it on is flowers for the gardens. There is, as always, a big bare spot on the hill out front where something (hosta?) died over the winter. Huge sections of grass didn't coming in again... and this year my solution is weeds. I'm purposely planting agriculture grade clover. I figure between that and the creeping charlie, maybe I'll have "grass" that will survive deep shade and tough winters.

I got a date tonight to see "Wolverine," despite lukewarm reviews. Okay, I only read the one in "Entertainment Weekly," which actually complains of too much action. Is that possible in a Marvel film??? I guess I'll find out tonight.

Anyway, I hope you all are well. I have more (positive!) fish news, but I'll save that for another day. Also, if anyone out there wants to win a copy of Tate's latest, you can check out an interview I'm giving tomorrow at Bitten By Books.

See ya on the flipside!

Alas too late for the majority of the tetra, but the answer is: NEVER mess with PH.

You remember when my first mysterious tetra death happened, and then her/his lover jumped out of the tank to his/her doom (and to the great interest to the cats)? Well, at that point, I checked all the various chemical levels in the tank (PH, KH [hardness], NH2, NH3, etc.) I THOUGHT that that water was too alkaline... so I messed with it.

When I talked to the guy at the fish store, I confessed to all this, but he didn't think that should cause a mold. So I didn't change it. Though I did buy a PH up and a PH down kit, because my instincts told me to. Oh, how I wish I'd just listened to those inner voices....

Because only one little (and I do mean LITTLE) guy was left, I nearly broke down the entire tank. I removed the driftwood, the plastic leaves, almost everything. Then I took out about eighty percent of the water. Putting in the water softener pillow, I did a very slow water change (remembering how badly the others reacted to the shock of the cold, hard water.)

Then I thought... I need to change the PH back to whatever it was because no one died when it was at 7.8. So I did.

Guess what?

Spots are gone. Fish is still swimming.

All alone.

But alive. That's good.

Oh, and in other news, I finished Tate's book on time for deadline last night at 1:30 am. I just finished printing it out and am taking it to the post office in about two minutes. One book down, two more to go!