Deva Fagan's Blog

I am about to start revising the current draft of CIRCUS, based on the excellent feedback from beta readers and my in-person writing group. So of course rather than actually revising, I am here talking about revising. You can call it "pre-revision preparation", or you can just call it procrastination.

What's already happened: I wrote the first draft, which involved several restarts (this meant tossing out about 30K total) as I searched around for the character's voice, the right POV and tense, a

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There's a lot of talk going on right now in the online writing and reading community about the issue of diversity in fiction, specifically related to book covers. The trigger point for the current discussion is the US cover of Justine Larbalestier's LIAR. The protagonist of LIAR describes herself as black, with hair short enough she can pass for a boy. The cover shows a white girl with long straight hair. Justine writes eloquently about the situation in her own blog here (The short version: She

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Today I'm happy to welcome Cynthea Liu to my blog, to answer a few questions about her second novel Paris Pan Takes the Dare. Cynthea stopped by a few months ago to talk about her first debut novel, The Great Call of China. Yes, that's right, she has two novels out this year! And that's in addition to helping hundreds of other aspiring writers through her website, managing a family, AND running a hugely successful fundraiser (involving dozens of authors, agents and editors) for a school in finan

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Today I'm happy to welcome Cyn Balog to my blog, to answer a few questions about her recently released debut novel Fairy Tale. I haven't gotten my hands on a copy of this yet, but it is on my list, both because it involves fairies, and because the main character tells fortunes. And check out the cover! Sparkly!

Q: Tell us about a scene or character from your novel that was especially easy (or especially difficult) to write.

A: Cam was really easy to write because he covers all his difficult emoti

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There are certain things that will automatically make me want to at least pick up a book. Kind of the same way I will always order creme brulee if it's on the menu. Here are a few:

It has to do with the geeky things I love: comics, LARP, fandom (see: Into the Wild Nerd Yonder by Julie Halpern and the recent Geektastic collection)
It appears to make math cool in some way (bonus points if it involves geometry!) (see: The Midnighters series by Scott Westerfeld)
It involves whales or dolphins (see

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I'm currently enjoying a "refilling the well" episode, while the folks who volunteered to read my CIRCUS GALACTICUS draft do so. I've been reading, mostly, and puttering around with several different ideas for new projects.

I also received the page proofs for PRUNELLA, which I've now gone over. This was one of those times when it was a bit hard for me to re-read the book for the umpteenth time. It wasn't that I disliked it, but I really wanted to be working on something new (aka CIRCUS). Thankf

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I've been meaning to post here about three YA or MG fantasy books released in the past few months that I have loved, now that they are all finally available. I've read a lot of excellent books lately but these three just particularly appeal to my tastes for lovely writing, excellent characters, and engaging and innovative plots. It doesn't hurt that all three authors (who are fellow debuts of 2009) are very cool, funny, and generous people and thus I am very pleased to be able to recommend their

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There's an interesting discussion going on over at The Five Randoms on book endings.

Some of my (quite random) thoughts, reposted here:

I do think good endings are very important — a good beginning will make me keep reading a book, but a bad ending will definitely spoil my experience of an otherwise good book, like a terrible dessert at the end of a delicious dinner.

I am a sap so I do enjoy a good, well-deserved happy ending. But I don't need one to be satisfied by a book - I loved the ending of T

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I've been doodling around with ideas for the next book, while CIRCUS GALACTICUS is off with a few brave readers. I'm generally never short on kernel ideas for books, but the last few years especially have taught me that "cool idea" does not equal "book I should start writing NOW". The thing I really need is "cool idea + fully-fleshed character". So I'm trying to be aware of that.

But another thing I've been thinking about is how I can push myself with this next project. What do I want to do bette

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Here are a few bits and pieces of news:

FORTUNE'S FOLLY has gotten a couple more nice reviews…

"Mixing romance, adventure, and unpredictable plot twists, this heartwarming story is a must for every collection."

~School Library Journal

"Practical, determined, and immensely likable, Fortunata is a compelling heroine."

~The Horn Book Guide

I've received the proof pages for THE MAGICAL MISADVENTURES OF PRUNELLA BOGTHISTLE. As it was with FF, this is definitely one of my favorite parts of the process: s

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