Cherie Priest's Blog: It's awards season, so here comes the shameless self-promotion, page 76

January 6, 2011

Good evening, everyone, and yes – I know I've been offline most of the day. This morning was dedicated to day-job work (as per usual), the afternoon was subject to writer business, and then I was fortunate enough to jaunt off for thrifting and drinks with Jillian (later to be joined by Pete for martinis). I was talked into a black velour jacket. Let us speak no more of it.

Anyway! As you can see if you have clicked directly to my main website, things have been swapped up around here, a bit. This tweaking is what ate up the middling, fiddly bits of the afternoon – and yes, I realize it's not a huge change at the digital homepage.

(Click right here if you have no idea what I'm talking about.)

In short, I have a site layout which is (a). clean, (b). straightforward, and (c). easy enough for me to maintain on my own time. I don't have the money to spring for anything shinier or more "professional" looking, and I don't really feel like doing so, regardless. This is easy. I know how to customize and fix it. It works fine for me. And now, I have changed out the images and colors to better advertise/announce/squee about Bloodshot – the aforementioned OHMYGOD IT'S BEING RELEASED IN JUST A COUPLE OF WEEKS urban fantasy coming on January 25th from Bantam.

Yes, well. I feel like it's important to make mention of that which is most imminently forthcoming.

This is not at all to say that I'm abandoning either my interest in or production of the Clockwork Century books. Far from it! In fact, as you click around, you will see that only the front page banner has been changed – and I've adjusted the CC widgets while adding a swank new button to the mix. I write in many styles, in several franchises. ALL WILL BE ACCOMMODATED. Damn straight.

Right. Um, I did mention there had been martinis, right? Salted caramel ones. In chocolate-dipped glasses. Ye gods, it's a marvel I only had two of them. [:: reminisces fondly ::] So please do pardon any silliness on my part. And, while you're here, help yourself to clicky links and feel free to bop around, investigating that which is available.

Thanks for reading!

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

Booklist Gives Some Less-Than-Threes to BLOODSHOT

On the 25th of this very month, my first foray into urban fantasy hits the streets. Bloodshot, as you may recall, is my fabulous adventure about a neurotic vampire/thief and her wealthy blind client, now with Bonus! Cuban drag queen and military intrigue.

*ahem*

Thus far, the early reviews have been exceedingly good, including a starred nod from Kirkus – plus a fat stack of reviews from the Amazon Vine program and some great advance word-of-mouth courtesy of the fine folks at Goodreads.

As you might assume, I am absolutely delighted, stoked, and ready to burst with antici … pation. [:: Covert drag reference FTW, pats self on back, etc. ::]

Anyway! Just a few minutes ago, I learned that I can now add the ALA's Booklist to my roster of Reviewers Who Are Prepared To Admit In Front Of God And Everybody That They Liked This Book.

[:: throws the horns ::]

So click the jump to read the review. (Or just keep scrolling, if you've hopped directly to this post.) I'd post it above the fold, but it's a little meaty. (And not spoilery!)

Click here to read Bloodshot's snazzy-wazzy Booklist review »

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

Link Salad: Occasionally Good For You

Or good for me, anyway, because I have no prose whatsoever to share with you today. Just a lot of work – including one interview which needs responding to, maybe an hour's worth of research, and a proposal for a book follow-up that isn't going to write itself. Ergo, you get some leafy greens in list form. Bon appetit!



The Science Fiction Book Club – Because people are always asking … technically both Boneshaker and Dreadnought are available in hardback editions, but only through this-here book club. (The editions are a bit strangely sized, and do not feature the cool off-white paper or brown text, though.) I thought to mention this now, because people are telling me that the SFBC has been featuring Dreadnought … so … yeah.

Speaking of hardback books – I think it's time to link this FAQ again, as I have been getting a real boatload of questions about Clementine lately. I don't know if it was reviewed someplace and I missed it …? Or what. But anyway, to everyone who wants to know why it's hard to find, and if it'll come out in paperback, here you go.

I love Bookslut – I mean, in case I haven't said so lately. Review of Dreadnought. Excerpt of particular cheer: "This is an author at the top of her game and consistent in her dedication to making steampunk as much a part of the American landscape as its traditional Victorian London roots." Many thanks, Colleen!

Burbank, CA, area animal-lovers – Anyone want to adopt the world's cutest quasi-cannibal bunny? Oh, just click. The pictures are simply darling.

Updates to my Appearances Page – There has been a bit of shuffling and an addition or two, when it comes to 2011′s list of Places You Can Find Me. Most imminently, my event at Off The Beaten Path Books in Michigan has been moved up to January 20th. Will these be the only places you find me all year? Almost certainly not. But I'll add future events as they become confirmed.

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

Peer Pressure and Hugo Nominations

It's that time of year again, when the Hugo nominations are open and people are looking for things to nominate. (I think the Nebulas are likewise open, but I might be wrong.) Last year I was fortunate enough to have Boneshaker on the ballot, and even though I feel like it is unreasonably optimistic (and perhaps inexcusably greedy) to hope for a second shot at that shiny rocket statue … well, people are urging me to mention what's eligible. So here goes.

In 2010 I saw published:

One novel: Dreadnought, through Tor.

One novella: Clementine, through Subterranean.

And one short story: "Reluctance," in The Living Dead II anthology by Night Shade Books.



That's all!

At present – and depending on the unfathomable flux of publishing schedules – it looks like 2011 will be a much heartier year of output for yours truly, at least, I certainly hope so. Not that I'm not proud of 2010′s offerings – far from it! But because it looks like an awful short list.* [:: squints critically ::] Or maybe I'm just nuts.

* At present, I have four books scheduled for release in 2011 – Ganymede, Bloodshot, Hellbent, and Fort Freak – for which I wrote the interstitial, but not the entire novel. However, my contribution to that project was every bit as time-consuming and exhausting and viciously ass-kicking as any full book I've ever written. So I'm totally counting it.

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

Book Reaction: Aurorarama

I wrote plenty of book reviews/reports in school, and I don't feel like doing it anymore, so I'm not going to. Instead, this year you'll get my general reactions to whatever I'm reading, but only when/if I get around to it.

So when I post these things, please don't assume that this is all I've had on my nightstand.

* * * * *

Over the weekend I finished Aurorarama by Jean-Christophe Valtat. I'd heard quite a lot about it – mostly to the tune of, "Prettily written, but too damn weird to parse." And actually, that's a fair cop.

This is essentially the tale of a late-nouveau/early-deco quasi-steampunk Arctic city called New Venice … and the people within it who are trying to fix it/change it/live in it despite the tribulations of the weather, the politics, and the social scene.

I ain't gonna lie – Aurorarama has a hell of a lot going for it, and a hell of a lot going on in it. It's one of those books wherein every individual element sounds like a gem, and it's so well realized from top to bottom that any discussion of the particulars would imply that this is the most bad-ass thing you'll ever read.

It kind of is. And it kind of isn't.

There's a lot of boundary-blurring that muddles the motives and identities of the female characters, and a fixation with masks and substance abuse that does likewise for the men. The women are – or are agents of – goddesses, ghosts, and capitalized abstractions; the men spend so much time slip-streaming their own POV with hypnosis, alcohol, sex, or drugs that they're likewise unreliable. And as if this wasn't enough narrative uncertainty, at some point in the distant past there was some kind of time-shifting event that involved the actual manipulation of time, in order to undo or prevent some calamity that is only obliquely referred to and never described.

So even what few things you can successfully pin down in this alternate-history metropolis … are built on a bedrock of hand-waving. In short, you can't really trust anyone in the book to tell you what's going on. Even the lucid people simply might not know.

The end result is a lovely artifact of a thing, but not an easy one – with a first half that's slow but interesting, and a second half that's baffling, but exciting. I found it difficult to love, but likewise difficult to put down.

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

Confucius does his crossword with a pen

Last night the husband and I dragged out the Sherlock DVD my sister sent us for Christmas. (The BBC modern update, natch.) And now, for a few wandering thoughts on that subject.

First of all, I would like to say for the record that I love living in a world wherein 34 years ago someone had a bouncing baby boy and named it "Benedict Timothy Carlton Cumberbatch" on the off chance that someone, somewhere, might someday give the lad a chance to play a Victorian sleuth. And then the infant in question subsequently grew up to play Sherlock Holmes.

What a universe, am I right?

Anyway. Second of all, it's worth noting that we'd already seen the episodes themselves – all three of them, drat the slow production overseas – and loved them to bits and pieces. But we had not seen the original, unaired pilot. So last night we played it, and it was absolutely fascinating … not because it was better than the pilot which actually aired, because it wasn't. Not at all. If I'd seen this pilot first, I would've walked away going, "Huh. This looks like it might be fun." Instead, I saw the final pilot … and my reaction was more, "HOLY SHIT Y'ALL I NEED ME SOME MORE OF THAT."

(This might be a good place to inform you that I've read Doyle's entire canon, and I consider myself an amateur Baker Street enthusiast. I'm not one of those nutters who can recite every single jot and tittle from each adventure – far from it – but I most certainly do know the proper answer to the slippery question, "Where was Dr. Watson wounded?"*)

No, the original unaired pilot (hereafter referred to as the OUP) was fascinating because of all the little ways it was altered in order to become the final Sherlock pilot (FSP).

Click here to read the rest of this entry »

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

Happy New Year!

Today the husband and I buckled down and cleaned the ever living hell out of our apartment – even going so far as to empty, vacuum, sort, and clean both the hall closet and the coat closet. Tomorrow we'll tackle our bedroom closet, for it is the last un-scrubbified frontier in this-here residence.

I even moved the couch and vacuumed underneath it, which is more of a chore than it sounds like. Particularly when one considers that we have a cat, and this cat has more toys than some small department stores, and this cat likes nothing better than to slap-shoot her toys under the couch – where she can retrieve them with ease, but we cannot.

I recovered more than two dozen bouncy balls, furry mice, rattly assorted doo-dads, and feather-thingamajigs. They are now in her basket, where they will remain for approximately the next hour … or until whenever she wakes up from her nap.

Anyway. At the moment, I'm waiting for the last load of towels to come out of the dryer, so I felt like I could take a few minutes and update. Might as well, right? It's my last chance all year! Of course, now I have no idea what to say.

There's a meme going around – "Ten Things I've Done That You (Probably) Haven't." Maybe I'll take a stab at that. I'll try to leave out book-specific stuff, since (a). I know a lot of writers, and (b). I feel like it's kind of cheating.

Otherwise, here goes – Ten Things I've Done That You (Probably) Haven't:

Got my braces from an orthodontist who'd once been an Olympic medalist.

Took comprehensive exams to receive my master's degree in writing, and failed the "Fiction" section.*

Spent a summer petitioning to legalize gambling – in order to raise the entry fee I needed to attend a private Christian university.

Barfed all over the escalator at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. (Because I refused to admit – until it was entirely too late – that I was too sick to see the Ramses II exhibit.)

Beat five out of six guys (a groom and four members of his wedding party) at Soul Calibur. The sixth guy refused to play me. That chickenshit.

Bought (and still use) a giant wicker parrot umbrella holder at an estate sale, and refused to sell it for twice what I paid for it when a dude tried to poach it off me as I carried it to my car.

Went on NPR to talk about zombies.

Dressed up like a Bozo's little sister as part of a "Christian Clown Ministry," and went handing out Jesus Loves You pamphlets at a housing project. In my defense, I was in high school and I had a huge crush on one of the other clowns. It's been twenty years, and I still feel embarrassed and weird about that whole experience.

Dated two guys who had been (independently, years apart, long before I knew them) struck by lightning.

Had eleven teeth pulled. At once.



Okay. The towels should be dry by now. I'd better go check.

Everyone have a great evening!



* Retook it. Passed it on the second try for the academic win, but irony fail.

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

2010

For the sake of convention, or vanity, or whatever … I feel the need to do a year-end wrap-up post. Perhaps I should hold off until tomorrow, but tomorrow I might not have time. In addition to the day-job work, I plan to clean this apartment from top to bottom, because I absolutely refuse to begin the new year with a dirty bathroom; it sets a bad precedent.

Therefore, any 2010 retrospective of mine needs to happen today.

And I'm not entirely sure what to say.

In 2010, my seventh novel sort of … well … took off. And everything changed.

With the help of an epic team of fabulous editors, a great boss, and my amazing agent … I had two more books published (Dreadnought and Clementine), sold two more (Ganymede and Inexplicable), either completed – or essentially completed – four others (Bloodshot, Hellbent, Ganymede, and my segments of Fort Freak), sold a couple of short stories, sold reprint rights on a couple others, sold foreign rights for three books in nine countries, and maintained a part-time day-job working as an associate editor for Subterranean.

I did conferences/conventions/events/signings in San Francisco, Portland (Oregon), Troy (Michigan), Victoria B.C., New York City, Washington D.C., Atlanta, Vancouver (Canada not Washington), Denver, Madison (Wisconsin), Richmond … plus a whole host of them in the greater Seattle/Tacoma/Olympia area.

I am completely freaking exhausted.

I am also grateful beyond words.

2010 has been worth every minute. Even the jet-lag.

* * * * *

So what about 2011?

Well, let's see.

This year I will get better about saying "No." I don't like saying it, but for the sake of my sanity, I need to deploy that syllable more often. Note to self: Am only human.

Likewise, I will get a death grip on my finances. Not altogether unrelated: The husband and I are saving up to buy a house – a goal which is actually within hypothetical reach this year, (a). barring unforeseen catastrophe, and (b). if we are careful. My shopping refrain for 2011 re: everything from groceries to tee shirts shall be, "Do I want this, or do I want a house?"

I will spend less time on the internet. I fart around online far too much; I use it as filler for all the in-between moments in my day – and some days, those in-between moments accumulate into hours. As a side benefit, it's amazing how much drama, bullshit, and butt-hurt I miss when I skip certain feeds. Amazing, I tell you! Not sure why it's taken me so long to figure out I don't need it, but really. I don't.

However, I will make a point to maintain this blog in a fashion that does NOT devolve into daily stats reports or lists of links for weeks at a time. Blogging isn't really that time-consuming, and I enjoy it. I also enjoy tweeting and posting kitty pictures, and lurking in a digital clubhouse or two. These are not Problem Time-Suck Areas with regards to my internet experience.

I will write the sequel to Ganymede (of course), and I will propose/pitch/pull together material for at least three other books, which I very much hope will sell. The first partial/proposal is almost finished; the other two I'll begin in the next week. I might throw in a fourth, but I want to talk to my agent about it before I do any fiddling on that one.

I will write. A lot.

And I will read. A lot.

I will hope for the best.

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

December 29, 2010

Today I trawled the internet for information about 19th-century industrial-capacity pressure cookers, and how long it takes to dissolve a corpse in lye (respectively). God help me if I'm ever suspected of murder. I'll be tried and convicted on my browser history alone.

I also did laundry. And I wrote.

Project: Steamhorror Sample

Word Count at Present: 15,055 words

New Words: 2505 words

Goal: 20K, or two more sections, whichever comes first

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

December 28, 2010

Not much to report, really. Today I actually wrote a bit – my first writing-of-new-material since I handed in Ganymede's first draft at the start of November. Everything else since then has been editorial or production work.

This was the first fresh composition, and though I had a hard time getting started, I'm pretty happy with the result. Yes, I'm still being vague about it. I've developed something of a superstition re: talking about projects. Not sure why. Yes, it's dumb. Sorry.

Project: Steamhorror Sample

Word Count at Present: 12,550 words

New Words: 2146 words

Goal: 20K, or two more sections, whichever comes first

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]