Rachel Hartman's Blog, page 4

The quirkier pictures

Just a few bits of silliness I didn’t want to clutter the travelogue with.

First: you may not realize this, but Ottorino Respighi and I share a birthday. I know, I know, EXCITING. Well, exciting if you’re some kind of classical music nerd, raised on classical music. He’s best-known for his Roman tone poems; my favourite is Feste Romane (which is inexplicably the least well-known), but the other two are Fountains of Rome (of which there are many, check) and Pines of Rome.

The actual pines of R...

Italian birthday

I’m back from Italy, where I had the good sense to turn forty-five. Shall I inflict pictures upon you? Indeed I shall!

I need to start with a little caveat, which is this: I was very nearly a classicist, at university. There are some aged classics professors who probably still lament this in their hearts – how did we lose her? Where did it all go wrong? – but in truth they never lost me. I couldn’t quite get my head around Greek cases, alas, and that’s the shameful truth. (This is one of the...

Tess of the Road: the ARC is real!

I know, I know, it’s been forever. Twice forever, in all honesty. But things are moving, and I have news now, so here I am. My next book, Tess of the Road, is coming out at the end of February, 2018! The early advanced readers’ copy is out now (there will be another ARC once the cover is officially official — stay tuned!)

I don’t have a copy yet, but my agent does and he took some pictures:

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Here’s the special ARC intro letter I wrote (won’t be in the final book) —

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And a shot of page 1, just...

Morris Finalist: Calla Devlin!

It is my great honour this evening to present you with my interview of Morris Award finalist Calla Devlin, author of TELL ME SOMETHING REAL. Due to my ongoing residence in a pineapple under the sea, I hadn’t heard of this book until it was nominated, and it was just chance that it got assigned to me in the interviews process — but what a lucky chance it was! Here’s the blurb, via Goodreads:

Three sisters struggle with the bonds that hold their family together as they face a darkness settling...

More Morris than you can handle

Who’s been sick this week? *raises hand*

Is that the best excuse I’ve got for being disorganized? Yup, and I’m sticking to it.

Here are the two Morris interviews you missed while I was drowning in phlegm:

Blythe Woolston interviews M-E Girard, author of GIRL MANS UP

Isabel Quintero interviews Sonia Patel, author of RANI PATEL IN FULL EFFECT

My own interview with Calla Devlin will be going up shortly! After decongestants.

More Morris: Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock

In today’s edition of the Morris Interviews, 2017: Stephanie Kuehn interviews Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock, author of THE SMELL OF OTHER PEOPLE’S HOUSES.

I haven’t read the book, but am intrigued to note that it’s set in the 70s. The finalist I read was also set in the 70s, and I’m wondering whether that’s a little trend right now, or merely indicative of the fact that many YA writers and Morris judges originally come from the 70s. I was born there, myself, and have a brightly-coloured, little-kid me...

Morris finalist Jeff Zentner

Hello, darlings! It’s Morris Award season again, and as per every year, we previous winners interview this year’s crop of finalists. And what an excellent crop it is this year (just like every year, who am I kidding).

First up, last year’s winner,Becky Albertalli, interviews Jeff Zentner, author of THE SERPENT KING. Tune in tomorrow for more Morris, and watch this space for my interview, which goes up Friday.

Review: SPINDLE, by E. K. Johnston

Fairy tale re-tellings are hit-or-miss for me; I’m seldom so in love with a fairy tale that I have much patience with hearing it again, and it’s rare that the re-telling provides surprises me with a take on the original that I hadn’t already considered.

SPINDLE, which just came out yesterday, is one of the latter — an old story made startlingly new. You can tell from the title that it’s Sleeping Beauty (or Briar Rose; this fairy tale is so ubiquitous that it has more than one name). I admit I...

A note to my trans readers:

It has come to my attention that my very first book — Seraphina, the one with all the good reviews and awards — relies on a trans-phobic trope. This is spoilery, but it can’t be helped: the villain is disguised as a person of another gender in order to fool people.

If you’ve read Seraphina and found this trope hurtful, my profound apologies to you. I love and value my trans readers, as I hope the better representation in Shadow Scale makes clear. I really did not understand that this trope co...

Drowning my sorrows

In death metal! Isn’t that the usual method?

Sorry for the silence. I had some notion I was going to start blogging more regularly in November, and then the US election happened and, well. It was like my usual November funk times ten thousand.

Anyway, to cheer me up, my husband took me out for our annual autumnal ear-splitting metal concert. There’s usually a good one in November. I don’t know what it is about Vancouver’s damp darkness that attracts– haha, just kidding, I know exactly.

Anyway...